A stout, reddish-faced man, who was familiar with all kinds of
exhibitions, and had the coaxing, deferential manner of many persons
who ply for money in the streets, gave me an account of what he called
“his experience” as the “_drum and pipes_:”--
“I have played the pandean pipes and the drum for thirty years to
street exhibitions of all kinds. I was a smith when a boy, serving
seven years’ apprenticeship; but after that I married a young woman
that I fell in love with, in the music line. She played a hurdy-gurdy
in the streets, so I bought pandean pipes, as I was always fond of
practising music, and I joined her. Times for street-musicianers were
good then, but I was foolish. I’m aware of that now; but I wasn’t
particularly partial to hard work; besides, I could make more as
a street-musicianer. When I first started, my wife and I joined a
fantoccini. It did well. My wife and I made from 9_s._ to 10_s._ a-day.
We had half the profits. At that time the public exhibitions were
different to what they are now. Gentlemen’s houses were good then,
but now the profession’s sunk to street corners. Bear-dancing was in
vogue then, and clock-work on the round board, and Jack-i’-the-green
was in all his glory every May, thirty years ago. Things is now very
dead indeed. In the old times, only sweeps were allowed to take part
with the Jack; they were particular at that time; all were sweeps but
the musicianers. Now it’s everybody’s money, when there’s any money.
Every sweep showed his plate then when performing. ‘My lady’ was
anybody at all likely that they could get hold of; she was generally
a watercress-seller, or something in the public way. ‘My lady’ had
2_s._ 6_d._ a-day and her keep for three days--that was the general
hire. The boys, who were climbing-boys, had 1_s._ or 6_d._, or what
the master gave them; and they generally went to the play of a night,
after washing themselves, in course. I had 6_s._ a-day and a good
dinner--shoulder of mutton, or something prime--and enough to drink.
‘My lord’ and the other characters shared and shared alike. They have
taken, to my knowledge, 5_l._ on the 1st of May. This year, one set,
with two ‘My ladies,’ took 3_l._ the first day. The master of the
lot was a teetotaler, but the others drank as they liked. He turned
teetotaler because drink always led him into trouble. The dress of the
Jack is real ivy tied round hoops. The sweeps gather the ivy in the
country, and make the dresses at their homes. My lord’s and the other
dresses are generally kept by the sweeps. My lord’s dress costs a mere
trifle at the second-hand clothes shop, but it’s gold-papered and
ornamented up to the mark required. What I may call war tunes, such as
‘The White Cockade,’ the ‘Downfall of Paris,’ (I’ve been asked for that
five or six times a-day--I don’t remember the composer), ‘Bonaparte’s
March,’ and the ‘Duke of York’s March,’ were in vogue in the old times.
So was ‘Scots wha hae’ (very much), and ‘Off she goes!’ Now new tunes
come up every day. I play waltzes and pokers now chiefly. They’re not
to compare to the old tunes; it’s like playing at musicianers, lots of
the tunes now-a-days. I’ve played with Michael, the Italy Bear. I’ve
played the fife and tabor with him. The tabor was a little drum about
the size of my cap, and it was tapped with a little stick. There are
no tabors about now. I made my 7_s._ or 8_s._ a-day with Michael. He
spoke broken English. A dromedary was about then, but I knew nothing of
that or the people; they was all foreigners together. Swinging monkeys
were in vogue at that time as well. I was with them, with Antonio of
Saffron Hill. He was the original of the swinging monkeys, twenty years
ago. They swing from a rope, just like slack-wire dancers. Antonio made
money and went back to his own country. He sold his monkeys,--there
was three of them,--small animals they were, for 70_l._ to another
foreigner; but I don’t know what became of them. Coarse jokes pleased
people long ago, but don’t now; people get more enlightened, and think
more of chapel and church instead of amusements. My trade is a bad one
now. Take the year through, I may make 12_s._ a-week, or not so much;
say 10_s._ I go out sometimes playing single,--that’s by myself,--on
the drum and pipes; but it’s thought nothing of, for I’m not a German.
It’s the same at Brighton as in London; brass bands is all the go when
they’ve Germans to play them. The Germans will work at 2_s._ a-day at
any fair, when an Englishman will expect 6_s._ The foreigners ruin this
country, for they have more privileges than the English. The Germans
pull the bells and knock at the doors for money, which an Englishman
has hardly face for. I’m now with a fantoccini figures from Canton,
brought over by a seaman. I can’t form an exact notion of how many
men there are in town who are musicianers to the street exhibitions;
besides the exhibitions’ own people, I should say about one hundred. I
don’t think that they are more drunken than other people, but they’re
liable to get top-heavy at times. None that I know live with women of
the town. They live in lodgings, and not in lodging-houses. Oh! no,
no, we’ve not come to that yet. Some of them succeeded their fathers
as street-musicianers; others took it up casalty-like, by having
learned different instruments; none that I know were ever theatrical
performers. All the men I know in my line would object, I am sure, to
hard work, if it was with confinement along with it. We can never stand
being confined to hard work, after being used to the freedom of the
streets. None of us save money; it goes either in a lump, if we get a
lump, or in dribs and drabs, which is the way it mostly comes to us.
I’ve known several in my way who have died in St. Giles’s workhouse. In
old age or sickness we’ve nothing but the parish to look to. The newest
thing I know of is the singing dogs. I was with that as musician,
and it answers pretty well amongst the quality. The dogs is three
Tobies to a Punch-and-Judy show, and they sing,--that is, they make a
noise,--it’s really a howl,--but they keep time with Mr. Punch as he
sings.”