in number, on a fine Sunday in the summer. Of these, some are
dock-labourers, who thus add to their daily earnings by a seventh day’s
labour; others, and a smarter class, are the “supers” (supernumeraries)
of theatres, who also eke out their pittance by Sunday toil; porters,
irregularly employed, and consequently “hard pushed to live,” also sell
walking-sticks on the Sundays; as do others who “cannot afford”--as a
well-educated man, a patterer on paper, once said to me--“to lose a
day if they were d----d for it.” The usual mode of this street-trade
is to carry the bundle of sticks strapped together, under the arm, and
deposit the ends on the ground when a sale is to be effected. A few,
however, and principally Jews, have “stands,” with the walking-sticks
inclosed in a sort of frame. On the Mondays there are not above a third
of the number of stick-sellers there are on the Sundays; and on the
other days of the week not above a seventh, or an eighth. Calculating
that for 12 weeks of the year there are every day 35 stick-sellers,
each taking, on an average, 30_s._ a week (with a profit, individually,
of about 12_s._), we find 630_l._ expended in walking-sticks in the
streets.
On clear winter days a stick-seller occasionally plies his trade, but
on frosty days they are occupied in letting out skates in the parks, or
wherever ponds are frozen.
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF WHIPS, ETC.
These traders are a distinct class from the stick-sellers, and have
a distinct class of customers. The sale is considerable; for to many
the possession of a whip is a matter of importance. If one be lost or
stolen, for instance, from a butcher’s cart at Newgate-market, the
need of a whip to proceed with the cart and horse to its destination,
prompts the purchase in the quickest manner, and this is usually
effected of the street-seller who offers his wares to the carters at
every established resort.
The commonest of the whips sold to cart-drivers is sometimes
represented as whalebone covered with gut; but the whalebone is a
stick, and the flexible part is a piece of leather, while the gut is a
sort of canvas, made to resemble the worked gut of the better sort of
whips, and is pasted to the stock; the thong--which in the common sort
is called “four strands,” or plaits--being attached to the flexible
part. Some of these whips are old stocks recovered, and many are sad
rubbish; but for any deceit the street-seller can hardly be considered
responsible, as he always purchases at the shop of a wholesale
whipmaker, who is in some cases a retailer at the same price and under
the same representations as the street-seller. The retail price is
1_s._ each; the wholesale, 8_s._ and 9_s._ a dozen. Some of the street
whip-sellers represent themselves as the makers, but the whips are
almost all made in Birmingham and Walsall.
[Illustration: THE STREET-SELLER OF WALKING-STICKS.
[_From a Daguerreotype by_ BEARD.]]
Of these traders very few are the ordinary street-sellers. Most of them
have been in some way or other connected with the care of horses,
and some were described to me as “beaten-out countrymen,” who had come
up to town in the hope of obtaining employment, and had failed. One
man, of the last-mentioned class, told me that he had come to London
from a village in Cambridgeshire, bringing with him testimonials of
good character, and some letters from parties whose recommendation he
expected would be serviceable to him; but he had in vain endeavoured
for some months to obtain work with a carrier, omnibus proprietor, or
job-master, either as driver or in charge of horses. His prospects thus
failing him, he was now selling whips to earn his livelihood. A friend
advised him to do this, as better than starving, and as being a trade
that he understood:--
“I often thought I’d be forced to go back home, sir,” he said, “and
I’d have been ashamed to do ’t, for I _would_ come to try my luck in
London, and would leave a place I had. All my friends--and they’re not
badly off--tried to ’suade me to stop at home another year or two, but
come I would, as if I must and couldn’t help it. I brought good clothes
with me, and they’re a’most all gone; and I’d be ashamed to go back
so shabby, like the prodigal’s son; you know, sir. I’ll have another
try yet, for I get on to a cab next Monday, with a very respectable
cab-master. As I’ve only myself, I know I can do. I was on one, but not
with the same master, after I’d been six weeks here; but in two days I
was forced to give it up, for I didn’t know my way enough, and I didn’t
know the distances, and couldn’t make the money I paid for my cab. If
I asked another cabman, he was as likely to tell me wrong as right.
Then the fares used to be shouting out, ‘I say, cabby, where the h----
are you going? I told you Mark-lane, and here we are at the Minories.
