The two street-sellers of old coats, waistcoats, and trousers, and of
boots and shoes, whose statements precede this account, confined their
trade, generally, to the second-hand merchandize I have mentioned as
more especially constituting their stock. But this arrangement does
not wholly prevail. There are many street-traders “in second-hand,”
perhaps two-thirds of the whole number, who sell indiscriminately
anything which they can buy, or what they hope to turn out an
advantage; but even they prefer to deal more in one particular kind of
merchandize than another, and this is most of all the case as concerns
the street-sale of old boots and shoes. Hats, however, are among the
second-hand wares which the street-seller rarely vends unconnected
with other stock. I was told that this might be owing to the hats sold
in the streets being usually suitable only for one class, grown men;
while clothes and boots and shoes are for boys as well as men. Caps may
supersede the use of hats, but nothing can supersede the use of boots
or shoes, which form the _steadiest_ second-hand street-trade of any.
There are, however, occasions, when a street-seller exerts himself to
become possessed of a cheap stock of hats, by the well-known process
of “taking a quantity,” and sells them without, or with but a small
admixture of other goods. One man who had been lately so occupied, gave
me the following account. He was of Irish parentage, but there was
little distinctive in his accent:--
“Hats,” he said, “are about the awkwardest things of any for the
streets. Do as you will, they require a deal of room, so that what
you’ll mostly see isn’t hats quite ready to put on your head and walk
away in, but to be made ready. I’ve sold hats that way though, I mean
ready to wear, and my father before me has sold hundreds--yes, I’ve
been in the trade all my life--and it’s the best way for a profit. You
get, perhaps, the old hat in, or you buy it at 1_d._ or 2_d._ as may
be, and so you kill two birds. But there’s very little of that trade
except on Saturday nights or Sunday mornings. People wants a decent
tile for Sundays and don’t care for work-days. I never hawks hats,
but I sells to those as do. My customers for hats are mechanics, with
an odd clerk or two. Yes, indeed, I sell hats now and then to my own
countrymen to go decent to mass in. I go to mass myself as often as
I can; sometimes I go to vespers. No, the Irish in this trade ain’t
so good in going to chapel as they ought, but it takes such a time;
not just while you’re there, but in shaving, and washing, and getting
ready. My wife helps me in selling second-hand things; she’s a better
hand than I am. I have two boys; they’re young yet, and I don’t know
what we shall bring them up to; perhaps to our own business; and
children seems to fall naturally into it, I think, when their fathers
and mothers is in it. They’re at school now.
“I have sold hats from 6_d._ to 3_s._ 6_d._, but very seldom 3_s._
6_d._ The 3_s._ 6_d._ ones would wear out two new gossamers, I know.
It’s seldom you see beaver hats in the street-trade now, they’re nearly
all silk. They say the beavers have got scarce in foreign parts where
they’re caught. I haven’t an idea how many hats I sell in a year,
for I don’t stick to hats, you see, sir, but I like doing in them as
well or better than in anything else. Sometimes I’ve sold nothing but
hats for weeks together, wholesale and retail that is. It’s only the
regular-shaped hats I can sell. If you offer swells’ hats, people’ll
say: ‘I may as well buy a new “wide-awake” at once.’ I have made
20_s._ in a week on hats alone. But if I confined my trade to them
now, I don’t suppose I could clear 5_s._ one week with another the
year through. It’s only the hawkers that can sell them in wet weather.
I wish we could sell under cover in all the places where there’s what
you call ‘street-markets.’ It would save poor people that lives by the
street many a twopence by their things not being spoiled, and by people
not heeding the rain to go and examine them.”