Part 112
In liquid blacking the trade is now small. It is occasionally sold in the street markets on Saturday nights, but the principal traffic is in the public-houses. This kind of blacking is retailed at 2_d._ a bottle, and, I was informed by a man who had sold it, was “rather queer stuff.” It is labelled “equal to” (in very small letters) “DAY AND MARTIN” in very large letters. One of the manufacturers a few years ago told my informant that he had been threatened “with being sued for piracy, but it was no use sueing a mouse.” There are sometimes none, and sometimes twenty persons hawking this blacking, and they are principally, I am informed, the servants of showmen, “out of employ,” or “down on their luck.” Some of these men “raffle” their blacking in public-houses. They are provided with tickets, numbered from one to six, which are thrown, the blank sides upwards on a table, and the drawer of number six wins a two-penny bottle of blacking for 1/2_d._; for this the raffler receives 3_d._ Few of these traders sell more than one dozen bottles in a day, the principal trade being in the evening, and “one-and-a-half dozen is a very good day.” The goods are carried in a sack, slung from the shoulder, and are a very heavy carriage, as two-and-a-half dozen, which are often carried, weigh about 100 lbs. If ten men, the year through, take each 6_s._ weekly (about half the amount being profit), which, I am assured, is the average extent of the trade, we find 156_l._ yearly expended in this liquid blacking. “Ten years ago,” said one blacking seller to me, “it was three times as much as it is now.” At the mews blacking is sold by men who are for the most part servants out of place, or who have become known to the denizens of the mews, from having been “helpers” in some capacity, if they have not worn a livery. Here the article vended is what it is announced to be,--“Hoby’s” or “Everett’s” blacking. The sellers are known to the coachmen and grooms, many of whom have to “find their own blacking,” or there would be no business done in the mews, the dwellers there being great sticklers for “a good article.” The profit to the vendors is 3_s._ in 12_s._ Shilling bottles are vended as numerously as “sixpennies.” An old coachman, who had lived in mews in all parts of town, calculated that, take the year through, there was every day twenty men selling blacking in the mews, with an average profit of 10_d._ a day, or 5s. a week, so taking 15_s._ each. This gives a mews expenditure, yearly, of 780_l._
_Black-Lead_, for the polishing of grates, is sold in small paper packets, the half ounce being a 1/2_d._, and the ounce a 1_d._ The profit is cent. per cent. Nearly all the women who sell blacking, as I have described, sell black-lead also. In addition to these elderly traders, however, there are from twenty to thirty boys and girls who vend black-lead in the street markets, but chiefly on Saturday nights, and on other days offer it through the area rails--their wretched plight, without any actual begging, occasionally procuring them custom.
The black-lead sold in the streets has often a label in imitation of that of established shop-keepers, as “Superfine Pencil Black-Lead, prepared expressly for, and sold by T. H. Jennings, Oil-Colour and Italian Warehouse, 25, Wormwood-street, City.” The name and address must of course be different, but the arrangement of the lines, and often the type, is followed closely, as are the adornments of the packet, which in the instance cited are heraldic. In other parts of town, the labels of tradesmen are imitated in a similar way, but not very closely; and in nearly half the quantity sold a _bonâ fide_ label is given, without imitation or sham. “There would be more sold in that way,” I was told by a sharp lad, “quite the real ticket, if the dons as wholesales the black-lead, would make it up to sell in ha’porths and penn’orths, with a proper ’lowance to us as sells.” This boy and a young sister went on a round; the boy with black-lead, the girl with boot-laces, in one direction, the mother going in another, and each making for their room at six in the evening, or as soon as “sold out.”
There are, I am informed, 100 to 150 persons selling and hawking black-lead in the streets, and it may be estimated that they take 4_s._ each weekly (the adults selling other small articles with the black-lead); thus we find, averaging the number of sellers at 125, that 1,300_l._ is yearly expended in this article, half of which sum forms the profit of the street-folk.
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF FRENCH POLISH.
The greater part of the French polish vended in the streets is bought at oil and varnish-shops in Bethnal-green and Whitechapel, the wholesale price being 1_s._ a pint. The street-vendors add turpentine to the polish, put it into small bottles, and retail it at 1_d._ a bottle. They thus contrive to clear 5_d._ on each shilling they take.
There are now five and sometimes six men selling French polish in the streets and public-houses. “But the trade’s getting stale,” I was told; “there was twice as many in it three or four years back, and there’ll be fewer still next year.” When French polish first became famous there were, I was informed, several cabinet-makers who hawked it--some having prepared it themselves--and they would occasionally clear 5_s._ in a day. Of these street-traders there are now none, the present vendors having been in no way connected with the manufacture of furniture. These men generally carry with them pieces of “fancy wood,” such as rose, or sandal wood, which they polish up in the streets to show the excellence of the varnish. The chief purchasers are working people and small tradespeople, or their wives, who require trifling quantities of such a composition when they re-polish any small article of furniture.
