Newcastle

“ The roads to Newcastle were cover'd almost,
As if Radical thunder [23] had summon'd its host,
Or an enemy's fleet had been seen off the coast,
On George the Fourth's Coronation.
In the streets what a buz among sweethearts and wives,
And children who ne'er rose so soon in their lives ”

“ NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE. “Her dusky hair in many a tangle clings About her, and her looks, though stern and cold, Grow tender with the dreams of by-gone days.” —W.W. Tomlinson.
The outward signs of “by-gone days,” in the Newcastle of to-day, with the one notable exception of the Castle, must be diligently sought out amongst the overwhelming mass of what is often called “rampant modernity,” of which the town to-day chiefly consists. The modernity, however, is not all bad, as this favourite phrase would imply; much of it is doubtless regrettable and a very little of it perhaps inevitable ”

“ But yet it consists now of a goodly village, in which live colonels, and majors, and chaplains, and surgeons, and purveyors, all in a state of bliss—as it were in a second Eden. It is a military paradise, in which war is spoken of, and dinners and dancing abound. If good air and fine scenery be dear to the heart of the British soldier, he ought to be happy at Newcastle. ”

“ Newcastle encountered strong opposition, even from those whom he had always considered as his tools. Legge, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, refused to sign the Treasury warrants, which were necessary to give effect to the treaties. Those persons who were supposed to possess the confidence of the young Prince of Wales and of his mother held very menacing language. In this perplexity Newcastle sent for Pitt, hugged him, patted him, smirked at him, wept over him, and lisped out the highest compliments and the most splendid promises. ”

“ Nothing can better illustrate the extraordinary power which Newcastle wielded in the House of Commons than the dumb terrified fidelity of the great majority who clung to his knees in spite of the attacks of Pitt and Fox. Hapless majority! They had neither voice nor faith; they despised almost equally their nominal chief Robinson, and their real chief Newcastle; so they huddled together for warmth and sympathy. And this was a House of Commons produced by a general election carried on under the auspices of a consummate manipulator and by long years of cozening, patronage, and corruption. ”

“ Newcastle impressed us very much as we thundered over the iron bridge across the Tyne and looked down on the smoke-shrouded, red-roofed city belching forth black and brown smoke and jets of white steam in all directions. It rises in fine masses up from the turbid flood of the dark river, and has a lurid grandeur quite novel to us. ”

“ We have no connection whatever with the coal-trade, and were never at Newcastle but once, passing through it on the top of an exceedingly heavy coach, along with about a score of other travellers. But, should we live a thousand years, it would not be possible for us to forget that transit. We wonder what blockhead first built Newcastle; for before you can get into and out of it, you must descend one hill and ascend another, about as steep as the sides of a coal-pit. ”

“ Newcastle has long been a byeword; he was so all through his protracted public life; and he has remained in history a synonym for a certain jobbing and fussing incapacity. Justice has, perhaps, been scarcely done to his laborious life; his disinterestedness about money, rare in any age, especially in that; above all to his unequalled capacity for remaining in office, a virtue not unappreciated by the great mass of politicians. ”

“ He had the water colour I gave him of his charger, done at Parkhurst in the old Ventnor days. Our return to Newcastle was made in glorious sunshine, and we greedily devoured the peculiarly sweet and remote-looking scenes we passed through. I shall long remember Newcastle at sunset on that evening, Then, I will say, the smoke looked grand. They asked me to look at my picture by gas light. The sixpenny crowd was there, the men touching their caps as I passed. In the street they formed a lane for me to pass to the carriage. “What nice people!” I exclaim in the Diary. ”

“ Our greatness shall appall,
And their topsails straight they'll lower to the lords of the Tyne.
'Twas thus with idle rumours poor gentlemen delighted,
The honest men of North Shields to fancy gave the rein;
Sad proof that when ambition with folly is united,
Astonishing chimeras oft occupy the brain.
But soon their joy was banish'd,
Soon each illusion vanish'd,
For news arriv'd the Butcher the Branch could not obtain.
Deep, deep in the dumps,
(After playing all his trumps)
Just as branchless as he went he was 'toddling hyem' again,
Newcastle, thou dear canny town! ”

