Of the Boys of the Costermongers, and their Bunts.
But there are still other “agents” among the costermongers, and these are the “boys” deputed to sell a man’s goods for a certain sum, all over that amount being the boys’ profit or “bunts.” Almost every costermonger who trades through the streets with his barrow is accompanied by a boy. The ages of these lads vary from ten to sixteen, there are few above sixteen, for the lads think it is then high time for them to start on their own account. These boys are useful to the man in “calling,” their shrill voices being often more audible than the loudest pitch of an adult’s lungs. Many persons, moreover, I am assured, prefer buying of a boy, believing that if the lad did not succeed in selling his goods he would be knocked about when he got home; others think that they are safer in a boy’s hands, and less likely to be cheated; these, however, are equally mistaken notions. The boys also are useful in pushing at the barrow, or in drawing it along by tugging at a rope in front. Some of them are the sons of the costermongers; some go round to the costermongers’ abodes and say: “Will you want me to-morrow?” “Shall I come and give you a lift?” The parents of the lads thus at large are, when they have parents, either unable to support them, or, if able, prefer putting their money to other uses, (such as drinking); and so the lads have to look out for themselves, or, as they say, “pick up a few halfpence and a bit of grub as we can.” Such lads, however, are the smallest class of costermongering youths; and are sometimes called “cas’alty boys,” or “nippers.”
The boys—and nearly the whole of them—soon become very quick, and grow masters of slang, in from six weeks to two or three months. “I suppose,” said one man familiar with their character, “they’d learn French as soon, if they was thrown into the way of it. They must learn slang to live, and as they have to wait at markets every now and then, from one hour to six, they associate one with another and carry on conversations in slang about the “penny gaffs” (theatres), criticising the actors; or may be they toss the pieman, if they’ve got any ha’pence, or else they chaff the passers by. The older ones may talk about their sweethearts; but they always speak of them by the name of ‘nammow’ (girls).
“The boys are severe critics too (continued my informant) on dancing. I heard one say to another; ‘What do you think of Johnny Millicent’s new step?’ for they always recognise a new step, or they discuss the female dancer’s legs, and not very decently. At other times the boys discuss the merits or demerits of their masters, as to who feeds them best. I have heard one say, ‘O, aint Bob stingy? We have bread and cheese!’ Another added; ‘We have steak and beer, and I’ve the use of Bill’s, (the master’s) ’baccy box.’”
Some of these lads are paid by the day, generally from 2d. or 3d. and their food, and as much fruit as they think fit to eat, as by that they soon get sick of it. They generally carry home fruit in their pockets for their playmates, or brothers, or sisters; the costermongers allow this, if they are satisfied that the pocketing is not for sale. Some lads are engaged by the week, having from 1s. to 1s. 6d., and their food when out with their employer. Their lodging is found only in a few cases, and then they sleep in the same room with their master and mistress. Of master or mistress, however, they never speak, but of Jack and Bet. They behave respectfully to the women, who are generally kind to them. They soon desert a very surly or stingy master; though such a fellow could get fifty boys next day if he wanted them, but not lads used to the trade, for to these he’s well known by their talk one with another, and they soon tell a man his character very plainly—“very plainly indeed, sir, and to his face too,” said one.
Some of these boys are well beaten by their employers; this they put up with readily enough, if they experience kindness at the hands of the man’s wife; for, as I said before, parties that have never thought of marriage, if they live together, call one another husbands and wives.
In “working the country” these lads are put on the same footing as their masters, with whom they eat, drink, and sleep; but they do not gamble with them. A few, however, go out and tempt country boys to gamble, and—as an almost inevitable consequence—to lose. “Some of the boys,” said one who had seen it often, “will keep a number of countrymen in a beer-shop in a roar for the hour, while the countrymen ply them with beer, and some of the street-lads can drink a good deal. I’ve known three bits of boys order a pot of beer each, one after the other, each paying his share, and a quartern of gin each after that—drunk neat; they don’t understand water. Drink doesn’t seem to affect them as it does men. I don’t know why.” “Some costermongers,” said another informant, “have been known, when they’ve taken a fancy to a boy—I know of two—to dress him out like themselves, silk handkerchiefs and all; for if they didn’t find them silk handkerchiefs, the boys would soon get them out of their ‘bunts.’ They like silk handkerchiefs, for if they lose all their money gambling, they can then pledge their handkerchiefs.”
