suffocation at least an hour before the theatre is opened; but, on the
occasion of a piece with a good murder in it, the crowd will frequently
collect as early as three o’clock in the afternoon. Lads stand upon the
broad wooden bannisters about 50 feet from the ground, and jump on each
others’ backs, or adopt any expedient they can think of to obtain a
good place.
The walls of the well-staircase having a remarkably fine echo, and the
wooden floor of the steps serving as a sounding board, the shouting,
whistling, and quarrelling of the impatient young costers is increased
tenfold. If, as sometimes happens, a song with a chorus is started,
the ears positively ache with the din, and when the chant has finished
it seems as though a sudden silence had fallen on the people. To the
centre of the road, and all round the door, the mob is in a ferment of
excitement, and no sooner is the money-taker at his post than the most
frightful rush takes place, every one heaving with his shoulder at the
back of the person immediately in front of him. The girls shriek, men
shout, and a nervous fear is felt lest the massive staircase should
fall in with the weight of the throng, as it lately did with the most
terrible results. If a hat tumbles from the top of the staircase, a
hundred hands snatch at it as it descends. When it is caught a voice
roars above the tumult, “All right, Bill, I’ve got it”--for they all
seem to know one another--“Keep us a pitch and I’ll bring it.”
To any one unaccustomed to be pressed flat it would be impossible
to enter with the mob. To see the sight in the gallery it is better
to wait until the first piece is over. The ham-sandwich men and
pig-trotter women will give you notice when the time is come, for with
the first clatter of the descending footsteps they commence their cries.
There are few grown-up men that go to the “Vic” gallery. The generality
of the visitors are lads from about twelve to three-and-twenty, and
though a few black-faced sweeps or whitey-brown dustmen may be among
the throng, the gallery audience consists mainly of costermongers.
Young girls, too, are very plentiful, only one-third of whom now take
their babies, owing to the new regulation of charging half-price for
infants. At the foot of the staircase stands a group of boys begging
for the return checks, which they sell again for 1-1/2_d._ or 1_d._,
according to the lateness of the hour.
At each step up the well-staircase the warmth and stench increase,
until by the time one reaches the gallery doorway, a furnace-heat
rushes out through the entrance that seems to force you backwards,
whilst the odour positively prevents respiration. The mob on the
landing, standing on tiptoe and closely wedged together, resists any
civil attempt at gaining a glimpse of the stage, and yet a coster lad
will rush up, elbow his way into the crowd, then jump up on to the
shoulders of those before him, and suddenly disappear into the body of
the gallery.
The gallery at “the Vic” is one of the largest in London. It will hold
from 1500 to 2000 people, and runs back to so great a distance, that
the end of it is lost in shadow, excepting where the little gas-jets,
against the wall, light up the two or three faces around them. When the
gallery is well packed, it is usual to see piles of boys on each others
shoulders at the back, while on the partition boards, dividing off the
slips, lads will pitch themselves, despite the spikes.
As you look up the vast slanting mass of heads from the upper boxes,
each one appears on the move. The huge black heap, dotted with faces,
and spotted with white shirt sleeves, almost pains the eye to look at,
and should a clapping of hands commence, the twinkling nearly blinds
you. It is the fashion with the mob to take off their coats; and the
cross-braces on the backs of some, and the bare shoulders peeping out
of the ragged shirts of others, are the only variety to be found. The
bonnets of the “ladies” are hung over the iron railing in front, their
numbers nearly hiding the panels, and one of the amusements of the lads
in the back seats consists in pitching orange peel or nutshells into
them, a good aim being rewarded with a shout of laughter.
When the orchestra begins playing, before “the gods” have settled into
their seats, it is impossible to hear a note of music. The puffed-out
cheeks of the trumpeters, and the raised drumsticks tell you that the
overture has commenced, but no tune is to be heard. An occasional burst
of the full band being caught by gushes, as if a high wind were raging.
Recognitions take place every moment, and “Bill Smith” is called to
in a loud voice from one side, and a shout in answer from the other
asks “What’s up?” Or family secrets are revealed, and “Bob Triller” is
asked where “Sal” is, and replies amid a roar of laughter, that she is
“a-larning the pynanney.”
By-and-by a youngster, who has come in late, jumps up over the
shoulders at the door, and doubling himself into a ball, rolls down
over the heads in front, leaving a trail of commotion for each one
as he passes aims a blow at the fellow. Presently a fight is sure to
begin, and then every one rises from his seat whistling and shouting;
three or four pairs of arms fall to, the audience waving their hands
till the moving mass seems like microscopic eels in paste. But the
commotion ceases suddenly on the rising of the curtain, and then the
cries of “Silence!” “Ord-a-a-r!” “Ord-a-a-r!” make more noise than ever.
