They are a puzzle, those Victorian ancestors, gazing through their beards stock-still to keep the image sharp. How did they move when the photographer had left, how uncomfortable were their bulky coats? The Airds found out. Charles (1831-1910) wrote a memoir in his retirement, and his grandson and great-granddaughter have piously transcribed and published it. The family memorials include the first Aswan Dam, the West Highland Railway, the sewers of Copenhagen and Berlin, and the gasworks at Kingston-upon-Thames. Here are the private thoughts and doings of one of those Scotsmen who literally built the Empire.
Less partial editors would have cut the boring bits, thought of a better title and generally smartened it up. That would have been a pity. The tale dives straight into childhood in the Phoenix Gas Company’s storeyard, beside the knacker’s where they cut up fallen horses into cat’smeat.
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