Of the Obsolete Cries of the Costermongers.
A brief account of the cries once prevalent among the street-sellers will show somewhat significantly the change in the diet or regalements of those who purchase their food in the street. Some of the articles are not vended in the public thoroughfares now, while others are still sold, but in different forms.
“Hot sheep’s feet,” for instance, were cried in the streets in the time of Henry V.; they are now sold cold, at the doors of the lower-priced theatres, and at the larger public-houses. Among the street cries, the following were common prior to the wars of the Roses: “Ribs of beef,”—“Hot peascod,”—and “Pepper and saffron.” These certainly indicate a different street diet from that of the present time.
The following are more modern, running from Elizabeth’s days down to our own. “Pippins,” and, in the times of Charles II., and subsequently, oranges were sometimes cried as “Orange pips,”—“Fair lemons and oranges; oranges and citrons,”—“New Wall-fleet oysters,” [“fresh” fish was formerly cried as “new,”]—“New-river water,” [I may here mention that water-carriers still ply their trade in parts of Hampstead,]—“Rosemary and lavender,”—“Small coals,” Orchis mascula, or Red-handed Orchis, a plant which grows luxuriantly in our meadows and pastures, flowering in the spring, though never cultivated to any extent in this country; that required for the purposes of commerce was imported from India. The saloop-stalls were superseded by the modern coffee-stalls.
There were many other cries, now obsolete, but what I have cited were the most common.