Thrifty Scotsmen and their Funerals

But the case of Scotland, our own country, is a much more emphatic illustration of this than any particular Savings Bank in however large a town it may be situated. In Scotland the eighteenth century, the time of perhaps her direst poverty, at any rate as compared with other countries in the world, was the period of our greatest thrift, A hundred and forty years ago there were probably not more than two or three hundred thousand pounds of current coin in the whole of Scotland; and when you compare that with the fourteen millions of deposits in the two Savings Banks of Edinburgh and Glasgow you may arrive at some computation of what the difference of prosperity is between the Scotland of to-day and the Scotland of that day. But that was the time of Scotland's greatest thrift, this time when her whole current coinage did not amount, as it is calculated, to £300,000—so much so that in these days we read that the one great object of a Scottish peasant was thrift, not for the sake of livelihood but for the sake of his funeral—(laughter)—to amass enough money to obtain a decent funeral, which was calculated at, I think, about £2. This patient and self-denying people page 9 amassed enough for what after all is the most insignificant event in our lives—toiled and spun and spared themselves for that purpose. Much more than that, they maintained their own aged, their own parents, their own relations. They thought it shame to take any money from the public or the State. (Applause.) They had a spirit of independence, which is at least equal to any spirit of independence which we boast of now. They scorned to take assistance, they scorned that any should maintain their families but themselves. They gave a little surplus in charity, for there were plenty of recipients in the beggars and tinkers on the road. But the nation at large was thrifty, independent, self-respecting to a degree perhaps known in no other nation at no other period in the world. (Applause.) Why, sir, when things were in this impoverished state in Scotland the Scottish people were a source of terror to their southern countrymen.