From inns one naturally turns to drink, which forms the theme of so large a proportion of Scottish stories. It must be admitted that this prominence is a sad indication of the extent to which for generations past alcoholic liquors of all kinds have been consumed in the country. I used to imagine that the ‘trade,’ that is, the calling of publican, was in the hands of Scotsmen, who were themselves entirely to blame not only for the drinking, but for the selling of whisky. On a visit to Antrim, however, I learned that others besides natives of Scotland have a share in the traffic. In driving out from Ballymena on an Irish car, my talkative ‘jarvie’ noticed me looking at a new villa that was in course of erection not far from the town.
‘That’ll be a foin place, sorr,’ said he. ‘That’s Mr. O’Donnel’s, sorr.’
‘Who is Mr. O’Donnel?’ I asked.
‘Oh, he was born in Ballymena, and left it when he was a boy. He went abroad and made his fortune, and now he’s come back and he’s bought the tinnant roight of the land and he’s puttin’ up that house and them greenhouses, and plantin’ them trees and layin’ out the garden. Oh, it’ll be a foin place, that it will, sorr.’
‘You say he went abroad; where did he go to?’
‘To Scotland, sorr.’
‘To Scotland! And how did he come to make his fortune there?’
‘Keepin’ public-houses, sorr.’
The question is often asked why so much whisky should be consumed in Scotland. One explanation assigns as the reason the moist, chilly climate of the country, and this cause may perhaps be allowed to have some considerable share in producing the national habit. No small proportion of the spirit, especially in the Highlands, is drunk by men who are certainly not at all drunkards, and who can toss off their glass without being any the worse of it, if, indeed, they are not, as they themselves maintain, a good deal the better. But it must be confessed that, especially among the working classes in the Lowlands, tipsiness is a state of pleasure to be looked forward to with avidity, to be gained as rapidly and maintained as long as possible. To many wretched beings it offers a transient escape from the miseries of life, and brings the only moments of comparative happiness which they ever enjoy. They live a double life—one part in the gloom and hardship of the workaday world, and the other in the dreamland into which whisky introduces them. The blacksmith expressed this view of life who, when remonstrated with by his clergyman for drunkenness, asked if his reverend monitor had himself ever been overcome with drink, and, on receiving a negative reply, remarked: ‘Ah, sir, if ye was ance richt drunk, ye wadna want ever to be sober again.’
SCOTTISH DRUNKENNESS