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Mr. Pulteney, member for
Shrewsbury, was the owner of extensive estates in that neighbourhood by
virtue of his marriage with the niece of the last Earl of Bath. Having
resolved to fit up the Castle there as a residence, he bethought him of the
young Eskdale mason, who had, some years before, advised him as to the
repairs of the Johnstone mansion at Wester Hall. Telford was soon found, and
engaged to go down to Shrewsbury to superintend the necessary alterations.
Their execution occupied his attention for some time, and during their
progress he was so fortunate as to obtain the appointment of Surveyor of
Public Works for the county of Salop, most probably through the influence of
his patron. Indeed, Telford was known to be so great a favourite with Mr.
Pulteney that at Shrewsbury he usually went by the name of "Young Pulteney."
Much of his attention was
from this time occupied with the surveys and repairs of roads, bridges, and
gaols, and the supervision of all public buildings under the control of the
magistrates of the county. He was also frequently called upon by the
corporation of the borough of Shrewsbury to furnish plans for the
improvement of the streets and buildings of that fine old town; and many
alterations were carried out under his direction during the period of his
residence there.
While the Castle repairs were
in course of execution, Telford was called upon by the justices to
superintend the erection of a new gaol, the plans for which had already been
prepared and settled. The benevolent Howard, who devoted himself with such
zeal to gaol improvement, on hearing of the intentions of the magistrates,
made a visit to Shrewsbury for the purpose of examining the plans; and the
circumstance is thus adverted to by Telford in one of his letters to his
Eskdale correspondent:--"About ten days ago I had a visit from the
celebrated John Howard, Esq. I say I, for he was on his tour of gaols and
infirmaries; and those of Shrewsbury being both under my direction, this
was, of course, the cause of my being thus distinguished. I accompanied him
through the infirmary and the gaol. I showed him the plans of the proposed
new buildings, and had much conversation with him on both subjects. In
consequence of his suggestions as to the former, I have revised and amended
the plans, so as to carry out a thorough reformation; and my alterations
having been approved by a general board, they have been referred to a
committee to carry out. Mr. Howard also took objection to the plan of the
proposed gaol, and requested me to inform the magistrates that, in his
opinion, the interior courts were too small, and not sufficiently
ventilated; and the magistrates, having approved his suggestions, ordered
the plans to be amended accordingly. You may easily conceive how I enjoyed
the conversation of this truly good man, and how much I would strive to
possess his good opinion. I regard him as the guardian angel of the
miserable. He travels into all parts of Europe with the sole object of doing
good, merely for its own sake, and not for the sake of men's praise. To give
an instance of his delicacy, and his desire to avoid public notice, I may
mention that, being a Presbyterian, he attended the meeting-house of that
denomination in Shrewsbury on Sunday morning, on which occasion I
accompanied him; but in the afternoon he expressed a wish to attend another
place of worship, his presence in the town having excited considerable
curiosity, though his wish was to avoid public recognition. Nay, more, he
assures me that he hates travelling, and was born to be a domestic man. He
never sees his country-house but he says within himself, 'Oh! might I but
rest here, and never more travel three miles from home; then should I be
happy indeed!' But he has become so committed, and so pledged himself to his
own conscience to carry out his great work, that he says he is doubtful
whether he will ever be able to attain the desire of his heart--life at
home. He never dines out, and scarcely takes time to dine at all: he says he
is growing old, and has no time to lose. His manner is simplicity itself.
Indeed, I have never yet met so noble a being. He is going abroad again
shortly on one of his long tours of mercy."*[1] The journey to which Telford
here refers was Howard's last. In the following year he left England to
return no more; and the great and good man died at Cherson, on the shores of
the Black Sea, less than two years after his interview with the young
engineer at Shrewsbury.
Telford writes to his
Langholm friend at the same time that he is working very hard, and studying
to improve himself in branches of knowledge in which he feels himself
deficient. He is practising very temperate habits: for half a year past he
has taken to drinking water only, avoiding all sweets, and eating no "nick-nacks."
