cod-fish, weighing 15lbs. to 20lbs. each, yesterday and the day
before, and had to take two home with me last night, and lost money
on the others--besides all my time, and trouble, and expense. I had
100 herrings, too, that cost 3_s._--prime quality, and I only sold ten
out of them in a whole day. I had two pads of soles, sir, and lost
4_s._--that is one pad--by them. I took only 4_s._ the first day I laid
in this stock, and only 2_s._ 6_d._ the next; I then had to sell for
anything I could get, and throw some away. Yet, people say mine’s a
lazy, easy life. I think the fall off is owing to meat being so cheap,
’cause people buy that rather than my goods, as they think there’s more
stay in it. I’m afeard things will get worse too.” (He then added by
way of _sequitur_, though it is difficult to follow the reasoning,) “If
this here is free-trade, then to h-- with it, I say!”
OF THE CAPITAL AND INCOME OF THE COSTERMONGERS.
I shall now pass, from the consideration of the individual earnings, to
the income and capital of the entire body. Great pains have been taken
to ensure exactitude on these points, and the following calculations
are certainly below the mark. In order to be within due bounds, I
will take the costermongers, exclusive of their wives and families,
at 10,000, whereas it would appear that their numbers are upwards of
11,000.
1,000 carts, at 3_l._ 3_s._ each £3,150
[Donkeys, and occasionally ponies, are
harnessed to barrows.]
5,000 barrows, at 2_l._ each 10,000
1,500 donkeys, at 1_l._ 5_s._ each 1,875
[One intelligent man thought there were
2,000 donkeys, but I account that in
excess.]
200 ponies, at 5_l._ each 1,000
[Some of these ponies, among the very
first-class men, are worth 20_l._: one
was sold by a coster for 30_l._]
1,700 sets of harness, at 5_s._ each 425
[All calculated as worn and second-hand.]
4,000 baskets (or shallows), at 1_s._ each 200
3,500 stalls or standings, at 5_s._ each 875
[The stall and barrow men have generally
baskets to be used when required.]
10,000 weights, scales, and measures,
at 2_s._ 6_d._ each 1,250
[It is difficult to estimate this item with
exactitude. Many averaged the value
at 3_s._ 4_d._]
Stock-money for 10,000 costers, at
10_s._ each 5,000
-------
Total capital £23,775
-------
Very nearly 24,000_l._, then, at the most moderate computation,
represents the value of the animals, vehicles, and stock, belonging to
the costermongers in the streets of London.
The keep of the donkeys is not here mixed up with their value, and I
have elsewhere spoken of it.
The whole course of my narrative shows that the bulk of the property
in the street goods, and in the appliances for their sale, is in the
hands of usurers as well as of the costers. The following account shows
the sum paid yearly by the London costermongers for the hire, rent, or
interest (I have heard each word applied) of their barrows, weights,
baskets, and stock:
Hire of 3,000 barrows, at 1_s._ 3_d._ a week £9,750
Hire of 600 weights, scales, &c., at
1_s._ 6_d._ a week for 2, and 6_d._ a week
for 10 months 1,020
Hire of 100 baskets, &c., at 6_d._ a week 130
Interest on 2,500_l._ stock-money, at
125_l._ per week 6,500
[Calculating at 1_s._ interest weekly for 20_s._]
-------
Total paid for hire and interest £17,400
-------
Concerning the income of the entire body of costermongers in the
metropolis, I estimate the earnings of the 10,000 costermongers, taking
the average of the year, at 10_s._ weekly. My own observation, the
result of my inquiries, confirmed by the opinion of some of the most
intelligent of the costermongers, induce me to adopt this amount.
It must be remembered, that if some costermongers do make 30_s._ a
week through the year, others will not earn a fourth of it, and hence
many of the complaints and sufferings of the class. Then there is the
drawback in the sum paid for “hire,” “interest,” &c., by numbers of
these people; so that it appears to me, that if we assume the income
of the entire body--including Irish and English--to be 15_s._ a week
per head in the summer, and 5_s._ a week each in the winter, as the
two extremes, or a mean of 10_s._ a week all the year through, we
shall not be far out either way. The aggregate earnings of the London
costermongers, at this rate, are 5,000_l._ per week, or 260,000_l._
yearly. Reckoning that 30,000 individuals have to be supported out of
this sum, it gives an average of 3_s._ 4_d._ a week per head.
