Ebook The King of Andaman

Ilkastane is now built about with houses of the genteel villa description, possessing bow-windows, door-bells, iron railings, a Shrub or two, and all the other tokens Of respecta bility. It is now practically one in life and interest, as it is one in corporation, with the busy city of Inverdoon. But in the year 1848 it was a wretched and rather remote suburb, the thread of whose connection with the city, both in life and interest, was of extreme tenuity. The year '48 is mem orable in home annals for the final, desperate, and unsuc cessful attempt of the Chartists to compel attention to their demands by other than moral force. None had been more reckless, and none felt their failure more keenly than the Chartist weavers of Ilkastane. There were other crafts folk there besides weavers who were Chartists, but the suburb was so distinctively a weaving community, and Weaving seemed so inseparable from Chartism, that weaver and Chartist were synonymous — at least, in the timid and prejudiced view Of the neighbouring townspeople.