The “Vic” gallery is not to be moved by touching sentiment. They prefer
vigorous exercise to any emotional speech. “The Child of the Storm’s”
declaration that she would share her father’s “death or imprisonment
as her duty,” had no effect at all, compared with the split in the
hornpipe. The shrill whistling and brayvos that followed the tar’s
performance showed how highly it was relished, and one “god” went so
far as to ask “how it was done.” The comic actor kicking a dozen Polish
peasants was encored, but the grand banquet of the Czar of all the
Russias only produced merriment, and a request that he would “give them
a bit” was made directly the Emperor took the willow-patterned plate in
his hand. All affecting situations were sure to be interrupted by cries
of “orda-a-r;” and the lady begging for her father’s life was told to
“speak up old gal;” though when the heroine of the “dummestic dreamer”
(as they call it) told the general of all the Cossack forces “not to be
a fool,” the uproar of approbation grew greater than ever,--and when
the lady turned up her swan’s-down cuffs, and seizing four Russian
soldiers shook them successively by the collar, then the enthusiasm
knew no bounds, and the cries of “Bray-vo Vincent! Go it my tulip!”
resounded from every throat.
Altogether the gallery audience do not seem to be of a gentle nature.
One poor little lad shouted out in a crying tone, “that he couldn’t
see,” and instantly a dozen voices demanded “that he should be thrown
over.”
Whilst the pieces are going on, brown, flat bottles are frequently
raised to the mouth, and between the acts a man with a tin can,
glittering in the gas-light, goes round crying, “Port-a-a-a-r! who’s
for port-a-a-a-r.” As the heat increased the faces grew bright red,
every bonnet was taken off, and ladies could be seen wiping the
perspiration from their cheeks with the play-bills.
No delay between the pieces will be allowed, and should the
interval appear too long, some one will shout out--referring to the
curtain--“Pull up that there winder blind!” or they will call to the
orchestra, saying, “Now then you catgut-scrapers! Let’s have a ha’purth
of liveliness.” Neither will they suffer a play to proceed until they
have a good view of the stage, and “Higher the blue,” is constantly
shouted, when the sky is too low, or “Light up the moon,” when the
transparency is rather dim.
The dances and comic songs, between the pieces, are liked better than
anything else. A highland fling is certain to be repeated, and a
stamping of feet will accompany the tune, and a shrill whistling, keep
time through the entire performance.
But the grand hit of the evening is always when a song is sung to which
the entire gallery can join in chorus. Then a deep silence prevails
all through the stanzas. Should any burst in before his time, a shout
of “orda-a-r” is raised, and the intruder put down by a thousand
indignant cries. At the proper time, however, the throats of the mob
burst forth in all their strength. The most deafening noise breaks
out suddenly, while the cat-calls keep up the tune, and an imitation
of a dozen Mr. Punches squeak out the words. Some actors at the minor
theatres make a great point of this, and in the bill upon the night of
my visit, under the title of “There’s a good time coming, boys,” there
was printed, “assisted by the most numerous and effective chorus in
the metropolis--” meaning the whole of the gallery. The singer himself
started the mob, saying, “Now then, the Exeter Hall touch if you please
gentlemen,” and beat time with his hand, parodying M. Jullien with
his _baton_. An “angcore” on such occasions is always demanded, and,
despite a few murmurs of “change it to ‘Duck-legged Dick,’” invariably
insisted on.
THE POLITICS OF COSTERMONGERS.--POLICEMEN.
The notion of the police is so intimately blended with what may be
called the politics of the costermongers that I give them together.
The politics of these people are detailed in a few words--they
are nearly all Chartists. “You might say, sir,” remarked one of
my informants, “that they _all_ were Chartists, but as its better
you should rather be under than over the mark, say _nearly_ all.”
Their ignorance, and their being impulsive, makes them a dangerous
class. I am assured that in every district where the costermongers
are congregated, one or two of the body, more intelligent than the
others, have great influence over them; and these leading men are all
Chartists, and being industrious and not unprosperous persons, their
pecuniary and intellectual superiority cause them to be regarded
as oracles. One of these men said to me: “The costers think that
working-men know best, and so they have confidence in us. I like to
make men discontented, and I will make them discontented while the
present system continues, because it’s all for the middle and the
moneyed classes, and nothing, in the way of rights, for the poor.
People fancy when all’s quiet that all’s stagnating. Propagandism is
going on for all that. It’s when all’s quiet that the seed’s a growing.
Republicans and Socialists are pressing their doctrines.”
