journeyman butcher, and I helped him, and so grew up to it. I never
had to call regular work, and made it out with hawking. Perhaps I’ve
hawked, take it altogether, nearly three quarters of every year. The
other times I’ve had a turn at slaughtering. But I haven’t slaughtered
for these three or four years; I’ve had turns as a butcher’s porter,
and wish I had more, as it’s sure browns, if it’s only 1_s._ 6_d._ a
day: but there’s often a bit of cuttings. I sell most pork of anything
in autumn and winter, and most mutton in summer; but the summer
isn’t much more than half as good as the winter for my trade. When I
slaughtered I had 3_s._ for an ox, 4_d._ for a sheep, and 1_s._ for
a pig. Calves is slaughtered by the master’s people generally. Well,
I dare say it _is_ cruel the way they slaughter calves; you would
think it so, no doubt. I believe they slaughter cheaper now. If I buy
cheap--and on a very hot day and a slow market, I have bought a fore,
aye, and a hind, quarter of mutton, about two and a half stone each
(8 lbs. to the stone), at 2_d._ a pound; but that’s only very, very
seldom--when I buy cheap sir, I aim at 2_d._ a pound over what I give,
if not so cheap at 1_d._, and then its low to my customers. But I cut
up the meat, you see, myself, and I carry it. I sell eight times as
much to public-houses and eating-houses as anywhere else; most to the
publics if they’ve ordinaries, and a deal for the publics’ families’
eating, ’cause a landlord knows I wouldn’t deceive _him_,--and there’s
a part of it taken out in drink, of course, and landlords is good
judges. Trade was far better years back. I’ve heard my father and his
pals talk about a hawking butcher that twenty years ago was imprisoned
falsely, and got a honest lawyer to bring his haction, and had 150_l._
damages for false imprisonment. It was in the Lord Mayor’s Court of
Equity, I’ve heard. It was a wrong arrest. I don’t understand the
particulars of it, but it’s true; and the damages was for loss of time
and trade. I’m no lawyer myself; not a bit. I have sold the like of a
loin of mutton, when it was small, in a tap-room, to make chops for the
people there. They’ll cook chops and steaks for a pint of beer, at a
public; that is, you must order a pint--but I’ve sold it very seldom.
When mutton was dearer it was easier to sell it that way, for I sold
cheap; and at one public the mechanics--I hardly know just what they
was, something about building--used to gather there at one o’clock and
wait for ‘Giblets’; so they called me there. I live a good bit on the
cuttings of the meat I hawk, or I chop a meal off if I can manage or
afford it, or my wife--(I’ve only a wife and she earns never less than
2_s._ a week in washing for a master butcher--I wish I was a master
butcher,--and that covers the rent)--my wife makes it into broth.
Take it all the year round, I s’pose I sell three stun a day (24 lb.),
and at 1_d._ a pound profit. Not a farthing more go round and round. I
don’t think the others, altogether, do as much, for I’m known to a many
landlords. But some make 3_s._ and 4_s._ a day oft enough. I’ve made as
much myself sometimes. We all aim at 1_d._ a pound profit, but have to
take less in hot weather sometimes. Last year 4_d._ the pound has been
a haverage price to me for all sorts.”
“Dead salesmen,” as they are called--that is, the market salesmen
of the meat sent so largely from Scotland and elsewhere, ready
slaughtered--expressed to me their conviction that my informant’s
calculation was correct, and might be taken as an average; so did
butchers. Thus, then, we find that the hawking butchers, taking
their number at 150, sell 747,000 lbs. of meat, producing 12,450_l._
annually, one-fourth being profit; this gives an annual receipt of
83_l._ each, and an annual earning of 20_l._ 15_s._ The capital
required to start in this trade is about 20_s._, which is usually laid
out as follows:--A basket for the shoulders, which costs 4_s._ 6_d._; a
leathern strap, 1_s._; a basket for the arm, 2_s._ 6_d._; a butcher’s
knife, 1_s._; a steel, 1_s._ 6_d._; a leather belt for the waist to
which the knife is slung, 6_d._; a chopper, 1_s._ 6_d._; and a saw,
2_s._; 6_s._ stock-money, though credit is sometimes given.