But it is important to ascertain not only the earnings or aggregate
amount of profit made by the London costermongers in the course
of the year, but likewise their receipts, or aggregate amount of
“takings,” and thus to arrive at the gross sum of money annually laid
out by the poorer classes of the metropolis in the matter of fish,
fruit, and vegetables alone. Assuming that the average profits of
the costermongers are at the rate of 25 per cent. (and this, I am
satisfied, is a high estimate--for we should remember, that though
cent. per cent. may be frequently obtained, still their “goods,”
being of a “perishable” nature, are as frequently lost or sold off at
a “tremendous sacrifice”); assuming then, I say, that the _average_
profits of the entire 10,000 individuals are 25 per cent. on the
cost-price of their stock, and that the aggregate amount of their
profits or earnings is upwards of 260,000_l._, it follows that the
gross sum of money laid out with the London costers in the course of
the twelvemonth is 1,040,000_l._ sterling--a sum so enormous as almost
to make us believe that the tales of individual want are matters of
pure fiction. Large, however, as the amount appears in the mass, still,
if distributed among the families of the working men and the poorer
class of Londoners, it will be found that it allows but the merest
pittance per head per week for the consumption of those articles, which
may be fairly said to constitute the staple commodities of the dinners
and “desserts!” of the poor.
OF THE PROVIDENCE AND IMPROVIDENCE OF COSTERMONGERS.
The costermongers, like all wandering tribes, have generally no
foresight; only an exceptional few are provident--and these are
mostly the more intelligent of the class--though some of the very
ignorant do occasionally save. The providence of the more intelligent
costermonger enables him in some few cases to become “a settled man,”
as I have before pointed out. He perhaps gets to be the proprietor
of a coal-shed, with a greengrocery and potato business attached to
it; and with the usual trade in oysters and ginger-beer. He may too,
sometimes, have a sum of money in the savings’-bank, or he may invest
it in the purchase of a lease of the premises he occupies, or expend
it in furnishing the rooms of his house to let them out to single-men
lodgers; or he may become an usurer, and lend out his money to his
less provident brethren at 1040_l._ per cent. per annum; or he may
purchase largely at the markets, and engage youths to sell his surplus
stock at half profits.
The provident costermonger, who has thus “got on in the world,” is
rarely speculative. He can hardly be induced to become a member of
a “building” or “freehold land” society, for instance. He has been
accustomed to an almost _immediate_ return for his outlays, and
distrusts any remote or contingent profit. A regular costermonger--or
any one who has been a regular costermonger, in whatever trade he may
be afterwards engaged--generally dies intestate, let his property be
what it may; but there is seldom any dispute as to the disposition of
his effects: the widow takes possession of them, as a matter of course.
If there be grown-up children, they may be estranged from home, and not
trouble their heads about the matter; or, if not estranged, an amicable
arrangement is usually come to. The costermongers’ dread of all courts
of law, or of anything connected with the law, is only second to their
hatred of the police.
The more ignorant costermonger, on the other hand, if he be of a
saving turn, and have no great passion for strong drink or gaming, is
often afraid to resort to the simple modes of investment which I have
mentioned. He will rather keep money in his pocket; for, though it does
not fructify there, at least it is safe. But this is only when provided
with a donkey or pony “what suits;” when not so provided, he will “suit
himself” forthwith. If, however, he have saved a little money, and have
a craving after gambling or amusements, he is sure at last to squander
it that way. Such a man, without any craving for drink or gaming,
will often continue to pay usuriously for the hire of his barrow, not
suspecting that he is purchasing it over and over and over again, in
his weekly payments. To suggest to him that he might place his money in
a bank, is to satisfy him that he would be “had” in some way or other,
as he believes all banks and public institutions to be connected with
government, and the taxes, and the police. Were any one to advise a
man of this class--and it must be remembered that I am speaking of the
_ignorant_ costers--to invest a spare 50_l._ (supposing he possessed
it) in the “three per cents.,” it would but provoke a snappish remark
that he knew nothing about them, and would have nothing to do with
them; for he would be satisfied that there was “some cheatery at the
bottom.” If he could be made to understand what is meant by 3_l._ per
centum per annum, he would be sure to be indignant at the robbery of
giving only 7-1/2_d._ for the use of 1_l._ for a whole year!
