J. Stephen Jeans

“ Talking and working are essentially different things; and it is well for Parliament, for the newspapers, and for the nation at large, that so many excellent legislators are compelled to confess, like Marc Antony, "I am no orator." The members for Glasgow have never made themselves famous in the direction of much speaking; their aim has been to gather much wool with little cry, thus reversing completely the well-known motto. The interests of a city like Glasgow are purely commercial and industrial, but they require to be constantly watched with the utmost vigilance. ”

“ Nor can we forget that the sad event which made way for the return of a stranger was the sudden death of Captain Spiers of Elderslie—one who was just beginning to be appreciated by the general public, as they saw the gradual development of qualities which were solid rather than brilliant, and in whom were united manliness and modesty in a degree which is rarely to be seen, and which now gives more than a touch of pathos to his memory. ”

“ My dear friend, Count de Lesseps,—At the time when difficulties are accumulating around you I feel impelled to tell you how firmly I believe in your great work, which is an object of envy to the whole world, and how much I admire your energy. ”

“ Thomas Corbett is a philanthropist of the most practical kind. He does not distribute his means like milk spilled upon the ground, which cannot be gathered up again; neither does he take cognisance of merely speculative benevolence. Everything to which he has put his hand has prospered, and he has thus laid the foundations of a good name, which is better than all his riches—a name which the working men of his native city will be slow to forget. It is with the establishment of the Great Western Cooking Depôt that Mr. Corbett's name is most prominently identified. ”

“ The proposal to construct a canal is by no means a new one. Manchester, as every one knows, has for more than a century and a quarter been the foremost in all plans and operations designed to secure economy and facility of transport. Many years ago it was proposed to convert the Irwell into a navigable river, and this, of course, would have connected Manchester with the Mersey and so with the sea. ”

“ Never having been directly engaged in commercial pursuits, Professor Rankine could not earn the credit of building those leviathans that have directly contributed to our commercial prosperity; but in another, and not less essential way, he has assisted to build up and consolidate our industrial supremacy, and his numerous writings and discoveries in the science of mechanics will ever cause him to be regarded as a pioneer, not less than Henry Bell or Robert Napier, of a trade that has proved a source of untold wealth to the West of Scotland. ”

“ The river Thames is in many respects one of the most remarkable in the world. No other river has so large a commerce, no other river can boast such a display of shipping, no other river is the highway for such a large population, no other river has such a romantic and interesting history. The Thames is, however, eclipsed by many other waterways as regards natural advantages for maritime commerce. It has an extremely tortuous, irregular, and dangerous channel; it is subject to great fluctuations of tides; it is liable to be silted up with the deposits of sand and sewage from its lower reaches ”

“ The full deep voice, so beautifully expressive, already taxed to its utmost extent, breaks into something which is almost a shriek; the gesticulation becomes wild; the preacher, who has hitherto held himself to some degree in check, seems to abandon himself to the full tide of his emotion; you feel that not even his eloquent lips can do justice to the rush of thought and feeling within. Two or three minutes in this impassioned strain and the sermon is done." [Pg 120]
In 1862, Dr. Caird was appointed Professor of Divinity in the University of Glasgow. ”

“ We are only concerned to state the simple truth. It may be that the railway companies in this country cannot afford to carry goods at cheaper rates. That is their look-out. They have undoubtedly incurred vast expense in providing the most ample and the most admirable facilities of transport, short of the all-important item of its cost. In no other country do we find such a splendid service. No other country has better roads nor more capable administration, nor quicker and more reliable dispatch, nor greater conveniences for traffic of all kinds. ”

“ Unlike not a few families and clans who can boast of a lineage almost if not quite as ancient and noble as their own, their name and fame are not "to hastening ills a prey." The lapse of years has not dimmed the lustre of their achievements, or caused them to lie upon their oars inactive and inglorious. The present head of their clan—the Duke of Argyll—has in his day and generation been as distinguished as any of his more formidable ancestry. ”

“ In no country have both systems of transportation had a more eventful, instructive, and interesting history. In no country have railroads and canals been afforded equally free scope for development, and in no country have transportation rates been cut so fine and reduced so low. We may, therefore, by a consideration of the conditions of transport in the United States, and especially by seeking to ascertain how far the two great systems of internal communication have competed with each other, learn something that will throw a good deal of light on this problem. ”

“ Certainly, the decadence of the one has not followed the development of the other. Learning and commerce flourish hand in hand, without the slightest trace of incompatibility. No less an authority than Sir Robert Peel declared, on the occasion of his installation as Lord Rector of the University in 1837, "I do not consider it an exaggerated compliment when I say that I doubt whether, of all cities existing on the face of the earth, there be any one so remarkable for the combination of commercial and active industry, with services rendered to science and literature, as Glasgow." ”

“ There is a very prevalent impression that railways and canals have each their proper and natural function in the transport of merchandise—the railways in the carrying of goods of considerable intrinsic value, or of a perishable character, in which speed is an element of value; and the canals in conveying heavy merchandise, such as coal, iron ore, pig iron, building stone, timber, and other traffic, of relatively low intrinsic value, and incapable of being deteriorated by delay. ”

“ Our merchant princes, too, subscribe most liberally to every movement projected for the amelioration of the moral, social, or religious condition of the lapsed masses. The story of our lives from year to year is one that contains many bright spots in which the recording angel must take pleasure, although it is also darkened by not a few stains so black, foul, and ghastly, that we are led to despair of ever attaining the ends for which the Church and the State are existent—for which laws and religion are inculcated and enforced. ”