The costermongers have very vague notions of an aristocracy; they call
the more prosperous of their own body “aristocrats.” Their notions of
an aristocracy of birth or wealth seem to be formed on their opinion of
the rich, or reputed rich salesmen with whom they deal; and the result
is anything but favourable to the nobility.
Concerning free-trade, nothing, I am told, can check the costermongers’
fervour for a cheap loaf. A Chartist costermonger told me that he
knew numbers of costers who were keen Chartists without understanding
anything about the six points.
The costermongers frequently attend political meetings, going there
in bodies of from six to twelve. Some of them, I learned, could not
understand why Chartist leaders exhorted them to peace and quietness,
when they might as well fight it out with the police at once. The
costers boast, moreover, that they stick more together in any “row”
than any other class. It is considered by them a reflection on the
character of the thieves that they are seldom true to one another.
It is a matter of marvel to many of this class that people can live
without working. The ignorant costers have no knowledge of “property,”
or “income,” and conclude that the non-workers all live out of the
taxes. Of the taxes generally they judge from their knowledge that
tobacco, which they account a necessary of life, pays 3_s._ per lb.
duty.
As regards the police, the hatred of a costermonger to a “peeler” is
intense, and with their opinion of the police, all the more ignorant
unite that of the governing power. “Can you wonder at it, sir,” said a
costermonger to me, “that I hate the police? They drive us about, we
must move on, we can’t stand here, and we can’t pitch there. But if
we’re cracked up, that is if we’re forced to go into the Union (I’ve
known it both at Clerkenwell and the City of London workhouses,) why
the parish gives us money to buy a barrow, or a shallow, or to hire
them, and leave the house and start for ourselves: and what’s the use
of that, if the police won’t let us sell our goods?--Which is right,
the parish or the police?”
To thwart the police in any measure the costermongers readily aid
one another. One very common procedure, if the policeman has seized
a barrow, is to whip off a wheel, while the officers have gone for
assistance; for a large and loaded barrow requires two men to convey it
to the green-yard. This is done with great dexterity; and the next step
is to dispose of the stock to any passing costers, or to any “standing”
in the neighbourhood, and it is honestly accounted for. The policemen,
on their return, find an empty, and unwheelable barrow, which they must
carry off by main strength, amid the jeers of the populace.
I am assured that in case of a political riot every “coster” would
seize his policeman.
MARRIAGE AND CONCUBINAGE OF COSTERMONGERS.
Only one-tenth--at the outside one-tenth--of the couples living
together and carrying on the costermongering trade, are married. In
Clerkenwell parish, however, where the number of married couples is
about a fifth of the whole, this difference is easily accounted for,
as in Advent and Easter the incumbent of that parish marries poor
couples without a fee. Of the rights of “legitimate” or “illegitimate”
children the costermongers understand nothing, and account it a mere
waste of money and time to go through the ceremony of wedlock when a
pair can live together, and be quite as well regarded by their fellows,
without it. The married women associate with the unmarried mothers of
families without the slightest scruple. There is no honour attached
to the marriage state, and no shame to concubinage. Neither are the
unmarried women less faithful to their “partners” than the married; but
I understand that, of the two classes, the unmarried betray the most
jealousy.
As regards the fidelity of these women I was assured that, “in anything
like good times,” they were rigidly faithful to their husbands or
paramours; but that, in the worst pinch of poverty, a departure
from this fidelity--if it provided a few meals or a fire--was not
considered at all heinous. An old costermonger, who had been mixed
up with other callings, and whose prejudices were certainly not in
favour of his present trade, said to me, “What I call the working
girls, sir, are as industrious and as faithful a set as can well be.
I’m satisfied that they’re more faithful to their mates than other
poor working women. I never knew one of these working girls do wrong
that way. They’re strong, hearty, healthy girls, and keep clean rooms.
Why, there’s numbers of men leave their stock-money with their women,
just taking out two or three shillings to gamble with and get drunk
upon. They sometimes take a little drop themselves, the women do,
and get beaten by their husbands for it, and hardest beaten if the
man’s drunk himself. They’re sometimes beaten for other things too,
or for nothing at all. But they seem to like the men better for their
beating them. I never could make that out.” Notwithstanding this
fidelity, it appears that the “larking and joking” of the young, and
sometimes of the middle-aged people, among themselves, is anything but
delicate. The unmarried separate as seldom as the married. The fidelity
characterizing the women does not belong to the men.
The dancing-rooms are the places where matches are made up. There the
boys go to look out for “mates,” and sometimes a match is struck up the
first night of meeting, and the couple live together forthwith. The
girls at these dances are all the daughters of costermongers, or of
persons pursuing some other course of street life. Unions take place
when the lad is but 14. Two or three out of 100 have their female
helpmates at that early age; but the female is generally a couple of
years older than her partner. Nearly all the costermongers form such
alliances as I have described, when both parties are under twenty.