He has "sowens and milk,' (oatmeal flummery) every night for his supper. His
friend having asked his opinion of politics, he says he really knows nothing
about them; he had been so completely engrossed by his own business that he
has not had time to read even a newspaper. But, though an ignoramus in
politics, he has been studying lime, which is more to his purpose. If his
friend can give him any information about that, he will promise to read a
newspaper now and then in the ensuing session of Parliament, for the purpose
of forming some opinion of politics: he adds, however, "not if it interfere
with my business--mind that!', His friend told him that he proposed
translating a system of chemistry. "Now you know," wrote Telford, "that I am
chemistry mad; and if I were near you, I would make you promise to
communicate any information on the subject that you thought would be of
service to your friend, especially about calcareous matters and the mode of
forming the best composition for building with, as well above as below
water. But not to be confined to that alone, for you must know I have a book
for the pocket,*[2] which I always carry with me, into which I have
extracted the essence of Fourcroy's Lectures, Black on Quicklime, Scheele's
Essays, Watson's Essays, and various points from the letters of my respected
friend Dr. Irving.*[3] So much for chemistry. But I have also crammed into
it facts relating to mechanics, hydrostatics, pneumatics, and all manner of
stuff, to which I keep continually adding, and it will be a charity to me if
you will kindly contribute your mite."*[4] He says it has been, and will
continue to be, his aim to endeavour to unite those "two frequently jarring
pursuits, literature and business;" and he does not see why a man should be
less efficient in the latter capacity because he has well informed, stored,
and humanized his mind by the cultivation of letters. There was both good
sense and sound practical wisdom in this view of Telford.
While the gaol was in course
of erection, after the improved plans suggested by Howard, a variety of
important matters occupied the county surveyor's attention. During the
summer of 1788 he says he is very much occupied, having about ten different
jobs on hand: roads, bridges, streets, drainage-works, gaol, and infirmary.
Yet he had time to write verses, copies of which he forwarded to his Eskdale
correspondent, inviting his criticism. Several of these were elegiac lines,
somewhat exaggerated in their praises of the deceased, though doubtless
sincere. One poem was in memory of George Johnstone, Esq., a member of the
Wester Hall family, and another on the death of William Telford, an Eskdale
farmer's son, an intimate friend and schoolfellow of our engineer.*[5]
These, however, were but the votive offerings of private friendship, persons
more immediately about him knowing nothing of his stolen pleasures in
versemaking. He continued to be shy of strangers, and was very "nice," as he
calls it, as to those whom he admitted to his bosom.
Two circumstances of
considerable interest occurred in the course of the same year (1788), which
are worthy of passing notice. The one was the fall of the church of St.
Chad's, at Shrewsbury; the other was the discovery of the ruins of the Roman
city of Uriconium, in the immediate neighbourhood. The church of St. Chad's
was about four centuries old, and stood greatly in need of repairs. The roof
let in the rain upon the congregation, and the parish vestry met to settle
the plans for mending it; but they could not agree about the mode of
procedure. In this emergency Telford was sent for, and requested to advise
what was best to he done. After a rapid glance at the interior, which was in
an exceedingly dangerous state, he said to the churchwardens, "Gentlemen,
we'll consult together on the outside, if you please." He found that not
only the roof but the walls of the church were in a most decayed state. It
appeared that, in consequence of graves having been dug in the loose soil
close to the shallow foundation of the north-west pillar of the tower, it
had sunk so as to endanger the whole structure. "I discovered," says he,
"that there were large fractures in the walls, on tracing which I found that
the old building was in a most shattered and decrepit condition, though
until then it had been scarcely noticed. Upon this I declined giving any
recommendation as to the repairs of the roof unless they would come to the
resolution to secure the more essential parts, as the fabric appeared to me
to be in a very alarming condition. I sent in a written report to the same
effect." *[6]
The parish vestry again met,
