University of Virginia Library

41. CHAPTER XLI.

I do not know that any other traveler would think it
worth while to mention such a thing; but the fact is, that
during the summer months in Liverpool, the days are exceedingly
lengthy; and the first evening I found myself
walking in the twilight after nine o'clock, I tried to recall
my astronomical knowledge, in order to account satisfactorily
for so curious a phenomenon. But the days in summer,
and the nights in winter, are just as long in Liverpool as at
Cape Horn; for the latitude of the two places very nearly
corresponds.

These Liverpool days, however, were a famous thing for
me; who, thereby, was enabled after my day's work aboard
the Highlander, to ramble about the town for several hours.
After I had visited all the noted places I could discover, of
those marked down upon my father's map; I began to extend
my rovings indefinitely; forming myself into a committee of
one, to investigate all accessible parts of the town; though
so many years have elapsed, ere I have thought of bringing
in my report.

This was a great delight to me: for wherever I have
been in the world, I have always taken a vast deal of lonely
satisfaction in wandering about, up and down, among out-of-the-way
streets and alleys, and speculating upon the strangers
I have met. Thus, in Liverpool I used to pace along endless
streets of dwelling-houses, looking at the names on the
doors, admiring the pretty faces in the windows, and invoking
a passing blessing upon the chubby children on the door-steps.
I was stared at myself, to be sure but what of that? We

must give and take on such occasions. In truth, I and my
shooting-jacket produced quite a sensation in Liverpool: and
I have no doubt, that many a father of a family went home
to his children with a curious story, about a wandering
phenomenon they had encountered, traversing the side-walks
that day. In the words of the old song, “I cared for
nobody, no not I, and nobody cared for me.” I stared my
fill with impunity, and took all stares myself in good part.

Once I was standing in a large square, gaping at a
splendid chariot drawn up at a portico. The glossy horses
quivered with good-living, and so did the sumptuous calves
of the gold-laced coachman and footmen in attendance. I
was particularly struck with the red cheeks of these men:
and the many evidences they furnished of their enjoying this
life with a wonderful relish.

While thus standing, I all at once perceived, that the
objects of my curiosity, were making me an object of their
own; and that they were gazing at me, as if I were some
unauthorized intruder upon the British soil. Truly, they
had reason: for when I now think of the figure I must have
cut in those days, I only marvel that, in my many strolls,
my passport was not a thousand times demanded.

Nevertheless, I was only a forlorn looking mortal among
tens of thousands of rags and tatters. For in some parts of
the town, inhabited by laborers, and poor people generally;
I used to crowd my way through masses of squalid men,
women, and children, who at this evening hour, in those
quarters of Liverpool, seem to empty themselves into the
street, and live there for the time. I had never seen any
thing like it in New York.

Often, I witnessed some curious, and many very sad
scenes; and especially I remembered encountering a pale,
ragged man, rushing along frantically, and striving to throw
off his wife and children, who clung to his arms and legs;
and, in God's name, conjured him not to desert them. He
seemed bent upon rushing down to the water, and drowning

himself, in some despair, and craziness of wretchedness. In
these haunts, beggary went on before me wherever I walked,
and dogged me unceasingly at the heels. Poverty, poverty,
poverty, in almost endless vistas: and want and woe staggered
arm in arm along these miserable streets.

And here, I must not omit one thing, that struck me at the
time. It was the absence of negroes; who in the large towns
in the “free states” of America, almost always form a considerable
portion of the destitute. But in these streets, not a
negro was to be seen. All were whites; and with the exception
of the Irish, were natives of the soil: even Englishmen;
as much Englishmen, as the dukes in the House of Lords.
This conveyed a strange feeling: and more than any thing
else, reminded me that I was not in my own land. For
there, such a being as a native beggar is almost unknown;
and to be a born American citizen seems a guarantee
against pauperism; and this, perhaps, springs from the
virtue of a vote.

Speaking of negroes, recalls the looks of interest with
which negro-sailors are regarded when they walk the Liverpool
streets. In Liverpool indeed the negro steps with a
prouder pace, and lifts his head like a man; for here, no
such exaggerated feeling exists in respect to him, as in
America. Three or four times, I encountered our black
steward, dressed very handsomely, and walking arm in arm
with a good-looking English woman. In New York, such
a couple would have been mobbed in three minutes; and
the steward would have been lucky to escape with whole
limbs. Owing to the friendly reception extended to them,
and the unwonted immunities they enjoy in Liverpool, the
black cooks and stewards of American ships are very much
attached to the place and like to make voyages to it.

