ANNALS OF GARELOCHSIDE.* Tars volume, which, although published in August,
is pre- maturely and absurdly dated 1897, is the fruit of the encouragements Mr. Maughan received for his valuable parish history of Rosneath. Of Garelochside, and indeed of the county of Drinbarton, be has much to say that is of more than mere local value. The details are minute, but not too much so for readers interested in one of the most beautiful counties in Scotland.
Unfortunately, we cannot praise the style in which the Annals are written. Had Mr. Maughan remembered Dr. Johnson's wise counsel, and cut out of his manuscript every passage which he considered fine, he would have written a better book, and one far less imposing in size. He positively riots in description, and when he reaches, as he too often does, the high-water mark of inflated rhetoric, the result may be seen in passages like the following:—
" Hushed is the night breeze on the solitary moor, but the cry of an owl arises from the old fir trees, and sounds strangely in keeping with the solemn stillness around. Overhead, the blue glittering stars scintillate with gem-like effulgence in the opaque, purple firmament. An hour and a spot calling for reverent con- templation, as the musing spectator views the pale picture, so delicately lambent in the wan rays of the moon Yon steep rising town with many a tall chimney pointing to the star- spangled sky, is the place where the great but modest man of genius who first gauged the gigantic power of steam, saw the light of day. The genius of Watt so regulated the mighty throbbings of the imprisoned giant within that iron cylinder, that the trans- mitted energy sufficed to drive the ponderous vessel through the mountainous billows of the Atlantic. At the summons of the magician's wand, the spirits which lay dormant in these antagon- istic elements, brought together in auspicious union, have evolved a power far transcending the fabled Cyclops of the Grecian poet."
Mr. Maughan's eloquence is by no means exhausted, but the reader's patience will be, and we will therefore turn to a more attractive aspect of the volume.
Gareloch is mentioned by Carlyle in his Reminiscences as "incomparable among kchs or lakes yet known to me," and with the charms of the neighbourhood many a famous or warmly cherished nature is associated. At Row lived and laboured Erskine of Linlathen's great friend, John McLeod Campbell, one of the wisest and holiest men in the Church of Scot- land, whose Christianity proved too liberal for its standards. In a cottage at the head of the Gareloeli resided Isabella Campbell, whose saintly life was told by her pastor, Story of Rosneath. Her sister Mary, a great invalid, startled many people in the spring of 1830 by suddenly speaking in a loud voice for more than an hour in what was supposed to be an "unknown tongue." Like some modern spiritualists she also seized the pen in moments of inspiration, and covered sheets of paper with unintelligible characters. This was the origin of the tongues which deluded Edward Irving, who appears under another aspect in Mr. Manghan's narrative when we read of him as visiting Story with Dr. Chalmers, and dancing "with marvel- lous vigour the Highland fling," to the astonishment of the com- pany. Robert Story, the friend of Chalmers and of Carlyle, was the minister of the parish for forty-two years, and the author relates how in days before that lovely spot was adorned or deformed by villas, the country women might be seen on a Sabbath morning sitting beside the Cla,chan burn washing their feet and putting on their stockings and shoes, which upon crossing the moor had been carried in their hands. Such a sight, however, may have been witnessed in days more recent, and the present writer has seen women folk in the Highlands attiring themselves in this fashion upon
• Annals of Garelochside: being an Account, Historical and Topographical, of the Parishes of sow, Rosneath, and Cardross. By William Charles Paisley : Alexander Gardner. steamers. At the time of the Disruption, party spirit in the district ran high, and a gentleman's coachman on being asked which side he would take replied, like a cannie Scotehman, "I'll gang whar the horse gangs." Dr. Story, now one of her Majesty's chaplains and well known as an author, suc- ceeded his father at Rosneath. It will be remembered that, among other works, he wrote the life of Dr. Lee of the Grey- friars, who fought and won what Mr. Maughan not without