I have mentioned the term “bunts.” Bunts is the money made by the boys in this manner:—If a costermonger, after having sold a sufficiency, has 2s. or 3s. worth of goods left, and is anxious to get home, he says to the boy, “Work these streets, and bring me 2s. 6d. for the tol,” (lot) which the costermonger knows by his eye—for he seldom measures or counts—is easily worth that money. The lad then proceeds to sell the things entrusted to him, and often shows great ingenuity in so doing. If, for instance, turnips be tied up in penny bunches, the lad will open some of them, so as to spread them out to nearly twice their previous size, and if any one ask if that be a penn’orth, he will say, “Here’s a larger for 1½d., marm,” and so palm off a penny bunch at 1½d. Out of each bunch of onions he takes one or two, and makes an extra bunch. All that the lad can make in this way over the half-crown is his own, and called “bunts.” Boys have made from 6d. to 1s. 6d. “bunts,” and this day after day. Many of them will, in the course of their traffic, beg old boots or shoes, if they meet with better sort of people, and so “work it to rights,” as they call it among themselves; servants often give them cast-off clothes. It is seldom that a boy carries home less than the stipulated sum.
The above is what is understood as “fair bunts.”
“Unfair bunts” is what the lad may make unknown to his master; as, if a customer call from the area for goods cried at 2d., the lad may get 2½d., by pretending what he had carried was a superior sort to that called at 2d.,—or by any similar trick.
“I have known some civil and industrious boys,” said a costermonger to me, “get to save a few shillings, and in six months start with a shallow, and so rise to a donkey-cart. The greatest drawback to struggling boys is their sleeping in low lodging-houses, where they are frequently robbed, or trepanned to part with their money, or else they get corrupted.”
Some men employ from four to twelve boys, sending them out with shallows and barrows, the boys bringing home the proceeds. The men who send lads out in this way, count the things, and can tell to a penny what can be realised on them. They neither pay nor treat the boys well, I am told, and are looked upon by the other costermongers as extortioners, or unfair dealers, making money by trading on poor lads’ necessities, who serve them to avoid starvation. These men are called “Scurfs.” If the boys working for them make bunts, or are suspected of making bunts, there is generally “a row” about it.
The bunts is for the most part the gambling money, as well as the money for the “penny gaff,” the “twopenny hop,” the tobacco, and the pudding money of the boys. “More would save their wages and their bunts,” was said to me on good authority, “but they have no place to keep their money in, and don’t understand anything about savings banks. Many of these lads are looked on with suspicion by the police, and treated like suspected folks; but in my opinion they are not thieves, or they wouldn’t work so hard; for a thief’s is a much easier life than a costermonger’s.”
When a boy begins business on his own account, or “sets up,” as they call it, he purchases a shallow, which costs at least 1s., and a half hundred of herrings, 1s. 6d. By the sale of the herrings he will clear 1s., going the round he has been accustomed to, and then trade on the 2s. 6d. Or, if it be fruit time, he will trade in apples until master of 5s., and then “take to a barrow,” at 3d. a day hire. By this system the ranks of the costermongers are not only recruited but increased. There is one grand characteristic of these lads; I heard on all hands they are, every one of them, what the costers call—“wide awake.”
There are I am assured from 200 to 300 costers, who, in the busier times of the year, send out four youths or lads each on an average. The young men thus sent out generally live with the costermonger, paying 7s. a week for board, lodging and washing. These youths, I was told by one who knew them well, were people who “didn’t care to work for themselves, because they couldn’t keep their money together; it would soon all go; and they must keep it together for their masters. They are not fed badly, but then they make ‘bunts’ sometimes, and it goes for grub when they’re out, so they eat less at home.”