and the report was read; but the meeting exclaimed against so extensive a
proposal, imputing mere motives of self-interest to the surveyor. "Popular
clamour," says Telford, "overcame my report. 'These fractures,' exclaimed
the vestrymen, 'have been there from time immemorial;' and there were some
otherwise sensible persons, who remarked that professional men always wanted
to carve out employment for themselves, and that the whole of the necessary
repairs could be done at a comparatively small expense."*[7] The vestry then
called in another person, a mason of the town, and directed him to cut away
the injured part of a particular pillar, in order to underbuild it. On the
second evening after the commencement of the operations, the sexton was
alarmed by a fail of lime-dust and mortar when he attempted to toll the
great bell, on which he immediately desisted and left the church. Early next
morning (on the 9th of July), while the workmen were waiting at the church
door for the key, the bell struck four, and the vibration at once brought
down the tower, which overwhelmed the nave, demolishing all the pillars
along the north side, and shattering the rest. "The very parts I had pointed
out," says Telford, "were those which gave way, and down tumbled the tower,
forming a very remarkable ruin, which astonished and surprised the vestry,
and roused them from their infatuation, though they have not yet recovered
from the shock."*[8]
The other circumstance to
which we have above referred was the discovery of the Roman city of
Uriconium, near Wroxeter, about five miles from Shrewsbury, in the year
1788. The situation of the place is extremely beautiful, the river Severn
flowing along its western margin, and forming a barrier against what were
once the hostile districts of West Britain. For many centuries the dead city
had slept under the irregular mounds of earth which covered it, like those
of Mossul and Nineveh. Farmers raised heavy crops of turnips and grain from
the surface and they scarcely ever ploughed or harrowed the ground without
turning up Roman coins or pieces of pottery. They also observed that in
certain places the corn was more apt to be scorched in dry weather than in
others--a sure sign to them that there were ruins underneath; and their
practice, when they wished to find stones for building, was to set a mark
upon the scorched places when the corn was on the ground, and after harvest
to dig down, sure of finding the store of stones which they wanted for
walls, cottages, or farm-houses. In fact, the place came to be regarded in
the light of a quarry, rich in ready-worked materials for building purposes.
A quantity of stone being wanted for the purpose of erecting a blacksmith's
shop, on digging down upon one of the marked places, the labourers came upon
some ancient works of a more perfect appearance than usual. Curiosity was
excited --antiquarians made their way to the spot--and lo! they pronounced
the ruins to be neither more nor less than a Roman bath, in a remarkably
perfect state of preservation. Mr. Telford was requested to apply to Mr.
Pulteney, the lord of the manor, to prevent the destruction of these
interesting remains, and also to permit the excavations to proceed, with a
view to the buildings being completely explored. This was readily granted,
and Mr. Pulteney authorised Telford himself to conduct the necessary
excavations at his expense. This he promptly proceeded to do, and the result
was, that an extensive hypocaust apartment was brought to light, with baths,
sudatorium, dressing-room, and a number of tile pillars --all forming parts
of a Roman floor--sufficiently perfect to show the manner in which the
building had been constructed and used.*[9] Among Telford's less agreeable
duties about the same time was that of keeping the felons at work. He had to
devise the ways and means of employing them without risk of their escaping,
which gave him much trouble and anxiety. "Really," he said, "my felons are a
very troublesome family. I have had a great deal of plague from them, and I
have not yet got things quite in the train that I could wish. I have had a
dress made for them of white and brown cloth, in such a way that they are
pye-bald. They have each a light chain about one leg. Their allowance in
food is a penny loaf and a halfpenny worth of cheese for breakfast; a penny
loaf, a quart of soup, and half a pound of meat for dinner; and a penny loaf
and a halfpenny worth of cheese for supper; so that they have meat and
clothes at all events. I employ them in removing earth, serving masons or
bricklayers, or in any common labouring work on which they can be employed;
during which time, of course, I have them strictly watched."