justice calls "the battle of the organ." Henry Bell, "the hero of a thousand blunders and one success," lived for many years at Helensburgh, then and now a favourite watering-place, and having in 1812 built what Mr. Maughan inaccurately calla the first steamboat—he should have said, the first built in Great Britain—it was advertised to sail three times a week between that port and Glasgow by the power of "wind, air, and steam." Years before, when Bell first son- ceived the idea of steam navigation, Nelson told the Lords of the Admiralty that if they did not adopt his scheme, other nations would, and "in the end vex every vein of this Empire." Another notability of Garelochside was Robert Napier, the far-famed naval architect. Both these men rose from the ranks, one of them being the son of a car- penter, and the other of a blacksmith. At Renton, the residence of the Smolletts, the novelist Tobias was born, and in the village a monument is erected to his memory. Mr. Maughan is a local historian, and not a critic of literature, and we may therefore pass by without comment the statement that Smollett's History is his "most important work." On literary matters the author does not often touch, but he paints out that Scott's description of Rosneath, and of the home chosen for the Deans' family, in The Heart of Mid- lothian, is a fancy sketch, and he thinks it evident that the novelist had never visited the place. If this were so, it is strange that Mr. Andrew Lang should have omitted to notice the fact in the Border edition of the novel. In a history of this kind we look for the record of customs, amusements, and primitive superstitions common to the locality, and Mr. Maughan does not disappoint us. At one of the schools still remembered by old inhabitants the master would smoke his pipe while teaching, and when he had finished would hand it to the nearest boy, who passed it through the class. At another school of a humble kind the boys in winter used to sit round a peat fire piled up in the middle of the room, and each scholar was expected to bring a peat every day for the common good. Letters were seldom received, the charge of 70. for postage from Glasgow being well-nigh prohibitive, and "in early days they used to lie for weeks at the old 'Ferry Inn' at Rosneath," as readers of The Antiquary will believe they must have often done at Mrs. Mailsetter's.
From the chapter about Helensburgh we learn that cock- fighting amongst schoolboys lingered on long into the present century, and that the cruel sport was actually encouraged by the schoolmaster. There, according to the custom common throughout Scotland, the townsfolk had to do penance in church for certain moral offences, and at Helensburgh they appear to have been fined for non-attendance at the parish kirk. Of course all the serious, as well as pleasant, events of life were celebrated with whisky :-
"At Rosneath in former days marriage ceremonies were attended by somewhat boisterous crowds, and on the intermediate days before the ' kirking ' the young couple and their jubilant attendants, preceded by a bagpiper, perambulated the parish from house to house visiting their friends. The nuptial rejoicings were closed by the whole party, after divine service on the Sabbath. adjourning for refreshments to the nearest tavern, and a scene of unseemly mirth and riotous festivity too often ensued. Baptisms were frequently desecrated by the accompanying conviviality, and after the service in church the friends and relatives proceeded to the inn and indulged in copious libations of the national beverage. Even funerals sometimes partook of the character of orgies, and it was considered that becoming honour to the departed neces- sitated at least four different distributions of spirits."
A kind of sentry-box for the night-watchers who guarded the kirkyard from the "resurrection men," at one time so active in Scotland, is another sign of days happily departed. It seems strange that people whose stern view of Sunday regarded a walk as sinful should have been always largely tolerant of so degrading a vice as drunkenness. So it was, however, and John Barleycorn's sway was more potent than that of
John Knox. When McLeod Campbell was appointed to the parish of Row, in 1825, we are told that the inhabitants, two thousand in number, required thirty public-houses at which to quench their thirst. In smuggling spirits a large trade
was done all along the shores of the Gareloch, and when in Dunbarton smugglers were captured and imprisoned they were still consoled with whisky, which was drawn up through the window concealed in a stocking. "With a complaisance only too common the jailer winked at these proceedings." So little was the contraband trade regarded as disreputable sixty years ago that "it was quite customary for young men to hire themselves out to smugglers for six months just like farm-servants at a feeing-market." We may add that Mr. Maughan's volume is well printed and is made more service- able and attractive by a map and by illustrations of the neighbourhood. There is an index which we cannot praise, since it is very imperfect and, in several cases, inaccurate.
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