I may state, in conclusion, that a costermonger of the class I have
been describing, mostly objects to give change for a five-pound note;
he will sooner give credit--when he knows “the party”--than change,
even if he have it. If, however, he feels compelled, rather than offend
a regular customer, to take the note, he will not rest until he has
obtained sovereigns for it at a neighbouring innkeeper’s, or from some
tradesman to whom he is known. “Sovereigns,” said one man, and not a
very ignorant man, to me, “is something to lay hold on; a note ain’t.”
Moreover, should one of the more ignorant, having tastes for the
beer-shop, &c., meet with “a great haul,” or save 5_l._ by some
continuous industry (which he will most likely set down as “luck”),
he will spend it idly or recklessly in dissipation and amusement,
regardless of the coming winter, whatever he may have suffered during
the past. Nor, though they know, from the bitterest experience, that
their earnings in the winter are not half those of the rest of the
year, and that they are incapacitated from pursuing their trade in bad
weather, do they endeavour to make the extra gains of their best time
mitigate the want of the worst.
OF THE COSTERMONGERS IN BAD WEATHER AND DURING THE CHOLERA.
“Three wet days,” I was told by a clergyman, who is now engaged in
selling stenographic cards in the streets, “will bring the greater part
of 30,000 street-people to the brink of starvation.” This statement,
terrible as it is, is not exaggerated. The average number of wet days
every year in London is, according to the records of the Royal Society,
161--that is to say, rain falls in the metropolis more than three days
in each week, and very nearly every other day throughout the year. How
precarious a means of living then must street-selling be!
When a costermonger cannot pursue his out-door labour, he leaves it to
the women and children to “work the public-houses,” while he spends his
time in the beer-shop. Here he gambles away his stock-money oft enough,
“if the cards or the luck runs again him;” or else he has to dip into
his stock-money to support himself and his family. He must then borrow
fresh capital at any rate of interest to begin again, and he begins on
a small scale. If it be in the cheap and busy seasons, he may buy a pad
of soles for 2_s._ 6_d._, and clear 5_s._ on them, and that “sets him
a-going again, and then he gets his silk handkerchief out of pawn, and
goes as usual to market.”
The sufferings of the costermongers during the prevalence of the
cholera in 1849, were intense. Their customers generally relinquished
the consumption of potatoes, greens, fruit, and fish; indeed, of almost
every article on the consumption of which the costermongers depend
for his daily bread. Many were driven to apply to the parish; “many
had relief and many hadn’t,” I was told. Two young men, within the
knowledge of one of my informants, became professional thieves, after
enduring much destitution. It does not appear that the costermongers
manifested any personal dread of the visitation of the cholera, or
thought that their lives were imperilled: “We weren’t a bit afraid,”
said one of them, “and, perhaps, that was the reason so few costers
died of the cholera. I knew them all in Lambeth, I think, and I knew
only one die of it, and he drank hard. Poor Waxy! he was a good fellow
enough, and was well known in the Cut. But it was a terrible time for
us, sir. It seems to me now like a shocking dream. Fish I could’nt
sell a bit of; the people had a perfect dread of it--all but the poor
Irish, and there was no making a crust out of them. _They_ had no
dread of fish, however; indeed, they reckon it a religious sort of
living, living on fish,--but they _will_ have it dirt cheap. We were in
terrible distress all that time.”
OF THE COSTERMONGERS’ RAFFLES.
In their relief of the sick, if relief it is to be called, the
costermongers resort to an exciting means; something is raffled, and
the proceeds given to the sufferer. This mode is common to other
working-classes; it partakes of the excitement of gambling, and is
encouraged by the landlords of the houses to which the people resort.
The landlord displays the terms of the raffle in his bar a few days
before the occurrence, which is always in the evening. The raffle
is not confined to the sick, but when any one of the class is in
distress--that is to say, without stock-money, and unable to borrow
it,--a raffle for some article of his is called at a public-house in
the neighbourhood. Cards are printed, and distributed among his mates.