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF HAM-SANDWICHES.
The ham-sandwich-seller carries his sandwiches on a tray or flat
basket, covered with a clean white cloth; he also wears a white apron,
and white sleeves. His usual stand is at the doors of the theatres.
The trade was unknown until eleven years ago, when a man who had
been unsuccessful in keeping a coffee-shop in Westminster, found it
necessary to look out for some mode of living, and he hit upon the plan
of vending sandwiches, precisely in the present style, at the theatre
doors. The attempt was successful; the man soon took 10_s._ a night,
half of which was profit. He “attended” both the great theatres, and
was “doing well;” but at five or six weeks’ end, competitors appeared
in the field, and increased rapidly, and so his sale was affected,
people being regardless of his urging that he “was the original
ham-sandwich.” The capital required to start in the trade was small; a
few pounds of ham, a proportion of loaves, and a little mustard was all
that was required, and for this 10_s._ was ample. That sum, however,
could not be commanded by many who were anxious to deal in sandwiches;
and the man who commenced the trade supplied them at 6_d._ a dozen, the
charge to the public being 1_d._ a-piece. Some of the men, however,
murmured, because they thought that what they thus bought were not
equal to those the wholesale sandwich-man offered for sale himself; and
his wholesale trade fell off, until now, I am told, he has only two
customers among street-sellers.
Ham sandwiches are made from any part of the bacon which may be
sufficiently lean, such as “the gammon,” which now costs 4_d._ and
5_d._ the pound. It is sometimes, but very rarely, picked up at
3-1/2_d._ When the trade was first started, 7_d._ a pound was paid for
the ham, but the sandwiches are now much larger. To make three dozen a
pound of meat is required, and four quartern loaves. The “ham” may cost
5_d._, the bread 1_s._ 8_d._ or 1_s._ 10_d._, and the mustard 1_d._ The
proceeds for this would be 3_s._, but the trade is very precarious:
little can be done in wet weather. If unsold, the sandwiches spoil, for
the bread gets dry, and the ham loses its fresh colour; so that those
who depend upon this trade are wretchedly poor. A first-rate week is
to clear 10_s._; a good week is put at 7_s._; and a bad week at 3_s._
6_d._ On some nights they do not sell a dozen sandwiches. There are
halfpenny sandwiches, but these are only half the size of those at a
penny.
The persons carrying on this trade have been, for the most part, in
some kind of service--errand-boys, pot-boys, foot-boys (or pages), or
lads engaged about inns. Some few have been mechanics. Their average
weekly earnings hardly exceed 5_s._, but some “get odd jobs” at other
things.
“There are now, sir, at the theatres this (the Strand) side the
water, and at Ashley’s, the Surrey, and the Vic., two dozen and nine
sandwiches.” So said one of the trade, who counted up his brethren for
me. This man calculated also that at the Standard, the saloons, the
concert-rooms, and at Limehouse, Mile-end, Bethnal-green-road, and
elsewhere, there might be more than as many again as those “working”
the theatres--or 70 in all. They are nearly all men, and no boys or
girls are now in the trade. The number of these people, when the large
theatres were open with the others, was about double what it is now.
The information collected shows that the expenditure in ham-sandwiches,
supplied by street-sellers, is 1,820_l._ yearly, and a consumption of
436,800 sandwiches.
To start in the ham-sandwich street-trade requires 2_s._ for a basket,
2_s._ for kettle to boil ham in, 6_d._ for knife and fork, 2_d._ for
mustard-pot and spoon, 7_d._ for 1/2 cwt. of coals, 5_s._ for ham,
1_s._ 3_d._ for bread, 4_d._ for mustard, 9_d._ for basket, cloth, and
apron, 4_d._ for over-sleeves--or a capital of 12_s._ 11_d._
OF THE EXPERIENCE OF A HAM SANDWICH-SELLER.
