6 baskets, 1_s._ 9_d._ each; 6 saucepans,
2_s._ each; 6 cloths, 6_d._ each;
6 knives, 2_d._ each; stock-money, for
6 vendors, 2_s._ each 1 18 6
_Street-sellers of Cakes, Tarts, &c._
150 trays, 1_s._ 9_d._ each; 150 cloths,
1_s._ 3_d._ each; 150 straps, 6_d._ each;
stock-money, 16_s._ 6_d._ each 150 0 0
_Other and inferior Cake-sellers._
30 trays, 1_s._ 9_d._ each; 30 straps,
6_d._ each; stock-money, 2_s._ 6_d._ each 7 2 6
_Street-sellers of Plum-cake._
4 trays, 1_s._ 9_d._ each; 4 baskets,
1_s._ 6_d._ each; 4 cloths (oil-cloth
covers for baskets), 1_s._ each; 4
knives, 2_d._ each; stock-money, for
4 sellers, 4_s._ each 1 18 8
_Gingerbread-nut Makers and Sellers._
50 ovens, 5_l._ each; 50 peels and
rakes, 3_s._ the two; 750 tins, 1_s._ each;
50 lamps, for fairs, 6_s._ each; 50
stalls, 6_s._ each; 50 sets of scales and
100 sets of weights, half of them
false, 7_s._ 6_d._ each; 100 canisters, 2_s._
each; 50 barrows, 30_s._ each; 50
baskets, 6_s._ each; 50 baizes, 1_s._ each;
50 cloths to cover stall, 1_s._ each;
stock-money, for 50 makers and
sellers, 14_s._ each 483 15 0
_Gingerbread-nut Sellers_ (_not Makers_.)
150 trays, 1_s._ 9_d._ each; 150 straps,
6_d._ each; stock-money, for 150
sellers, 1_s._ 6_d._ each 28 5 6
_Street-sellers of Hot cross Buns._
500 baskets, 2_s._ 6_d._ each; 500
flannels and cloths, 2_s._ the two;
stock-money, for 500 sellers, 2_s._ 6_d._
each 175 0 0
_Street-sellers of Muffins and Crumpets._
500 baskets, 2_s._ 6_d._ each; 500
cloths, 1_s._ each; stock-money, for
500 sellers, 5_s._ each 212 10 0
_Street-sellers of Sweet-stuff._
6 barrows, 1_l._ 10_s._ each; 150
trays, 1_s._ 9_d._ each; 50 saucepans,
2_s._ each; 18 canisters (long tin), 2_s._
each; 44 stalls, at 4_s._ each; 50 sets
of weights and scales, at 4_s._ each;
stock-money, for 150 vendors, 3_s._
each 70 4 6
_Street-sellers of Cough Drops._
2 stills and barrows, 3_l._ 10_s._ each;
4 stalls, 7_s._ each; 6 weights and
scales, 3_s._ 6_d._ each; stock-money,
for 6 sellers, 2_s._ 6_d._ each 10 4 0
_Street-sellers of Ices._
20 jars, 1_s._ each; 20 coolers, 2_s._
each; 30 cups, 1_d._ each, and 30
glasses, 4_d._ each; 60 spoons, 1_d._
each; stock-money, for 20 vendors,
2_s._ per head 5 17 6
------------------
TOTAL CAPITAL INVESTED IN
THE STREET SALE OF EATABLES
AND DRINKABLES 9,077 12 5
------------------
INCOME, OR “TAKINGS,” OF STREET-SELLERS OF EATABLES AND DRINKABLES.
_Street-sellers of Hot Eels._
There are upwards of 1,000,000 lbs.
weight of hot eels sold yearly in the
streets of London. 140 vendors each
sell 6 lbs. of eels daily at their stands;
60 sell 40 lbs. daily; and 100 itinerant
sell 5 lbs. nightly at the public-houses.