“ In the British Colonies, and especially in India and Canada, both the railways and the waterways have been and are being provided at the public expense, and are administered by officials responsible to the people generally. England, on the contrary, has allowed both railways and waterways to be monopolised by private enterprise, with results disastrous to the latter, as we have already seen, and with consequences, as regards the former, that threaten to be almost as serious to the public, who are held fast in the iron grip of a monopoly which they are powerless to control. ”

“ SIR JAMES CAMPBELL.
Glasgow cannot lay claim to a hereditary aristocracy. She has, however, what is infinitely better for the purposes of commercial, political, and social progress—an aristocracy of energy, talent, and moral worth. There are very few of her merchants and manufacturers who have not been the architects of their own fortune. The pioneers of her industrial prosperity do not build their aspirations and hopes upon a few broad acres, or a pedigree stretching backwards to the time of William the Conqueror. ”

“ A glance at a map of the United States will suffice to show that it has unique natural facilities for water transport. Its great lakes, which are inland seas of no inconsiderable dimensions, now connected together by the Erie and St. Mary’s Falls Canals, its magnificent rivers, such as the Mississippi and the Missouri, and the natural configuration of the country, create an ensemble for cheap transportation such as no other country can surpass. Besides these resources, however, the United States have now a railway system of over 160,000 miles. ”

“ These are the words of one who has evidently "read, marked, learned, and inwardly digested" the whole subject of education, and is prepared, at whatever sacrifice or cost, to stand up for a system of instruction that shall embrace preparation not only for the duties and exigencies of this life but also for that which is to come. ”

“ When we consider the enormous disadvantages under which the majority of the canals of this country now labour, the great matter for wonder is, not that they do not secure the lion’s share of the traffic, but that they get any traffic at all. ”

“ I have much respect for the voluntary system of education, but I feel that it does not reach all the children of a large city such as Glasgow, and that therefore a national system of education is required. I would also support the establishment of schools for the teaching of children, because I believe that he who teaches should first be taught himself. ”

“ An examination of the geography of European countries will disclose the fact that the United Kingdom is almost unique in regard to its possession of a magnificent coast-line, studded with harbours and docks, and approached by a large number of navigable rivers, which afford easy communication with the sea. If we compare our facilities with those of Germany, Austria, Belgium, Holland, Italy, or indeed any other European country, we cannot fail to be struck with their enormous superiority. Scarcely any part of the United Kingdom is more than a hundred miles distant from a good harbour. ”

“ When we remember that Sir John was no less able as a teacher than as an author, and that his knowledge of engineering was not bounded by mere theory alone, we get a clue to the eminently practical turn of mind which characterised his illustrious pupil. ”

“ It must be borne in mind, for example, that as railways are performing the double function of transporting both passengers and goods, their traffic per mile, measured in terms of merchandise, cannot be fairly compared with that of canals, which carry goods traffic alone. Nor can the traffic of a canal, where the speed is necessarily slow, be rightly compared with that of a river like the Thames or the Rhine, where there is almost no limit to the speed that may be safely applied, except the limits imposed by mechanical laws. ”

“ Truly, those who have had the management of this gigantic business are entitled to be regarded as the pioneers of a high standard of progress, the highest standard, indeed, that has yet been attained, or is possible of attainment, in the direction of one of the greatest ends of civilisation—that of making the navigation of the ocean compatible with perfect safety to human life. ”

“ The great secret of cheap transportation is to handle and carry large quantities. It is this, and this only, that has enabled the United States to achieve such remarkably cheap transport, both on railways and canals—on land and on water. In 1850 the capacity of the trains which carried grain from Chicago to New York was only twenty-five cars or waggons, carrying eight tons each, or a total train-load of about 200 tons. It is now, however, no uncommon thing to see train loads of 1000 to 1200 tons between Buffalo and New York. ”

“ The commercial annals of the West of Scotland are full of interest. They illustrate a prosperity that is almost without parallel. Macaulay's New Zealander is not likely to plant his foot on Glasgow Bridge for many generations to come, or if he does he will witness a scene totally unlike that for which the historian had prepared him. In all our staple industries we are advancing with gigantic strides. Shipping and shipbuilding are especially conspicuous for their steady and rapid development. As a shipping port Glasgow stands second to none in the United Kingdom, Liverpool alone excepted. ”

“ If there is one country more than another that ought to be possessed of ample and complete water communication, that country is surely Ireland. Surrounded on all sides by the sea, with a population greatly inured to the conditions of living upon or by the water, it should have at once the cheapest and the most comprehensive system of water transport in the world. ”

“ In a sermon which he preached before the Senate, at the opening of the new University Chapel, on the 8th of January last, he set himself to show that the mere holding of the Catholic faith, in the sense and form of the creed, cannot be the essence of religion—first, because the great mass of mankind are incapable of doing justice to the definitions and evidences of the creeds; yet need religion, and are, in point of fact, pious in spite of their want of theological accomplishments ”

“ COMPARATIVE COST OF WATER AND LAND TRANSPORT.
There is no matter connected with the trade and commerce of a country that is of greater importance to its welfare than cheap transport. The business of transportation, both by land and by sea, is now one of the most gigantic in the history of the world. ”

“ One who had taught himself to write by copyright the letters of a printed book as he lay watching his flock on the hill side, and whose vivacious imagination, as his own brother informs us, disqualified him from study or research, was not likely while alive to make many close friends in the exclusive and polished circles which formed the élite of Edinburgh. But by Bell and a few others, who saw the diamond glittering in the rough casket, Hogg was duly appreciated. To the Literary Journal he was a constant contributor both of prose and verse, and he took a warm interest in its success. ”

“ All these canals are intended to economise time and space, which has become the greatest desideratum of our age. By fulfilling this mission they facilitate commerce, cheapen the cost of commodities, bring nations into closer touch, and materially lengthen the sum of work and knowledge that can be crowded into the average span of human life. ”