55

Nor any Drop to Drink

In the balmy, early evening of midsummer’s day, the Vital Spark lay against the inner face of Inveraray pier. In the afternoon the thermometer had touched 80 degrees fahrenheit, without so much as a whisper of wind, and even now, at six o’clock, there was not the slightest promise of any freshness in the air and the heat remained overwhelming.

The puffer’s crew were spreadeagled on the main-hatch: Para Handy, vainly seeking some shade in the wheelhouse, leaned his elbows on the sill of its opened fore-window and surveyed the crowds thronging the pier and its approaches with a somewhat jaundiced eye.

Preparing to board the steamer Ivanhoe were the several hundred members of a special charter party. Special in more ways than one, for this was a strangely silent crowd. Though it included scores of children of an age-group which would normally be expected to be of a boisterous and undisciplined disposition, these particular youngsters were marshalled into subdued groups under the watchful eye of straight-backed ladies of an angular build, a frosty mien and a certain age — and all apparently sharing a taste for unseasonably drab and voluminous garments.

The balance of the company was comprised of perhaps one hundred couples, presumably the parents and grandparents of the silent children, conversing in small groups in a whisper, their heads down: occasionally, just occasionally, a few of the menfolk glanced wistfully towards the frontage of the town, dominated by the prominent white facade of the Argyll Arms Hotel. The last components of the party were about one hundred younger men and women who were also gathered in supervised clusters, all men in this one or that, all girls in these others.

Gliding through the crowd with beady eyes which seemed to peer everywhere and take in everything were a dozen or more stiffly erect figures in black frock coats, high-buttoned waistcoats, and tall, shiny-black stovepipe hats, and carrying tight-rolled umbrellas, the glint of white dog-collars (largely hidden behind full sets of Dundreary whiskers) the only departure from unrelieved black in their whole attire.

“A Good Templar’s summer ooting,” said Para Handy with a degree of acerbity, to nobody in particular: and he shivered in spite of the heat. “Now there iss a sight to mak’ the blood run cold! There is chust aboot as much spurit of happiness, good-wull and harmony in that gaitherin’ ass would fill an empty vestas box!

“They’ll have been at the Cherry Park for a tent-meeting and a picnic, and then a march back doon the toon to the pier. Cheery days! Look you at aal they bible-thumpers wi’ the chuldren, and aal they spunster wummen chaperonin’ the lasses, crampin’ their style and makin’ sure they keep them awa’ from the lads and dinna let ony couples go wanderin’ off into the woods or up wan o’ the closes. Then there’s a wheen o’ bleck-coated meenisters to stop the men-folk from sluppin’ off to the bar of the Argyll Arms or the George Hotel for chust the wan wee Chrustian dram and a necessary refreshment on a thirsty day like this!

“I am thinking they would be better to hire in a whole pack of collie dugs and drive the puir duvvles through the town ass if they wass a flock of sheeps, for if you ask me that iss what they aal are, and that iss surely how they are treated by their weemen and their meenisters: if Dougie wass here he would tell you that himself.”

Indeed the thronged pier dispersed an aura of gloom totally at odds with the brightness of the day, and in dismal contrast to the cheery joie-de-vivre and bonhommie which were dispensed in large measure to all and sundry by the typical excursion party.

Certainly the crew of the Vital Spark, and perhaps the whole of Inveraray as well, breathed a sigh of quiet relief when, at half past six and with the boarding process completed, there was a toot (even that a subdued one) on the Ivanhoe’s whistle and the paddler moved out into open water and headed off back towards Ardrossan.

“In a sense,” observed Para Handy half-an-hour later, as the crew settled onto a bench in front of the Argyll Arms Hotel and contemplated the play of light on the trees of Duniquaich over the top of a pint pot, “in a sense they only have themselves to blame, puir craiturs, but at the same time there iss many of the menfolk chust bludgeoned into the Templars, or maybe the Rechabites forbye, by their wummenfolk, wi’ no chance at aal to mak’ an escape. I mean, would you want to argue the rights and wrongs wi’ maist o’ the wummen we saw on that pier today? They certainly pit the fear o’ the Lord in me. I am thinkin’ that maist men would simply do what they wass told ass long ass the wummen wass around, and do what they wanted to do themselves ass soon ass they were on their own.

“And when you get them on their own, the maist o’ the Templars men are chust ordinary mortals like the rest o’ us.”

“I’m sure an they didna bring mich business to the Inveraray Inns today, though,” observed Macphail. “The Licensees’ herts must sink to their boots when they see the Ivanhoe offshore. If she had been the Lord of the Isles wi’ a works’ ootin’ frae Fairfield’s yerd that wud hae been different, Ah’m thinkin’.”