The first mentioned take on an average
2_s._ daily; the second 16_s._; and the third
1_s._ 8_d._ This gives a yearly street expenditure
in the trade in hot eels amounting to £19,448
_Street-sellers of Pea-soup._
The annual street consumption of
pea-soup amounts to 1,680 gallons. 100
vendors sell each 4 gallons daily; and
50 vendors, each sell upon an average
10 gallons daily. The first mentioned
take 3_s._ a day; and the last, 7_s._ 6_d._
This gives a street expenditure during
the winter season of five months, of £4,050
_Street-sellers of Pickled Whelks._
According to the Billingsgate returns,
there are nearly 5,000,000 of whelks sold
yearly in the streets of London. These
are retailed in a boiled state, and
flavoured with vinegar, at four a penny.
150 vendors take on an average 13_s._
weekly. This gives an annual street
expenditure, of £5,000
_Street-sellers of Fried Fish._
150 sellers make 10_s._ 6_d._ weekly, or
yearly 27_l._ 6_s._; and 150 sellers make
half that amount, 13_l._ 13_s._ per annum.
Reckoning 20_l._ a year as a medium
earning, and adding 90 per cent. for
profit, the annual consumption of fried
fish supplied by London street-sellers
amounts to 684,000 lbs., and the sum
expended thereupon to £11,400
_Street-sellers of Sheep’s Trotters._
In the wholesale “trotter” establishment
there are prepared, weekly, 20,000
sets, or 80,000 feet; giving a yearly
average of 4,160,000 trotters, or the
feet of 1,040,000 sheep. Of this quantity
the street-folk buy seven-eighths, or
3,640,000 trotters yearly. The number
of sheep trotter-sellers may be taken at
300; which gives an average of nearly
60 sets a week per individual. There
is then expended yearly in London
streets on trotters, calculating their
sale, retail, at 1/2_d._ each, 6,500_l._; but
though the regular price is 1/2_d._, some
trotters are sold at four for 1-1/2_d._, very
few higher than 1/2_d._, and some are kept
until they are unsaleable, so that the
amount thus expended may be estimated at £6,000
_Street-sellers of Ham-sandwiches._
60 vendors, take 8_s._ a week, and sell
annually 486,800 sandwiches, at a cost of £1,800
_Street-sellers of Baked ’Tatoes._
300 vendors, sell upon an average
3/4 cwt. of baked potatoes daily, or 1,755
tons in the season. The average takings
of each vendor amount to 6_s._ a day; and
the receipts of the whole number throughout
the season (which lasts from the
latter end of September till March inclusive),
a period of 6 months, are £14,000
_The Street-sellers of Hot Green Peas._
The chief man of business sells 3 gallons
a day (which, at 1_d._ the quarter-pint,
would be 8_s._, my informant said
7_s._), the other three together sell the
same quantity; hence there is an annual
street consumption of 1,870 gallons, and
a street expenditure on “hot green peas” of £250
_Street-sellers of Meat._
The hawking butchers, taking their
number at 150, sell 747,000 lbs. of meat,
and take annually £12,450
_Street-sellers of Bread._
25 men take 45_s._ a day for five
months in the summer, and 12 regular
traders take 1_l._ 12_s._ per day; this gives
an annual street consumption of 700,000
quartern loaves of bread, and a street
expenditure of £9,000
_Street-sellers of Cats and Dogs’ Meat._
There are 300,000 cats in the metropolis,
and from 900 to 1,000 horses,
averaging 2 cwt. of meat each, boiled
down every week; the quantity of cats’
and dogs’ meat used throughout London
is about 200,000 lbs. per week,
and this, sold at the rate of 2-1/2_d._ per lb.,
gives 2,000_l._ a week for the money spent
in cats’ and dogs’ meat, or per year,
upwards of £100,000
_Street-sellers of Coffee, Tea, &c._
Each coffee-stall keeper on an average
clears 1_l._ a week, and his takings may
be said to be at least double that sum;
hence the quantity of coffee sold annually
in the streets, is about 550,000 gallons,
while the yearly street expenditure
for tea, coffee, &c., amounts to £31,200
_Street-sellers of Ginger-beer._
The bottles of ginger-beer sold yearly
in the streets number about 4,798,000,
and the total street consumption of the
same beverage may be said to be about
250,000 gallons per annum. 200 street-sellers
of ginger-beer in the bottle trade
of the penny class take 30_s._ a week each
(thus allowing for inferior receipts in
bad weather); 300 take 20_s._ each, selling
their “beer” for the most part at 1/2_d._ the
bottle, while the remaining 400 “in a
small way” take 6_s._ each; hence there
is expended in the bottled ginger-beer
of the streets 11,480_l._ Adding the receipts
from the fountains and the barrels,
the barrel season continuing only ten
weeks, the total sum expended annually
in street ginger-beer amounts altogether to £14,660
_Street-sellers of Lemonade, Sherbet, Nectar, &c._
There are 200 persons, chiefly men,
selling solely lemonade, &c., and an
additional 300 uniting the sale with that
of ginger-beer. Their average receipts
on fine days are 3_s._ 6_d._ a day, or, allowing
for wet weather and diminished receipts,
10_s._ a week. The receipts, then, for this
street luxury, show a street expenditure
in such a summer as the last, of 2,800_l._,
among those who do not unite ginger-beer
with the trade. Calculating that
those who _do_ unite ginger-beer with it
sell only one-half as much as the others,
we find a total outlay of £4,900
_Street-sellers of Elder-wine._
50 vendors clear 5_s._ a week for 16
weeks by the sale of elder-wine in the
streets, their profit being at least cent.
