Part 14

It will be asked, "What portion may be allowed?" Prudence will answer, "As much as you please, but not to disgust."

It is equally found in the senate-house, or the button-shop; the scene of action is the scene of pride; and I, unable to adorn this work with erudition, take a pride in cloathing a worn-out subject afresh, and that pride will increase, should the world smi ---- "But why, says my friend, do you forsake the title of your chapter, and lead us a dance through the mazes of pride? Can there be any connexion between that sovereign passion, and forging a bar of steel?" Yes, he who makes steel prides himself in carrying the art one step higher than he who makes iron.

This art appeared among us in the seventeenth century; was introduced by the family of Kettle. The name of Steelhouse-lane will convey to posterity the situation of the works, the commercial spirit of Birmingham, will convey the produce to the Antipodes.

From this warm, but dismal climate, issues the button, which shines on the breast, and the bayonet, intended to pierce it; the lancet, which bleeds the man, and the rowel, the horse; the lock, which preserves the beloved bottle, and the screw, to uncork it; the needle, equally obedient to the thimble and the pole.

NAILS.

In most occupations, the profit of the master and the journeyman bear a proportion: if the former is able to figure in genteel life, the latter is able to figure in silk stockings. If the matter can afford to allow upon his goods ten per cent. discount for money, the servant can afford to squander half his wages. In a worn-down trade, where the tides of profit are reduced to a low ebb, and where imprudence sets her foot upon the premises, the matter and the man starve together. Only half this is our present case.

The art of nail-making is one of the most ancient among us; we may safely charge its antiquity with four figures.

We cannot consider it a trade in, so much as of Birmingham; for we have but few nail-makers left in the town: our nailers are chiefly masters, and rather opulent. The manufacturers are so scattered round the country, that we cannot travel far, in any direction, out of the sound of the nail-hammer. But Birmingham, like a powerful magnet, draws the produce of the anvil to herself.

When I first approached her, from Walsall, in 1741, I was surprized at the prodigious number of blacksmiths shops upon the road; and could not conceive how a country, though populous, could support so many people of the same occupation. In some of these shops I observed one, or more females, stript of their upper garment, and not overcharged with their lower, wielding the hammer with all the grace of the sex. The beauties of their face were rather eclipsed by the smut of the anvil; or, in poetical phrase, the tincture of the forge had taken possession of those lips, which might have been taken by the kiss.

Struck with the novelty, I inquired, "Whether the ladies in this country shod horses?" but was answered, with a smile, "They are nailers."

A fire without heat, a nailer of a fair complexion, or one who despises the tankard, are equally rare among them. His whole system of faith may be comprised in one article--That the slender two-penny mug, used in a public house, is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.

While the master reaps the harvest of plenty, the workman submits to the scanty gleanings of penury, a thin habit, an early old age, and a figure bending towards the earth. Plenty comes not near his dwelling, except of rags, and of children. But few recruits arise from his nail-shop, except for the army. His hammer is worn into deep hollows, fitting the fingers of a dark and plump hand, hard as the timber it wears. His face, like the moon, is often seen through a cloud.

BELLOWS.

Man first catches the profession; the profession afterwards moulds the man.

In whatever profession we engage, we assume its character, become a part of it, vindicate its honor, its eminence, its antiquity; or feel a wound through its sides.

Though there may be no more pride in a minister of state, who opens a budget, than in a tinker who carries one, yet they equally contend for the honor of their trade.

Every man, from the attorney's clerk to the butcher's apprentice, feels his own honor, with that of his profession, wounded by travelling on foot. To be caught on his feet, is nearly the same as to be caught in a crime. The man who has gathered up his limbs, and hung them on a horse, looks down with dignity on him who has not; while the man on foot offers his humble bow, afraid to look up--If providence favours us with feet, is it a disgrace to use them?--I could instance a person who condescended to quit London, that center of trick, lace, and equipage; and in 1761, open a draper's shop in Birmingham: but his feet, or his pride, were so much hurt by walking, that he could scarcely travel ten doors from his own without a post-chaise--the result was, he became such an adept in riding, that in a few months, he rode triumphant into the Gazette. Being quickly scoured bright by the ill-judged laws of bankruptcy, he rode, for the last time, out of Birmingham, where he had so often rode in: but his injured creditors were obliged to walk after the slender dividend of eighteen pence in the pound. The man who can use his feet, is envied by him who cannot; and he, in turn, envies him who will not. Our health and our feet, in a double sense, go together. The human body has been justly compared to a musical instrument; I add, this instrument was never perfectly in tune, without a due portion of exercise.