The article, let it be whatever it may--perhaps a handkerchief--is
put up at 6_d._ a member, and from twenty to forty members are got,
according as the man is liked by his “mates,” or as he has assisted
others similarly situated. The paper of every raffle is kept by the
party calling it, and before he puts his name down to a raffle for
another party, he refers to the list of subscribers to _his_ raffle,
in order to see if the person ever assisted him. Raffles are very
“critical things, the pint pots fly about wonderful sometimes”--to
use the words of one of my informants. The party calling the raffle
is expected to take the chair, if he can write down the subscribers’
names. One who had been chairman at one of these meetings assured me
that on a particular occasion, having called a “general dealer” to
order, the party very nearly split his head open with a quart measure.
If the hucksters know that the person calling the raffle is “down,”
and that it is necessity that has made him call it, they will not
allow the property put up to be thrown for. “If you was to go to the
raffle to-night, sir,” said one of them to me, many months ago, before
I became known to the class, “they’d say to one another directly you
come in, ‘Who’s this here swell? What’s he want?’ And they’d think you
were a ‘cad,’ or else a spy, come from the police. But they’d treat you
civilly, I’m sure. Some very likely would fancy you was a fast kind of
a gentleman, come there for a lark. But you need have no fear, though
the pint pots _does_ fly about sometimes.”
OF THE MARKETS AND TRADE RIGHTS OF THE COSTERMONGERS, AND OF THE LAWS
AFFECTING THEM.
The next point of consideration is what are the legal regulations under
which the several descriptions of hawkers and pedlars are allowed to
pursue their occupations.
The laws concerning hawkers and pedlars, (50 Geo. III., c. 41, and 6
Geo. IV., c. 80,) treat of them as identical callings. The “hawker,”
however, is, strictly speaking, one who sells wares by _crying_
them in the streets of towns, while the _pedlar_ travels _on foot_
through the country with his wares, not publicly proclaiming them, but
visiting the houses on his way to solicit private custom. Until the
commencement of the present century--before the increased facilities
for conveyance--the pedlars were a numerous body in the country. The
majority of them were Scotchmen and some amassed considerable wealth.
Railways, however, have now reduced the numbers to insignificance.
Hawkers and pedlars are required to pay 4_l._ yearly for a license, and
an additional 4_l._ for every horse or ass employed in the conveyance
of wares. The hawking or exposing for sale of fish, fruit, or victuals,
does not require a license; and further, it is lawful for any one
“being the maker of any home manufacture,” to expose it for sale in
any fair or market, without a warrant. Neither does anything in either
of the two acts in question prohibit “any tinker, cooper, glazier,
plumber, harness-mender, or other person, from going about and carrying
the materials proper to their business.”
The right of the costermongers, then, to “hawk” their wares through
the streets is plainly inferred by the above acts; that is to say,
nothing in them extends to prohibit persons “going about,” unlicensed,
and at their own discretion, and selling fish, vegetables, fruit, or
provisions generally.
The law acknowledges none of the street “markets.” These congregatings
are, indeed, in antagonism to the municipal laws of London, which
provide that no market, or public place where provisions are sold,
shall be held within seven miles of the city. The law, though it
permits butchers and other provisionmongers to hire stalls and
standings in the flesh and other markets, recognised by custom or
usage, gives no such permission as to street-trading.
The right to sell provisions from stands in the streets of the
metropolis, it appears, is merely permissive. The regulation observed
is this: where the costermongers or other street-dealers have been in
the habit of standing to sell their goods, they are not to be disturbed
by the police unless on complaint of an adjacent shopkeeper or other
inhabitant. If such a person shows that the costermonger, whose stand
is near his premises, is by his improper conduct a nuisance, or that,
by his clamour or any peculiarity in his mode of business, he causes a
crowd to gather and obstruct the thoroughfare, the policeman’s duty
is to remove him. If the complaint from the inhabitants against the
street-sellers be at all general the policemen of the beat report it to
the authorities, taking no steps until they receive instructions.
It is somewhat anomalous, however, that the law now
recognises--inferentially it is true--the right of costermongers to
carry about their goods for sale. Formerly the stands were sometimes
tolerated, but not the itinerancy.
