The number of tortoises sold in the streets of London is far greater
than might be imagined, for it is a creature of no utility, and one
which is inanimate in this country for half its life.
Of live tortoises, there are 20,000 annually imported from the port of
Mogadore in Morocco. They are not brought over, as are the parrots,
&c., of which I have spoken, for amusement or as private ventures of
the seamen, but are regularly consigned from Jewish houses in Mogadore,
to Jewish merchants in London. They are a freight of which little care
is taken, as they are brought over principally as ballast in the ship’s
hold, where they remain torpid.
The street-sellers of tortoises are costermongers of the smarter
class. Sometimes the vendors of shells and foreign birds “work” also
a few tortoises, and occasionally a wholesale dealer (the consignee
of the Jewish house in Africa) will send out his own servants to sell
barrow-loads of tortoises in the street on his own account. They are
regularly ranged on the barrows, and certainly present a curious
appearance--half-alive creatures as they are (when the weather is not
of the warmest), brought from another continent for sale by thousands
in the streets of London, and retention in the gardens and grounds of
our civic villas. Of the number imported, one-half, or 10,000, are
yearly sold in the streets by the several open-air dealers I have
mentioned. The wholesale price is from 4_s._ to 6_s._ the dozen; they
are retailed from 6_d._ to 1_s._, a very fine well-grown tortoise being
sometimes worth 2_s._ 6_d._ The mass, however, are sold at 6_d._ to
9_d._ each, but many fetch 1_s._ They are bought for children, and
to keep in gardens as I have said, and when properly fed on lettuce
leaves, spinach, and similar vegetables, or on white bread sopped in
water, will live a long time. If the tortoise be neglected in a garden,
and have no access to his favourite food, he will eat almost any
green thing which comes in his way, and so may commit ravages. During
the winter, and the later autumn and earlier spring, the tortoise is
torpid, and may be kept in a drawer or any recess, until the approach
of summer “thaws” him, as I heard it called.
Calculating the average price of tortoises in street-sale at 8_d._
each, we find upwards of 333_l._ thus expended yearly.