Much more pleasant was his
first sight of Mrs. Jordan at the Shrewsbury theatre, where he seems to have
been worked up to a pitch of rapturous enjoyment. She played for six nights
there at the race time, during which there were various other'
entertainments. On the second day there was what was called an Infirmary
Meeting, or an assemblage of the principal county gentlemen in the
infirmary, at which, as county surveyor, Telford was present. They proceeded
thence to church to hear a sermon preached for the occasion; after which
there was a dinner, followed by a concert. He attended all. The sermon was
preached in the new pulpit, which had just been finished after his design,
in the Gothic style; and he confidentially informed his Langholm
correspondent that he believed the pulpit secured greater admiration than
the sermon, With the concert he was completely disappointed, and he then
became convinced that he had no ear for music. Other people seemed very much
pleased; but for the life of him he could make nothing of it. The only
difference that he recognised between one tune and another was that there
was a difference in the noise. "It was all very fine," he said, "I have no
doubt; but I would not give a song of Jock Stewart *[10] for the whole of
them. The melody of sound is thrown away upon me. One look, one word of Mrs.
Jordan, has more effect upon me than all the fiddlers in England. Yet I sat
down and tried to be as attentive as any mortal could be. I endeavoured, if
possible, to get up an interest in what was going on; but it was all of no
use. I felt no emotion whatever, excepting only a strong inclination to go
to sleep. It must be a defect; but it is a fact, and I cannot help it. I
suppose my ignorance of the subject, and the want of musical experience in
my youth, may be the cause of it."*[11] Telford's mother was still living in
her old cottage at The Crooks. Since he had parted from her, he had written
many printed letters to keep her informed of his progress; and he never
wrote to any of his friends in the dale without including some message or
other to his mother. Like a good and dutiful son, he had taken care out of
his means to provide for her comfort in her declining years. "She has been a
good mother to me," he said, "and I will try and be a good son to her." In a
letter written from Shrewsbury about this time, enclosing a ten pound note,
seven pounds of which were to be given to his mother, he said, "I have from
time to time written William Jackson [his cousin] and told him to furnish
her with whatever she wants to make her comfortable; but there may be many
little things she may wish to have, and yet not like to ask him for. You
will therefore agree with me that it is right she should have a little cash
to dispose of in her own way.... I am not rich yet; but it will ease my mind
to set my mother above the fear of want. That has always been my first
object; and next to that, to be the somebody which you have always
encouraged me to believe I might aspire to become. Perhaps after all there
may be something in it!" *[12] He now seems to have occupied much of his
leisure hours in miscellaneous reading. Among the numerous books which he
read, he expressed the highest admiration for Sheridan's 'Life of Swift.'
But his Langholm friend, who was a great politician, having invited his
attention to politics, Telford's reading gradually extended in that
direction. Indeed the exciting events of the French Revolution then tended
to make all men more or less politicians. The capture of the Bastille by the
people of Paris in 1789 passed like an electric thrill through Europe. Then
followed the Declaration of Rights; after which, in the course of six
months, all the institutions which had before existed in France were swept
away, and the reign of justice was fairly inaugurated upon earth!
In the spring of 1791 the
first part of Paine's 'Rights of Man' appeared, and Telford, like many
others, read it, and was at once carried away by it. Only a short time
before, he had admitted with truth that he knew nothing of politics; but no
sooner had he read Paine than he felt completely enlightened. He now
suddenly discovered how much reason he and everybody else in England had for
being miserable. While residing at Portsmouth, he had quoted to his Langholm
friend the lines from Cowper's 'Task,' then just published, beginning
"Slaves cannot breathe in England;" but lo! Mr. Paine had filled his
imagination with the idea that England was nothing but a nation of bondmen
and aristocrats. To his natural mind, the kingdom had appeared to be one in
which a man had pretty fair play, could think and speak, and do the thing he
would,-- tolerably happy, tolerably prosperous, and enjoying many blessings.