A young man gave me the following account. His look and manners were
subdued; and, though his dress was old and worn, it was clean and
unpatched:--
“I hardly remember my father, sir,” he said; “but I believe, if
he’d lived, I should have been better off. My mother couldn’t keep
my brother and me--he’s older than me--when we grew to be twelve or
thirteen, and we had to shift for ourselves. She works at the stays,
and now makes only 3_s._ a week, and we can’t help her. I was first
in place as a sort of errand-boy, then I was a stationer’s boy, and
then a news agent’s boy. I wasn’t wanted any longer, but left with a
good character. My brother had gone into the sandwich trade--I hardly
know what made him--and he advised me to be a ham sandwich-man, and
so I started as one. At first, I made 10_s._, and 7_s._, and 8_s._
a week--that’s seven years, or so--but things are worse now, and
I make 3_s._ 6_d._ some weeks, and 5_s._ others, and 6_s._ is an
out-and-outer. My rent’s 2_s._ a week, but I haven’t my own things. I
am so sick of this life, I’d do anything to get out of it; but I don’t
see a way. Perhaps I might have been more careful when I was first
in it; but, really, if you do make 10_s._ a week, you want shoes, or
a shirt--so what is 10_s._ after all? I wish I had it now, though. I
used to buy my sandwiches at 6_d._ a dozen, but I found that wouldn’t
do; and now I buy and boil the stuff, and make them myself. What _did_
cost 6_d._, now only costs me 4_d._ or 4-1/2_d._ I work the theatres
this side of the water, chiefly the ’Lympic and the ’Delphi. The best
theatre I ever had was the Garding, when it had two galleries, and was
dramatic--the operas there wasn’t the least good to me. The Lyceum was
good, when it was Mr. Keeley’s. I hardly know what sort my customers
are, but they’re those that go to theaytres: shopkeepers and clerks,
I think. Gentlemen don’t often buy of me. They _have_ bought, though.
Oh, no, they never give a farthing over; they’re more likely to want
seven for 6_d._ The women of the town buy of me, when it gets late, for
themselves and their fancy men. They’re liberal enough when they’ve
money. They sometimes treat a poor fellow in a public-house. In summer
I’m often out ’till four in the morning, and then must lie in bed half
next day. The ’Delphi was better than it is. I’ve taken 3_s._ at the
first “turn out” (the leaving the theatre for a short time after the
first piece), “but the turn-outs at the Garding was better than that.
A penny pie-shop has spoiled us at the ’Delphi and at Ashley’s. I go
out between eight and nine in the evening. People often want more in
my sandwiches, though I’m starving on them. ‘Oh,’ they’ll say, ‘you’ve
been ’prenticed to Vauxhall, you have.’ ‘They’re 1_s._ there,’ says I,
‘and no bigger. I haven’t Vauxhall prices.’ I stand by the night-houses
when it’s late--not the fashionables. Their customers would’nt look
at me; but I’ve known women, that carried their heads very high, glad
to get a sandwich afterwards. Six times I’ve been upset by drunken
fellows, on purpose, I’ve no doubt, and lost all my stock. Once, a
gent. kicked my basket into the dirt, and he was going off--for it
was late--but some people by began to make remarks about using a poor
fellow that way, so he paid for all, after he had them counted. I am
_so_ sick of this life, sir. I _do_ dread the winter so. I’ve stood up
to the ankles in snow till after midnight, and till I’ve wished I was
snow myself, and could melt like it and have an end. I’d do anything
to get away from this, but I can’t. Passion Week’s another dreadful
time. It drives us to starve, just when we want to get up a little
stock-money for Easter. I’ve been bilked by cabmen, who’ve taken a
sandwich; but, instead of paying for it, have offered to fight me.
