Part 14

1,000 carts, at 3_l._ 3_s._ each £3,150 [Donkeys, and occasionally ponies, are harnessed to barrows.] 5,000 barrows, at 2_l._ each 10,000 1,500 donkeys, at 1_l._ 5_s._ each 1,875 [One intelligent man thought there were 2,000 donkeys, but I account that in excess.] 200 ponies, at 5_l._ each 1,000 [Some of these ponies, among the very first-class men, are worth 20_l._: one was sold by a coster for 30_l._] 1,700 sets of harness, at 5_s._ each 425 [All calculated as worn and second-hand.] 4,000 baskets (or shallows), at 1_s._ each 200 3,500 stalls or standings, at 5_s._ each 875 [The stall and barrow men have generally baskets to be used when required.] 10,000 weights, scales, and measures, at 2_s._ 6_d._ each 1,250 [It is difficult to estimate this item with exactitude. Many averaged the value at 3_s._ 4_d._] Stock-money for 10,000 costers, at 10_s._ each 5,000 ------- Total capital £23,775 -------

Very nearly 24,000_l._, then, at the most moderate computation, represents the value of the animals, vehicles, and stock, belonging to the costermongers in the streets of London.

The keep of the donkeys is not here mixed up with their value, and I have elsewhere spoken of it.

The whole course of my narrative shows that the bulk of the property in the street goods, and in the appliances for their sale, is in the hands of usurers as well as of the costers. The following account shows the sum paid yearly by the London costermongers for the hire, rent, or interest (I have heard each word applied) of their barrows, weights, baskets, and stock:

Hire of 3,000 barrows, at 1_s._ 3_d._ a week £9,750 Hire of 600 weights, scales, &c., at 1_s._ 6_d._ a week for 2, and 6_d._ a week for 10 months 1,020 Hire of 100 baskets, &c., at 6_d._ a week 130 Interest on 2,500_l._ stock-money, at 125_l._ per week 6,500 [Calculating at 1_s._ interest weekly for 20_s._] ------- Total paid for hire and interest £17,400 -------

Concerning the income of the entire body of costermongers in the metropolis, I estimate the earnings of the 10,000 costermongers, taking the average of the year, at 10_s._ weekly. My own observation, the result of my inquiries, confirmed by the opinion of some of the most intelligent of the costermongers, induce me to adopt this amount. It must be remembered, that if some costermongers do make 30_s._ a week through the year, others will not earn a fourth of it, and hence many of the complaints and sufferings of the class. Then there is the drawback in the sum paid for “hire,” “interest,” &c., by numbers of these people; so that it appears to me, that if we assume the income of the entire body--including Irish and English--to be 15_s._ a week per head in the summer, and 5_s._ a week each in the winter, as the two extremes, or a mean of 10_s._ a week all the year through, we shall not be far out either way. The aggregate earnings of the London costermongers, at this rate, are 5,000_l._ per week, or 260,000_l._ yearly. Reckoning that 30,000 individuals have to be supported out of this sum, it gives an average of 3_s._ 4_d._ a week per head.

But it is important to ascertain not only the earnings or aggregate amount of profit made by the London costermongers in the course of the year, but likewise their receipts, or aggregate amount of “takings,” and thus to arrive at the gross sum of money annually laid out by the poorer classes of the metropolis in the matter of fish, fruit, and vegetables alone. Assuming that the average profits of the costermongers are at the rate of 25 per cent. (and this, I am satisfied, is a high estimate--for we should remember, that though cent. per cent. may be frequently obtained, still their “goods,” being of a “perishable” nature, are as frequently lost or sold off at a “tremendous sacrifice”); assuming then, I say, that the _average_ profits of the entire 10,000 individuals are 25 per cent. on the cost-price of their stock, and that the aggregate amount of their profits or earnings is upwards of 260,000_l._, it follows that the gross sum of money laid out with the London costers in the course of the twelvemonth is 1,040,000_l._ sterling--a sum so enormous as almost to make us believe that the tales of individual want are matters of pure fiction. Large, however, as the amount appears in the mass, still, if distributed among the families of the working men and the poorer class of Londoners, it will be found that it allows but the merest pittance per head per week for the consumption of those articles, which may be fairly said to constitute the staple commodities of the dinners and “desserts!” of the poor.

OF THE PROVIDENCE AND IMPROVIDENCE OF COSTERMONGERS.

The costermongers, like all wandering tribes, have generally no foresight; only an exceptional few are provident--and these are mostly the more intelligent of the class--though some of the very ignorant do occasionally save. The providence of the more intelligent costermonger enables him in some few cases to become “a settled man,” as I have before pointed out. He perhaps gets to be the proprietor of a coal-shed, with a greengrocery and potato business attached to it; and with the usual trade in oysters and ginger-beer. He may too, sometimes, have a sum of money in the savings’-bank, or he may invest it in the purchase of a lease of the premises he occupies, or expend it in furnishing the rooms of his house to let them out to single-men lodgers; or he may become an usurer, and lend out his money to his less provident brethren at 1040_l._ per cent. per annum; or he may purchase largely at the markets, and engage youths to sell his surplus stock at half profits.