Drive back, sir.’ I know my way now well enough, sir. I’ve walked the
streets too long not to know it. I notice them on purpose now, and know
the distances. I’ve written home for a few things for my new trade, and
I’m sure to get them. They don’t know I’m selling whips. There would be
such a laugh against me among all t’ young fellows if they did. Me as
was so sure to do well in London!
“It’s a poor trade. A carman’ll bid me 6_d._ for such a whip as this,
which is 4_s._ 3_d._ the half dozen wholesale. ‘I have to find my own
whips,’ my last customer said, ‘though I drives for a stunning grocer,
and be d----d to him.’ They’re great swearers some of them. I make
7_s._ or 8_s._ in a week, for I can walk all day without tiring. I one
week cleared 14_s._ Next week I made 3_s._ I _have_ slept in cheap
lodging-houses--but only in three: one was very decent, though out of
the way; one was middling; and the t’other was a pig-sty. I’ve seen
very poor places in the country, but nothing to it. I now pay 2_s._ a
week for a sort of closet, with a bed in it, at the top of a house, but
it’s clean and sweet; and my landlord’s a greengrocer and coal-merchant
and firewood-seller;--he’s a good man--and I can always earn a little
against the rent with him, by cleaning his harness, and grooming his
pony--he calls it a pony, but it’s over 15 hands--and greasing his
cart-wheels, and mucking out his stable, and such like. I shall live
there when I’m on my cab.”
Other carmen’s whips are 1_s._ 6_d._, and as high as 2_s._ 6_d._,
but the great sale is of those at 1_s_. The principal localities for
the trade are at the meat-markets, the “green markets,” Smithfield,
the streets leading to Billingsgate when crowded in the morning, the
neighbourhood of the docks and wharfs, and the thoroughfares generally.
The trade in the other kind of whips is again in the hands of another
class, in that of cabmen who have lost their licence, who have been
maimed, and the numerous “hands” who job about stables--especially
cab-horse stables--when without other employment. The price of the
inferior sort of “gig-whips” is 1_s._ to 1_s._ 6_d._, the wholesale
price being from 9_s._ 6_d._ to 14_s._ 6_d._ the dozen. Some are lower
than 9_s._ 6_d._, but the cabmen, I am told, “will hardly look at them;
they know what they’re a-buying of, and is wide awake, and that’s one
reason why the profit’s so small.” Occasionally, one whip-seller told
me, he had sold gig-whips at 2_s._ or 2_s._ 6_d._ to gentlemen who had
broken their “valuable lance-wood,” or “beautiful thorn,” and who made
a temporary purchase until they could buy at their accustomed shops.
“A military gent, with mustachers, once called to me in Piccadilly,”
the same man stated, “and he said, ‘Here, give me the best you can for
half-a-crown, I’ve snapped my own. I never use the whip when I drive,
for my horse is skittish and won’t stand it, but I can’t drive without
one.’”
In the height of the season, two, and sometimes three men, sell
handsome gig-whips at the fashionable drives or the approaches. “I have
taken as much as 30_s._ in a day, for three whips,” said one man, “each
10_s._; but they were silver-mounted thorn, and very cheap indeed;
that’s 8 or 9 years back; people looks oftener at 10_s._ now. I’ve sold
horse-dealers’ whips too, with loaded ends. Oh, all prices. I’ve bought
them, wholesale, at 8_s._ a dozen, and 7_s._ 6_d._ a piece. Hunting
whips are never sold in the streets now. I have sold them, but it’s a
good while ago, as riding whips for park gentlemen. The stocks were
of fine strong lancewood--such a close grain! with buck horn handles,
and a close-worked thong, fastened to the stock by an ‘eye’ (loop),
which it’s slipped through. You could hear its crack half a mile off.
‘Threshing machines,’ I called them.”
All the whip-sellers in a large way visit the races, fairs, and large
markets within 50 miles of London. Some go as far as Goodwood at the
race-time, which is between 60 and 70 miles distant. On a well-thronged
race-ground these men will take 3_l._ or 4_l._ in a day, and from a
half to three-fourths as much at a country fair. They sell riding-whips
in the country, but seldom in town.
An experienced man knew 40 whip-sellers, as nearly as he could call
them to mind, by sight, and 20 by name. He was certain that on no
day were there fewer than 30 in the streets, and sometimes--though
rarely--there were 100. The most prosperous of the body, including
their profits at races, &c., make 1_l._ a week the year through; the
poorer sort from 5_s._ to 10_s._, and the latter are three times as
numerous as the others. Averaging that only 30 whip-sellers take 25_s._
each weekly (with profits of from 5_s._ to 10_s._) in London alone, we
find 1,950_l._ expended in the streets in whips.
