Various
Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 452
Our Bradshaw leaves us little to notice on the continent beyond the groups of railways included under the above four systems. The Dutch have given a curious serpentine line of railway, about 150 miles in length, from Rotterdam through Schiedam, Delft, The Hague, Leyden, Haarlem, Amsterdam, and Utrecht, to Arnhem—an economical mode of linking most of the chief towns together. Holstein, the recent field of struggle between the Danes and the Germans, has its humble quota of about 100 miles of railway, from Altona to Glückstadt, Rendsburg, and Kiel, connecting the German Ocean with the Baltic in a very convenient way. Russia has a railway in its Polish dominions from Warsaw to Cracow; a short bit from St Petersburg to Tsarkoé-soélo; portions of the projected great lines from St Petersburg to Moscow and to Warsaw, and a horse railway connecting the Don with the Volga. Italy has a few bits of railway—perhaps quite as much as we could yet expect in so strangely governed a country; one from Venice through Padua, Vicenza, and Verona, to Mantua; another from Treviglio to Milan, Monza, and Como; a Piedmontese line from Genoa to Alessandria and Turin; a Tuscan web which connects Florence, Sienna, Pistoja, Lucca, Pisa, and Leghorn, in a roundabout way; and a few miles of Neapolitan railway, to connect Naples with Pompeii, Portici, Castel-a-mare, and Capua. Rome, behindhand in most things, is behindhand in railways. Switzerland has its little railway of twenty-five miles, from Zurich to Baden. Spain has its two small lines, from Madrid to Aranjuez, and from Barcelona to Mataro. Turkey and Greece, in the south-east; Portugal, in the south-west; Sweden and Norway,1 in the bleak north, have yet to become members of the great European railway system.
In comparing all these continental railways with those of our own country, we find many instructive differences. In the first place, the engineering, as we lately remarked, is much less daring; there is not so much capital at command, and the engineers, therefore, bend to difficulties instead of cutting through them. Still, there are not wanting engineering works of great magnitude. One such is the great railway bridge over the Vistula, near Bromberg, the first stone of which was laid with much form by the king of Prussia some short time back, and which will form one link in the chain from Berlin to Königsberg. Another is the double railway bridge over the Elbe at Dresden, opened in April 1852, having a railway on its eastern half, and an ordinary roadway on its western. The stupendous Cologne Bridge will be for the future to talk about: at present, not a single railway bridge, we believe, crosses the Rhine; so that Western Europe is, in fact, not yet connected by the iron pathway with Eastern. Among the many thousand miles of continental railway, there must, of course, be numerous constructions of great skill and magnitude; but the ratio is small compared with those of England.
Another feature, is the great prevalence of single lines of rail. In England, there is so much wrangling against single lines, and so great a tendency among directors to think that there ought to be traffic enough for more, that double lines prevail almost everywhere. In the German railways, double lines are laid down only in places of great traffic—single lines being the rule, and the others the exception. Where there are only three or four departures per day, which is the case on most German railways, one line, with carefully-managed sidings, is amply sufficient. 'Express trains,' and 'first-class trains,' and 'special trains,' and anything which disturbs the steady jog-trot mode of proceeding, are very little known in Germany; the general speed, including stoppages, is about twenty miles an hour. Although the first-class fares are only a fraction above 1-1/2d. per mile, and the second-class just over 1d., yet the Germans travel so cheaply, and mix among each other with so little exclusiveness, that it is said only 3½ per cent. of the whole number of passengers travel by first-class, and 74 per cent. by third-class; the ratios in England being 14 and 46 per cent. respectively. One apparent effect of these very low fares is, that although the railways are for the most part cheaply constructed, the net profits are not supposed to exceed 3 per cent. on an average; but if the fares were higher, perhaps the number of passengers would be so reduced as to lessen the net profit.
Whatever else may be the superiority of English railways over those of the continent, assuredly it is not apparent in the carriages. The public press has made an onslaught on the English railway carriages for twenty years, but with very little success. Let those whose bones ache with the ill-conditioned wooden seats of our second-class carriages, think wishfully of the cushioned seats, and the easily-opened windows shielded with sun-blinds, and the useful hat-hooks found in many of the French second-class carriages; let those who shiver under English arrangements, think of the hot-water tin cases beneath the feet of the first-class French passengers; and let those who wish to be usefully employed while travelling, think of the little table, and the pen and ink, provided in some of the Prussian carriages. The truth is, we spend money on magnificent stations which ought to be expended on carriages. The cramped-up position of passengers on English railways is much reprobated by foreigners. In America, and in many parts of the continent, it is customary to have carriages long, broad, and high, with an avenue down the middle, and short seats for two persons each on either side of the avenue; every person looks towards the engine, and there is a plentiful supply of window on both sides. In America, these short seats are not only cushioned, but each seat has its two elbows and its cushioned back.