He himself had felt free to labour, to prosper, and to rise from manual to
head work. No one had hindered him; his personal liberty had never been
interfered with; and he had freely employed his earnings as he thought
proper. But now the whole thing appeared a delusion. Those rosy-cheeked old
country gentlemen who came riding into Shrewsbury to quarter sessions, and
were so fond of their young Scotch surveyor occupying themselves in building
bridges, maintaining infirmaries, making roads, and regulating gaols-- those
county magistrates and members of parliament, aristocrats all, were the very
men who, according to Paine, were carrying the country headlong to ruin!
If Telford could not offer an
opinion on politics before, because he "knew nothing about them," he had now
no such difficulty. Had his advice been asked about the foundations of a
bridge, or the security of an arch, he would have read and studied much
before giving it; he would have carefully inquired into the chemical
qualities of different kinds of lime--into the mechanical principles of
weight and resistance, and such like; but he had no such hesitation in
giving an opinion about the foundations of a constitution of more than a
thousand years' growth. Here, like other young politicians, with Paine's
book before him, he felt competent to pronounce a decisive judgment at once.
"I am convinced," said he, writing to his Langholm friend, "that the
situation of Great Britain is such, that nothing short of some signal
revolution can prevent her from sinking into bankruptcy, slavery, and
insignificancy." He held that the national expenditure was so enormous,*[13]
arising from the corrupt administration of the country, that it was
impossible the "bloated mass" could hold together any longer; and as he
could not expect that "a hundred Pulteneys," such as his employer, could be
found to restore it to health, the conclusion he arrived at was that ruin
was "inevitable."*[14] Notwithstanding the theoretical ruin of England which
pressed so heavy on his mind at this time, we find Telford strongly
recommending his correspondent to send any good wrights he could find in his
neighbourhood to Bath, where they would be enabled to earn twenty shillings
or a guinea a week at piece-work-- the wages paid at Langholm for similar
work being only about half those amounts.
In the same letter in which
these observations occur, Telford alluded to the disgraceful riots at
Birmingham, in the course of which Dr. Priestley's house and library were
destroyed. As the outrages were the work of the mob, Telford could not
charge the aristocracy with them; but with equal injustice he laid the blame
at the door of "the clergy," who had still less to do with them, winding up
with the prayer, "May the Lord mend their hearts and lessen their incomes!"
Fortunately for Telford, his
intercourse with the townspeople of Shrewsbury was so small that his views
on these subjects were never known; and we very shortly find him employed by
the clergy themselves in building for them a new church in the town of
Bridgenorth. His patron and employer, Mr. Pulteney, however, knew of his
extreme views, and the knowledge came to him quite accidentally. He found
that Telford had made use of his frank to send through the post a copy of
Paine's 'Rights of Man' to his Langholm correspondent,*[15] where the
pamphlet excited as much fury in the minds of some of the people of that
town as it had done in that of Telford himself. The "Langholm patriots
"broke out into drinking revolutionary toasts at the Cross, and so disturbed
the peace of the little town that some of them were confined for six weeks
in the county gaol.
Mr. Pulteney was very
indignant at the liberty Telford had taken with his frank, and a rupture
between them seemed likely to ensue; but the former was forgiving, and the
matter went no further. It is only right to add, that as Telford grew older
and wiser, he became more careful in jumping at conclusions on political
topics. The events which shortly occurred in France tended in a great
measure to heal his mental distresses as to the future of England. When the
"liberty" won by the Parisians ran into riot, and the "Friends of Man"
occupied themselves in taking off the heads of those who differed from them,
he became wonderfully reconciled to the enjoyment of the substantial freedom
which, after all, was secured to him by the English Constitution. At the
same time, he was so much occupied in carrying out his important works, that
he found but little time to devote either to political speculation or to
versemaking.
