HELP! HELP FOR MOTHER SCOTLAND.

[Currie]

While rummaging through the newspapers I found this poem. It was in the Glasgow Herald on Wednesday, February 19, 1879.


HELP! HELP FOR MOTHER SCOTLAND.

My dear old Mother Scotland,
'Tis hard to see thee lie
In grief and anguish on the ground,
Thy children passing by,
While blinding snow is falling
From the black and leaden sky.

How can thy sons and daughters
Who lay upon thy breast,
And clustered close around thee
Like birdlings in their nest,
How can they pass and leave thee
In this dishonoured rest?

My dear old Mother Scotland,
Pour out thy griefs to me,
I am thy child, thy daughter,
And will not let thee be,
We'll weep our tears together
And that may comfort thee.

Ah! now I hear thee murmur,
But I can only trace
Among thy sobs one single word,
The bitter word Disgrace,
And a burning blush is mantling
Thy dear old faded face.

Alas! my dear old mother,
Disgrace is hard to bear,
For thee whose heart was stainless
As thine own silver hair;
Who sat among the nations
Retired, and pure and fair.

Who could have thought that thine own sons
Had been the first to shame
Thy grand old fearless forehead,
Thy unpolluted name,
And in the dust to drag and trail
The banners of thy fame?

Who could have thought that thine own sons
Thy tender heart would tear,
And crush and paralyse these limbs
That once were strong and fair,
Until thy cries of agony
Filled all the wintry air.

My dear old Mother Scotland,
So hungry, wet, and cold,
Couldst thou be raised and cherished,
And purified like gold,
Thou'dst shine in rarer splendour
Than thou hast done of old.

And, dear old Mother Scotland,
Thine eyes of heavenly blue
Would look the nations in the face
As they were wont to do,
And thou be known, as thou hast been,
The trusted and the true.

Nay! Nay! my dear old mother,
Thy days are not nigh done,
There is so much before thee
That thy life is but begun,
For art thou not immortal
As the stars and as the sun?

But, ah! my dear old mother,
Thy wounds are bleeding still—
Will no one bring some healing balm
To stanch the purple rill
That thy chill veins may feel again
Glad life's returning thrill?

My dear old Mother Scotland,
Too weak to raise thee, I
Can only kneel beside thee
And weep, and wail, and cry—
Help! help our Mother Scotland.
Help! help! Ye passers by.

MARY M. BEGG,
Glasgow, 13th February, 1879.



My first reaction after reading it was ‘What was she on about!’ Could it have been anything to do with the collapse, just a few months before, of the City of Glasgow Bank which resulted in many folk being badly hurt financially, and caused the bank’s directors to be locked up in the slammer? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Glasgow_Bank

It seems to me as though bankers could easily travel in time backward or forward a couple of centuries and fit perfectly into the same job no trouble at all.

The author of this poem may have been Mary Millar Begg, a Glasgow poet of about that era. Does anybody know if there was anything else happened around then that may have inspired her to write it?

Alan

[Hibee]

Hi Alan

I think you may be correct. The last British banking collapse....until 2008.

Hibee

[SarahND]

Hi Alan and Hibee,
All sounds eerily familiar, doesn't it? I don't think humans change that much over time…

Mary Millar seems to have been the wife of Hugh Alexander Begg, a manufacturer according to the 1891 and 1901 censuses, probably in the garment industry (in 1881 he was a wholesale shirtmaker employing 40 persons, 3 men & 37 women). I wonder if he lost a fortune in the bank crash?

In 1871, before she married, she was living in the household of her sister and brother-in-law in Glasgow. The brother-in-law, James Clark, was a banker… So she may well have had a very personal interest in the City of Glasgow Bank!

Regards,
Sarah

[nelmit]

I think you're right Alan.

I'm sure you'll have seen he lengthy report of the trial (and a few smaller reports re liquidation) in the Glasgow Herald in January 1879 just before Mary's poem was published.

Nothing changes right enough.

Regards,
Annette

[Currie]

Thanks everyone,

She sounded pretty emotional about it all. Chances are the bank collapse did have some impact on her family, as Sarah suggested.

All the best,
Alan

[Falkyrn]

The Collapse of the Glasgow Bank had a major impact at the time as it was one of the largest savings Banks in Scotland with 133 branches throughout the country holding over £8 million pounds in deposits (roughly equivalent to around £500 million today). The shareholders not only lost their shares but huge penalties were imposed upon them making many previously well to do families bankrupt.

[Alan SHARP]

Hi Alan

I think you may be correct. The last British banking collapse....until 2008.

Hibee

Thanks Alan for the poem quote.

Hibee - I was aware that the early 1980's "British Banking Collapse" had huge ramifications on the raising of loans for the capital development of New Zealand, [both Government and private] but never really lumped the Glasgow Bank/s in with that, as nearly always the references are to England or UK banks. In hind site how naive of me.

Alan SHARP.