Another English annoyance, is the ticket-taking. If all the wrath which is poured out on the heads of the railway directors during this formality could take effect, they would be among the most miserable and unfortunate of mortals. Arrived at Euston Station, we will say, by the last train from the north—some sleepy, some hungry, and all tired—the passengers are anxious to wend their several ways as quickly as possible; instead of this, the train is brought to a stand-still, the man with his bull's-eye lantern pokes his head into one doorway after another, and all are kept waiting until all the tickets are collected. One passenger may have dropped his ticket, and then comes a search among the hat-boxes and carpet-bags beneath the seats; another may have underpaid his fare, or overridden the power of his ticket, and then occurs the fuss of paying up the difference; a third may be sleeping weariedly in the further corner of the carriage, and then comes the process of waking him, followed, perhaps, by a search for the ticket in an incalculable number of pockets. All this is nicely ill-managed! The larger size of many of the continental carriages, and the avenue through the centre, enable the ticket-taker to enter the carriage easily while the train is yet in motion, and to collect the tickets by the time of arrival at the station. On one of the Austrian railways, the carriages have an exterior gangway extending the whole length of the train, by which a guard can obtain easy access to all the passengers: shortly before arriving at a station, he enters the carriages, calls out the name of the station about to be approached, and takes the tickets of those who are to alight at that station. There is one oddity about the railway management abroad. In England, a railway smoker commits a high crime and misdemeanour, for which he is frowned at by his neighbours, and threatened by the guard; but on the continent, not only do the passengers smoke abundantly, but we were once rather struck at seeing a ticket-taker enter the carriage with a meerschaum in his mouth; one passenger, whose pipe was out, asked the customary German question: 'Haben sie feuer?' and the official gave him a light accordingly. We believe, however, that there is a wish at head-quarters to keep down this habit of smoking on the continental railways.
There are two sources of embarrassment which the Englishman is spared in his own country, but which press upon him in full force while travelling by rail abroad—namely, the different kinds of distance measurement, and the different kinds of money employed. Accustomed to English charges varying from three farthings to threepence per mile, he is frequently thrown out of his reckoning by the absence of miles abroad. The French kilomètre and the German meile are not English miles; the former equals 1093 yards, and is therefore a troublesome fraction of an English mile; while the German meile is as long as about four and a half English miles.
But this, however, is a minor inconvenience; for our 'Continental Bradshaw' gives most of the measurements in English miles. Not so in respect to the current coinage abroad. Although there was a 'railway congress' held a few years ago, to determine on a plan for facilitating the intercourse between country and country, yet this plan did not go so far as to assimilate the moneys of the different states; the tourist speedily discovers that this is the case, and he becomes perplexed with a multiplicity of cares. So long as he is in France or Belgium, the franc (9-1/2d.), with its multiples and submultiples, are easily managed; but when he gets beyond the Rhine, his troubles begin. If in Holland, he has to manage with the guilder (1s. 8d.) and its fractional parts in cents. If in the neighbourhood of Hamburg, he has to pay by means of the mark (14-1/2d.), and certain strange-looking schillings or skillings, of which sixteen equal one mark. Going south and east into Prussia, he finds the ruling coin to be the thaler (3s.), divisible into thirty groschen. and each of these into twelve pfennige; but if he be hovering in the frontiers of Prussia and Saxony, he will find that the neu-groschen of the latter country is worth a little more than the silber-groschen of the former, and that there is some difficulty in getting rid of either in the country of the other. Getting further south, to the regions belonging to or adjoining Austria, he will find his thalers and groschen no longer welcome; he has to attend to the florin (2s.), and its divisions into sixty kreutzers. If he travels north-east, to the few miles of railway yet existing in Poland, he will have to pay in rubles (3s. 3d.) and kopecks, which rank at 100 to the ruble. On the little Zurich and Baden Railway, the only one yet in Switzerland, our traveller meets again with his old acquaintance the franc; but this is worth 14-1/2d., instead of 9-1/2d., and, moreover, it is divided into ten batzen, each of which is worth ten rappen. If he crosses the Alps to Austrian Italy, he finds that his fare is reckoned in Austrian lire (about 8d.) In many cases, the different states take money from through passengers in the coin of either country; but the traveller who makes frequent stoppages, soon finds the embarrassment of the different moneys. A railway has lately been completed from Dresden to Prague—the capitals of the two kingdoms of Saxony and Bohemia—along the banks of the Elbe; it is no great distance, and yet the fees north of the frontier are charged in thalers and neu-groschen, while those south of it are in florins and kreutzers.
