Part 40

About one-half of the whelks are sold alive (wholesale), and the other half “cooked” (boiled), some of the salesmen having “convenience for cooking” near the market; but they are all brought to London alive, “or what should be alive.” When bought alive, which ensures a better quality, I was told--for “whelks’ll boil after they’re dead and gone, you see, sir, as if they was alive and hungry”--the costermonger boils them in the largest saucepan at his command for about ten minutes, and then leaves them until they cool. “They never kicks as they boils, like lobsters or crabs,” said one whelk dealer, “they takes it quiet. A missionary cove said to me, ‘Why don’t you kill them first? it’s murder.’ _They_ doesn’t suffer; _I’ve_ suffered more with a toothach than the whole of a measure of whelks has in a boiling, that I’m clear upon.” The boiling is generally the work of the women. The next process is to place them in a tub, throw boiling water over them, and stir them up for ten or fifteen minutes with a broom-handle. If the quantity be a wash, two broom-handles, usually wielded by the man and his wife, are employed. This is both to clean them and “to make them come out easier to be wormed.” The “worming” is equivalent to the removing of the beard of an oyster or mussel. The whelks are wormed one by one. The operator cuts into the fish, rapidly draws out the “worm,” and pushes the severed parts together, which closes. The small whelks are not wormed, “because it’s not reckoned necessary, and they’re sold to poor lads and such like, that’s not particular; but nearly all the women, and a good many of the boys, are very particular. They think the worm’s poison.” The whelks are next shaken in a tub, in cold water, and are then ready for sale. The same process, after the mere boiling, is observed, when the whelks are bought “cooked.”

Some whelk-sellers, who wish to display a superior article, engage children for a few halfpence to rub the shell of every whelk, so that it looks clean and even bright.

I find a difficulty, common in the course of this inquiry, of ascertaining precisely the number of whelk-sellers, because the sale is often carried on simultaneously with that of other things, (stewed eels, for instance,) and because it is common for costermongers to sell whelks on a Saturday night only, both at stalls and “round to the public-houses,” but only when they are cheap at Billingsgate. On a Saturday night there may be 300 whelk-sellers in the streets, nearly half at stalls, and half, or more, “working the public-houses.” But of this number it must be understood that perhaps the wife is at the stall while the husband is on a round, and some whelks are sent out by a man having an extra stock. This, therefore, reduces the number of independent dealers, but not the actual number of sellers. On all other nights there may be half the number engaged in this traffic, in the streets regularly all the year; and more than half on a Monday, as regards the public-house business, in which little is done between Monday and Saturday nights. But a man will, in some instances, work the public-houses every night (the wife tending the stall), and the more assiduously if the weather be bad or foggy, when a public-house custom is the best. A fair week’s earnings in whelks, “when a man’s known,” is 1_l._; a bad week is from 5_s._ to 8_s._ I am assured that bad weeks are “as plenty as good, at least, the year round;” and thus the average to the street whelk-sellers, in whelks alone, is about 13_s._ when the trade is carried on daily and regularly, and 5_s._ a week by those who occasionally resort to it; and as the occasional hands are the more numerous, the average may be struck at 7_s._

The whelks are sold at the stalls at two, three, four, six, and eight a penny, according to size. Four is an average pennyworth for good whelks; the six a penny are small, and the eight a penny very small. The principal place for their sale is in Old-street, City-road. The other principal places are the street-markets, which I have before

## particularised. The whelks are sold in saucers, generally small and

white, and of common ware, and are contained in jars, ready to be “shelled” into any saucer that may have been emptied. Sometimes a small pyramid of shells, surmounted by a candle protected by a shade, attracts the regard of the passer-by. The man doing the best business in London was to be found, before the removals of which I have spoken, in Lambeth-walk, but he has now no fixed locality. His profits, I am informed, were regularly 3_l._ a week; but out of this he had to pay for the assistance of two or sometimes three persons, in washing his whelks, boiling them, &c.; besides that, his wife was as busy as himself. To the quality and cleanliness of his whelks he was very attentive, and would sell no mediocre article if better could be bought. “He deserved all he earned, sir,” said another street-dealer to me; “why, in Old-street now they’ll have the old original saucers, miserable things, such as they had fifty years back; but the man we’re talking of, about two years ago, brought in very pretty plates, quite enterprising things, and they answered well. His example’s spreading, but it’s slowly.” The whelks are eaten with vinegar and pepper.

For sale in the public-houses, the whelks are most frequently carried in jars, and transferred in a saucer to the consumer. “There’s often a good sale,” said a man familiar with the business, “when a public room’s filled. People drinking there always want to eat. They buy whelks, not to fill themselves, but for a relish. A man that’s used to the trade will often get off inferior sorts to the lushingtons; he’ll have them to rights. Whelks is all the same, good, bad, or middling, when a man’s drinking, if they’re well seasoned with pepper and vinegar. Oh yes; any whelk-man will take in a drunken fellow, and he will do it all the same, if he’s made up his mind to, get drunk hisself that very night.”

The trade is carried on by the regular costers, but of the present number of whelk-sellers, about twenty have been mechanics or servants. The whelk-trade is an evening trade, commencing generally about six, summer and winter, or an hour earlier in winter.

The capital required to start in the whelk-business is: stall, 2_s._ 6_d._; saucers, vinegar-bottle, jar, pepper-castor, and small watering-pan (used only in dusty weather), 2_s._ 6_d._; a pair of stilts (supports for the stall), 1_s._ 6_d._; stock-money, 5_s._; pepper and vinegar, 6_d._, or 12_s._ in all. If the trade be commenced in a round basket, for public-house sale, 7_s._ or 8_s._ only is required, but it is a hazardous experiment for a person unpractised in street business.

OF THE CUSTOMERS, ETC., OF PICKLED WHELK-SELLERS.

An intelligent man gave me the following account. He had been connected with street-trading from his youth up, and is now about thirty:

“The chief customers for whelks, sir, are working people and poor people, and they prefer them to oysters; I do myself, and I think they’re not so much eaten because they’re not fashionable like oysters. But I’ve sold them to first-rate public-houses, and to doctors’ shops--more than other shops, I don’t know why--and to private houses. Masters have sent out their servant-maids to me for three or four penn’orths for supper. I’ve offered the maids a whelk, but they won’t eat them in the street; I dare say they’re afraid their young men may be about, and might think they wasn’t ladies if they eat whelks in the street. Boys are the best customers for ‘small,’ but if you don’t look sharp, you’ll be done out of three-ha’porth of vinegar to a ha’porth of whelks. I can’t make out why they like it so. They’re

## particular enough in their way. If the whelks are thin, as they will

be sometimes, the lads will say, ‘What a lot of snails you’ve gathered to-night!’ If they’re plump and fine, then they’ll say, ‘Fat ’uns to-night--stunners!’ Some people eat whelks for an appetite; they give me one, and more in summer than winter. The women of the town are good customers, at least they are in the Cut and Shoreditch, for I know both. If they have five-penn’orth, when they’re treated perhaps, there’s always sixpence. They come on the sly sometimes, by themselves, and make what’s a meal, I’m satisfied, on whelks, and they’ll want credit sometimes. I’ve given trust to a woman of that sort as far as 2_s._ 6_d._ I’ve lost very little by them; I don’t know how much altogether. I keep no account, but carry any credit in my head. Those women’s good pay, take it altogether, for they know how hard it is to get a crust, and have a feeling for a poor man, if they haven’t for a rich one--that’s my opinion, sir. Costermongers in a good time are capital customers; they’ll buy five or six penn’orths at a time. The dust’s a great injury to the trade in summer time; it dries the whelks up, and they look old. I wish whelks were cheaper at Billingsgate, and I could do more business; and I could do more if I could sell a few minutes after twelve on a Saturday night, when people must leave the public-house. I have sold three wash of a Saturday night, and cleared 15_s._ on them. I one week made 3_l._, but I had a few stewed eels to help,--that is, I cleared 2_l._, and had a pound’s worth over on the Saturday night, and sent them to be sold--and they were sold--at Battersea on the Sunday; I never went there myself. I’ve had twenty people round my stall at one time on a Saturday. Perhaps my earnings on that (and other odd things) may come to 1_l._ a week, or hardly so much, the year round. I can’t say exactly. The shells are no use. Boys have asked me for them ‘to make sea-shells of,’ they say--to hold them to their ears when they’re big, and there’s a sound like the sea rolling. Gentlemen have sometimes told me to keep a dozen dozen or twenty dozen, for borders to a garden. I make no charge for them--just what a gentleman may please to give.”

The information given shows an outlay of 5,250_l._ yearly for street whelks, and as the return I have cited shows the money spent in whelks at Billingsgate to be 2,500_l._, the number of whelks being 4,950,000, the account is correct, as the coster’s usual “half-profits” make up the sum expended.

OF THE STREET SELLERS, AND OF THE PREPARATION OF FRIED FISH.

Among the cooked food which has for many years formed a portion of the street trade is fried fish. The sellers are about 350, as a maximum and 250 as a minimum, 300 being an average number. The reason of the variation in number is, that on a Saturday night, and occasionally on other nights, especially on Mondays, stall-keepers sell fried fish, and not as an ordinary article of their trade. Some men, too, resort to the trade for a time, when they cannot be employed in any way more profitable or suitable to them. The dealers in this article are, for the most part, old men and boys, though there may be 30 or 40 women who sell it, but only 3 or 4 girls, and they are the daughters of the men in the business as the women are the wives. Among the fried-fish sellers there are not half a dozen Irish people, although fish is so especial a part of the diet of the poor Irish. The men in the calling have been, as regards the great majority, mechanics or servants; none, I was told, had been fishmongers, or their assistants.

The fish fried by street dealers is known as “plaice dabs” and “sole dabs,” which are merely plaice and soles, “dab” being a common word for any flat fish. The fish which supplies upwards of one half the quantity fried for the streets is plaice; the other fishes used are soles, haddocks, whitings, flounders, and herrings, but very sparingly indeed as regards herrings. Soles are used in as large a quantity as the other kinds mentioned altogether. On my inquiry as to the precise quantity of each description fried, the answer from the traders was uniform: “I can’t say, sir. I buy whatever’s cheapest.” The fish is bought at Billingsgate, but some of the street dealers obtain another and even a cheaper commodity than at that great mart. This supply is known in the trade as “friers,” and consists of the overplus of a fishmonger’s stock, of what he has not sold overnight, and does not care to offer for sale on the following morning, and therefore vends it to the costermongers, whose customers are chiefly among the poor. The friers are sometimes half, and sometimes more than half, of the wholesale price in Billingsgate. Many of the friers are good, but some, I was told, “in any thing like muggy or close weather were very queer fish, very queer indeed,” and they are consequently fried with a most liberal allowance of oil, “which will conceal anything.”

The fish to be fried is first washed and gutted; the fins, head, and tail are then cut off, and the trunk is dipped in flour and water, so that in frying, oil being always used, the skin will not be scorched by the, perhaps, too violent action of the fire, but merely browned. Pale rape oil is generally used. The sellers, however, are often twitted with using lamp oil, even when it is dearer than that devoted to the purpose. The fish is cooked in ordinary frying-pans. One tradesman in Cripplegate, formerly a costermonger, has on his premises a commodious oven which he had built for the frying, or rather baking, of fish. He supplies the small shopkeepers who deal in the article (although some prepare it themselves), and sells his fish retail also, but the street-sellers buy little of him, as they are nearly all “their own cooks.” Some of the “illegitimates,” however, lay in their stock by purchase of the tradesman in question. The fish is cut into portions before it is fried, and the frying occupies about ten minutes. The quantity prepared together is from six to twenty portions, according to the size of the pans; four dozen portions, or “pieces,” as the street people call them, require a quart of oil.

The fried fish-sellers live in some out of the way alley, and not unfrequently in garrets; for among even the poorest class there are great objections to their being fellow-lodgers, on account of the odour from the frying. Even when the fish is fresh (as it most frequently is), and the oil pure, the odour is rank. In one place I visited, which was, moreover, admirable for cleanliness, it was very rank. The cooks, however, whether husbands or wives--for the women often attend to the pan--when they hear of this disagreeable rankness, answer that it may be so, many people say so; but for their parts they cannot smell it at all. The garments of the fried-fish sellers are more strongly impregnated with the smell of fish than were those of any “wet” or other fish-sellers whom I met with. Their residences are in some of the labyrinths of courts and alleys that run from Gray’s-inn-lane to Leather-lane, and similar places between Fetter and Chancery-lanes. They are to be found, too, in the courts running from Cow-cross, Smithfield; and from Turnmill-street and Ray-street, Clerkenwell; also, in the alleys about Bishopsgate-street and the Kingsland-road, and some in the half-ruinous buildings near the Southwark and Borough-roads. None, or very few, of those who are their own cooks, reside at a greater distance than three miles from Billingsgate. A gin-drinking neighbourhood, one coster said, suits best, “for people hasn’t their smell so correct there.”

The sale is both on rounds and at stalls, the itinerants being twice as numerous as the stationary. The round is usually from public-house to public-house, in populous neighbourhoods. The itinerants generally confine themselves to the trade in fried fish, but the stall-keepers always sell other articles, generally fish of some kind, along with it. The sale in the public-houses is the greatest.

At the neighbouring races and fairs there is a great sale of fried fish. At last Epsom races, I was told, there were at least fifty purveyors of that dainty from London, half of them perhaps being costermongers, who speculated in it merely for the occasion, preparing it themselves. Three men joined in one speculation, expending 8_l._ in fish, and did well, selling at the usual profit of cent. per cent., but with the drawback of considerable expenses. Their customers at the races and fairs are the boys who hold horses or brush clothes, or who sell oranges or nuts, or push at roundabouts, and the costers who are there on business. At Epsom races there was plenty of bread, I was informed, to be picked up on the ground; it had been flung from the carriages after luncheon, and this, with a piece of fish, supplied a meal or “a relish” to hundreds.

In the public-houses, a slice of bread, 16 or 32 being cut from a quartern loaf--as they are whole or half slices--is sold or offered with the fish for a penny. The cry of the seller is, “fish and bread, a penny.” Sometimes for an extra-sized piece, with bread, 2_d._ is obtained, but very seldom, and sometimes two pieces are given for 1-1/2_d._ At the stalls bread is rarely sold with the edible in question.

[Illustration: THE BAKED POTATO MAN.

“Baked ’taturs! All ’ot, all ’ot!”

[_From a Daguerreotype by_ BEARD.]]

For the itinerant trade, a neatly painted wooden tray, slung by a leathern strap from the neck, is used: the tray is papered over generally with clean newspapers, and on the paper is spread the shapeless brown lumps of fish. Parsley is often strewn over them, and a salt-box is placed at the discretion of the customer. The trays contain from two to five dozen pieces. I understand that no one has a trade greatly in advance of his fellows. The whole body complain of their earnings being far less than was the case four or five years back.

The itinerant fried fish-sellers, when pursuing their avocation, wear generally a jacket of cloth or fustian buttoned round them, but the rest of their attire is hidden by the white sleeves and apron some wear, or by the black calico sleeves and dark woollen aprons worn by others.

The capital required to start properly in the business is:--frying-pan 2_s._ (second-hand 9_d._); tray 2_s._ 6_d._ (second-hand 8_d._); salt-box 6_d._ (second-hand 1_d._); and stock-money 5_s._--in all 10_s._ A man has gone into the trade, however, with 1_s._, which he expended in fish and oil, borrowed a frying-pan, borrowed an old tea-board, and so started on his venture.

OF THE EXPERIENCE OF A FRIED FISH-SELLER, AND OF THE CLASS OF CUSTOMERS.

The man who gave me the following information was well-looking, and might be about 45 or 50. He was poorly dressed, but his old brown surtout fitted him close and well, was jauntily buttoned up to his black satin stock, worn, but of good quality; and, altogether, he had what is understood among a class as “a _betterly_ appearance about him.” His statement, as well as those of the other vendors of provisions, is curious in its details of public-house vagaries:--