Some of the whip-sellers vend whipcord, also, to those cabmen and
carters who “cord” their own whips. The whipcord is bought wholesale at
2_s._ the pound (sometimes lower), and sold at 1/2_d._ the knot, there
being generally six dozen knots in a pound.
Another class “mend” cabmen’s whips, re-thonging, or “new-springing”
them, but these are street-artisans.
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF PIPES, AND OF SNUFF AND TOBACCO BOXES.
The pipes now sold in the streets and public-houses are the “china
bowls” and the “comic heads.” The “china-bowl” pipe has a bowl of
white stone china, which unscrews, from a flexible tube or “stem,” as
it is sometimes called, about a foot long, with an imitation-amber
mouth-piece. They are retailed at 6_d._ each, and cost 4_s._ a dozen at
the swag-shops. The “comic heads” are of the clay ordinarily used in
the making of pipes, and cost 16_d._ the dozen, or 15_s._ the gross.
They are usually retailed at 2_d._ Some of the “comic heads” may be
considered as hardly well described by the name, as among them are
death’s-heads and faces of grinning devils. “The best sale of the comic
heads,” said one man, “was when the Duke put the soldiers’ pipes out at
the barracks; wouldn’t allow them to smoke there. It was a Wellington’s
head with his thumb to his nose, taking a sight, you know, sir. They
went off capital. Lots of people that liked their pipe bought ’em,
in the public-houses especial, ’cause, as I heerd one man--he was a
boot-closer--say, ‘it made the old boy a-ridiculing of hisself.’ At
that time--well, really, then, I can’t say how long it’s since--I
sold little bone ‘tobacco-stoppers’--they’re seldom asked for now,
stoppers is quite out of fashion--and one of them was a figure of ‘old
Nosey,’ the Duke you know--it was intended as a joke, you see, sir; a
tobacco-_stopper_.”
There are now nine men selling pipes, which they frequently raffle
at the public-houses; it is not unusual for four persons to raffle
at 1/2_d._ each, for a “comic head.” The most costly pipes are not
now offered in the streets, but a few are sold on race-courses. I am
informed that none of the pipe-sellers depend entirely upon their
traffic in those wares, but occasionally sell (and raffle) such things
as china ornaments or table-covers, or tobacco or snuff-boxes. If,
therefore, we calculate that four persons sell pipes daily the year
through, taking each 25_s._ (and clearing 10_s._), we find 260_l._
yearly expended upon the hawkers’ pipes.
The snuff and tobacco-boxes disposed of by street-traders, for they are
usually sold by the same individual, are bought at the swag-shops.
In a matter of traffic, such as snuff-boxes, in which the “fancy” (or
taste) of the purchaser is freely exercised, there are of course many
varieties. The exterior of some presents a series of transverse lines,
coloured, and looking neat enough. Others have a staring portrait of
the Queen, or of “a young lady,” or a brigand, or a man inhaling the
pungent dust with evident delight; occasionally the adornment is a
ruin, a farm-house, or a hunting scene. The retail price is from 4_d._
to 1_s._, and the wholesale 3_s._ to 7_s._ 6_d._ the dozen. The Scotch
boxes, called “Holyroods” in the trade, are also sold in the streets
and public-houses. These are generally the “self-colour” of the wood;
the better sort are lined with horn, and are, or should be, remarkable
for the closeness and nice adjustment of the hinges or joints. They are
sold--some I was told being German-made--at the swag-shops at 3_s._
the dozen, or 4_d._ each, to 6_s._ the dozen, or 8_d._ each. “Why, I
calc’lated,” said one box-seller, “that one week when I was short of
tin, and had to buy single boxes, or twos, at a time, to keep up a
fair show of stock, the swags got 2_s._ more out of me than if I could
have gone and bought by the dozen. I once ventured to buy a very fine
Holyrood; it’ll take a man three hours to find out the way to open it,
if he doesn’t know the trick, the joints is so contrived. But I have it
yet. I never could get an offer for what it cost me, 5_s._”
The tobacco-boxes are of brass and iron (though often called “steel”).