The provident costermonger, who has thus “got on in the world,” is rarely speculative. He can hardly be induced to become a member of a “building” or “freehold land” society, for instance. He has been accustomed to an almost _immediate_ return for his outlays, and distrusts any remote or contingent profit. A regular costermonger--or any one who has been a regular costermonger, in whatever trade he may be afterwards engaged--generally dies intestate, let his property be what it may; but there is seldom any dispute as to the disposition of his effects: the widow takes possession of them, as a matter of course. If there be grown-up children, they may be estranged from home, and not trouble their heads about the matter; or, if not estranged, an amicable arrangement is usually come to. The costermongers’ dread of all courts of law, or of anything connected with the law, is only second to their hatred of the police.

The more ignorant costermonger, on the other hand, if he be of a saving turn, and have no great passion for strong drink or gaming, is often afraid to resort to the simple modes of investment which I have mentioned. He will rather keep money in his pocket; for, though it does not fructify there, at least it is safe. But this is only when provided with a donkey or pony “what suits;” when not so provided, he will “suit himself” forthwith. If, however, he have saved a little money, and have a craving after gambling or amusements, he is sure at last to squander it that way. Such a man, without any craving for drink or gaming, will often continue to pay usuriously for the hire of his barrow, not suspecting that he is purchasing it over and over and over again, in his weekly payments. To suggest to him that he might place his money in a bank, is to satisfy him that he would be “had” in some way or other, as he believes all banks and public institutions to be connected with government, and the taxes, and the police. Were any one to advise a man of this class--and it must be remembered that I am speaking of the _ignorant_ costers--to invest a spare 50_l._ (supposing he possessed it) in the “three per cents.,” it would but provoke a snappish remark that he knew nothing about them, and would have nothing to do with them; for he would be satisfied that there was “some cheatery at the bottom.” If he could be made to understand what is meant by 3_l._ per centum per annum, he would be sure to be indignant at the robbery of giving only 7-1/2_d._ for the use of 1_l._ for a whole year!

I may state, in conclusion, that a costermonger of the class I have been describing, mostly objects to give change for a five-pound note; he will sooner give credit--when he knows “the party”--than change, even if he have it. If, however, he feels compelled, rather than offend a regular customer, to take the note, he will not rest until he has obtained sovereigns for it at a neighbouring innkeeper’s, or from some tradesman to whom he is known. “Sovereigns,” said one man, and not a very ignorant man, to me, “is something to lay hold on; a note ain’t.”

Moreover, should one of the more ignorant, having tastes for the beer-shop, &c., meet with “a great haul,” or save 5_l._ by some continuous industry (which he will most likely set down as “luck”), he will spend it idly or recklessly in dissipation and amusement, regardless of the coming winter, whatever he may have suffered during the past. Nor, though they know, from the bitterest experience, that their earnings in the winter are not half those of the rest of the year, and that they are incapacitated from pursuing their trade in bad weather, do they endeavour to make the extra gains of their best time mitigate the want of the worst.

OF THE COSTERMONGERS IN BAD WEATHER AND DURING THE CHOLERA.

“Three wet days,” I was told by a clergyman, who is now engaged in selling stenographic cards in the streets, “will bring the greater part of 30,000 street-people to the brink of starvation.” This statement, terrible as it is, is not exaggerated. The average number of wet days every year in London is, according to the records of the Royal Society, 161--that is to say, rain falls in the metropolis more than three days in each week, and very nearly every other day throughout the year. How precarious a means of living then must street-selling be!

When a costermonger cannot pursue his out-door labour, he leaves it to the women and children to “work the public-houses,” while he spends his time in the beer-shop. Here he gambles away his stock-money oft enough, “if the cards or the luck runs again him;” or else he has to dip into his stock-money to support himself and his family. He must then borrow fresh capital at any rate of interest to begin again, and he begins on a small scale. If it be in the cheap and busy seasons, he may buy a pad of soles for 2_s._ 6_d._, and clear 5_s._ on them, and that “sets him a-going again, and then he gets his silk handkerchief out of pawn, and goes as usual to market.”