While living at Shrewsbury,
he had his poem of 'Eskdale' reprinted for private circulation. We have also
seen several MS. verses by him, written about the same period, which do not
appear ever to have been printed. One of these--the best--is entitled
'Verses to the Memory of James Thomson, author of "Liberty, a poem;"'
another is a translation from Buchanan, 'On the Spheres;' and a third,
written in April, 1792, is entitled 'To Robin Burns, being a postscript to
some verses addressed to him on the establishment of an Agricultural Chair
in Edinburgh.' It would unnecessarily occupy our space to print these
effusions; and, to tell the truth, they exhibit few if any indications of
poetic power. No amount of perseverance will make a poet of a man in whom
the divine gift is not born. The true line of Telford's genius lay in
building and engineering, in which direction we now propose to follow him.
Shrewsbury Castle
Footnotes for Chapter IV.
*[1] Letter to Mr. Andrew
Little, Langholm, dated Shrewsbury Castle, 21st Feb., 1788.
*[2] This practice of noting
down information, the result of reading and observation, was continued by
Mr. Telford until the close of his life; his last pocket memorandum book,
containing a large amount of valuable information on mechanical subjects--a
sort of engineer's vade mecum--being printed in the appendix to the 4to.
'Life of Telford' published by his executors in 1838, pp. 663-90.
*[3] A medical man, a native
of Eskdale, of great promise, who died comparatively young.
*[4] Letter to Mr. Andrew
Little, Langholm.
*[5] It would occupy
unnecessary space to cite these poems. The following, from the verses in
memory of William Telford, relates to schoolboy days, After alluding to the
lofty Fell Hills, which formed part of the sheep farm of his deceased
friend's father, the poet goes on to say:
"There 'mongst those rocks
I'll form a rural seat,
And plant some ivy with its moss compleat;
I'll benches form of fragments from the stone,
Which, nicely pois'd, was by our hands o'erthrown,--
A simple frolic, but now dear to me,
Because, my Telford, 'twas performed with thee.
There, in the centre, sacred to his name,
I'll place an altar, where the lambent flame
Shall yearly rise, and every youth shall join
The willing voice, and sing the enraptured line.
But we, my friend, will often steal away
To this lone seat, and quiet pass the day;
Here oft recall the pleasing scenes we knew
In early youth, when every scene was new,
When rural happiness our moments blest,
And joys untainted rose in every breast."
*[6] Letter to Mr. Andrew
Little, Langholm, dated 16th July, 1788.
*[7] Ibid.
*[8] Letter to Mr. Andrew
Little, Langholm, dated 16th July, 1788.
*[9] The discovery formed the
subject of a paper read before the Society of Antiquaries in London on the
7th of May, 1789, published in the 'Archaeologia,' together with a drawing
of the remains supplied by Mr. Telford.
*[10] An Eskdale crony. His
son, Colonel Josias Stewart, rose to eminence in the East India Company's
service, having been for many years Resident at Gwalior and Indore.
*[11] Letter to Mr. Andrew
Little, Langholm, dated 3rd Sept. 1788.
*[12] Letter to Mr. Andrew
Little, Langholm, dated Shrewsbury, 8th October, 1789.
*[13] It was then under
seventeen millions sterling, or about a fourth of what it is now.
*[14] Letter to Mr. Andrew
Little, Langholm, dated 28th July, 1791.
*[15] The writer of a memoir
of Telford, in the 'Encyclopedia Britannica,' says:--"Andrew Little kept a
private and very small school at Langholm. Telford did not neglect to send
him a copy of Paine's 'Rights of Man;' and as he was totally blind, he
employed one of his scholars to read it in the evenings. Mr. Little had
received an academical education before he lost his sight; and, aided by a
memory of uncommon powers, he taught the classics, and particularly Greek,
with much higher reputation than any other schoolmaster within a pretty
extensive circuit. Two of his pupils read all the Iliad, and all or the
greater part of Sophocles. After hearing a long sentence of Greek or Latin
distinctly recited, he could generally construe and translate it with little
or no hesitation. He was always much gratified by Telford's visits, which
were not infrequent, to his native district." |