There’s no help. We’re knocked about sadly by the police. Time’s very
heavy on my hands, sometimes, and that’s where you feel it. I read a
bit, if I can get anything to read, for I was at St. Clement’s school;
or I walk out to look for a job. On summer-days I sell a trotter or
two. But mine’s a wretched life, and so is most ham sandwich-men. I’ve
no enjoyment of my youth, and no comfort.
“Ah, sir! I live very poorly. A ha’porth or a penn’orth of cheap
fish, which I cook myself, is one of my treats--either herrings or
plaice--with a ’tatur, perhaps. Then there’s a sort of meal, now and
then, off the odds and ends of the ham, such as isn’t quite viewy
enough for the public, along with the odds and ends of the loaves. I
can’t boil a bit of greens with my ham, ’cause I’m afraid it might
rather spoil the colour. I don’t slice the ham till it’s cold--it cuts
easier, and is a better colour then, I think. I wash my aprons, and
sleeves, and cloths myself, and iron them too. A man that sometimes
makes only 3_s._ 6_d._ a week, and sometimes less, and must pay 2_s._
rent out of that, must look after every farthing. I’ve often walked
eight miles to see if I could find ham a halfpenny a pound cheaper
anywhere. If it was tainted, I know it would be flung in my face. If I
was sick there’s only the parish for me.”
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF BREAD.
The street-trade in bread is not so extensive as might be expected,
from the universality of the consumption. It is confined to
Petticoat-lane and the poorer districts in that neighbourhood. A person
who has known the East-end of town for nearly fifty years, told me
that as long as he could recollect, bread was sold in the streets,
but not to the present extent. In 1812 and 1813, when bread was the
dearest, there was very little sold in the streets. At that time,
and until 1815, the Assize Acts, regulating the bread-trade, were in
force, and had been in force in London since 1266. Previously to 1815
bakers were restricted, by these Acts, to the baking of three kinds
of bread--wheaten, standard wheaten, and household. The wheaten was
made of the best flour, the standard wheaten of the different kinds of
flour mixed together, and the household of the coarser and commoner
flour. In 1823, however, it was enacted that within the City of London
and ten miles round, “it shall be lawful for the bakers to make and
sell bread made of wheat, barley, rye, oats, buck-wheat, Indian-corn,
peas, beans, rice, or potatoes, or any of them, along with common salt,
pure-water, eggs, milk, barm-leaven, potato, or other yeast, and mixed
in such proportions as they shall think fit.” I mention this because
my informant, as well as an old master baker with whom I conversed on
the subject, remembered that every now and then, after 1823, but only
for two or three years, some speculative trader, both in shops and in
the streets, would endeavour to introduce an inferior, but still a
wholesome, bread, to his customers, such as an admixture of barley with
wheat-flour, but no one--as far as I could learn--persevered in the
speculation for more than a week or so. Their attempts were not only
unsuccessful but they met with abuse, from street-buyers especially,
for endeavouring to palm off “brown” bread as “good enough for poor
people.” One of my elder informants remembered his father telling
him that in 1800 and 1801, George III. had set the example of eating
brown bread at his one o’clock dinner, but he was sometimes assailed
as he passed in his carriage, with the reproachful epithet of “_Brown_
George.” This feeling continues, for the poor people, and even the more
intelligent working-men, if cockneys, have still a notion that only
“white” bread is fit for consumption. Into the question of the relative
nutrition of breads, I shall enter when I treat of the bakers.