“ The peri left out of Paradise clasped her pretty, soft, pliant hands, and the novelist asked her, willing to be instructed,
“Is Newcastle, then, worse than other provincial towns?”
“I only know Newcastle, but I am sure it’s worse. There are a few nice advanced people, but they go away all the time, or if they bring nice people down from London, they keep them to themselves. I never see any one worth talking to. ”

“ Lying peacefully amidst pastoral hills, by the side of a river unpolluted by modern commerce, this ancient Border town still presents the plain and austere aspect which it wore when the great stage-coaches passed through on their way from London to Edinburgh. In Newcastle, despite its numerous relics of antiquity, one's mind is ever dominated by the potent Present, whereas in Alnwick, it is ever under the spell of the dreamy Past. ”

“ Newcastle, which was originally held by the crown, was granted (1265) to Simon de Montfort, and subsequently to Edmund Crouchback, through whom it passed to Henry IV. In Leland's time the castle had disappeared “save one great Toure”; in the 17th and 18th centuries the town was flourishing and had a manufacture of hats. The market was originally held on Sunday; in the reign of John it was changed to Saturday; by the charter of Elizabeth it was fixed on Monday. Markets are now held on Monday, Wednesday and Saturday. ”

“ Newcastle men, rejoice! O haste, on this occasion,
With many a jovial bumper our whistles let us wet,
Lord Eldon, with Sir William Scott, and all our deputation,
To toast, with acclamations due, O let us not forget:
To them our thanks be tender'd,
Good services they've render'd—
And let us hope in after times, should Branch wars rage again,
In Newcastle 'twill be found,
Such men do then abound,
The commercial pre-eminence still boldly to maintain.
[32] The New Market Place.
THE MECHANICS' PROCESSION; Or, A Trip to South Shields. ”

“ It appears to me you have been tramping this morning,
I see by the dust that's so thick on your shoes.
I have been a tramping, I've been at Newcastle,
All the things I have seen there my memory can't bring; [Pg 199]
The folks from all parts have rais'd such a noration,
About the Coronation of Geordy the King.
The first thing I saw was two fires for the bullocks—
They hung them both down as it struck twelve at night;
But lang ere day-light was come in on the morning,
Both stuffing and 'tatoes were burnt in their kites. ”

“ But more remarkable even than the commerce of the river are its great industries. From Gateshead to the sea on the one hand, and from Newcastle to the sea on the other, there is a constant succession of shipyards, chemical factories, engineering establishments, glass-works, docks, and coal-shoots. Newcastle, it has been [Pg 158] remarked, owes its rise to war, its maintenance to piety, and its increase to trade. A very neat and true saying. But trade has done more for the Tyne than for Newcastle. ”

“ Pretty Newcastle—Oranges!—New Norcia—Native Love—The Mission—Northam—The Grand Old Man—Ploughing Match—Oat Crop—The Show.
There is without doubt a great field in Western Australia for workers who will settle on the land and cultivate it. Newcastle is a little town, nestling at the foot of hills and beautifully situated near the Avon river. It is a splendid farming district; the soil will grow almost everything. I saw some magnificent oranges and vegetables. The cattle are as fat and sleek as can be. ”

“ It is therefore quite characteristic of Newcastle folks that, in the mid-century, a literary man, since become famous, was as a boy solemnly warned by a townsman against such a career as he was contemplating. ”

“ Leaving Perthir, we soon passed through the little village of Newcastle, which derives its name from a castle that may still be traced in an earthen mound 300 feet in circumference, and some intrenchments, but whose history no tradition reaches. This barrow, and an ancient oak of extraordinary size, are considered by the superstitious neighbourhood to be under the immediate protection of spirits and fairies, and to form the scene of their nocturnal revels. A spring near the village is deemed miraculous in the cure of rheumatic and other disorders. ”

“ Their first inquiries after their arrival in Newcastle were whether they would meet any of the “good people” in that town, and whether that was a place where they had prisons and a gallows like those in London and in York. I answered that they would no doubt find many of the Friends there, for I knew several very kind families who would call upon them, and also that the good lady who gave me the book in York had written letters to several of the Friends in Newcastle to call on them; and that, as to the jails, &c., I believed they were much the same. ”