The French polish-sellers, I am assured by a man familiar with the business, take 2_s._ a day each, or rather in an evening, for the sales are then the most frequent: the 2_s._ leaves a profit of 10_d._ The street expenditure is, therefore (reckoning five regular sellers), 156_l._ yearly. None of the French polish-sellers confine themselves entirely to the sale of it.
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF GREASE-REMOVING COMPOSITIONS.
The persons engaged in this trade carry it on with a regular patter. One man’s street announcement is in the following words: “Here you have a composition to remove stains from silks, muslins, bombazeens, cords, or tabarets of any kind or colour. It will never injure nor fade the finest silk or satin, but restore it to its original colour. For grease on silks, &c., only rub the composition on dry, let it remain five minutes, then take a clothes’ brush and brush it off, and it will be found to have removed the stains. For grease in woollen cloths spread the composition on the place with a piece of woollen cloth and cold water; when dry rub it off, and it will remove the grease or stain. For pitch or tar use hot water instead of cold, as that prevents the nap coming off the cloth. Here it is. Squares of grease-removing composition, never known to fail, only 1_d._ each.”
This street-traffic, I was informed, was far more extensively carried on when silks and woollen cloths, and textile manufactures generally, were more costly and more durable than at present, and when to dye, and scour, and “turn” a garment, was accounted good housewiveship. The sellers then told wonders of their making old silk gowns, or old coats, as good as new, by removing every discolouration, no matter from what cause. Now a silk dress is rarely, if ever, subjected to the experiment of being renovated by the virtues of grease-removing compositions sold in the streets. The trade, at present, is almost confined to the removing of the grease from coat-collars, or of stains from contact with paint, &c., with which boys (principally) have damaged their garments.
The grease-remover generally carries his wares on a tray slung in front of him, and often illustrates the efficacy of his composition, by showing its application to the very greasy collar of a boy’s old jacket, which is removed with admirable facility. The man patters as he carries on this work. “You would have thought now that jacket was done for, and only fit for the rag-bag, or to go to make up a lot for a Jew; but with my composition--only 1_d._ a cake--it has acquired a new nap and a new gloss, and you’ve escaped a tailor’s bill for awhile for 1_d._ You can use your own eyes. You’ve seen me do it, and here’s the very same stuff as I have proved to you is so useful and was never known to fail. No mother, or wife, or mistress, or maid, that wishes to be careful and not waste money, should be without it in the house. It removes stains from silks, &c., &c.”
Notwithstanding these many recommendations, the street trade in grease-removing cakes is a very poor one. It cannot be carried on in bad weather, for an audience cannot then be collected, and to clear 1_s._ 6_d._ in a day is accounted fair work. No grease-remover confines his trade to that commodity. One of the best known sells also plate balls, and occasionally works conundrums and comic exhibitions. The two brothers, who were formerly Grecians at the Blue Coat School, are also in this line. There are now seven men who sell grease-removing compositions, which they prepare themselves. The usual ingredients are pipe clay, two pennyworth of which is beat up and “worked with two colours,” generally red lead and stone blue. This gives the composition a streaky look, and takes away the appearance of pipe clay.
The purchasers of this article are, I am told, women and servants, but the trade is one which is declining. One of the best localities for sale is Ratcliff Highway and the purchasers there are sailors. One man told me that he once made a pound’s worth for a sailor, who took it to sea with him. The street-seller did not know for what purpose, but he conjectured that it was as a matter of speculation to a foreign country.
Calculating that the seven grease-removers carry on the sale of the article 3 days each week, and clear 1_s._ 6_d._ per day, we find 78 guineas yearly expended in the streets for the removal of grease. Nearly the whole is profit.
_Plating Balls_ are generally sold by the grease-removers, but sometimes they are proffered for sale alone. There are four men whose principal dependance is on the sale of plating balls. One announces his wares as “making plate as good as silver, and all inferior metals equal to the best plated. No tarnish can stand against my plate balls,” he goes on, “and if, in this respectable company, there should chance to be any lady or genl’man that has no plate, then let him make an old brass candlestick shine like gold, or his tin candlestick, extinguisher and all, shine like silver. Here are the balls that can do it, and only 4 a penny. You have only to rub the ball on your wash-leather, or dry woollen cloth, and rub it on what has to be restored. Four a penny!”
These balls, which are prepared by the street-sellers, are usually made of a halfpennyworth of whitening, a farthing’sworth of red-lead, and an ounce of quicksilver, costing 7_d._ A gross of balls costs 7-3/4_d._, as regards the materials. The receipts of the plating ball sellers are the same as those of the grease-removers, but with a somewhat smaller profit.
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF CORN-SALVE.
