Complete New Tales of Para Handy (33 page)

F
ACTNOTE

The Bute Tramway was in existence for more than half-a-century, the first two miles of track being opened in 1882 between Rothesay and Port Bannatyne. For the first 20 years of its operations the service was provided by horse-drawn vehicles which took about an hour on the round trip. Though the initial impetus for its construction came from its role as a tourist attraction (Rothesay was then just about to enter its zenith years as the number one tourism mecca on the Firth) the service ran year round.

In due course, the winter operations were being provided by specially constructed enclosed vehicles, whereas the summer service (somewhat optimistically!) was always maintained by open-top carriages.

In 1902, the service was electrified. This involved closing it down completely for a few months to allow the necessary conversion to be carried out, before the new tramway opened for business in May of that year. Some three-quarters of a million passengers were carried annually at its peak, and there were 22 trams in service.

In 1905, following years of planning and discussion, the line was extended to provide a summer season service to the fine sands of Ettrick Bay on the south side of the island and though there was occasional talk of further extensions, none actually came to reality.

The tramway finally closed down in 1936, the victim of the expansion of more comfortable and reliable coach and charabanc service.

Most of the vehicles for the Rothesay tramway were indeed brought to Bute by pairs of puffers or lighters lashed together to provide the necessary beam, this being the most practical and above all the most economical way of transporting such a bulky and awkward cargo.

The limestone cargoes referred to earlier were confirmed by most puffer crews as their real bete-noir. The loading and unloading process kicked up a positive stour of clinging dust which got into clothes, hair, lungs, and pervaded every nook and cranny aboard the boats.

By comparison, carrying a couple of tramcars down river really must have seemed like a relaxing holiday — especially since it would not have involved any back-breaking work with the steam winch or the shovel!

R
OTHESAY
T
RAM
T
ERMINUS
— Here is the town terminus for the Bute Tramways at Guildford Square, Rothesay, with one of the new electric vehicles loading holidaymakers for Port Bannatyne and Ettrick Bay. To the left lies the inner harbour, destination and berthing place for the numerous puffers which served the island community, but it was unfortunately empty of shipping the day this photograph was taken.

28

The Cargo of Cement

S
unny Jim had been sent up on deck to bring back a report about the weather as soon as the battered old alarm clock (the only item of any ornamental pretension in the fo'c'sle) had gone off as usual at seven o'clock.

“Sorry boys,” he said as he returned. “It's rainin' as hard as ever, and no sign of a break in the sky at all.”

The
Vital Spark
had lain at Berry's Pier on Loch Striven for four days now and, though the month was May, the rain had been unrelenting for nearly 96 solid hours. The tops of the hills in Cowal to the north and on the Kyles to the south were embedded head first, as it were, in the base of low grey clouds which pressed down to within a few hundred feet of the surface of the loch.

“Still rainin' on!” complained Para Handy, swinging his feet out of his bunk and reaching for his shirt. “I have neffer known weather like it and I am fair at the end of my tether wi' it aal.

“I shall go and talk to the builders again. We cannot lie here for effer and a day. What the owner must be thinkin' I hate to imachine. With there bein' no telephone in the big hoose for us to get a message to him, he'll be thinkin' that we iss aal lost at sea, and his shup wi' us!”

Their enforced idleness had been caused by a combination of the constant rain, the nature of their cargo — and a very cautious clerk-of-works. The ‘big house' at Glenstriven was in process of having some amenities added before the annual summer visit of its owners, a Glasgow merchant and his family.

Chief amongst these was the building of a large new boathouse beside the pier which served the estate: and the construction of a substantial flagstoned terrace at the front of the house, as a necessary adjunct to the quite unheard-of extravagance of the small outdoor swimming pool which had been installed there only the previous year.

The paving stones, bricks, tiles and miscellaneous items of hardware for these works had been delivered by the puffer the previous Thursday — together with the building squad, who had spent the weekend carting sand and pebbles from the nearby beaches to the site of operations. On Monday, the puffer had returned from the Broomielaw with the last and most important ingredient in the recipe — the bags of the cement itself.

And that, so far as the supervising agent of the contract was concerned, was the problem.

Cement.