“ Newcastle, in the minds of many, is merely the home of “The best golf-links in Ireland.” This is perhaps a sign of the advanced age in which we live, but Newcastle, forty miles north of Dublin, can lay claim to more than that.
Newcastle, as a tourist point and “a beauty-spot,” really exists by means of, and on account of, Slieve Donard, the highest mountain in Ulster, which hangs its 2,796 feet right over the little seacoast town, and provides non-golfing visitors with a continual field for pleasant excursions. ”

“ Whilst Lord Stowell, smarting under the domestic misery of which his foolish marriage with the Dowager Marchioness of Sligo was fruitful, sought comfort and forgetfulness in the cellar of the Middle Temple, Lord Eldon drained magnums of Newcastle port at his own table. Populous with wealthy merchants, and surrounded by an opulent aristocracy, Newcastle had used the advantages given her by a large export trade with Portugal to draw to her cellars such superb port wine as could be found in no other town in the United Kingdom ”

“ On October 1, he found himself after a long and busy day, at Newcastle-on-Tyne, where he had never stayed since his too memorable visit in 1862.286 Since the defeat of the Irish policy in 1886, he had attended the annual meeting of the chief liberal organisation at Nottingham (1887) , Birmingham (1888) , and Manchester (1889) . This year it was the turn of Newcastle. On October 2, he gave his blessing to various measures that afterwards came to be known as the Newcastle programme. ”

“ In the mountains round Newcastle, some four thousand feet above the sea, it is merely warm during the day, and cool enough at night to make a blanket desirable.
It is pleasant enough living up amongst those green mountains. There are no roads there for wheeled carriages, nor are there carriages with or without wheels. ”

“ He is said to have much fugitive verse, but only published 'The Village Pedagogue, a Poem, and other lesser Pieces; together with a Walk from Newcastle to Keswick,' 2nd ed. Newcastle, 1817, 8vo. The last piece, in prose, is partly autobiographical, and the whole volume rhapsodically descriptive of the lake scenery. There is attributed to him in the 'British Museum Catalogue,' 'The Right of the People of England to Annual Parliaments vindicated. ... From the most authentic records,' Newcastle, 1819. This was probably the production of a namesake, John Marshall, a Newcastle printer. ”

“ Newcastle was appointed lord-lieutenant of Nottingham in 1809, a knight of the Garter in 1812, and on 4 April in the same year steward of the forest of Sherwood and of the park of Folewood, Nottinghamshire. He was a rigid conservative, and violently opposed the claims of the protestant dissenters, catholic emancipation, and parliamentary reform. On various occasions he laid himself open to the bitterest assaults of popular indignation. ”

“ What though our fields present a naked sight?
A paradise should be an adamite.
The northern lad his bonny lass throws down
And gives her a black bag for a green gown.
News from Newcastle, if not Cleveland's, is infinitely more of a Clevelandism than any other attributed piece, either in the untrustworthy (or rather upside-down-trustworthy) Cleaveland Revived or elsewhere. It first appeared as a quarto pamphlet, 'London. Printed in the year 1651. By William Ellis', and with a headline to the poem 'Upon the Coalpits about Newcastle-upon-Tyne'. This quarto furnishes the only sound text. ”

“ In the early autumn of 1889, the writer of this paper had the good fortune to be present at the Newcastle meeting of the British Association. Newcastle-upon-Tyne, standing at the very gateway of Scotland and looking out from the Tyne upon the great North Sea, is a famous old city in English history, that lay directly in the path of conquest and migration and was literally cradled in war, alternately rocked by Scandinavian or Dane, Saxon or Norman, Englishman or Scot. To-day it is big, prosperous, and progressive; even in the midst of peace perpetually sounding the note of preparation for war. ”

“ I was debating in my mind whether to start up country or join a vessel going to a port that I had not yet been to, when news reached Newcastle of a rush to the Palmer goldfields. This news put the whole place in a ferment. Hundreds of men in Newcastle alone threw up their employment, and started for the north, whenever there was a chance of getting along the coast. Ships in the harbour were deserted by their crews, even the officers in many instances deserting at the same time. ”