The street purveyors of corn-salve, or corn-plaster, for I heard both words used, are not more than a dozen in number; but, perhaps, none depend _entirely_ upon the sale of corn-salve for a living. As is the wont of the pattering class to which they belong, these men make rounds into the country and into the suburbs, but there are sometimes, on one day, a dozen “working the main drags” (chief thoroughfares) of London: there are no women in the trade. The salve is most frequently carried on a small tray, slung in front of the street professional; but sometimes it is sold at a small stall or stand. Oxford-street, Holborn, Tottenham-court-road, and Whitechapel, are favourite localities for these traders; as are Blackfriars-road and Newington-causeway on the Surrey side of the Thames. On the Saturday evening the corn-salve sellers resort to the street markets.
The patter of these traders is always to the same purport (however differently expressed)--the long-tested efficacy and the unquestionable cheapness of their remedies. The vendors are glib and unhesitating; but some, owing, I imagine, to a repetition of the same words, as they move from one part of a thoroughfare to another, or occupy a pitch, have acquired a monotonous tone, little calculated to impress a street audience--to effect which a man must be, or appear to be, in earnest. The patter of one of these dealers, who sells corn-salve on fine evenings, and works the public-houses, “with anything likely,” on wet evenings, is, from his own account, in the following words:--
“Here you have a speedy remedy for every sort of corn! Your hard corn, soft corn, blood corn, black corn, old corn, new corn, wart, or bunion, can be safely cured in three days! Nothing further to do but spread this salve on a piece of glove-leather, or wash-leather, and apply it to the place. Art and nature does the rest. Either corns, warts, or bunions, cured for one penny.”
This, however, is but as the announcement of the article on sale, and is followed by a recapitulation of the many virtues of that peculiar recipe; but, as regards the major part of these street-traders, the recapitulation is little more than a change of words, if that. There are, however, one and sometimes two patterers, of acknowledged powers, who every now and then sell corn-salve--for the restlessness of this class of people drives them to incessant changes in their pursuits--and their oratory is of a higher order. One of the men in question speaks to the following purport:--
“Here you are! here you are! all that has to complain of corns. As fast as the shoemaker lames you, I’ll cure you. If it wasn’t for me he dursn’t sing at his work; bless you, but he knows I’ll make his pinching easy to you. Hard corn, soft corn, any corn--sold again! Thank you, sir, you’ll not have to take a ’bus home when you’ve used my corn-salve, and you can wear your boots out then; you can’t when you’ve corns. Now, in this little box you see a large corn which was drawn by this very salve from the honourable foot of the late lamented Sir Robert Peel. It’s been in my possession three years and four months, and though I’m a poor man--hard corn, soft corn, or any corn--though I’m a poor man, the more’s the pity, I wouldn’t sell that corn for the newest sovereign coined. I call it the free-trade corn, gen’l’men and leddis. No cutting and paring, and sharpening penknives, and venturing on razors to level your corns; this salve draws them out--only one penny--and without pain. But wonders can’t be done in a moment. To draw out such a corn as I’ve shown you, the foot, the whole foot, must be soaked five minutes in warm soap and water. That makes the salve penetrate, and draw the corn, which then falls out, in three days, like a seed from a flower. Hard corn, soft corn, &c., &c.”
The corn from “the honourable foot” of Sir Robert Peel, or from the foot of any one likely to interest the audience, has been scraped and trimmed from a cow’s heel, and may safely be submitted to the inspection and handling of the incredulous. “There it is,” the corn-seller will reiterate--“it speaks for itself.”
[Illustration: THE STREET-SELLER OF GREASE-REMOVING COMPOSITION, ETC.
[_From a Daguerreotype by_ BEARD.]]
One practice--less common than it was, however,--of the corn-salve street-seller, is to get a friend to post a letter--expressive of delighted astonishment at the excellence and rapidity of the corn-cure--at some post-office not very contiguous. If the salve-seller be anxious to remove the corns of the citizens, he displays this letter, with the genuine post-mark of Piccadilly, St. James’s-street, Pall-mall, or any such quarter, to show how the fashionable world avails itself of his wares, cheap as they are, and fastidious as are the fashionable! If the street-professional be offering his corn-cures in a fashionable locality, he produces a letter from Cheapside, or Cornhill--“there it is, it speaks for itself”--to show how the shrewd city-people, who were never taken in by street-sellers in their lives, and couldn’t be, appreciated that particular corn-salve! Occasionally, as the salve-seller is pattering, a man comes impetuously forward, and says loudly, “Here, doctor, let me have a shilling’s-worth. I bought a penn’orth, and it cured one corn by bringing it right out--here the d----d thing is, it troubled me seven year--and I’ve got other corns, and I’m determined I’ll root out the whole family of them. Come, now, look sharp, and put up a shilling’s-worth.” The shilling’s-worth is gravely handed to the applicant as if it were not only a _boná fide_, but an ordinary occurrence in the way of business.