There are three sizes: the “quarter-ounce,” costing 3_s._ the dozen;
the “half-ounce,” 4_s._ 3_d._; and “the ounce,” 5_s._ 6_d._ the dozen,
or 6-1/2_d._ each. These are the prices of the brass. The iron, which
are “sized” in the same way, are from 2_s._ to 3_s._ 6_d._ the dozen,
wholesale. They are retailed at from 3_d._ to 6_d._ each, the brass
being retailed at from 4_d._ to 1_s._ All these boxes are opened and
shut by pressure on a spring; they are partly flat (but rounded), so as
to fit in any pocket. The cigar-cases are of the same quality as the
snuff-boxes (not the Holyroods), and cost, at the German swag-shops,
3_s._ 6_d._ the dozen, or 4-1/2_d._ each. They are usually retailed, or
raffled for on Saturday and Monday nights, at 6_d._ each, but the trade
is a small one.
One branch of this trade, concerning which I heard many street-sellers
very freely express their opinions, is the sale of “indecent
snuff-boxes.” Most of these traders insisted, with a not unnatural
bitterness, that it would be as easy to stop the traffic as it was to
stop Sunday selling in the park, but then “gentlemen was accommodated
by it,” they added. These boxes and cigar-cases are, for the most part,
I am told, French, the lowest price being 2_s._ 6_d._ a box. One man,
whose information was confirmed to me by others, gave me the following
account of what had come within his own knowledge:--
“There’s eight and sometimes nine persons carrying on the indecent
trade in snuff-boxes and cigar-cases. They make a good bit of money,
but they’re drunken characters, and often hard up. They’ve neither
shame nor decency; they’ll tempt lads or anybody. They go to
public-houses which they know is used by fast gents that has money
to spare. And they watch old and very young gents in the streets, or
any gents indeed, and when they see them loitering and looking after
the girls, they take an opportunity to offer a ‘spicy snuff-box,
very cheap.’ It’s a trade only among rich people, for I believe the
indecent sellers can’t afford to sell at all under 2_s._ 6_d._, and
they ask high prices when they get hold of a green ’un; perhaps one up
on a spree from Oxford or Cambridge. Well, I can’t say where they get
their goods, nor at what price. That’s their secret. They carry them
in a box, with proper snuff-boxes to be seen when its opened, and the
others in a secret drawer beneath; or in their pockets. You may have
seen a stylish shop in Oxford-street, and in the big window is large
pipe heads of a fine quality, and on them is painted, quite beautiful,
naked figures of women, and there’s snuff-boxes and cigar-cases of
much the same sort, but they’re nothing to what these men sell. I must
know, for it’s not very long since I was forced, through distress,
to colour a lot of the figures. I could colour 50 a day. I hadn’t a
week’s work at it. I don’t know what they make; perhaps twice as much
in a day, as in the regular trade can be made in a week. I was told by
one of them that one race day he took 15_l._ It’s not every day they
do a good business, for sometimes they may hawk without ever showing
their boxes; but gentlemen will have them if they pay ever so much for
them. There’s a risk in the trade, certainly. Sometimes the police gets
hold of them, but very very seldom, and it’s 3 months. Or if the Vice
Society takes it up, it may be 12 months. The two as does best in the
trade are women; they carry great lots. They’ve never been apprehended,
and they’ve been in the trade for years. No, I should say they was not
women of the town. They’re both living with men, but the men’s not in
the same trade, and I think is in no trade; just fancy men. So I’ve
understood.”
I may observe that the generality of the hawkers of indecent prints and
cards are women.
There are about 35 persons selling snuff and tobacco-boxes--the
greatest sale being of tobacco-boxes--and cigar-cases, generally with
the other things I have mentioned. Of these 35, however, not one-half
sell snuff-boxes constantly, but resort to any traffic of temporary
interest in the public or street-public estimation. Some sell only in
the evenings. Reckoning that 15 persons on snuff and tobacco and cigar
boxes alone take 18_s._ weekly (clearing 7_s._ or 8_s._), we find
702_l._ thus expended.
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF CIGARS.
Cigars, I am informed, have constituted a portion of the street-trade
for upwards of 20 years, having been introduced not long after the
removal of the prohibition on their importation from Cuba. It was
not, however, until five or six years later that they were at all
extensively sold in the streets; but the street-trade in cigars is no
longer extensive, and in some respects has ceased to exist altogether.