Despite the skipper's assurances that they had trans-shipped such a cargo successfully many times in the past and that the specially-treated bags were rain-proof, the clerk-of-works, terrified of the effects of such an unending downpour on his precious cement, had refused point-blank to countenance its unloading till the rain had stopped. That was Monday. And today was Friday.

Thus the hatch on the puffer's hold was undisturbed. The heavy tarpaulin across it was still fastened down tightly, and the bag of rope netting which would transfer the cargo to a waiting horse and cart on the pier hung idle from the derrick.

On the puffer, the crew sat fuming in the fo'c'sle and getting ever more short-tempered with each other: ashore, the builders huddled under the leaking canvas roof of their ramshackle bothy and wished they were back in Glasgow.

And both sets of disgruntled and frustrated men individually and collectively cursed the clerk-of-works — who was himself safely ensconced in the considerable comfort of the staff wing at the big house, courtesy of the estate factor, though to the dismay of the domestic staff who were expected to look after his needs.

“He still insists that the bags would chust turn ass solid ass a rock,” Para Handy protested as he climbed back down into the fo'c'sle and hung his dipping oilskins over a line stretched across the deck-beams next to the chimney of the iron stove in the fore-peak.

“To the duvvle,” said Macphail with feeling. “Is your word no' good enough for the man, Peter?”

“He wuddna' believe it even if it wass written in the Good Book itself,” said the skipper bitterly. “He iss that nervous for his chob. We must chust thole it oot for another day, boys, and see what comes.

“At least though we can get a wee break, for when I telt him we wass low on proveesions, instead of offerin' food from the big hoose, ass any Chrustian wud do, he chust said we could tak' a trup ower to Rothesay and stock up.”

Within a short space of time, Macphail had steam up, and the puffer eased out from Berry's Pier for the crossing to the capital of Bute. Though the rain still swept mercilessly out of a grey sky, the prospect of a change of scenery, the chance of some company, and the promise of a quiet dram, went a long way to brightening the day for the crew.

For once, their optimism was not to be disappointed.

The owner, when Para Handy telegraphed his office to report on their problems and their whereabouts, was sufficiently moved by their plight to wire some money to them at once, care of the Rothesay Post Office.

Though this was probably through a sense of relief at learning that his investment was not lost with all hands somewhere off the Cumbraes, it at least made possible a re-stocking of the
Vital Spark
's larder, and a welcome refreshment for the crew before they re-embarked for the return crossing to their berth in Loch Striven.

As the puffer edged in to Berry's Pier, two things immediately became apparent.

Firstly, the clerk-of-works was to be seen, waiting for them on the pier — and in a very agitated state.

Secondly, the rain had stopped for the first time in four days and though it seemed that the respite would be brief (for dark, laden clouds were rolling in from the south west) it was at least a break from the monotonous deluge which they had tholed for so long.

The reason for the clerk-of-work's agitation was soon made clear. Dunoon Telegraph Office had delivered a wire from the owner of the big house, advising the factor and the steward that his three sons, with a dozen or more of their friends, would be arriving at Berry's Pier on a chartered steam launch at six o'clock that evening, intending to spend the weekend at the house.

“You'll have to move the boat immediately,” cried the frantic clerk-of-works. “They will need to berth the launch here and, besides, we cannot have the loch frontage of Glenstriven marred by the spectacle of a steam-gabbart at the pier.”

Para Handy was with some difficulty restrained by the engineer and eventually was able to point out that he had a cargo for delivery here, it was still aboard, and he had no intention of leaving until it was safely ashore.

“The fact that it iss not,” he concluded, “iss entirely your own fault, Mr Patullo, and I would be grateful if you would chust remember that before you miscall the shup!”

The wretched Patullo wrung his hands. “But we've got to get the boat away — and my gang, too, if you'll give them passage back to Glasgow. The gentry will want the place to themselves for the weekend.”

“Well,” said Para Handy. “Get my cargo off the shup, and we'll can do that for you. But so long ass my cargo iss aboard — here I stay!”

“But how can I do that,” protested the clerk-of-works. “It may be dry enough to unload ye noo — but the weather for the weekend looks set to continue wet, and I've no place to store the cement under cover.

“Captain,” said Sunny Jim suddenly. “I think we can maybe sort this all oot…”