During a period of about four months in the summer, there are from
twenty to thirty men daily selling stale bread. Of these only twelve
sell it regularly every day of the year, and they trade chiefly on
their own account. Of the others, some are sent out by their masters,
receiving from 1_s._ to 2_s._ for their labour. Those who sell on their
own account, go round to the bakers’ shops about Stepney, Mile-end,
and Whitechapel, and purchase the stale-bread on hand. It is sold to
them at 1/2_d._, 1_d._ and 1-1/2_d._ per quartern less than the retail
shop price; but when the weather is very hot, and the bakers have a
large quantity of stale-bread on hand, the street-sellers sometimes
get the bread at 2_d._ a quartern less than the retail price. All the
street-sellers of bread have been brought up as bakers. Some have
resorted to the street-trade, I am told, when unable to procure work;
others because it is a less toilsome, and sometimes a more profitable
means of subsistence, than the labour of an operative baker. It is very
rarely that any of the street-traders leave their calling to resume
working as journeymen. Some of these traders have baskets containing
the bread offered for street-sale; others have barrows, and one has a
barrow resembling a costermonger’s, with a long basket made to fit upon
it. The dress of these vendors is a light coat of cloth or fustian;
corduroy, fustian, or cloth trousers, and a cloth cap or a hat, the
whole attire being, what is best understood as “dusty,” ingrained as it
is with flour.
From one bread-seller, a middle-aged man, with the pale look and
habitual stoop of a journeyman baker, I had the following account:
“I’ve known the street-trade a few years; I can’t say exactly how
many. I was a journeyman baker before that, and can’t say but what I
had pretty regular employment; but then, sir, what an employment it
is! So much night-work, and the heat of the oven, with the close air,
and sleeping on sacks at nights (for you can’t leave the place), so
that altogether it’s a slave’s life. A journeyman baker hasn’t what
can be called a home, for he’s so much away at the oven; he’d better
not be a married man, for if his wife isn’t very careful there’s talk,
and there’s unhappiness about nothing perhaps. I can’t be thought to
speak feelingly that way though, for I’ve been fortunate in a wife.
But a journeyman baker’s life drives him to drink, almost whether he
will or not. A street life’s not quite so bad. I was out of work two
or three weeks, and I certainly lushed too much, and can’t say as I
tried very hard to get work, but I had a pound or two in hand, and
then I began to think I’d try and sell stale bread in the streets, for
it’s a healthfuller trade than the other; so I started, and have been
at it ever since, excepting when I work a few days, or weeks, for a
master baker; but he’s a relation, and I assist him when he’s ill. My
customers are all poor persons,--some in rags, and some as decent as
their bad earnings’ll let them. No doubt about it, sir, there’s poor
women buy of me that’s wives of mechanics working slop, and that’s
forced to live on stale bread. Where there’s a family of children,
stale bread goes so very much further. I think I sell to few but what
has families, for a quartern’s too much at a time for a single woman.
I often hear my customers talk about their children, and say they must
make haste, as the poor things are hungry, and they couldn’t get them
any bread sooner. O, it’s a hard fight to live, all Spitalfields and
Bethnal-green way, for I know it all. There are first the journeyman
bakers over-worked and fretted into drinking, a-making the bread, and
there are the poor fellows in all sorts of trade over-worked to get
money to buy it. I’ve had women that looked as if they was ‘reduced,’
come to me of an evening as soon as it was dusk, and buy stale bread,
as if they was ashamed to be seen. Yes, I give credit. Some has a
week’s credit regular, and pays every Saturday night. I lose very
little in trusting. I sometimes have bread over and sell it--rather
than hold it over to next day--for half what it cost me. I have given
it away to begging people, sooner than keep it to be too stale, and
they would get something for it at a lodging-house. The lodging-house
keepers never buy of me that I know of. They can buy far cheaper than
I can--you understand, sir. Perhaps, altogether, I make about a guinea
every week; wet weather and short days are against me. I don’t sell
more, I think, on a Saturday than on other nights. The nights are much
of a muchness that way.”
The average quantity sold by each vendor during the summer months
is 150 quarterns daily, usually at 4_d._, but occasionally at 3_d._
the quartern. One man informed me that he had sold in one day 350
quarterns, receiving 5_l._ 16_s._ 8_d._ for them.
The number of men (for if there be women they are the men’s wives)
engaged daily throughout the year in the street-sale of bread is 12.