The sufferings of the costermongers during the prevalence of the cholera in 1849, were intense. Their customers generally relinquished the consumption of potatoes, greens, fruit, and fish; indeed, of almost every article on the consumption of which the costermongers depend for his daily bread. Many were driven to apply to the parish; “many had relief and many hadn’t,” I was told. Two young men, within the knowledge of one of my informants, became professional thieves, after enduring much destitution. It does not appear that the costermongers manifested any personal dread of the visitation of the cholera, or thought that their lives were imperilled: “We weren’t a bit afraid,” said one of them, “and, perhaps, that was the reason so few costers died of the cholera. I knew them all in Lambeth, I think, and I knew only one die of it, and he drank hard. Poor Waxy! he was a good fellow enough, and was well known in the Cut. But it was a terrible time for us, sir. It seems to me now like a shocking dream. Fish I could’nt sell a bit of; the people had a perfect dread of it--all but the poor Irish, and there was no making a crust out of them. _They_ had no dread of fish, however; indeed, they reckon it a religious sort of living, living on fish,--but they _will_ have it dirt cheap. We were in terrible distress all that time.”

OF THE COSTERMONGERS’ RAFFLES.

In their relief of the sick, if relief it is to be called, the costermongers resort to an exciting means; something is raffled, and the proceeds given to the sufferer. This mode is common to other working-classes; it partakes of the excitement of gambling, and is encouraged by the landlords of the houses to which the people resort. The landlord displays the terms of the raffle in his bar a few days before the occurrence, which is always in the evening. The raffle is not confined to the sick, but when any one of the class is in distress--that is to say, without stock-money, and unable to borrow it,--a raffle for some article of his is called at a public-house in the neighbourhood. Cards are printed, and distributed among his mates. The article, let it be whatever it may--perhaps a handkerchief--is put up at 6_d._ a member, and from twenty to forty members are got, according as the man is liked by his “mates,” or as he has assisted others similarly situated. The paper of every raffle is kept by the party calling it, and before he puts his name down to a raffle for another party, he refers to the list of subscribers to _his_ raffle, in order to see if the person ever assisted him. Raffles are very “critical things, the pint pots fly about wonderful sometimes”--to use the words of one of my informants. The party calling the raffle is expected to take the chair, if he can write down the subscribers’ names. One who had been chairman at one of these meetings assured me that on a particular occasion, having called a “general dealer” to order, the party very nearly split his head open with a quart measure. If the hucksters know that the person calling the raffle is “down,” and that it is necessity that has made him call it, they will not allow the property put up to be thrown for. “If you was to go to the raffle to-night, sir,” said one of them to me, many months ago, before I became known to the class, “they’d say to one another directly you come in, ‘Who’s this here swell? What’s he want?’ And they’d think you were a ‘cad,’ or else a spy, come from the police. But they’d treat you civilly, I’m sure. Some very likely would fancy you was a fast kind of a gentleman, come there for a lark. But you need have no fear, though the pint pots _does_ fly about sometimes.”

OF THE MARKETS AND TRADE RIGHTS OF THE COSTERMONGERS, AND OF THE LAWS AFFECTING THEM.

The next point of consideration is what are the legal regulations under which the several descriptions of hawkers and pedlars are allowed to pursue their occupations.

The laws concerning hawkers and pedlars, (50 Geo. III., c. 41, and 6 Geo. IV., c. 80,) treat of them as identical callings. The “hawker,” however, is, strictly speaking, one who sells wares by _crying_ them in the streets of towns, while the _pedlar_ travels _on foot_ through the country with his wares, not publicly proclaiming them, but visiting the houses on his way to solicit private custom. Until the commencement of the present century--before the increased facilities for conveyance--the pedlars were a numerous body in the country. The majority of them were Scotchmen and some amassed considerable wealth. Railways, however, have now reduced the numbers to insignificance.

Hawkers and pedlars are required to pay 4_l._ yearly for a license, and an additional 4_l._ for every horse or ass employed in the conveyance of wares. The hawking or exposing for sale of fish, fruit, or victuals, does not require a license; and further, it is lawful for any one “being the maker of any home manufacture,” to expose it for sale in any fair or market, without a warrant. Neither does anything in either of the two acts in question prohibit “any tinker, cooper, glazier, plumber, harness-mender, or other person, from going about and carrying the materials proper to their business.”

The right of the costermongers, then, to “hawk” their wares through the streets is plainly inferred by the above acts; that is to say, nothing in them extends to prohibit persons “going about,” unlicensed, and at their own discretion, and selling fish, vegetables, fruit, or provisions generally.

The law acknowledges none of the street “markets.” These congregatings are, indeed, in antagonism to the municipal laws of London, which provide that no market, or public place where provisions are sold, shall be held within seven miles of the city. The law, though it permits butchers and other provisionmongers to hire stalls and standings in the flesh and other markets, recognised by custom or usage, gives no such permission as to street-trading.