per cent.; hence the street consumption
of this beverage in the course of the year
is 1,500 gallons, and the outlay £200
_Street-sellers of Peppermint-water._
Calculating that 4 “pepperminters”
take 2_s._ a day the year round, Sundays
excepted, we find that 900 gallons of
peppermint-water are consumed every
year in the streets of London, while the
sum expended in it amounts annually to £125
_Street-sellers of Milk in the Markets, Parks, &c._
The vendors in the markets clear
about 1_s._ 6_d._ a day each, for three
months; and as the profit is rather
more than cent. per cent., there are
about 4,000 gallons of milk thus sold
yearly. The quantity sold in the park
averages 20 quarts a day for a period of
nine months, or 1,170 gallons in the
year. This is retailed at 4_d._ per quart;
hence the annual expenditure is £344
_Street-sellers of Curds and Whey._
50 sellers dispose of 12-1/2 gallons in 3
weeks; the other 50 sell only half as
much. Taking the season at 3 months,
the annual consumption of curds and
whey in the streets is 2,812 double gallons
(as regards the ingredients of milk),
which is retailed at a cost to the purchasers
of £412
_Street-sellers of Rice-milk._
Calculating that 50 sellers dispose of
24 quarts weekly, while one-half of the
remaining 25 sell 12 quarts each per
week at 1_d._ the half-pint, and the other
half vend 24 quarts at 1/2_d._ the half-pint,
there are about 3,000 gallons of
rice-milk yearly consumed in the streets
of London, while the expenditure
amounts to £320
_Water-carriers._
The number of water-carriers are
sixty, and their average earnings through
the year 5_s._ a week; hence the sum annually
expended in water thus obtained
amounts to £780
_Street Piemen._
There are fifty street piemen plying
their trade in London, the year through,
their average takings are one guinea a
week; hence there is an annual street
consumption of pies of nearly to three-quarters
of a million, and a street expenditure
amounting to £3,000
_Street-sellers of Meat and Currant Puddings._
Each street-seller gets rid of, on an
average, 85 dozen, or 1,020 puddings;
there are now but six street-sellers (regularly)
of these comestibles; hence the
weekly aggregate would be--allowing
for bad weather--5,400, and the total
129,600 meat and currant puddings sold
in the streets, in a season of 24 weeks.
