Complete New Tales of Para Handy (43 page)

“Forbye, you canna learn seamanshup oot of a book, whateffer they say, it iss something you either have or you have not, and ass for navigation, weel, my idea o' navigatin' is doon to the Garrioch Heid, first right for Tighnabruaich, second right for Ardrishaig, straight on for Brodick, left for Saltcoats — that kind o' thing. Aal this business wi' sextants and chairts and compasses and the rest is way beyond me. It iss wan thing for the men who have the agility for them, like Hurricane Jeck for example — he has a heid for figures and he passed for his Master's Certificate the fastest effer in the merchant marine.

“It wass a peety he lost it chust aboot ass quick, but ass Jeck himself would say, what's for you wullna go by you, and what you're no meant to have you wullna keep.

“The wan thing I disagree wi' him aboot in sayin' that iss when it comes to the matter o' money, for I'm sure that there wass neffer anybody better suited to
have
it than Jeck. Money could have been invented for him, he spends it wi' such dignity and style that it is a privilege simply to waatch him doin' it. But then at the same time, you see, it iss exactly because of that that he can neffer
keep
it. It chust runs through his hands like watter from a tap.”

I felt it best to offer no opinion on the question of Hurricane Jack's suitability to be a member of the moneyed classes.

“But I wass abroad myself, chust the wan time” continued the Captain, “and I decided then and there that wance wass enough for me.”

I stared in surprise. “I had no idea,” I said. “When was this, and where to?”

“Luverpool,” said the Captain. “Chust before I got the command o' the
Vital Spark
.”

“But Liverpool isn't
abroad
, Captain,” I protested. “Liverpool is in England.”

“Weel, if England issna abroad then I would be very pleased if you wud tell me what it iss,” said Para Handy scathingly and with considerable conviction. “They are a very strange sort of a people indeed doon there. They aal taalk a lenguage that you simply canna understand, they dinna drink whusky, their beer iss like watter, not wan o' them hass so mich as a single word o' the Gaelic, they canna mak' a daicent bleck pudding or bit of breid, nor cure bacon, nor catch fush, they've neffer even heard o' Hurricane Jeck, they dinna like the pipes, and instead of amusing themselves wi' something ceevilised like shinty, they play some sissy game caalled cricket.”

Before an attack set on so broad a front, and one so vehemently delivered, I was for a moment speechless.

“Well, Captain,” I said after a moment, “that is a different way of life to ours, perhaps, but it does not make England a foreign country. I am sure that many English people who come to Scotland would be just as entitled to describe
us
and
our
ways as foreign if they applied the same criteria as you have.”

“I am sure I have neffer applied a criteria in my naitural Mr Munro,” said the Captain indignantly, “and I would be grateful if you wud chust bear that in mind.”

I decided that this was neither the time nor the place to embark on a short lesson in semantics.

“And in any case,” Para Handy continued, “any Englishman trying to miscaall
us
as foreigners wud be in serious trouble. I am a peaceable man, myself, and wud simply try to persuade him of the error of his ways in a chentlemanly fashion, but the likes of Hurricane Jeck wud have a mair immediate and violent means of debating hiss misconceptions wi' him.”

“Tell me more about your visit to Liverpool…” I prompted.

“I wass between chobs at the time, ass I said a while back. I wass waiting for the
Vital Spark
to be laaunched, and I had signed aff a gabbart I'd been crewing oot of Ardrossan, I chust couldna stand her skipper, he wassna a chentleman at aal.

“So I wass lookin' for a berth for two weeks or thereby, and when I made an enquiry at the Ardrossan Docks Office they telt me that there wass a shup o' the Burns Line on a charter cairgo run to Luverpool that wass short of a deckhand, and I got the chob the same mornin'.

“The shup wass the
Lamprey
, she wass usually on the regular Belfast service but she had been chartered to tak' a load of steel plate from Harland and Wolff's to wan o' the shipyerds in Luverpool.

“We wass two days in Belfast takin' the cairgo on board. I have a lot of time for the Irish, they could be chust ass good ass the Scots if it wassna for those few miles of sea cuttin' them aff from us. I ken that their whusky is different, but then you dinna really notice that after the third gless or thereby, for you get kind of used wi' it.

“We had a very rough passage across the Irish Sea to Luverpool and wi' the load of steel plate the shup took a fair pounding. I wass the happy man when we cam' safe to the docks.