Being so young and inexperienced then, and unconsciously
swayed in some degree by those local and social prejudices,
that are the marring of most men, and from which, for the
mass, there seems no possible escape; at first I was surprised

that a colored man should be treated as he is in this town;
but a little reflection showed that, after all, it was but
recognizing his claims to humanity and normal equality; so
that, in some things, we Americans leave to other countries
the carrying out of the principle that stands at the head of
our Declaration of Independence.

During my evening strolls in the wealthier quarters, I
was subject to a continual mortification. It was the humiliating
fact, wholly unforeseen by me, that upon the whole,
and barring the poverty and beggary, Liverpool, away from
the docks, was very much such a place as New York.
There were the same sort of streets pretty much; the same
rows of houses with stone steps; the same kind of sidewalks
and curbs; and the same elbowing, heartless-looking crowd
as ever.

I came across the Leeds Canal, one afternoon; but, upon
my word, no one could have told it from the Erie Canal at
Albany. I went into St. John's Market on a Saturday
night; and though it was strange enough to see that great
roof supported by so many pillars, yet the most discriminating
observer would not have been able to detect any difference
between the articles exposed for sale, and the articles
exhibited in Fulton Market, New York.

I walked down Lord-street, peering into the jewelers'
shops; but I thought I was walking down a block in Broadway.
I began to think that all this talk about travel was
a humbug; and that he who lives in a nut-shell, lives in an
epitome of the universe, and has but little to see beyond
him.

It is true, that I often thought of London's being only
seven or eight hours' travel by railroad from where I was;
and that there, surely, must be a world of wonders waiting
my eyes: but more of London anon.

Sundays were the days upon which I made my longest
explorations. I rose bright and early, with my whole plan
of operations in my head. First walking into some dock

hitherto unexamined, and then to breakfast. Then a walk
through the more fashionable streets, to see the people going
to church; and then I myself went to church, selecting the
goodliest edifice, and the tallest Kentuckian of a spire I
could find.

For I am an admirer of church architecture; and though,
perhaps, the sums spent in erecting magnificent cathedrals
might better go to the founding of charities, yet since these
structures are built, those who disapprove of them in one
sense, may as well have the benefit of them in another.

It is a most Christian thing, and a matter most sweet to
dwell upon and simmer over in solitude, that any poor sinner
may go to church wherever he pleases; and that even
St. Peter's in Rome is open to him, as to a cardinal; that
St. Paul's in London is not shut against him; and that the
Broadway Tabernacle, in New York, opens all her broad
aisles to him, and will not even have doors and thresholds
to her pews, the better to allure him by an unbounded invitation.
I say, this consideration of the hospitality and
democracy in churches, is a most Christian and charming
thought. It speaks whole volumes of folios, and Vatican
libraries, for Christianity; it is more eloquent, and goes farther
home than all the sermons of Massillon, Jeremy Taylor,
Wesley, and Archbishop Tillotson.

Nothing daunted, therefore, by thinking of my being a
stranger in the land; nothing daunted by the architectural
superiority and costliness of any Liverpool church; or by the
streams of silk dresses and fine broadcloth coats flowing into
the aisles; I used humbly to present myself before the sexton,
as a candidate for admission. He would stare a little,
perhaps (one of them once hesitated), but in the end, what
could he do but show me into a pew; not the most commodious
of pews, to be sure; nor commandingly located; nor
within very plain sight or hearing of the pulpit. No; it
was remarkable, that there was always some confounded
pillar or obstinate angle of the wall in the way; and I used

to think, that the sextons of Liverpool must have held a
secret meeting on my account, and resolved to apportion me
the most inconvenient pew in the churches under their
charge. However, they always gave me a seat of some
sort or other; sometimes even on an oaken bench in the
open air of the aisle, where I would sit, dividing the attention
of the congregation between myself and the clergyman.
The whole congregation seemed to know that I was
a foreigner of distinction.

It was sweet to hear the service read, the organ roll, the
sermon preached—just as the same things were going on
three thousand five hundred miles off, at home! But then,
the prayer in behalf of her majesty the Queen, somewhat
threw me aback. Nevertheless, I joined in that prayer, and
invoked for the lady the best wishes of a poor Yankee.

How I loved to sit in the holy hush of those brown old
monastic aisles, thinking of Harry the Eighth, and the
Reformation! How I loved to go a roving with my eye,
all along the sculptured walls and buttresses; winding in
among the intricacies of the pendent ceiling, and wriggling
my fancied way like a wood-worm. I could have sat there
all the morning long, through noon, unto night. But at
last the benediction would come; and appropriating my share
of it, I would slowly move away, thinking how I should like
to go home with some of the portly old gentlemen, with
high-polished boots and Malacca canes, and take a seat at
their cosy and comfortable dinner-tables. But, alas! there was
no dinner for me except at the sign of the Baltimore Clipper.

