In a particular part of St. John’s, running north and south, lies a well-made broad street, which, from being inhabited principally by Scotchmen, is known by the appropriated name of “Scotch Row.” Capital stores (when I am at Rome, I like to do as Rome does, and give everything its approved title) flank each side of the street, and display their glittering wares to the admiration of passers-by; and from whence (with but few exceptions) emanate those dresses and ribbons of a thousand dyes, with which the fair sex of every colour delight to enrobe their lovely forms.
Here, as in the merchants’ stores, may be found articles of the most opposite natures. In one part lies a delicate white satin bonnet, with its bunches of “orange flowers,” to grace the head of some blushing bride, or decorated with the snowy plumes torn by the swarthy African from some swift-footed ostrich; while by its side reposes a broken ewer, or an iron pot.
You may, in truth, buy anything and everything in these “Scotch shops,” from three farthings’ worth of tape to the most costly articles. Dresses of all kinds; ribbons, laces, flowers, and bonnets; coats, vests, pantaloons, umbrellas, and shoes; blondes, scarfs, mantelets, perfumery, and tenpenny nails; paint, frying-pans, and carpets; jewellery of every description, dripping-pans, and Seidlitz powders; Epsom salts, ginger-beer, and white lead; horses’ halters, cherry-tree chairs, and preserved fruits; children’s dresses, lanterns, horse-whips, and coffee; sugar-loaves, saddles, bonnet-shapes, and white-handled knives; ladies’ corsets, Valenciennes edging, and Westphalia hams; pigs’ tongues, truckle cheese, and bird-seed; dish-covers, bottle-baskets, hooks-and-eyes, and brimstone; harness, cattle medicines, and lozenges; “Mechian” razor strops, and Metcalf’s toothbrushes; with brandy, champagne, Madeira, sherry, port, sauterne, Rhenish wines, bottled stout, pale ale, glasses to drink all these good articles out of, and I know not what besides. Loaves of sugar dangling by the side of zephyr scarfs, or candle-boxes vis-à-vis with ostrich feathers.
Oh! ye tradesmen of Regent-street, so polite and perfumed, and such calibre, who stand behind your glossy counters with the air of “my lord duke,” or glide with noiseless steps and mincing airs over your Persian carpeted floor,—what, what would you think of our Antiguan shops? Or how would those over-fashionable gentlemen at Storr and Mortimer’s be astounded, when tendering for approval to “beauty bright” those costly gems which carry us back to the days of the Arabian nights, if they came in contact with a brass kettle or an iron pot!
I often wonder how the pale-faced, straight-haired clerks (for they are not termed shopmen in this part of the world) manage to get on among such a multiplicity of dissimilar articles; or that from being asked for so many contrary goods during the day, they do not make many and greater mistakes. A lady drives up in her carriage to the door of one of these labyrinthan depôts of vanity, and in that “low soft voice so sweet in woman,” asks to be shewn some orange flower chaplets, and essence of Frangipanier. The poor clerk, his brains turning round like a revolving light, flies to obey her commands; but lo! in his hurry and confusion, he catches up a frying-pan, and with streaming brow, presents the inelegant article to the lady’s astounded and horrified gaze, instead of the delicate perfume.
The master of these gay and changeful stores, is as diversiformed as his goods are various. In the morning he stands behind his counter, and “bows to” and “ma’am’s” any black member of the canaille that condescends to purchase a few yards of “half-a-bit” (2d. sterling) ribbon to sandal her mill-post ankle; while in the evening, in all the glories of white pantaloons, new coat, smart buttons and embroidered stock, he figures away at an aristocratic dinner party.
Times are indeed altered with these Scotchmen. In former years, when Sawney left his mountain home, his trouty lochs, and oaten bannocks, for the hot suns and debilitating climate of these “Isles of the West;” he did it for the sake alone of siller. As to ambition—faugh! he hated the very name, or else, like the cock in Esop’s fable, he spurned the glittering bauble, of which he knew not the worth. They plodded on from year to year, increased their stock of goods, and added many a round dollar to their worldly wealth, and then sat down contentedly to enjoy the smoky flavour of their usquebaugh, forming no greater acquaintance with the governor, than as they saw him proceed to the court-house in discharge of his high office, or knowing no more of government-house than the outer appearance.
But the Scotchmen of the present day scorn the lowly ideas of their predecessors. They ape the man of fashion, call their haberdashery store a merchant’s warehouse, and foregoing the vulgar title of draper, take to themselves the loftier name of merchant. Nor is this all. They attend the governor’s levees, play the amiable at a quadrille party, frequent the billiard table, or perchance take wine with his excellency, and grin and bow with approved precision. Their shops prove an agreeable morning lounge for the superiors of the island, and in a glass of sangaree, or a flowing bowl of pepper-punch, the difference of grade between the entertainer and the entertained is overlooked.
That “there is no rule without an exception,” is a true apophthegm; and among the many emigrants from the “land o’ cakes,” some very respectable individuals are to be met with.
I believe it a correct statement to assert, that “Scotch Row” begins with one of this superior class, and ends with him who has been called “The father of the Scotchmen,” not from his age, but from his high conduct.