“You would be surprised, Dan,” said Para Handy, “at chust how profitable a temperance excursion can be for the licensed trade if aal the arrangements are in the right hands.”

Sunny Jim sensed a story.

“Go on, Captain,” he prompted. “What d’ye mean?”

“It wass many years back,” said Para Handy. “Hurricane Jeck and me wass crewin’ a sailin’ gabbart that turned a penny for a man in Saltcoats.

“We were to load a cargo o’ bales o’ wool from Lochranza, and we arrived there late one Friday evenin’ and went ashore for a gless of something at Peter Murdo Cameron’s Inn, chust along the road from the head of the pier.

“Cameron was in a bleck mood, that wass plain to see, and Jeck asked him what wass the matter.

“ ‘Chust my luck,’ says Cameron, ‘you can imachine how very few excursion perties we get comin’ to Lochranza, the maist o’ the steamer passengers we see iss those aboard the Kintyre goin’ to or from Campbeltown. Precious few effer comes ashore here for a dram. If it wassna for the likes of you, Jeck, and the herring boats in season, and the workers on the big estate, there would be little point openin’ a bar in Lochranza and little chance o’ makin’ a livin’ from it.

“ ‘So when we heard yestreen that there wass an excursion comin’ to Lochranza tomorrow — aal adults, too — on a special charter on the Glen Sannox, you can imachine that I got quite excited and ordered in extra supplies from the distillery up the road, and brought in more beer on the dray from Brodick this mornin’. It wass going to be like Chrustmas and Hogmanay rolled into one, I told myself. Then this afternoon we foond out what this excursion perty consists of. Chust Rechabites from Fairlie. Rechabites! And me with effery penny I could raise invested in drink for them. It’ll be months before I clear the stock I’ve bought in, and the most of the beer will have turned sour, wait you and you will see.

“ ‘Rechabites! They’ll be the ruin o’ me.’

“ ‘Tush, Peter Murdo,’ says Jeck reproachfully — and he wass quite jocco — ‘for a Lochranza man you are givin’ up aawful easily. The average chentleman of the Rechabite persuasion has exactly the same proportions of a thirst as you or me, it is chust that he hass rather less of an opportunity to indulge it, especially when his wummenfolk are aboot him. Tomorrow you will have to see to it that the men get a run at the refreshments and you will do very well.’

“ ‘But that’s just it,’ cried Cameron. ‘The wummenfolk wull be aal aboot them aal the time, and forbye Lochranza iss chust a wee place. They canna lose each other ass if this wass a lerge metropiliss like Campbeltown. They daurna come in to an Inns.’

“ ‘Well then,’ says Jeck, ‘you will chust have to cater for the wummen at the same time, and whiles they are busy at their teas and scones who iss to know what their menfolk might be up to? Get yourself up early the morn’s morn, wi’ a wheen o’ your frien’s (and wan or two wives ass well) and I will show you.’ ”

Para Handy paused to drain his glass, and look pointedly at the Engineer as he set it on the table in front of him. Macphail took the hint and signalled to a passing barman.

“I must admut,” the Captain continued, “that I thought Jeck had taken leave of his senses. But I had reckoned without the man’s cheneral agility. He wass sublime, chust sublime!

“On Saturday morning we were up to the Inns at first light. You will mind, Dougie, that there iss a big white board along the front o’ the hoose with PETER M CAMERON’S spelt oot on it in big bleck-painted wudden letters, and then inside there iss a corridor, and off it, two big rooms — the bar to the right, and a room on the left wi’ tables and chairs where ye can take your refreshments in peace and ring a wee bell when you are wantin’ anither gless.

“What Jeck did wass to tak’ aal the letters off the board along the front o’ the hoose, mak’ another ‘O’ oot o’ the lid of a herring firkin, and hammer the letters back up on the board but this time so that they spelt oot TEMPERANCE ROOMS.

“Then he sent for a can o’ white paint and a wee brush, and on the door in the corridor that led into the bar he wrote ‘Coffee Room and Smoking Parlour — Gentlemen Only’: and on the door to the sitting room he wrote ‘Tea Room — Ladies Only’.

“And he got Cameron’s wife, and three of her friends, to go and bake up a stock o’ buns and scones and fancies that wouldna have disgraced a Baker’s shop, and to fetch over aal their cups and saucers and plates and teapots and the like.

“He had Cameron put on his best Fast Day suit, and his wife a bleck dress and white peenie, and the two o’ them wi’ silver trays under their airms, and had them meet the excursionists at the heid o’ the pier as they came off the shup at wan o’clock.

“Jeck himself stood at the Inns door and greeted the ladies wi’ a most gracious bow that it wass a preevilege to behold, and ushered them aal into the big Tea Room.