One corn-salve seller--who was not in town at the time of my inquiry into this curious matter--had, I was assured, “and others might have” full faith in the efficacy of the salve he vended. One of his fellow-traders said to me, “Ay, sir, and he has good reason for trusting to it for a cure; he cured _me_ of my corns, that I’m sure of; so there can be no nonsense about it. He has a secret.” On my asking this informant if he had tried his own corn-salve, he laughed, and said “No! I’m like the regular doctors that way, never tries my own things.” The same man, who had no great faith in what he sold being of any use in the cure of “corn, wart, or bunion,” assured me--and I have no doubt with truth--that he had sold his remedy to persons utter strangers to him, who had told him afterwards that it had cured their corns. “False relics,” says a Spanish proverb, “have wrought true miracles,” and to what cause these corn-cures were attributable, it is not my business to inquire.
I had no difficulty in acquiring a knowledge of the ingredients of a street corn-salve. “Anybody,” said one man, “that understands how to set about it, can get the recipe for 2_d._” Resin, 1 lb., (costing 2_d._); tallow, 1/4 lb. (1-1/2_d._); emerald green (1_d._); all boiled together. The emerald green, I was told, was to “give it a colour.” The colour is varied, but I have cited the most usual mode of preparation. Attempts have been made to give an aromatic odour to the salve, but all the perfumes within the knowledge, or rather the means, of the street-sellers, were overpowered by the resin and the tallow, “and it has,” remarked one dealer, “a physicky sort of smell as it is, which answers.” The quantity I have cited would supply a sufficiency of the composition for the taking of “a sovereign in penn’orths.” In a week or so the stuff becomes discoloured, often from dust, and has to be re-boiled. Some of the traders illustrate the mode of applying the salve by carrying a lighted candle, and a few pieces of leather, and showing how to soften the composition and spread it on the leather. “After all, sir,” said the man, who had faith in the virtues of his fellow street-trader’s salve, “the regular thing, such as I sell, may do good; I cannot say; but it is very likely that the resin will draw the corn, just as people apply cobbler’s wax, which has resin in it. The chemists will sell you something of the same sort as I do.”
The principal purchasers are working men, who buy in the streets, and occasionally in the public-houses. The trade, however, becomes less and less remunerative. To take 15_s._ in a week is a good week, and to take 10_s._ is more usual; the higher receipt is no doubt attributable to a superior patter being used, as men will give 1_d._ to be amused by this street work, without caring about the nostrum. Calculating that eight of these traders take 10_s._ weekly--so allowing for the frequent resort of the patterers to anything more attractive--we find 208_l._ expended in the streets on this salve. The profits of the seller are about the same as his receipts, for 240 pennyworths can be made out of materials costing only 4-1/2_d._ The further outlay necessary to this street profession is a tray worth 1_s._ or 1_s._ 6_d._, but a large old backgammon board, which may be bought at the second-hand shops for 1_s._ and sometimes for 6_d._, is more frequently used by the street purveyors of corn-salve.
OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF GLASS AND CHINA CEMENT, AND OF RAZOR PASTE.
The sale of glass and china cement is an old trade in the streets, but one which becomes less and less followed. Before the finer articles of crockeryware became cheap as they are now, it was of importance to mend, if possible, a broken dish of better quality, and of more importance to mend a china punch-bowl. Dishes, however, are now much cheaper, and china punch-bowls are no longer an indispensable part of even tavern festivity.
The sellers of this cement proclaim it as one which will “cure any china, stone, or earthenware, and make the broken parts adhere so firmly, that if you let it fall again, it will break, not at the part where it has been cemented, but at some other. Only a halfpenny, or a penny a stick.” These traders sometimes illustrate the adhesive strength of the composition by producing a plate or dish which has been cemented in different places, and letting it fall, to break in some hitherto sound part. This they usually succeed in doing. For the cementing of glass the street article is now perhaps never sold, and was but scantily sold, I am informed, at any time, as the junction was always unsightly.
There are now four men who sell this cement in the streets, one usually to be found in Wilderness-row, Goswell-street, being, perhaps, the one who carries on the trade most regularly. They all make their own cement; one of the receipts being--1 lb. shellac (5_d._), 1/4 lb. brimstone (1/2_d._), blended together until it forms a thick sort of glue. This quantity makes half-a-crown’s-worth of the cement for the purposes of retail. The sellers do not confine themselves to one locality, but are usually to be found in one or other of the street-markets on a Saturday night. If each seller take 5_s._ weekly (of which 4_s._ may be profit), we find 52_l._ expended yearly by street customers in this cement.
I include razor paste under this head, as sometimes, and at one time more frequently than now, the same individual sold both articles, though not at the same time.