There have been very busy and important railway enterprises agreed upon or discussed within the last year or two, in various parts of the continent, which augur favourably for the future of Europe. We shall shortly pass these in review, to shew what may possibly be the aspect presented by the 'Continental Bradshaw' in 1862.
A SEARCH FOR ROBIN HOOD
The adventures of an amateur in search of a picture, of a foundling in search of his father, and even of a dog in search of his master, have been severally recorded by skilful pens for the amusement of the public. But, however entertaining or romantic these narratives may be considered, they can hardly surpass in interest the curious history which has just been disclosed of the adventures of an antiquary in search of a ballad-hero. We owe our knowledge of the facts to one of a series of Critical and Historical Tracts, by the Rev. Joseph Hunter, now in course of publication. Mr Hunter is an assistant-keeper of the public records, and is well known, by his other publications, as one of the most laborious and most judicious elucidators of mysterious passages in our national history. But the evidences of industry, of minute knowledge, and of logical acuteness, contained in his little treatise concerning 'the ballad-hero, Robin Hood,' are really surprising. The story of an obscure outlaw, who chased deer and took purses in a northern forest five hundred years ago, has been investigated with the painstaking sagacity of a Niebuhr; and a strong light has been unexpectedly thrown on the state of public sentiment and manners existing at that period. Mr Hunter, it is proper to say, dwells in his treatise chiefly upon results, and says little, and that very modestly, of the labours by which they were obtained. He even seems to fear that his subject may be considered trivial, and that he may possibly receive 'the censure of being one who busies himself with the mere playthings of antiquity.' Dr Percy, when he compiled his invaluable Reliques, had similar apprehensions, which were then not altogether groundless; but it may reasonably be hoped, that the race of pedants, who wondered how a man of learning could be interested in a bundle of old ballads, is now extinct.
Departing a little from the method and order observed by Mr Hunter in his tract, we will endeavour not only to state in a condensed form the remarkable conclusions at which he has arrived, but also to follow, as accurately as his references will enable us to do so, the ingenious processes of investigation which led to these results. The object of the inquiry was to determine, in the first place, whether such a person as Robin Hood ever existed; and, in the second place, to ascertain who and what he was, and to what extent the ballads of which he was the hero were based upon actual occurrences. What a vast amount of uncertainty there was to clear up, may be inferred from the wide differences of opinion among writers of the highest credit who preceded Mr Hunter in this inquiry. The celebrated historian of the Norman Conquest, M. Thierry, supposes Robin Hood to have been the chief of a small body of Saxons, who, in their forest strongholds, held out for a time against the domination of the Norman conquerors. On this point, as confessedly on others, the French historian seems to have derived his opinions from the suggestive scenes in Scott's splendid romance of Ivanhoe. Another writer conjectures, that the outlaws of whom Robin was the leader, may have been some of the adherents of Simon de Montfort, whose partisans were pursued to extremity after the fatal battle of Evesham, in the year 1264. Others, still, have denied altogether the existence, at any period, of such a person as Robin Hood. They make him either a mere hero of romance—the 'creation of some poetical mind;' or else, led by a similarity of names, they discover in him merely one of the embodiments of popular superstitions—a sylvan sprite, a Robin Goodfellow, or a Hudkin. Only two years ago, a historical writer of no small acumen, Mr Thomas Wright, published his opinion, that Robin Hood, in his original character, was simply 'one amongst the personages of the early mythology of the Teutonic people.'
But Mr Hunter could not concur in these views, or be satisfied with the mode of reasoning by which they were maintained. In his opinion, Robin Hood was neither a Saxon malcontent nor the hero of a poet's romance; nor yet was he 'a goblin or a myth.' He was, in all probability, exactly such a person as the popular songs described him—an English yeoman, an outlaw living in the woods, and noted for his skill in archery. Previous researches had proved, that many of our old ballads are merely rhyming records of historical events. Mr Hunter had already rescued one ballad-hero, Adam Bell, from the 'danger of being reduced to an abstraction or a myth;' and it now remained for him to undertake the same good office for a more renowned freebooter.