The enactments of the Common-council from the time of Elizabeth are
stringent against itinerant traders of all descriptions, but stringent
to no purpose of prevention. In 1607, a Common-council enactment sets
forth, that “many People of badd and lewde Condicon daylie resorte
from the most Parte of this Realme to the said Cyttie, Suburbes, and
Places adjoininge, procuringe themselves small Habytacons, namely, one
Chamber-Roome for a poore Forreynor and his Familye, in a small Cottage
with some other as poore as himself in the Cyttie, Suburbes, or Places
adjacente, to the great Increase and Pestringe of this Cyttie with
poore People; many of them proovinge Shifters, lyvinge by Cozeninge,
Stealinge, and Imbeazellinge of Mens Gooddes as Opportunitye may serve
them, remoovinge from Place to Place accordinglye; many Tymes runninge
away, forsakinge their Wives and Children, leavinge them to the Charge
of the said Cyttie, and the Hospitalles of the same.”
It was towards this class of men who, by their resort to the capital,
recruited the numbers of the street-sellers and public porters
and others that the jealousy of the Corporation was directed. The
city shop-keepers, three centuries ago, complained vehemently and
continuously of the injuries inflicted on their trade by itinerant
dealers, complaints which led to bootless enactments. In Elizabeth’s
reign the Court of Common Council declared that the streets of the city
should be used, as in ancient times, for the common highway, and not
for the traffic of hucksters, pedlars, and hagglers. But this traffic
increased, and in 1632 another enactment was accounted necessary.
Oyster-wives, herb-wives, tripe-wives, and all such “unruly people,”
were threatened with the full pains and penalties of the outraged
law if they persevered in the prosecution of their callings, which
are stigmatised as “a way whereby to live a more easie life than by
labour.” In 1694 the street-sellers were menaced with the punishments
then deemed suitable for arrant rogues and sturdy beggars--whipping;
and that remedy to be applied alike to males and females!
The tenor of these Vagrant Laws not being generally known, I here
transcribe them, as another proof of the “wisdom” and mercy of our
“ancestors” in “the good old times!”
In the year 1530 the English Parliament enacted, that, while the
impotent poor should receive licenses from the justices of the peace
to beg within certain limits, all men and _women_, “being whole and
mighty in body, and able to labour,” if found vagrant and unable
to give an account as to how they obtained their living, should be
apprehended by the constables, tied to the tail of a cart _naked_,
and beaten with whips through the nearest market-town, or hamlet,
“till their bodies be bloody by reason of such whipping!” Five years
afterwards it was added, that, if the individual had been once already
whipped, he or she should not only be whipped again, but “also shall
have the upper part of the gristle of his ear clean cut off, so as
it may appear for a perpetual token hereafter that he hath been a
contemner of the good order of the commonwealth.” And finally, in 1562,
it was directed that any beggar convicted of being a vagabond should,
after being grievously whipped, be burnt through the gristle of the
right ear “with a hot iron of the compass of an inch about,” unless
some person should agree to take him as a servant--of course without
wages--for a year; then, that if he twice ran away from such master, he
should be adjudged a felon; and that if he ran away a third time, he
should “suffer pains of death and loss of land and goods as a felon,
without benefit of clergy or sanctuary.”
The only acts now in force which regulate the government of the
streets, so to speak, are those best known as Michael Angelo Taylor’s
Act, and the 2 & 3 Vic., best known as the Police Act.
OF THE REMOVALS OF COSTERMONGERS FROM THE STREETS.
Such are the laws concerning street trading: let us now see the effect
of them.
Within these three months, or little more, there have been many
removals of the costermongers from their customary standings in the
streets. This, as I have stated, is never done, unless the shopkeepers
represent to the police that the costermongers are an injury and a
nuisance to them in the prosecution of their respective trades. The
costermongers, for the most part, know nothing of the representation
of the shopkeepers, so that perhaps the first intimation that they
must “quit” comes from the policemen, who thus incur the full odium
of the measure, the majority of the street people esteeming it a mere
arbitrary act on the part of the members of the force.
The first removal, recently, took place in Leather-lane, Holborn,
between three and four months back. It was effected in consequence of
representations from the shopkeepers of the neighbourhood. But the
removal was of a brief continuance. “Leather-lane,” I was told, “looked
like a desert compared to what it was. People that had lived there for
years hardly knew their own street; and those that had complained,
might twiddle their thumbs in their shops for want of something better
to do.”