Northward and eastward the eyes of Englishmen are turning, straining to catch a glimpse of the white sails of their country’s ships, to discern the streaks of smoke which tell of far-off steamers, or to hear the echo at least of their thundering cannon. And many, too, not content to wait for tidings, are hurrying towards the scenes of action, if haply they may witness or sooner learn what the fortune of war may bring. Due east from the northern part of our island the Baltic fleet is now manœuvring; but from London the speediest route is through Belgium, and along the German railways, till the traveller reaches Stettin. Thence he can skirt the Baltic landwards by Königsberg as far as Memel, beyond which it will scarcely be safe to venture; or he can, by ship or boat, from the mouths of the Stettiner Haaf, prosecute his recognisance on the waters of the east sea itself.
But as mere ever-moving couriers, few, even in these exciting times, will travel. Most men will stop now and then, look about them, ask questions, gather information, reflect between whiles, and thus add interest at once and extract instruction from the countries they pass through. Especially they will observe what bears upon their individual professions, pursuits, or favourite studies; and thus, almost without effort, will gather new materials, to be used up in the details of ordinary life, when, the warlike curiosity being gratified, they return again to the welcome routine of home or domestic duties.
Such has been our own case, in a recent run from London through Stettin into Western Prussia, in less genial weather than now prevails; and it may interest our readers to make the journey with us, by anticipation, at their own firesides, while the trunks and passports are preparing for their own real journey.
On the 27th of January, at eight in the morning, a huge pyramid of luggage blocked up the London station of the South-eastern Railway. Troops of boys hovered about, some true Cockney lads, and others half-Frenchified, with an occasional usher fussing about the boxes. “Do you see that mountain, sir?” said the superintendent to us. “All school traps, sir.” “Two hundred boys at least?” we interposed, interrogatively. “No; only fifty. Fill a steamer, sir, itself.” However, the master contrived to get all put right, the mountain vanished into the waggons, the whistle blew, and we were off. The boys gave a hearty hurra as we left the station, which they repeated, time after time, at every fresh start we made, from station to station. At Dover the boat was waiting, the day fine, the wind in our favour, the sea moderately smooth, and by 11.40 we were on our way to Calais. Alas for the brave boys! The last cheer was given as they bade adieu to the cliffs of Dover. Melancholy came over them by degrees. It was painful to see how home-sick they became. From the bottom of their stomachs they regretted leaving their native land, and, heart-sore, chopfallen, and sorely begrimed as to their smart caps and jackets, they paraded, two hours after, before the customhouse at Calais, like the broken relics of a defeated army. M. Henequin was importing the half-yearly draft of Cockney boys to his school at Guines; and we recommend such of our readers as are curious in sea-comforts respectfully to decline the companionship of M. Henequin and his troop, should they at any future time lucklessly stumble upon them on the gangway of a steamer.
At Calais the patriotic and Protestant Englishman, who visits the cathedral of Nôtre Dame, will particularly admire a huge modern painting, which is supposed to adorn the north transept, and will have no difficulty in interpreting the meaning looks of the gaping peasantry when he reads underneath—“Calais taken from the English in 1558, and restored to Catholicity.”
The Pas de Calais—at least that portion of the department of that name through which the railway runs—at once tells the Englishman that he is in a new country. Low, wet, and marshy, like the seaward part of Holland, it is parcelled out, drained, and fenced by numberless ditches. Wandering over its tame and, in winter at least, most uninviting surface, the eye finds only occasional rows of small pollard willows to rest upon, as if the scavengers of the land had all gone home to dinner, and in the mean time had planted their brooms in readiness along the sides of the ditches they were employed to scour.
But passing St Omer and approaching Hazebrook, the land lifts itself above the sea marshes, becomes strong and loamy, and fitted for every agricultural purpose. Arrived at Lille, the traveller is already in the heart of the most fertile portion of northern France. Twin fortresses of great strength, Lille and Valenciennes, are also twin centres of what, in certain points of view, is the most wonderful industry of France. The sugar beet finds here a favourite soil and climate, and a rural and industrial population suited to the favourable prosecution of the beet-sugar manufacture. Though long before suggested and tried in Germany, this manufacture is purely French in its economical origin. The Continental System of the first Napoleon raised colonial produce to a fabulous price. At six francs a pound colonial sugar was within the reach of few. The high price tempted many to cast about for means of producing sugar at home, and a great stimulus was given to this research by the magnificent premium of a million of francs offered by the Emperor to the successful discoverer of a permanent source of supply from plants of native growth. Of the many plants tried, the beet proved the most promising; but it required twenty years of struggles and failures, and conquering of difficulties, to place the new industry on a comparatively independent basis. Twenty years more has enabled it to compete successfully with colonial sugar, and to pay an equal tax into the French exchequer. From France and Belgium the industry returned to its native Germany, and has since spread far into the interior of Russia. The total produce of this kind of sugar on the continent of Europe has now reached the enormous quantity of three hundred and sixty millions of pounds, of which France produces about one hundred and fifty millions in three hundred and thirty-four manufactories.
It is a pleasant excursion on a fine day in autumn, when the beet flourishes still green in the fields, and the roots are nearly ripe for pulling, to drive out from Lille, as we did some years ago, among the country farmers ten or twelve miles around. The land is so rich and promising, and on the whole so well tilled—and yet in the hands of good English or Scotch farmers might, we fancy, be made to yield so much more, and to look so much nicer, and drier, and cleaner, that we enjoy at once the gratification which in its present condition it is sure to yield us, while we pleasantly flatter ourselves at the same time with the thoughts of what we could make it. That it is not badly cultivated the practical man will infer from the average produce of sugar beet being estimated about Lille at sixteen, and about Valenciennes at nineteen tons an acre. At the same time, that much improvement is possible he will gather from the fact that, though often strong and but little undulating, the land is still unconscious of thorough drainage, and of the benefits which underground tiles and broken stones have so liberally conferred upon us.
The adjoining provinces of Hainault and Brabant—which the traveller leaves to the right on his way to Ghent and Brussels—are the seat of the sugar manufacture in Belgium. There the average yield of beetroot is said to be from eighteen to twenty-four tons an acre, the land in general being excellent, while the total produce of beet-sugar in Belgium is ten millions of pounds. In Belgium, as in France, the home-growth of sugar is equal to about one-half of the home consumption.
Late in the evening we found ourselves in Brussels, and the following morning—though wet and dirty—we were visiting, as strangers do, the numerous churches. It was Sunday; and as in the face of nature we had seen in the Pas de Calais that we were in a foreign country, so to-day the appearance of the streets told us at every step that we were among a foreign people. The shops open everywhere, and more than usually frequented; the universal holiday sparkling upon every face; the frequent priests in gowns, bands, and broadbrims to be met with on the streets; the crowding to morning mass at St Gudule’s and St Jacques’; the pious indifference of the apparently devout congregations; the huddling together and intermixture among them of all classes and costumes; the mechanical crossings and genuflections even in the remotest corners, where only the tinkling of the bells was faintly heard; the easy air of superiority, and lazy movements and mumbling of the officiating clergy at the altar; and the happy contentment pictured on every face as the crowd streamed from the door when the service was ended;—all these things spoke of a foreign people and a foreign church. The evening theatres and Sunday amusements told equally of foreign ideas and foreign habits; while the old town-hall and the other quaint buildings which the English traveller regards at every new visit with new pleasure, kept constantly before his eyes that he was in a foreign city.