“Efter the steel had been unloaded the owners wass trying to find a cargo of some sort for either Belfast or Ardrossan so they could mak' somethin' oot of the home trup — I can tell you there iss nobody near ass greedy ass a man that owns a shup, he canna stand sein' it no' makin' money wi' effery turn o' the propellor.

“So for two days we wass coolin' our heels in Luverpool. There wassna mich to do, and we wass runnin' desperate low on coin, we didna have ass much ass would pay for even chust the wan wee quiet dram. I had got friendly wi' wan o' the stokers, a laad caaled Danny, frae Stornoway: Danny had wance been a piper wi' the Bleck Watch and he still had his pipes aboot him — he practiced oot on the poop deck when he wass aff duty — so I put a proposeetion to him.

“I telt him that they wudna often ha'e the chance to hear a daicent piper in Luverpool, and if we went into the toon and he played and I went roond wi' the hat, we wud surely mak' enough to put oorselves in funds for a refreshment.

“Danny chumped at the idea, dashed doon below to get his pipes and aff we went.

“We picked a spot where two o' the main streets crossed, and there wass a big public hoose at each corner.

“ ‘This'll do fine and dandy,' says I. ‘The chentlemen comin' in and oot o' the Inns wull be pleased enough to hear a cheery tune. Wait you and you'll see. We wull do weel here!'

“Danny sterted to tune up his pipes, and wud you credit it, he hadna been blawin' for mair than a hauf a meenit when a big fella wi' a long white apron, and a bleck waistcoat on him same ass he wis a meenister, came rushin' oot o' wan o' the public hooses.

“ ‘Whit sort o' racket d'ye caal this,' he shouted, very red in the face. ‘Are you tryin' to scare my customers away? Whit the bleezes is yon man daeing?'

“ ‘It iss aal right,' said I: ‘stop you and you wull see something worth listening to in a meenit. For the moment he iss simply tuning his pipes.'

“ ‘Tuning them is it, for peety's sakes.' howls the man. ‘
Tuning
them indeed! And wull you tell me chust how the bleezes he's meant to know when he
has
?'

“And he disappeared into the public hoose. Twa meenits later, when Danny wass chust gettin' warmed up wi'
The Glendaruel Highlanders
, he cam' oot again, wi' a smaall cairdboard box in his haunds, and went across the street and into the ither three public hooses, wan efter another.

“When he cam' oot o' the last Inns, he walked over and tipped a wee pile of sulver oot o' the cairdboard box into the kep I was holding.

“ ‘Now,' he shouted, purple wi' rage by this time, ‘That's frae me and my fellow publicans. Wull you please now be reasonable for we are aal trying to run a business here. Wull you and your frien' now
please go away!
'

“Well, we wassna weel content at the way we got the money, but at least we had enough for a few refreshments. ‘We'd better no' go near wan o' these hooses, Danny' said I, ‘we shall look for a likely-looking Inns close by.'

“We foond this wee public hoose doon an alley and in we went and I ordered up two drams. ‘Drams?' says the barman, ‘What in tarnation is
drams
? We dinna sell drams in here.'

“So we ordered beer, and I can tell you it wass chust like drinking coloured watter. Mr Younger would neffer get awa' wi' foisting rubbish like that on your average thirsty Gleska man. But we had paid for it, and we would drink it if it killed us. Danny had his pipes under his airm, of course, and after a meenit the barman leaned over the coonter and said, quite jocco, ‘We dinna get mony bagpipers in here.'

“ ‘Wi' coloured watter at saxpence the pint, I'm not at aal surprised aboot that,' said Danny. And we never got to feenish the beer, they threw us oot.

“By this time the public hooses wass aal shutting for the efternoon. Danny stopped a man in the street and asked him where we could get a refreshment. ‘The only place iss the cricket metch,' says the man. ‘The Inns there iss open aal day.'

“ ‘I havna the faintest notion what a cricket metch is,' says Danny. ‘But if the public hooses are open, who cares?'

“We paid oor sixpences to get in the gate, and made for the refreshment rooms. There wass a whole wheen o' chaps in white shirts and troosers standin' in the middle of a field throwing a red ball at a man haudin' some sort of club. Personally I dinna think this cricket is a game at aal, it's some kind of a magic ritual, for ass soon ass the wan that wass throwin' the ball hit the man wi' the club on the legs, aal the ithers threw their arms up in the air and shouted ‘Howzat!' — and wud you credit it, at that very instant the rain came
pourin'
doon!