“The chentlemen were asked to wait in the roadway till aal the ladies wass seated, and then Jeck invited them to come into the hoose.

“It chust needed the wan quick question at the entrance to find oot exactly what sort of refreshment the chentlemen were most anxious for, and ony that wass true teetotalisators (and there wassna but a handful o’ them) wass quietly taken into the hoose next door where Jeck had arranged wi’ Cameron’s neebour that she would provide teas for any o’ the chentlemen that wass soft enough in the heid to want chust that and nothin’ else.

“It wass a roarin’ success! Cameron took more money in that day than he had effer seen before in a week, and his wife and her friends did such a great tred wi’ the ladies in the Tea Room that she wass able to pit new curtains right through the hoose wi’ the profits on it. A total waste o’ money, Cameron thought that, but he couldna complain.

“Jeck had thought of efferything. When it wass time for the steamer to sail, and the chentlemen wass leaving the Inns by the back door, Jeck even had a boy there passin’ oot pan drops and soor plooms to the chentlemen so their wives wouldna jalouse chust what kind o’ coffee and tea they had been drinking!

“Cameron had even struck a bargain wi’ the Lodge Secretary that they would come back again the next month. ‘The best ooting we have ever had,’ said that worthy, ‘for you have opened up a new world to us, Mr Cameron’. And Cameron had the grace to admit that if it hadna been for Jeck there wouldna have been any sort of new world for the Rechabites to open up at aal.

“Jeck got a half-a-case of whusky for his troubles, and Cameron gave me a crate of Bass beer, and that evening we loaded the wool and set off for Gleska.

“Next time we called at Lochranza we found that the planned return trup had been caaled off. There wass some things that even Jeck chust couldna legislate for.

“The chentlemen had aal gone back on board smelling as sweet as a nut, thenks to the lozengers and the boilings that Jeck had dispensed. What he could neffer have foreseen or prevented wass that some of them wass that cheery they began to sing on the trup home — loudly. And it wassna Moodey and Sankey neither. When the wummenfolk heard a roaring chorus of The Foggy Foggy Dew come echoing throughout the shup from the fore-saloon where the chentlemen had gathered, they realised something wass going on and a few enquiries wass put urchently in hand wi’ some bemused and befuddled husbands, and the game wass up.

“But it was a rare high-jink while it lasted!”

FACTNOTE

Victorian and Edwardian society had an ambivalent attitude to drink and its problems and an ambivalent way of coping with the situation as well.

These were the generations which saw the peak of the Temperance Movements (although they were in serious decline by the end of the 19th century) but at the same time they were also the years of almost unlimited and unchecked consumption of alcohol.

THE SUMMER ‘TRIP’ — Not, on this occasion, anything as depressing as a Templar’s Outing but, probably, either a School or most likely a Sunday School picnic. These were common enough in the west of Scotland until well into the 1950s but are nowadays, I’m sure, a thing of the past. Higher standards of living and above all the wider availability of the ubiquitous motorcar mean that there is no novelty or excitement in an annual day-out by coach or steamer.

Temperance movements were usually led by the ‘middle’ classes, the objects of whose campaigning were — inevitably, but all too frequently unjustifiably — the ‘working’ classes.

Drink was perceived as a social problem with well-defined class boundaries and the heavy consumption of those more fortunate in their circumstances was accepted with good-natured tolerance while over-indulgence by the ‘lower orders’ was railed against and vilified.

The two most influential Movements were the splendidly-titled Independent Order of Rechabites (British in origin and dating from the 1830s) and the Good Templars, imported from America in the 1870s. It is a fact that in both cases women were often leading protagonists. Where else, in the stifling chauvinistic atmosphere of the mid-Victorian era, could a woman hope to make her mark in the world? It was true also that there were as many backsliders and time-servers as there were genuine converts and followers among the male membership. Neil Munro makes several references to the standing of the Temperance Movements in the Para Handy, Erchie and Jimmy Swan stories. The Movements were accepted by then as legitimate targets for gentle humour — not cruel mockery: for mild parody — not merciless pillory.

There was even a brief nod in the direction of the teetotal lobby from the shipping companies. The Ivanhoe was a brave experiment, an alcohol-free vessel commissioned for and managed by a group of Clyde owners and operators — not for the benefit of the Temperance Movements, but for the sake of families whose enjoyment of the amenity of the Clyde was on occasion not just threatened but destroyed by the excesses of a raucous minority.

By the 1890s the problem of drink on the ships (which in any case history has probably, in retrospect, exaggerated) was more or less under control. The worst excesses had been snuffed out as operators improved supervision and control, and common sense and acceptable behaviour prevailed. The Ivanhoe reverted to the role of a typical Clyde steamer of her day.

Tea was no longer compulsory aboard her: but neither was strong drink.