GLIMPSES OF GLASGOW
Round the Cathedral clustered in olden times an ecclesiastical community. Some of its quaint gables and narrow streets still survive as in the winding Ladywell, which is to be seen from Duke Street. The way dips sharply to rise in the hillock upon which sits the Cathedral in ancient dignity. Once, as the artist reminds us, the fine edifice rose graciously from an assembly of unpretentious buildings. Ungenerously hemmed in by the buildings of today, the Cathedral's quiet solemnity remains still a proud possession.
Less in evidence than the frontage to George square, this aspect of the city chambers is familiar to every worthy citizen, for almost in its shadow is the doorway through which he passes to pay his rates. No doubt he is inspired by this high and proud arch of fine proportions which links the older portion of the municipal buildings to the new. A structure befitting the dignity of Glasgow, it consorts finely with its surroundings, one of the most satisfying architectural achievements of modern Glasgow.
One of those tidal streets that ebb and flow, not by the spell of the moon but by the caprice of city habits, Waterloo Street has its varied interests. At morning, at midday, at evening, it has its spates of hurrying business people; at night a theatre spills its crowd upon the roadway. Or, again, you may find it in repose, its line of taxis waiting for custom, and its spires pointing serenely to the sky a message remote from either money-making or pleasure-seeking.
To outsiders this is often the first glimpse of Glasgow, the square seen when they emerge from St Enoch railway station. A church having been demolished to make the square more spacious, they come upon its appearance of a continental open market-place, see for a moment a phase of the older town of a century age, against which is massed the opulent solidity of modern architecture, to be surrounded there by the clamorous bustle of Argyle Street and Buchanan Street at the heart of the city.
Poets who have written of triremes and of galleons laden with romantic merchandise might seek a subject as picturesque in the lorries that jog along the Broomielaw. From the docks they come with all the wealth of the Indies or America in barrels and sacks and packing cases; to the docks they go with the machinery and wool and manufactured goods of Glasgow. Strange seafaring men meander here, and some tang of the sea comes with the tide and the calls of sirens from the river. For at the Broomielaw the tide keeps a tryst with Glasgow’s great seagoing commerce.
Little has been preserved of Glasgow’s antiquity. Over the historic centre of the city have swept successive waves of prosperity. Only in odd corners linger traces of another day, old "closes" degenerated for the most part into sad impoverishment. There is quaintness about this staircase which in its happier times knew the swish of crinolines, but now has to be content with the voices of the wearers of shawls.
Flower sellers, in tartan shawls, stand daily beside their gay blooms and watch the pageant of Sauchiehall Street. They flaunt democracy in the face of the most luxurious of shop windows. Therein Glasgow glimpses Paris, for the cars sweep past brilliant shops rich with the fads and fashions and luxuries of the moment. On wide pavements stroll citizens young and old, allured by shops and picture houses, and the ever-fascinating spectacle of seeing one another. And ever and anon the trams and ‘buses boom past, bound for Loch Lomond. It is Glasgow’s gayest, brightest, and happiest street.
If enterprise by merchant princes has led the second city to greatness, that guidance has been strengthened by another factor, the solid, unceasing thrift of Glasgow people. From accumulations of small sums - from a shilling upwards! - millions of pounds have
been deposited to the credit of that democratic institution, the Glasgow Savings Bank. The head office, fittingly housed in Ingram Street, has an entrance that impresses by its spacious dignity. Irresistible indeed must be the impulse to enter that great doorway, a shilling in hand!
For the lover of city beauty as well as for the foot passenger has the suspension bridge been conveniently flung across the Clyde. Here, unperturbed by traffic, it is possible to see some of the glamour of the river. Of an evening a twilit quietude steals over its tidal reaches, lights begin to glisten upon the water, and a sentiment akin to Whistler's possesses the onlooker. Has not the artist sought something of that, too, in the silhouette of warehouses and tenements and the gracious sweep from arch to arch?
This curious byway, just east of Glasgow Cross, holds a Crimean War memory in its name. Of the hive of old closes that environed it originally, little is left. In its day it took the place, doubtless, of an older lane which saw kings and bishops, and Mary, Queen of Scots, herself, and heard the jingling of Claverhouse’s dragoons, the shots of Covenanters, the clash of Wallace’s sword, the very step, perhaps, of Prince Charlie. For the "pass" is at the heart of Glasgow’s historic past.
Alone among the suburbs to receive the favour of the artist's pencil, Pollokshaws deserves that by claims of antiquity. The Maxwell family have been lairds there since the thirteenth century. The sturdy little town hall of Pollokshaws was built in 1803, and "the 'shaws" was the envy of its neighbours for the elegance of its new assembly room. The effort made the burgh bankrupt to the tune of £969, 10s., But the debt was surmounted, and today Pollokshaws flourishes on a vastly more opulent scale.
William Cunningham, merchant, waxed rich in the American War of Independence. He bought up Virginian tobacco at 6d. a pound and sold it at 3s. 6d. Out of his fortune he built a mansion, and this was incorporated later in the Royal Exchange. Where his garden ran down to Queen Street was built a massive portico and a great hall behind it. There, in august solemnity, city men of substance pace in dignity and discuss the market reports. Outside stands the equestrian statue of the Duke of Wellington.
Nobly piled upon the hill, St Vincent Street United Free Church is the finest example of architecture in Glasgow. Alexander Thomson, who saw his vision completed in 1858, earned by devotion to classic art the epithet "Greek" Thomson. So full of power and dignity is this, the best of his churches, so exquisite in detail, and so just in proportions, that artists unite in reverence for his achievement. Characteristically Glasgow has, despite his wish, allowed the foreground to be cluttered with unworthy buildings. Even these cannot mask the fine ionic dignity of the columns, or the strength of his tower and its beauty against the sky.
From the assembly rooms which Charles Dickens opened with a racy speech in 1847, the athenaeum was transferred to the present building in 1887. Behind its dignified facade is contained an institution of civic versatility, ministering to literary interests and to educational needs with a club and a restaurant, and a little theatre; a syllabus of commercial classes, and, most important, a staff of professors who make it the centre of Glasgow’s musical study. By concerts, lectures, plays innumerable, its precincts have become hallowed to cultured interest.
Here is a remnant of that old town that had its trees and gardens, now engulfed in a sea of tenements. Outside stairs such as these, typical of the homelier Scots cottage building, link eighteenth century Glasgow with many a country town or fishing hamlet. They will linger but a little longer, to pass as their former dwellers, the handloom weavers, have gone. Almost forgotten already to common knowledge, they have to be sought by the artist who sees the sentiment of a simpler decade in their decay.
Colour abounds in this quarter where foregather the merchants of fruit. Carts and motors laden with produce for the shops rattle over the stones. Those picturesque characters, the street hawkers, muster with their hand-barrows, their shawls as vivid often as the fruit they sell. A pleasant aroma of oranges and fresh vegetables pervades Bell Street, bringing a hint, among the solemn buildings, of country gardens or sunny foreign groves.