“The Inns kept open, but efter an hour or thereby they wudna serve ony more to Danny and me. We'd been blethering awa' in the Gaelic and they thought that we wass the worse for drink and said it wassna a lenguage at aal, it wass chust us so fu' we couldna speak. ‘If Hurricane Jeck wass here,' says I quite angry, ‘You wouldna get awa' wi' refusing
him
.'

‘Hurricane
who
?' says the man behind the bar.

“We sailed for Ardrossan the next morning wi' a half cairgo of pit props, so it wassna a total loss for the owners.

“But the food on the way hame wass deplorable. They'd stocked up the galley in Luverpool, and aal we got wass bleck pudding filled wi' lumps of fet, rubbery breid, tasteless streaky bacon wi' nae cure to it, and fush that aromatic you wouldna put it doon to a cat.

“Don't talk to me aboot England no' being a foreign country. I wass there — I've seen it for myself!”

And I thought it best not to argue with the Captain, but to take him for a quiet glass of something with which to wash away the taste of such an unhappy — if misinterpreted — memory.

F
ACTNOTE

The Anchor Line was established by two brothers — Nicol and Robert Handyside — in Glasgow in 1856 and lasted for exactly a century. The name ‘Anchor Line' was only adopted in 1899.

Though usually thought of as a Clyde-based transatlantic company, Anchor traded to America from a score or more of European and Mediterranean ports, and to India and the East.

The
Columbia
was a three-funnelled passenger and cargo liner of just over 8000 tons, almost 500ft in length and carrying 345 passengers in first class, 218 in second and 740 in steerage to take advantage of the booming traffic and she sailed mostly on the Glasgow to New York run, with a regular call in Ireland on the outward journey to take on emigrant familes. She served as an armed merchant cruiser (renamed the
Columbella
) in the First World War, was sold to Greek interests in 1926, and was finally broken up in 1929.

There was a complex network of shipping links between Scotland and Ireland in the early years of the century, and G & J Burns of Ardrossan held a substantial share of this. Later amalgamated to become the Burns-Laird Line, they moved the centre of their operations to Glasgow and a generation ago their handsome vessels provided a comfortable and reliable overnight service to ireland from the Broomielaw, and their cargo ships criss-crossed the Irish Sea and the North Channel.

Harand and Wolff in Belfast were — with Vickers in Barrow-in-Furness — the only serious rivals to the Clyde Yards on the western seaboard. The Belfast builders are probably best remembered nowadays for the
Olympic
and above all for the
Titanic
, the two giants which (with the later
Britannic
) were intended to set the seal on the superiority of Ismay's White Star Line. Instead they nearly destroyed it.

There is a piece of maritime folklore associated with the naming of the
Britannic
— as there later was with the naming of the
Queen Mary
. It is said that the original plan had been that the three huge sisters, which dwarfed anything else on the high seas at the time of their launch, were to have been named
Olympic
,
Titanic
— and finally
Gigantic
.

But legend has it that the sheer horror of the
Titanic
's loss convinced the company that to call their third ship by such an arrogant and boastful name would simply be to tempt providence (particularly after the bitterly-regretted claims about the unsinkability of her sister) and the plan was shelved, with the patriotic and uncontroversial
Britannic
being chosen instead.

37

Cavalcade to Camelon

I
t was just past two o'clock of the afternoon of a fine Saturday in early May. The
Vital Spark
lay against the stone facing of the passenger quay on the east side of Craigmarloch bridge on the Forth and Clyde Canal.

A welcome, idle weekend was in prospect for her crew. She was scheduled, first thing on Monday morning, to load a cargo of cask whisky from the Rosebank distillery at Camelon, on the western fringes of the historic Burgh of Falkirk. Until then a long and lazy meander across central Scotland was in prospect, a passage no longer plagued by the taunts of the urchins of the towns and villages which fringed the canal. The manner in which a previous generation of those youthful predators on the inland voyages of the vessel was devastatingly dealt with — thanks to the ingenuity of Sunny Jim — has already been set out in one of my earlier accounts of the travels and travails of the
Vital Spark
, and is now firmly entrenched in the folklore of today's towpath tearaways who therefore give to the puffer a wide (and respectful) berth.