This gives an annual expenditure on
the part of the street boys and girls
(who are the principal purchasers), and
of the poor persons who patronise the
street-trade, of about £270
_Street-sellers of Plum “duff.”_
Calculating 42_s._ a week as the takings
of six persons, for five months, we find
there is yearly expended in the street
purchase of plum dough upwards of £250
_Street-sellers of Cakes, Tarts, &c._
Reckoning 150 cake-sellers, each
taking 6_s._ a week--a sufficiently low
average--the street consumption of
cakes, tarts, &c., will be 1,123,200 every
year, and the street outlay about £2,350
_Street-sellers of other and inferior Cakes._
The sale of the inferior street cakes
realises about a fifth of that taken by
the other cake-sellers; hence it may be
estimated yearly at £450
_Street-sellers of Gingerbread-nuts._
150 gingerbread-nut-sellers take 17_s._
each weekly (clearing 9_s._); at this rate
the sum spent yearly in “spice” nuts
in the streets of London amounts to £6,630
_Street-sellers of Hot-cross Buns._
There are nearly 100,000 hot-cross
buns sold every Good Friday in the
streets of London; hence there is expended
in one day, upon the buns thus
bought about £300
_Street-sellers of Muffins and Crumpets._
There are 500 muffin-sellers, each
clearing 4_s._ and taking 12_s._ a week on
an average; hence the metropolitan
street sale of muffins and crumpets will
be in 20 weeks about 120,000 dozen,
and the sum expended thereon £6,000
_Street-sellers of Sweet-stuff._
The number of sweet-stuff sellers in
London amounts to 200, each of whom,
on an average, clears 10_s._, and takes 20_s._
weekly; the yearly consumption, therefore,
of rocks, candies, hard-bakes, &c.,
purchased in the streets is nearly two
and a half millions of halfpenny-worths,
or (at the rate of 1/2_d._ an ounce) about
70 tons weight per annum, costing the
consumers about £10,000
_Street-sellers of Cough-drops._
The earnings of the principal man in
the “cough-drop” street trade may be
taken at 30_s._ a week for twenty weeks;
that of another at 15_s._ for the same
period; and those of the remaining four
street-sellers of the same compound at
5_s._ each, weekly; allowing the usual
cent. per cent., we find there is annually
expended by street-buyers on cough-drops £130
_Street-sellers of Ice Creams._
The sale of street ices may be calculated
at twenty persons, taking 1_s._ 6_d._
daily for four weeks. This gives a street
consumption of 10,000 penny ices, and
an annual expenditure thereon of £42
--------
TOTAL SUM EXPENDED YEARLY
ON STREET EATABLES AND DRINKABLES £203,115
--------
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF STATIONERY, LITERATURE, AND THE FINE ARTS.
We now come to a class of street-folk wholly distinct from any before
treated of. As yet we have been dealing principally with the uneducated
portion of the street-people--men whom, for the most part, are allowed
to remain in nearly the same primitive and brutish state as the
savage--creatures with nothing but their appetites, instincts, and
passions to move them, and made up of the same crude combination of
virtue and vice--the same generosity combined with the same predatory
tendencies as the Bedouins of the desert--the same love of revenge and
disregard of pain, and often the same gratitude and susceptibility to
kindness as the Red Indian--and, furthermore, the same insensibility
to female honour and abuse of female weakness, and the same utter
ignorance of the Divine nature of the Godhead as marks either
Bosjesman, Carib, or Thug.
The costers and many other of the street-sellers before described,
however, are bad--not so much from their own perversity as from our
selfishness. That they partake of the natural evil of human nature is
not their fault but ours,--who would be like them if we had not been
taught by others better than ourselves to controul the bad and cherish
the good principles of our hearts.
The street-sellers of stationery, literature, and the fine arts,
however, differ from all before treated of in the _general_, though
far from universal, education of the sect. They constitute principally
the class of street-orators, known in these days as “patterers,” and
formerly termed “mountebanks,”--people who, in the words of Strutt,
strive to “help off their wares by pompous speeches, in which little
regard is paid either to truth or propriety.” To patter, is a slang
term, meaning to speak. To indulge in this kind of oral puffery, of
course, requires a certain exercise of the intellect, and it is the
consciousness of their mental superiority which makes the patterers
look down upon the costermongers as an inferior body, with whom they
object either to be classed or to associate. The scorn of some of the
“patterers” for the mere costers is as profound as the contempt of the
pickpocket for the pure beggar. Those who have not witnessed this pride
of class among even the most degraded, can form no adequate idea of
the arrogance with which the skilled man, no matter how base the art,
looks upon the unskilled. “We are the haristocracy of the streets,”
was said to me by one of the street-folks, who told penny fortunes
with a bottle. “People don’t pay us for what we gives ’em, but only
to hear us talk. We live like yourself, sir, by the hexercise of our
hintellects--we by talking, and you by writing.”