The right to sell provisions from stands in the streets of the metropolis, it appears, is merely permissive. The regulation observed is this: where the costermongers or other street-dealers have been in the habit of standing to sell their goods, they are not to be disturbed by the police unless on complaint of an adjacent shopkeeper or other inhabitant. If such a person shows that the costermonger, whose stand is near his premises, is by his improper conduct a nuisance, or that, by his clamour or any peculiarity in his mode of business, he causes a crowd to gather and obstruct the thoroughfare, the policeman’s duty is to remove him. If the complaint from the inhabitants against the street-sellers be at all general the policemen of the beat report it to the authorities, taking no steps until they receive instructions.

It is somewhat anomalous, however, that the law now recognises--inferentially it is true--the right of costermongers to carry about their goods for sale. Formerly the stands were sometimes tolerated, but not the itinerancy.

The enactments of the Common-council from the time of Elizabeth are stringent against itinerant traders of all descriptions, but stringent to no purpose of prevention. In 1607, a Common-council enactment sets forth, that “many People of badd and lewde Condicon daylie resorte from the most Parte of this Realme to the said Cyttie, Suburbes, and Places adjoininge, procuringe themselves small Habytacons, namely, one Chamber-Roome for a poore Forreynor and his Familye, in a small Cottage with some other as poore as himself in the Cyttie, Suburbes, or Places adjacente, to the great Increase and Pestringe of this Cyttie with poore People; many of them proovinge Shifters, lyvinge by Cozeninge, Stealinge, and Imbeazellinge of Mens Gooddes as Opportunitye may serve them, remoovinge from Place to Place accordinglye; many Tymes runninge away, forsakinge their Wives and Children, leavinge them to the Charge of the said Cyttie, and the Hospitalles of the same.”

It was towards this class of men who, by their resort to the capital, recruited the numbers of the street-sellers and public porters and others that the jealousy of the Corporation was directed. The city shop-keepers, three centuries ago, complained vehemently and continuously of the injuries inflicted on their trade by itinerant dealers, complaints which led to bootless enactments. In Elizabeth’s reign the Court of Common Council declared that the streets of the city should be used, as in ancient times, for the common highway, and not for the traffic of hucksters, pedlars, and hagglers. But this traffic increased, and in 1632 another enactment was accounted necessary. Oyster-wives, herb-wives, tripe-wives, and all such “unruly people,” were threatened with the full pains and penalties of the outraged law if they persevered in the prosecution of their callings, which are stigmatised as “a way whereby to live a more easie life than by labour.” In 1694 the street-sellers were menaced with the punishments then deemed suitable for arrant rogues and sturdy beggars--whipping; and that remedy to be applied alike to males and females!

The tenor of these Vagrant Laws not being generally known, I here transcribe them, as another proof of the “wisdom” and mercy of our “ancestors” in “the good old times!”

In the year 1530 the English Parliament enacted, that, while the impotent poor should receive licenses from the justices of the peace to beg within certain limits, all men and _women_, “being whole and mighty in body, and able to labour,” if found vagrant and unable to give an account as to how they obtained their living, should be apprehended by the constables, tied to the tail of a cart _naked_, and beaten with whips through the nearest market-town, or hamlet, “till their bodies be bloody by reason of such whipping!” Five years afterwards it was added, that, if the individual had been once already whipped, he or she should not only be whipped again, but “also shall have the upper part of the gristle of his ear clean cut off, so as it may appear for a perpetual token hereafter that he hath been a contemner of the good order of the commonwealth.” And finally, in 1562, it was directed that any beggar convicted of being a vagabond should, after being grievously whipped, be burnt through the gristle of the right ear “with a hot iron of the compass of an inch about,” unless some person should agree to take him as a servant--of course without wages--for a year; then, that if he twice ran away from such master, he should be adjudged a felon; and that if he ran away a third time, he should “suffer pains of death and loss of land and goods as a felon, without benefit of clergy or sanctuary.”

The only acts now in force which regulate the government of the streets, so to speak, are those best known as Michael Angelo Taylor’s Act, and the 2 & 3 Vic., best known as the Police Act.

OF THE REMOVALS OF COSTERMONGERS FROM THE STREETS.

Such are the laws concerning street trading: let us now see the effect of them.

Within these three months, or little more, there have been many removals of the costermongers from their customary standings in the streets. This, as I have stated, is never done, unless the shopkeepers represent to the police that the costermongers are an injury and a nuisance to them in the prosecution of their respective trades. The costermongers, for the most part, know nothing of the representation of the shopkeepers, so that perhaps the first intimation that they must “quit” comes from the policemen, who thus incur the full odium of the measure, the majority of the street people esteeming it a mere arbitrary act on the part of the members of the force.

The first removal, recently, took place in Leather-lane, Holborn, between three and four months back. It was effected in consequence of representations from the shopkeepers of the neighbourhood. But the removal was of a brief continuance. “Leather-lane,” I was told, “looked like a desert compared to what it was. People that had lived there for years hardly knew their own street; and those that had complained, might twiddle their thumbs in their shops for want of something better to do.”