I am told by experienced persons that the cigars first vended in
the streets and public-houses were really smuggled. I say “really”
smuggled, as many now vended under that pretence never came from the
smuggler’s hands. “Well, now, sir,” said one man, “the last time I
sold Pickwicks and Cubers a penny apiece with lights for nothing, was
at Greenwich Fair, on the sly rather, and them as I could make believe
was buying a smuggled thing, bought far freer. Everybody likes a
smuggled thing.” [This remark is only in consonance with what I have
heard from others of the same class.] “In my time I’ve sold what was
smuggled, or made to appear as sich, but far more in the country than
town, to all sorts--to gentlemen, and ladies, and shopkeepers, and
parsons, and doctors, and lawyers. Why no, sir, I can’t say as how I
ever sold anything in that way to an exciseman. But smuggling’ll always
be liked; it’s sich a satisfaction to any man to think he’s done the
tax-gatherer.”
The price of a cigar, in the earlier stages of the street-traffic, was
2_d._ and 3_d._ One of the boxes in which these wares are ordinarily
packed was divided by a partition, the one side containing the higher,
and the other the lower priced article. The division was often a mere
trick of trade--in justification of which any street-seller would be
sure to cite the precedent of shopkeepers’ practices--for the cigars
might be the same price (wholesale) but the bigger and better-looking
were selected as “threepennies,” the “werry choicest and realest
Hawanners, as mild as milk, and as strong as gunpowder,” for such, I am
told, was the cry of a then well-known street-trader. The great sale
was of the “twopennies.” As the fuzees, now so common, were unknown,
and lucifer matches were higher-priced, and much inferior to what they
are at present, the cigar seller in most instances carried tow with
him, a portion of which he kept ignited in a sort of tinder-box, and at
this the smokers lighted their cigars; or the vender twisted together
a little tow and handed it, ignited, to a customer, that if he were
walking on he might renew his “light,” if the cigar “wouldn’t draw.”
A cheaper cigar soon found its way into street commerce, “only a
penny apiece, prime cigars;” and on its first introduction, a straw
was fitted into it, as a mouth-piece. “Cigar tubes” were also sold in
the streets; they were generally of bone, and charged from 2_d._ to
1_s._ each. The cigar was fitted into the tube, and they were strongly
recommended on the score of economy, as “by means of this tube, any
gen’l’man can smoke his cigar to half a quarter of an inch, instead
of being forced to throw it away with an inch and a half left.” These
tubes have not for a long time been vended in the streets. I am told by
a person, who himself was then engaged in the sale, that the greatest
number of penny cigars ever sold in the streets in one day was on that
of her Majesty’s coronation (June 28, 1838). Of this he was quite
positive from what he had experienced, seen, and heard.
“In my opinion,” said another street-seller, “the greatest injury the
street-trade in such things had was when the publicans took to selling
cigars. They didn’t at first, at least not generally; I’ve sold cigars
myself, at the bars of respectable houses, to gentlemen that was
having their glass of ale with a friend, and one has said to another,
‘Come, we’ll have a smoke,’ and has bought a couple. O, no; I never
was admitted to offer them in a parlour or tap-room; that would have
interfered with the order for ‘screws’ (penny papers of tobacco), which
is a rattling good profit, I can tell you. Indeed, I was looked shy at,
from behind the bar; but if customers chose to buy, a landlord could
hardly interfere. Now, it’s no go at all in such places.”
One common practice among the smarter street-seller, when “on cigars,”
was, until of late years, and still is, occasionally at races and
fairs, to possess themselves of a few really choice “weeds,” as like as
they could procure them to their stock-in-trade, and to smoke one of
them, as they urged their traffic.
The aroma was full and delicate, and this was appealed to if necessary,
or, as one man worded it, the smell was “left to speak for itself.”
The street-folk who prefer the sale of what is more or less a luxury,
become, by the mere necessities of their calling, physiognomists and
quick observers, and I have no reason to doubt the assertion of one
cigar-vendor, when he declared that in the earlier stages of this
traffic he could always, and most unerringly in the country, pick out
the man on whose judgment others seemed to rely, and by selling him
one of his choice reserve, procure a really impartial opinion as to
its excellence, and so influence other purchasers. When the town trade
“grew stale”--the usual term for its falling-off--the cigar-sellers had
a remunerative field in many parts of the country.
In London, before railways became the sole means of locomotion to a
distance, the cigar-sellers frequented the coaching-yards; and the
“outsides” frequently “bought a cigar to warm their noses of a cold
night,” and sometimes filled their cases, if the cigar-seller chanced
to have the good word of the coachman or guard.