One reason why these alliances are contracted at early ages is, that
when a boy has assisted his father, or any one engaging him, in the
business of a costermonger, he knows that he can borrow money, and hire
a shallow or a barrow--or he may have saved 5_s._--“and then if the
father vexes him or snubs him,” said one of my informants, “he’ll tell
his father to go to h--l, and he and his gal will start on their own
account.”
Most of the costermongers have numerous families, but not those who
contract alliances very young. The women continue working down to the
day of their confinement.
“Chance children,” as they are called, or children unrecognised by any
father, are rare among the young women of the costermongers.
RELIGION OF COSTERMONGERS.
An intelligent and trustworthy man, until very recently actively
engaged in costermongering, computed that not 3 in 100 costermongers
had ever been in the interior of a church, or any place of worship,
or knew what was meant by Christianity. The same person gave me the
following account, which was confirmed by others:
“The costers have no religion at all, and very little notion, or none
at all, of what religion or a future state is. Of all things they
hate tracts. They hate them because the people leaving them never
give them anything, and as they can’t read the tract--not one in
forty--they’re vexed to be bothered with it. And really what is the
use of giving people reading before you’ve taught them to read? Now,
they respect the City Missionaries, because they read to them--and
the costers will listen to reading when they don’t understand it--and
because they visit the sick, and sometimes give oranges and such like
to them and the children. I’ve known a City Missionary buy a shilling’s
worth of oranges of a coster, and give them away to the sick and the
children--most of them belonging to the costermongers--down the court,
and that made him respected there. I think the City Missionaries
have done good. But I’m satisfied that if the costers had to profess
themselves of some religion to-morrow, they would all become Roman
Catholics, every one of them. This is the reason:--London costers live
very often in the same courts and streets as the poor Irish, and if the
Irish are sick, be sure there comes to them the priest, the Sisters
of Charity--they _are_ good women--and some other ladies. Many a man
that’s not a Catholic, has rotted and died without any good person near
him. Why, I lived a good while in Lambeth, and there wasn’t one coster
in 100, I’m satisfied, knew so much as the rector’s name,--though
Mr. Dalton’s a very good man. But the reason I was telling you of,
sir, is that the costers reckon _that_ religion’s the best that gives
the most in charity, and they think the Catholics do this. I’m not a
Catholic myself, but I believe every word of the Bible, and have the
greater belief that it’s the word of God because it teaches democracy.
The Irish in the courts get sadly chaffed by the others about their
priests,--but they’ll die for the priest. Religion is a regular puzzle
to the costers. They see people come out of church and chapel, and as
they’re mostly well dressed, and there’s very few of their own sort
among the church-goers, the costers somehow mix up being religious with
being respectable, and so they have a queer sort of feeling about it.
It’s a mystery to them. It’s shocking when you come to think of it.
They’ll listen to any preacher that goes among them; and then a few
will say--I’ve heard it often--‘A b--y fool, why don’t he let people go
to h-ll their own way?’ There’s another thing that makes the costers
think so well of the Catholics. If a Catholic coster--there’s only very
few of them--is ‘cracked up’ (penniless), he’s often started again, and
the others have a notion that it’s through some chapel-fund. I don’t
know whether it is so or not, but I know the cracked-up men are started
again, if they’re Catholics. It’s still the stranger that the regular
costermongers, who are nearly all Londoners, should have such respect
for the Roman Catholics, when they have such a hatred of the Irish,
whom they look upon as intruders and underminers.”--“If a missionary
came among us with plenty of money,” said another costermonger, “he
might make us all Christians or Turks, or anything he liked.” Neither
the Latter-day Saints, nor any similar sect, have made converts among
the costermongers.
OF THE UNEDUCATED STATE OF COSTERMONGERS.
I have stated elsewhere, that only about one in ten of the regular
costermongers is able to read. The want of education among both men
and women is deplorable, and I tested it in several instances. The
following statement, however, from one of the body, is no more to be
taken as representing the ignorance of the class generally, than are
the clear and discriminating accounts I received from intelligent
costermongers to be taken as representing the intelligence of the body.
The man with whom I conversed, and from whom I received the following
statement, seemed about thirty. He was certainly not ill-looking, but
with a heavy cast of countenance, his light blue eyes having little
expression. His statements, or opinions, I need hardly explain, were
given both spontaneously in the course of conversation, and in answer
to my questions. I give them almost verbatim, omitting oaths and slang: