Part 64

Here, then, we perceive an immediate increase in the price paid for scavaging between 1846 and 1847 of nearly 33 per cent., and since the wages of the workmen were not proportionately increased in the latter year by the employers, it follows that the profits of the contractors must have been augmented to that enormous extent. The only effectual mode of preventing this system of jobbing being persevered in, _at the expense of the workmen_, is by the insertion of a clause in each parish contract similar to that introduced by the Commissioners of Sewers--that at least a fair living rate of wages shall be paid by each contractor to the men employed by him. This may be an interference with the freedom of labour, according to the economists’ “cant” language, but at least it is a restriction of the tyranny of capital, for free labour means, when literally translated, _the unrestricted use of capital_, which is (especially when the moral standard of trade is not of the highest character) perhaps the greatest evil with which a State can be afflicted.

* * * * *

Let me now speak of the _Scurf labourers_. The moral and social characteristics of the working scavagers who labour for a lower rate of hire do not materially differ from those of the better paid and more regularly employed body, unless, perhaps, in this respect, that there are among them a greater proportion of the “casuals,” or of men reared to the pursuit of other callings, and driven by want, misfortune, or misconduct, to “sweep the streets;” and not only that, but to regard the “leave to toil” in such a capacity a boon. These constitute, as it were, the cheap labourers of this trade.

Among the parties concerned in the lower-priced scavaging, are the usual criminations. The parish authorities will not put up any longer with the extortions of the contractors. The contractors cannot put up any longer with the stinginess of the parishes. The _working_ scavagers, upon whose shoulders the burthen falls the heaviest--as it does in all depreciated tradings--grumble at both. I cannot aver, however, that I found among the men that bitter hatred of their masters which I found actuating the mass of operative tailors, shoemakers, dressmakers, &c., toward the slop capitalists who employed them.

I have pointed out in what the “scurf” treatment of the labourers was chiefly manifested--in extra work for inferior pay; in doing eight or nine days’ work in six; and in being paid for only six days’ labour, and not always at the ordinary rate even for the lighter toil--not 2_s._ 8_d._, but 2_s._ 6_d._ or even 2_s._ 4_d._ a day. To the wealthy, this 2_d._ or 4_d._ a day may seem but a trifling matter, but I heard a working scavager (formerly a house-painter) put it in a strong light: “that 3_d._ or 4_d._ a day, sir, is a poor family’s rent.” The rent, I may observe, as a result of my inquiries among the more decent classes of labourers, is often the primary consideration: “You see, sir, we must have a roof over our heads.”

A scavager, working for a scurf master, gave me the following account. He was a middle-aged man, decently dressed, for when I saw him, he was in his “Sunday clothes,” and was quiet in his tones, even when he spoke bitterly.

“My father,” he said, “was once in business as a butcher, but he failed, and was afterwards a journeyman butcher, but very much respected, I know, and I used to job and help him. O dear, yes! I can read and write, but I have very seldom to write, only I think one never forgets it, it’s like learning to swim, that way; and I read sometimes at coffee-shops. My father died rather sudden, and me and a brother had to look out. My brother was older than me, he was 20 or 21 then, and he went for a soldier, I believe to some of the Ingees, but I’ve never heard of him since. I got a place in a knacker’s yard, but I didn’t like it at all, _it was so confining_, and should have hooked it, only I left it honourable. I can’t call to mind how long that’s back, perhaps 16 or 18 years, but I know there was some stir at the time about having the streets and yards cleaner. A man called and had some talk with the governor, and says he, says the governor, says he, ‘if you want a handy lad with his besom, and he’s good for nothing else’--but that was his gammon--‘here’s your man;’ so I was engaged as a young sweeper at 10_s._ a week. I worked in Hackney, but I heard so much about railways, that I saved my money up to 10_s._, and popped [pledged] a suit of mourning I’d got after my father’s death for 22_s._, and got to York, both on foot and with lifts. I soon got work on a rail; there was great call for rails then, but I don’t know how long it’s since, and I was a navvy for six or seven years, or better. Then I came back to London. I don’t know just what made me come back, _but I was restless_, and I thought I could get work as easy in London as in the country, but I couldn’t. I brought 21 gold sovereigns with me to London, twisted in my fob for safeness, in a wash-leather bag. They didn’t last so long as they ought to. I didn’t care for drinking, only when I was in company, but I was a little too gay. One night I spent over 12_s._ in the St. Helena Gardens at Rotherhithe, and that sort of thing soon makes money show taper. I got some work with a rubbish carter, a regular scurf. I made only about 8_s._ a week under him, for he didn’t want me this half day or that whole day, and if I said anything, he told me I might go and be d----d, he could get plenty such, and I knew he could. I got on then with a gangsman I knew, at street-sweeping. I had 15_s._ a week, but not regular work, but when the work wer’n’t regular, I had 2_s._ 8_d._ a day. I then worked under another master for 14_s._ a week, and was often abused that I wasn’t better dressed, for though that there master paid low wages, he was vexed if his men didn’t look decent in the streets. I’ve heard that he said he paid the best of wages when asked about it. I had another job after that, at 15_s._, and then 16_s._ a week, with a contractor as had a wharf; but a black nigger slave was never slaved as I was. I’ve worked all night, when it’s been very moonlight, in loading a barge, and I’ve worked until three and four in the morning that way, and then me and another man slept an hour or two in a shed as joined his stables, and then must go at it again. Some of these masters is ignorant, and treats men like dirt, but this one was always civil, and made his people be civil. But, Lord, I hadn’t a rag left to my back. Everything was worn to bits in such hard work, and then I got the sack. I was on for Mr. ---- next. He’s a jolly good ’un. I was only on for him temp’ry, but I was told it was for temp’ry when I went, so I can’t complain. I’m out of work this week, but I’ve had some jobs from a butcher, and I’m going to work again on Monday. I don’t know at what wages. The gangsmen said they’d see what I could do. It’ll be 15_s._, I expect, and over-work if it’s 16_s._

“Yes, I like a pint of beer now and then, and one requires it, but I don’t get drunk. I dusted for a fortnight once while a man was ill, and got more beer and twopences give me than I do in a year now; aye, twice as much. My mate and me was always very civil, and people has said, ‘there’s a good fellow, just sweep together this bit of rubbish in the yard here, and off with it.’ That was beyond our duty, but we did it. I have very little night-work, only for one master; he’s a sweep as well. I get 2_s._ 6_d._ a job for it. Yes, there’s mostly something to drink, but you can’t demand nothing. Night-work’s nothing, sir; no more ain’t a knacker’s yard.

“I pay 2_s._ a week rent, but I’m washed for and found soap as well. My landlady takes in washing, and when her husband, for they’re an old couple, has the rheumatics, I make a trifle by carrying out the clothes on a barrow, and Mrs. Smith goes with them and sees to the delivery. I’ve my own furniture.

“Well, I don’t know what I spend in my living in a week. I have a bit of meat, or a saveloy or two, or a slice of bacon every day, mostly when I’m at work. I sometimes make my own meals ready in my room. No, I keep no accounts. There’d be very little use or pleasure in doing it when one has so little to count. When I’m past work, I suppose I must go to the workhouse. I sometimes wish I’d gone for a soldier when I was young enough. I shouldn’t have minded going abroad. I’d have liked it better than not, for _I like to be about; yes, I like a change_.

“I go to chapel every Sunday night, and have regularly since Mr. ---- (the butcher) gave me this cast-off suit. I promised him I would when I got the togs.

“Things would be well enough with me if I’d constant work and fair pay. I don’t know what makes wages so low. I suppose it’s rich people trying to get all the money they can, and caring nothing for poor men’s rights, and poor men’s sometimes forced to undersell one another, ’cause half a loaf you know, sir, is better than no bread at all” (a proverb, by the way, which has wrought no little mischief).

In conclusion, I may remark, that although I was told, in the first instance, there was sub-letting in street sweeping, I could not hear of any facts to prove it. I was told, indeed, by a gentleman who took great interest in parochial matters, with a view to “reforms” in them, that such a thing was most improbable, for if a contractor sub-let any of his work it would soon become known, and as it would be evident that the work could be accomplished at a lower rate, the contractor would be in a worse position for his next contract.

OF THE STREET-SWEEPING MACHINE, AND THE STREET-SWEEPERS EMPLOYED WITH IT.

Until the introduction of the machines now seen in London, I believe that no mechanical contrivances for sweeping the streets had been attempted, all such work being executed by manual labour, and employing throughout the United Kingdom a great number of the poor. The street-sweeping machine, therefore, assumes an importance as another instance of the displacement, or attempted displacement, of the labour of man by the mechanism of an engine.

The street-sweeping machines were introduced into London about five years ago, after having been previously used, under the management of a company, in Manchester, the inventor and maker being Mr. Whitworth, of that place. The novelty and ingenuity of the apparatus soon attracted public attention, and for the first week or two the vehicular street-sweeper was accompanied in its progress by a crowd of admiring and inquisitive pedestrians, so easily attracted together in the metropolis. In the first instance the machines were driven through the streets merely to display their mode and power of work, and the drivers and attendants not unfrequently came into contact with the regular scavagers, when a brisk interchange of street wit took place, the populace often enough encouraging both sides. At present the street-sweeping machine proceeds on its line of operation as little noticed, except by visitors, and foreigners especially, as any other vehicle. The body of the sweeping machine, although the sizes may not all be uniform, is about 5 feet in length, and 2 feet 8 inches or 3 feet in width; the height is about 5 feet 6 inches or 6 feet, and the form that of a covered cart, with a rounded top. The sides of the exterior are of cast iron, the top being of wood. At the hinder part of the cart is fixed the sweeping-machine itself, covered by sloping boards which descend from the top of the cart, projecting slightly behind the vehicle to the ground; under the sloping boards is an endless chain of brushes as wide as the cart, 16 in number, placed at equal distances, and so arranged, that when made to revolve, each brush in turn passes over the ground, sweeping the mud along with it to the bottom sloping board, and so carrying it up to the interior of the cart. The chain of brushes is set in motion, over the surface of the pavement, by the agency of three cog wheels of cast iron; these are worked by the rotation of the wheels of the cart, the cogs acting upon the spindles to which the brooms are attached. The spindles, brushes, and the sloped boards can be raised or lowered by the winding of an instrument called the broom winder; or the whole can be locked. The brooms are raised when any acclivity is to be swept, and lowered at a declivity. The vehicle must be water-tight, in order to contain the slop.

When full the machine holds about half a cart load or half a ton of dirt; this is emptied by letting down the back in the manner of a trap door. If the contents be solid, they have to be forked out; if more sloppy, they are “shot” out, as from a cart, the interior generally being roughly scraped to complete the emptying.

The districts which have as yet been cleansed by the machines are what may be considered a government domain, being the public thoroughfares under the control of the Commissioners of the Woods and Forests, running from Westminster Abbey to the Regent-circus in Piccadilly, and including Spring-gardens, Carlton-gardens, and a portion of the West Strand, where they were first employed in London; they have been used also in parts of the City; and are at present employed by the parish of St. Martin-in-the-Fields. The company by whom the mechanical street-sweeping business is carried on employ 12 machines, 4 water carts, 19 horses, and 24 men. They have also the use, but not the sole use, of two wharfs and barges at Whitefriars and Millbank. The machines altogether collect about 30 cart-loads of street-dirt a day, which is equivalent to four or five barge-loads in a week, if all were boated. Two barges per week are usually sent to Rochester, the others up the river to Fulham, &c. The average price is 5_l._ 10_s._ to 6_l._ per barge load, but when the freight has been chiefly dung, as much as 8_l._ has been paid for it by a farmer.

The street-sweeping machine seems to have commanded the approbation of the General Board of Health, although the Board’s expression of approval is not without qualification. “Even that efficient and economical implement,” says one of the Reports, “the street-sweeping machine, leaves much filth between the interstices of the stones and some on the surface.” One might have imagined, however, that an efficient and economical implement would not have left this “much filth” in its course; but the Board, I presume, spoke comparatively.

The reason of the circumscribed adoption of the machine--I say it with some reluctance, but from concurrent testimony--appears to be that it does _not_ sweep sufficiently clean. It sweeps the surface, but only the surface; not cleansing what the scavagers call the “nicks” and “holes,” and the Board of Health the “interstices,” in the pavement.

One man is obliged to go along with each machine, to sweep the ridge of dirt invariably left at the edge of the track of the vehicle into the line of the next machine, so that it may be “licked up.” In fine weather this work is often light enough. It is also the occupation of the accompanying scavager to sweep the dirt from the sloping edges of the public ways into the direct course of the machine, for the brushes are of no service along such slopes; he must also sweep out the contents of any hole or hollow there may be in the streets, as is frequently the case when the pavement has been disturbed in the relaying or repairing of the gas or water pipes. But for this arrangement, I was told, the brushes would pass “clean over” such places, or only disturb without clearing away the dirt. Indeed irregularities of any kind in the pavement are great obstructions to the efficiency of the street-sweeping machine.

There are some places, moreover, wholly unsweepable by the machine; in many parts of St. Martin’s parish, for instance, there are localities where the machine cannot be introduced; such are--St. Martin’s-court; the flagged ways about the National Gallery; and the approach, alongside the church, to the Lowther Arcade; the pavement surrounding the fountains which adorn the “noblest site in Europe;” and a variety of alleys, passages, yards, and minor streets, which must be cleansed by manual labour.

In fair weather, again, water carts are indispensable before machine sweeping, for if the ground be merely dry and dusty, the set of brooms will not “bite.”

We now come to estimate the _relative values of the mechanical and manual labour applied to the scavaging of the streets_. The average progress of the street-sweeping machine, in the execution of the scavagers’ work, is about two miles an hour. It must not be supposed, however, that two streets each a mile in length, could be swept in one hour; for to do this the vehicle would have to travel up and down those streets as many times as the streets are wider than the machine. The machines, sometimes two, sometimes three or four, follow alongside each other’s tracks in sweeping a street, so as to leave no part unswept. Thus, supposing a street half a mile long and nine yards wide, and that each machine swept a breadth of a yard, then three such machines, driven once up, and once again down, and once more up such a street, would cleanse it in three quarters of an hour. To do this by manual labour in the same or nearly the same time, would require the exertions of five men. Each machine has been computed to have mechanical power equal to the industry of five street-sweepers; and such, from the above computation, would appear to be the fact. I do not include the drivers in this enumeration, as of course the horse in the scavagers’ cart, and in the machine require alike the care of a man, and there is to each vehicle (whether mechanical or not) one hand (besides the carman) to sweep after the ordinary work. Hence every two men with the machine do the work of seven men by hand.

Having, then, ascertained the relative values of the two forces employed in cleansing the streets, let me now proceed to set forth what is “the economy of labour” resulting from the use of the sweeping machine. In the following table are given the number of men at present engaged by the machine company in the cleansing of those districts where the machine is in operation, as well as the annual amount of wages paid to the machine labourers; these facts are then collocated with the number of manual labourers that would be required to do the same work under the ordinary contract system (assuming every two labourers with the machine to do the work of seven labourers by hand), as well as the amount of wages that would be paid to such manual labourers; and finally, the number of men and amount of wages under the one system of street-cleansing is subtracted from the other, in order to arrive at the number of street-sweepers at present displaced by machine labour, and the annual loss in wages to the men so displaced; or, to speak economically, the last column represents the amount by which the Wage Fund of the street-sweepers is diminished by the employment of the machine.

TABLE SHOWING THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE NUMBER OF MEN AT PRESENT ENGAGED IN STREET-SWEEPING BY MACHINES, AND THE NUMBER THAT WOULD BE REQUIRED TO SWEEP THE SAME DISTRICTS BY HAND, TOGETHER WITH THE ANNUAL AMOUNT OF WAGES ACCRUING TO EACH.

+--------------------+----------------------------------+ | Machine Labour. | +----------------------------------+ | Number | Annual Wages | DISTRICTS. | of Men | received | | employed to | by Machine | | attend | Men, at 16s. | | Machines. | a Week. | +--------------------+------------------+---------------+ | | £ _s._ | St. Martin’s-in-the} | | | Fields } | 8 | 332 16 | | | | Regent-street and } | | | Pall-mall (see } | 12 | 499 4 | table, p. 214) } | | | | | | Other places, } | | | connected } | | | with Woods } | 4 | 166 8 | and Forests } | | | +--------------------+------------------+---------------+ Total | 24 | 998 8 | +--------------------+------------------+---------------+

+--------------------+----------------------------------+ | Manual Labour. | +----------------------------------+ | Number of | Annual | | men that | Wages that | DISTRICTS. | would be | would be | | required to | received by | | sweep the | Manual | | Streets by | Labourers, at | | Manual labour. | 15s. a Week. | +--------------------+------------------+---------------+ | | £ _s._ | St. Martin’s-in-the} | | | Fields } | 28 | 1092 0 | | | | Regent-street and } | | | Pall-mall (see } | 42 | 1638 0 | table, p. 214) } | | | | | | Other places, } | | | connected } | | | with Woods } | 14 | 546 0 | and Forests } | | | +--------------------+------------------+---------------+ Total | 84 | 3276 0 | +--------------------+------------------+---------------+

+--------------------+------------------+---------------+ | Difference. | +----------------------------------+ | Number | Annual Loss | DISTRICTS. | of | in Wages to | | Men displaced | Manual | | by Machine-work. | Labourers by | | | Machine-work. | +------------------+---------------+ | | £ _s._ | St. Martin’s-in-the} | | | Fields } | 20 | 759 4 | | | | Regent-street and } | | | Pall-mall (see } | 30 | 1138 16 | table, p. 214) } | | | | | | Other places, } | | | connected } | | | with Woods } | 10 | 379 12 | and Forests } | | | +--------------------+------------------+---------------+ Total | 60 | 2277 12 | +--------------------+------------------+---------------+

Hence, we perceive that no less than 60 street-sweepers are deprived of work by the street-sweeping machine, and that the gross Wage Fund of the men is diminished by the employment of mechanical labour no less than 2277_l._ per annum.