These sell upon an average 100 quarterns each per day: taking every day
in the year 1_l._ 12_s._ each (a few being sold at 3_d._)
Calculating then the four months’ trade in summer at 150 quarterns per
day per man, and reckoning 15 men so selling, and each receiving 45_s._
(thus allowing for the threepenny sale); and taking the receipts of the
12 regular traders at 1_l._ 12_s._ per day, we find nearly 9,000_l._
annually expended in the street purchase of 700,000 quartern loaves
of bread. The profits of the sellers vary from 1_l._ to 2_l._ a week,
according to the extent of their business.
To start in this branch of the street-trade a capital is required
according to the following rate:--Stock-money for bread, average 1_l._;
(largest amount required, 5_l._; smallest, 10_s._); a basket, 4_s._
6_d._ Of those who are employed in the summer, one-half have baskets,
and the other half bakers’ barrows; while of those who attend the year
through, 8 have baskets at 4_s._ 6_d._ each, 3 have barrows at 40_s._
each, and one a barrow and the long basket, before mentioned. The
barrow costs 30_s._, and the basket 2_l._
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF HOT GREEN PEAS.
The sale of hot green peas in the streets is of great antiquity, that
is to say, if the cry of “hot peas-cod,” recorded by Lydgate (and
formerly alluded to), may be taken as having intimated the sale of the
same article. In many parts of the country it is, or was, customary
to have “_scaldings_ of peas,” often held as a sort of rustic feast.
The peas were not shelled, but boiled in the pod, and eaten by the
pod being dipped in melted butter, with a little pepper, salt, and
vinegar, and then drawn through the teeth to extract the peas, the
pod being thrown away. The mention of _peas-cod_ (or pea-shell) by
Lydgate renders it probable that the “scalding” method was that then in
use in the streets. None of the street-sellers, however, whom I saw,
remembered the peas being vended in any other form than shelled and
boiled as at present.
The sellers of green peas have no stands, but carry a round or oval tin
pot or pan, with a swing handle; the pan being wrapped round with a
thick cloth, to retain the heat. The peas are served out with a ladle,
and eaten by the customers, if eaten in the street, out of basins,
provided with spoons, by the pea-man. Salt, vinegar, and pepper, are
applied from the vendor’s store, at the customer’s discretion.
There are now four men carrying on this trade. They wear no particular
dress, “just what clothes we can get,” said one of them. One, who has
been in the trade twenty-five years, was formerly an inn-porter; the
other three are ladies’ shoemakers in the day-time, and pea-sellers
in the evening, or at early morning, in any market. Their average
sale is three gallons daily, with a receipt of 7_s._ per man. Seven
gallons a day is accounted a large sale; but the largest of all is at
Greenwich fair, when each pea-man will take 35_s._ in a day. Each
vendor has his district. One takes Billingsgate, Rosemary-lane, and its
vicinity; another, the Old Clothes Exchange, Bishopsgate, Shoreditch,
and Bethnal-green; a third, Mile-end and Stepney; and a fourth,
Ratcliffe-highway, Limehouse, and Poplar. Each man resides in his
“round,” for the convenience of boiling his peas, and introducing them
to his customers “hot and hot.”
The peas used in this traffic are all the dried field pea, but dried
green and whole, and not split, or prepared, as are the yellow peas
for soup or puddings. They are purchased at the corn-chandlers’ or
the seed-shops, the price being 2_s._ the peck (or two gallons.) The
peas are soaked before they are boiled, and swell considerably, so
that one gallon of the dried peas makes rather more than two gallons
of the boiled. The hot green peas are sold in halfpennyworths; a
halfpennyworth being about a quarter of a pint. The cry of the sellers
is, “Hot green peas! all hot, all hot! Here’s your peas hot, hot, hot!”
OF THE EXPERIENCE OF A HOT GREEN PEA SELLER.
The most experienced man in the trade gave me the following account:--