But notwithstanding the self-esteem of the patterers, I am inclined
to think that they are less impressionable and less susceptible of
kindness than the costers whom they despise. Dr. Conolly has told
us that, even among the insane, the educated classes are the most
difficult to move and govern through their affections. They are
invariably suspicious, attributing unworthy motives to every benefit
conferred, and consequently incapable of being touched by any sympathy
on the part of those who may be affected by their distress. So far
as my experience goes it is the same with the street-patterers. Any
attempt to befriend them is almost sure to be met with distrust. Nor
does their mode of life serve in any way to lessen their misgivings.
Conscious how much their own livelihood depends upon assumption and
trickery, they naturally consider that others have some “dodge,” as
they call it, or some latent object in view when any good is sought
to be done them. The impulsive costermonger, however, approximating
more closely to the primitive man, moved solely by his feelings, is as
easily humanized by any kindness as he is brutified by any injury.
The patterers, again, though certainly more intellectual, are scarcely
less immoral than the costers. Their superior cleverness gives them
the power of justifying and speciously glossing their evil practices,
but serves in no way to restrain them; thus affording the social
philosopher another melancholy instance of the evil of developing the
intellect without the conscience--of teaching people to _know_ what is
morally beautiful and ugly, without teaching them at the same time to
feel and delight in the one and abhor the other--or, in other words, of
quickening the cunning and checking the emotions of the individual.
Among the patterers marriage is as little frequent as among the
costermongers; with the exception of the older class, who “were perhaps
married before they took to the streets.” Hardly one of the patterers,
however, has been bred to a street life; and this constitutes another
line of demarcation between them and the costermongers.
The costers, we have seen, are mostly hereditary wanderers--having been
as it were born to frequent the public thoroughfares; some few of the
itinerant dealers in fish, fruit, and vegetables, have it is true been
driven by want of employment to adopt street-selling as a means of
living, but these are, so to speak, the aliens rather than the natives
of the streets. The patterers, on the other hand, have for the most
part neither been born and bred nor driven to a street life--but have
rather _taken_ to it from a natural love of what they call “roving.”
This propensity to lapse from a civilized into a nomad state--to pass
from a settler into a wanderer--is a peculiar characteristic of the
pattering tribe. The tendency however is by no means extraordinary;
for ethnology teaches us, that whereas many abandon the habits of
civilized life to adopt those of a nomadic state of existence, but few
of the wandering tribes give up vagabondising and betake themselves to
settled occupations. The innate “love of a roving life,” which many of
the street-people themselves speak of as the cause of their originally
taking to the streets, appears to be accompanied by several peculiar
characteristics; among the most marked of these are an indomitable
“self-will” or hatred of the least restraint or controul--an innate
aversion to every species of law or government, whether political,
moral, or domestic--a stubborn, contradictory nature--an incapability
of continuous labour, or remaining long in the same place occupied
with the same object, or attending to the same subject--an unusual
predilection for amusements, and especially for what partakes of the
ludicrous--together with a great relish of all that is ingenious, and
so finding extreme delight in tricks and frauds of every kind. There
are two patterers now in the streets (brothers)--well-educated and
respectably connected--who candidly confess they prefer that kind of
life to any other, and would not leave it if they could.
Nor are the patterers less remarkable than the costermongers for
their utter absence of all religious feeling. There is, however, this
distinction between the two classes--that whereas the creedlessness
of the one is but the consequence of brutish ignorance, that of the
other is the result of natural perversity and educated scepticism--as
the street-patterers include many men of respectable connections, and
even classical attainments. Among them, may be found the son of a
military officer, a clergyman, a man brought up to the profession of
medicine, two Grecians of the Blue-coat School, clerks, shopmen, and
a class who have been educated to no especial calling--some of the
latter being the natural sons of gentlemen and noblemen--and who, when
deprived of the support of their parents or friends, have taken to the
streets for bread. Many of the younger and smarter men, I am assured,
reside with women of the town, though they may not be dependent for
their livelihood on the wages got by the infamy of these women. Not a
few of the patterers, too, in their dress and appearance, present but
little difference to that of the “gent.” Some wear a moustache, while
others indulge in a Henri-Quatre beard. The patterers are, moreover,
as a body, not distinguished by that good and friendly feeling one
to another which is remarkable among costermongers. If an absence of
heartiness and good fellowship be characteristic of an aristocracy--as
some political philosophers contend--then the patterers may indeed be
said to be the aristocrats of the streets.