The first thing to be done was, of course, to examine carefully the ballads themselves, and to ascertain the amount and value of the evidence they afforded, as to the epoch and the real story of their hero. It appeared, then, that 'three single ballads are found in manuscript, which cannot be later than the fourteenth century.' There is also a poem of considerable length, entitled The Lytel Geste of Robyn Hood, which was printed by Winkyn de Worde, in or about the year 1495. It is 'a kind of life' of the outlaw, and is composed of several ballads, strung together by means of a few intermediate stanzas, which give continuity to the story. The language of these ballads is that of the preceding century—being, in fact, the same as that of the ballads in manuscript. Thus the date of the songs themselves is carried back as far as the fourteenth century. It is, moreover, in the middle of this century that the first allusion to Robin Hood occurs in any work of undoubted authority. In Longland's poem, entitled The Vision of Pierce Ploughman, the date of which is between 1355 and 1365, mention is made of 'rymes of Robyn Hood and Randolph Earl of Chester,' the outlaw and the earl being apparently both regarded as historical personages, about whom songs had been written. It may be observed, that if the Robin Hood ballads were much older than this date, it must be considered surprising that no earlier allusion to them should be found, since in the subsequent century they were referred to by many writers.
According to the story contained in the Lytel Geste, Robin Hood was at the head of a band of outlaws, who made their head-quarters in Bernysdale, or Barnesdale—once 'a woody and famous forest,' on the southern confines of Yorkshire, in the neighbourhood of Doncaster, Wakefield, and Pontefract; and who infested the woodlands and the highways from thence as far as Sherwood and Nottingham, near which ancient town some of their boldest exploits were performed. They slew the king's deer, and plundered rich travellers, but spared the humble, relieved the distressed, and were courteous to all who did not offend them.
Robyn was a proude outlaw
Whyles he walked on ground;
So curtyse an outlaw as he was one,
Was never none yfound.
All the ballads agree in ascribing to the outlaw chief a manly bearing and a generous disposition, such as might be expected to distinguish a respectable yeoman of a class somewhat above the ordinary, whom the fortune of war had driven from his home to a lawless life in the forest. That this was Robin Hood's condition, may be inferred from the general language of the ballads; but the important question is, whether any other testimony can be found to confirm this conjecture, and to give us any definite and authentic information about the fact. This is the question which Mr Hunter has undertaken to answer. The clue which first catches his experienced eye, is the name of an English king. One of the most remarkable adventures which the ballads record of Robin Hood, is his meeting with the king, who induced him, for a time, to take service in his household. The king, according to this authority, was exasperated with Robin and his men chiefly on account of the destruction which they had made of his deer. Finding that it was impossible to capture the outlaw by force, the king consented to practise a stratagem, suggested by a forester who was well acquainted with the outlaw's habits. He disguised himself as an abbot, and with five knights habited as monks, and a man leading sumpter-horses, rode into the greenwood. A wealthy abbot's baggage, and his ransom, would be just the bait most tempting to Robin and his men. The king, as he had expected, was seized by them, and led away to their lodge in the forest. The outlaws, however, behave courteously as usual; and when the abbot announces that he comes from the king at Nottingham, and brings a letter from his majesty, inviting Robin to come to that town, the latter receives the information joyously, and declares that 'he loves no man in all the world so well as he does his king.' Presently the monarch discovers himself, and the outlaw chief and his men kneel, and profess their loyalty—Robin at the same time asking for mercy for him and his. The king grants it on condition that Robin will leave the greenwood, and will come to court and enter his service. We quote the following after Mr Hunter, merely modernising the orthography:—
'Yes, fore God!' then said our king,
'Thy petition I grant thee,
With that thou leave the greenwood,
And all thy company;
'And come home, sir, to my court,
And there dwell with me.'
'I make mine avow to God,' said Robin,
'And right so shall it be:
'I will come to your court
Your service for to see.'
Accordingly, Robin left the greenwood and his company, entered the king's household, went with him to the court at London, and remained in his service for a year and three months. Having by that time become weary of this uncongenial mode of life, he obtained permission from the king to pay a visit to his old residence at Barnesdale. Here he resumes once more his former way of life 'under the greenwood-tree,' and becomes again chief of the outlaws of Barnesdale and Sherwood.