Yet the Sunday dinners that Handsome Mary served up
were not to be scorned. The roast beef of Old England
abounded; and so did the immortal plum-puddings, and the
unspeakably capital gooseberry pies. But to finish off with
that abominable “swipes” almost spoiled all the rest: not
that I myself patronized “swipes,” but my shipmates did;
and every cup I saw them drink, I could not choose but
taste in imagination, and even then the flavor was bad.

On Sundays, at dinner-time, as, indeed, on every other
day, it was curious to watch the proceedings at the sign of
the Clipper. The servant girls were running about, mustering
the various crews, whose dinners were spread, each in a
separate apartment; and who were collectively known by
the names of their ships.

“Where are the Arethusas?—Here's their beef been
smoking this half-hour.”—“Fly, Betty, my dear, here come
the Splendids.”—“Run, Molly, my love; get the salt-cellars
for the Highlanders.”—“You Peggy, where's the
Siddons' pickle-pot?”—“I say, Judy, are you never coming
with that pudding for the Lord Nelsons?”

On week days, we did not fare quite so well as on Sundays;
and once we came to dinner, and found two enormous bullock
hearts smoking at each end of the Highlanders' table. Jackson
was indignant at the outrage.

He always sat at the head of the table; and this time
he squared himself on his bench, and erecting his knife and
fork like flag-staffs, so as to include the two hearts between
them, he called out for Danby, the boarding-house keeper;
for although his wife Mary was in fact at the head of the
establishment, yet Danby himself always came in for the
fault-findings.

Danby obsequiously appeared, and stood in the door-way,
well knowing the philippics that were coming. But he was
not prepared for the peroration of Jackson's address to him;
which consisted of the two bullock hearts, snatched bodily
off the dish, and flung at his head, by way of a recapitulation
of the preceding arguments. The company then broke
up in disgust, and dined elsewhere.

Though I almost invariably attended church on Sunday
mornings, yet the rest of the day I spent on my travels;
and it was on one of these afternoon strolls, that on passing
through St. George's-square, I found myself among a large
crowd, gathered near the base of George the Fourth's equestrian
statue.

The people were mostly mechanics' and artisans in their
holiday clothes; but mixed with them were a good many
soldiers, in lean, lank, and dinnerless undresses, and sporting
attenuated rattans. These troops belonged to the various
regiments then in town. Police officers, also, were conspicuous
in their uniforms. At first perfect silence and decorum
prevailed.

Addressing this orderly throng was a pale, hollow-eyed
young man, in a snuff-colored surtout, who looked worn
with much watching, or much toil, or too little food. His
features were good, his whole air was respectable, and there
was no mistaking the fact, that he was strongly in earnest
in what he was saying.

In his hand was a soiled, inflammatory-looking pamphlet,
from which he frequently read; following up the quotations
with nervous appeals to his hearers, a rolling of his eyes,
and sometimes the most frantic gestures. I was not long
within hearing of him, before I became aware that this
youth was a Chartist.

Presently the crowd increased, and some commotion was
raised, when I noticed the police officers augmenting in
number; and by and by, they began to glide through the
crowd, politely hinting at the propriety of dispersing. The
first persons thus accosted were the soldiers, who accordingly
sauntered off, switching their rattans, and admiring their
high-polished shoes. It was plain that the Charter did not
hang very heavy round their hearts. For the rest, they also
gradually broke up; and at last I saw the speaker himself
depart.

I do not know why, but I thought he must be some
despairing elder son, supporting by hard toil his mother and
sisters; for of such many political desperadoes are made.

That same Sunday afternoon, I strolled toward the outskirts
of the town, and attracted by the sight of two great
Pompey's pillars, in the shape of black steeples, apparently
rising directly from the soil, I approached them with much

curiosity. But looking over a low parapet connecting
them, what was my surprise to behold at my feet a smoky
hollow in the ground, with rocky walls, and dark holes at
one end, carrying out of view several lines of iron railways;
while far beyond, straight out toward the open country, ran
an endless railroad. Over the place, a handsome Moorish
arch of stone was flung; and gradually, as I gazed upon
it, and at the little side arches at the bottom of the hollow,
there came over me an undefinable feeling, that I had
previously seen the whole thing before. Yet how could
that be? Certainly, I had never been in Liverpool before:
but then, that Moorish arch! surely I remembered that very
well. It was not till several months after reaching home
in America, that my perplexity upon this matter was cleared
away. In glancing over an old number of the Penny Magazine,
there I saw a picture of the place to the life; and
remembered having seen the same print years previous. It
was a representation of the spot where the Manchester railroad
enters the outskirts of the town.