The man of military character, puts on, with his scarlet, that martial air, which tells us, "he has formed a resolution to kill:" and we naturally ask, "Which sex?"

Some "pert and affected author" with anxiety on his brow, will be apt to step forward, and say, "Will you celebrate the man of the sword, who transfers the blush of his face to his back, and neglect the man of the quill, who, like the pelican, portions out his vitals to feed others? Which is preferable, he who lights up the mental powers, or he who puts them out? the man who stores the head with knowledge, or he who stores it with a bullet?"

The antiquarian supports his dignity with a solemn aspect; he treats a sin and a smile as synonimous; one half of which has been discarded from his childhood. If a smile in the house of religion, or of mourning, be absurd, is there any reason to expel it from those places where it is not? A tale will generally allow of two ingredients, information and amusement: but the historian and the antiquarian have, from time immemorial, used but one. Every smile, except that of contempt, is beneficial to the constitution; they tend to promote long life, and pleasure while that life lasts. Much may be said in favour of tears of joy, but more on joy without tears. I wonder the lively fancy of Hogarth never sketched the dull historian, in the figure of an ass, plodding to market under his panniers, laden with the fruits of antiquity, and old time driving up the rear, with his scythe converted into an hedge-stake.

The bellows-maker proclaims the honor of his art, by observing, he alone produces that instrument which commands the winds; his soft breeze, like that of the south, counter-acts the chill blasts of winter: by his efforts, like those of the sun, the world receives light: he creates when he pleases, and gives breath when he creates. In his caverns the winds deep at pleasure; and by his orders they set Europe in flames.

He pretends, that a gentle puff in the eyes of a reviewer, from a pair of his bellows, would tend to clear the sight, and enable him to distinguish between a smile and a serious face: that his circular board, like a ferula, applied by the handle to an inferior part, would induce him to peruse the whole treatise, and not partially pronounce from the preface.

He farther pretends, that the antiquity of his occupation will appear from the plenty of elm, once in the neighbourhood, but long cut up for his use: that the leather-market in Birmingham, for many ages, furnished him with sides; and though the manufacture of iron is allowed to be extremely ancient, yet the smith could not procure his heat without a blast, nor could that blast be raised without the bellows.

Two inferences arise from these remarks, that the antiquarian will frown on this little history; and that bellows-making is one of the oldest trades in Birmingham.

THREAD.

We, who reside in the interior parts of the kingdom, may observe the first traces of a river issue from its fountain; the current so extremely small, that if a bottle of liquor, distilled through the urinary vessels, was discharged into its course, it would manifestly augment the water, and quicken the stream: the reviving bottle, having added spirits to the man, seems to add spirits to the river.--If we pursue this river, winding through one hundred and thirty miles, we shall observe it collect strength as it runs, expand its borders, swell into consequence, employ multitudes of people, carry wealth in its bosom, and exactly resemble thread-making in Birmingham.

If we represent to our idea, a man able to employ three or four people, himself in an apron, one of the number; but being unable to write his name, shows his attachment to the christian religion, by signing the cross to receipts; whose method of book-keeping, like that of the publican, is a door and a lump of chalk; producing a book which none can peruse but himself: who, having manufactured 40lb. weight of thread, of divers colours, and rammed it into a pair of leather bags, something larger than a pair of boots, which we might deem the arms of his trade empaled; flung them on a horse, and placed himself on the top, by way of a crest; visits an adjacent market, to starve with his goods at a stall, or retail them to the mercer, nor return without the money--we shall see a thread-maker of 1652.

If we pursue this occupation, winding through the mazes of one hundred and thirty years, we shall see it enlarge its boundaries, multiply its people, increase its consequence and wealth, till 1782, when we behold the matter in possession of correct accounts, the apron thrown aside, the stall kicked over, the bags tossed into the garret, and the mercer overlooked in the grand prospect of exportation. We farther behold him take the lead in provincial concerns, step into his own carriage, and hold the king's commission as a magistrate.