The Recreations of a Country ParsonBoyd, Andrew Kennedy Hutchison
General
The Recreations of a Country Parson
Boyd, Andrew Kennedy Hutchison
Clergy -- Anecdotes; Country life -- England; Rural clergy -- England
Everybody everywhere of course longs for the country, the sea-side,
change of air and scene, at some period during the year. Almost every
man of the wealthier and more cultivated class in this country has
a vacation, longer or shorter. But there never was a city whence the
annual migration to the sea-side is so universal or so protracted
as it is from Glasgow. By the month of March in each year, every
house along the coast within forty miles of Glasgow is let for the
season at a rent which we should say must be highly remunerative.
Many families go to the coast early in May, and every one is down
the water by the first of June. Most people now stay till the end
of September. The months of June and July form what is called 'the
first season;' August and September are 'the second season.' Until
within the last few years, one of these 'seasons' was thought to
furnish a Glasgow family with vigour and buoyancy sufficient to
face the winter, but now almost all who can afford it stay at the
sea-side during both. And from the little we have seen of Glasgow,
we do not wonder that such should be the case. No doubt Glasgow is
a fine city on the whole. The Trongate is a noble street; the park
on the banks of the Kelvin, laid out by Sir Joseph Paxton, furnishes
some pleasant walks; the Sauchyhall-road is an agreeable promenade;
Claremont, Crescent and Park Gardens consist of houses which would
be of the first class even in Belgravia or Tyburnia; and from the
West-end streets, there are prospects of valley and mountain which
are worth going some distance to see. But the atmosphere, though
comparatively free from smoke, wants the exhilarating freshness of
breezes just arrived from the Atlantic. The sun does not set in
such glory beyond Gilmore-hill, as behind the glowing granite of
Goatfell; and the trunks of the trees round Glasgow are (if truth
must be spoken) a good deal blacker than might be desired, while
their leaves are somewhat shrivelled up by the chemical gales of
St. Rollox. No wonder, then, that the purest of pure air, the bluest
of blue waves, the most picturesque of noble hills, the most purple
of heather, the greenest of ivy, the thickest of oak-leaves, the
most fragrant of roses and honeysuckle, should fairly smash poor
old Glasgow during the summer months, and leave her not a leg to
stand on.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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