The cultivation of vegetables in the open ground within ten miles surrounding London, has arrived at great perfection; and so certain is the demand, that the whole is regularly conveyed by land or water to the metropolis; insomuch that persons residing in the neighbourhood of those well-arranged gardens are really less readily accommodated than the inhabitants of the metropolis, and have no supply of vegetables but such as have already been sent to London, and thence back to retailers in their own locality. There are also large supplies of foreign fruit and vegetables. The annual produce of the garden-grounds cultivated to supply the London markets with fruit and vegetables has been estimated at the enormous weight of 360,000 tons, or 1,000 tons per day.
Corn.—The greater part of the corn used for bread and other purposes in the metropolis is sold by corn-factors at the Corn Exchange, Mark Lane; but the corn itself is not taken to that place. Enormous quantities of flour are also brought in, ground at mills in the country and in foreign parts.
Malt liquors.—The beer and ale consumed in the metropolis is, of course, vast in quantity, though there are no means of determining the amount. If, by a letter of introduction, a stranger could obtain admission to Barclay & Perkins’s or Truman & Hanbury’s breweries, he would there see vessels and operations astonishing for their magnitude—bins that are filled with 2,000 quarters of malt every week; brewing-rooms nearly as large as Westminster Hall; fermenting vessels holding 1,500 barrels each; a beer-tank large enough to float an up-river steamer; vats containing 100,000 gallons each; and 60,000 casks, with 200 horses to convey them in drays to the taverns of the metropolis!
Shops and Bazaars.—The better-class London retail shops, for wealth, variety, and vast number, are among the greatest wonders of the place. They speak for themselves. The wholesale establishments with which New Cannon Street, Wood Street, and the south side of St. Paul’s Churchyard—noticeably the gigantic warehouses of Messrs. Cook & Co.—abound, if, by a letter of introduction, an order of admission can be obtained, would strike a stranger—in spite of less external display, save as regards size—as more wonderful still, so enormous is the amount of their business operations, and of capital incoming and outgoing.
There are about 7,400 streets, lanes, rows, &c., in the metropolis. From Charing Cross, within a six miles radius, there are something over 2,600 miles of streets. As regards trades generally, it is hard even to get anything like an approximate notion of their numbers. As the Post Office London Directory says, new trades are being added to the list every year. Thus, we are told, 57 new trades were so added in the year 1870. But to specify a few, there are, say, about 130,000 shopkeepers, or owners of commercial establishments, who carry on more than 2,500 different trades. Loss of much of London’s shipping trade, &c., has indeed driven hundreds of emigrants of late from our east-end waterside neighbourhoods. But London has gone on growing all the same, and trade with it. Among these trades are, without counting purely wholesale dealers, about 2,847 grocers and tea dealers, 2,087 butchers, 2,461 bakers, 1,508 dairymen, &c., 2,370 greengrocers and fruiterers, more than 595 retail fishmongers, 891 cheesemongers, (this computation does not include the small shops in poor neighbourhoods which sell almost everything,) 2,755 tailors, (not including about 500 old-clothesmen, wardrobe-dealers, &c.,) about 3,347 bootmakers, about 450 hatters, and so forth. All these are master tradesmen or shopkeepers, irrespective of workmen, foremen, shopmen, clerks, porters, apprentices, and families. We may add, that in the pages of that very large book the London Post Office Directory, no less than 52 columns and over are occupied by the long list of London publicans.
The principal Bazaars of London are the Soho, London Crystal Palace, (Oxford Street,) and Baker Street bazaars, to which should be added the Burlington Arcade, Piccadilly, and the Lowther Arcade, (famous for cheap toys,) in the Strand. The once celebrated Pantheon, in Oxford Street, is now a wine merchant’s stores. Many small bazaars exist.
The Bazaar system of oriental countries, in which all the dealers in one kind of commodity are met with in one place, is not observable in London; yet a stranger may usefully bear in mind that, probably for the convenience both of buyers and sellers, an approach to the system is made. For instance, coachmakers congregate in considerable number in Long Acre and Great Queen Street; watchmakers and jewellers, in Clerkenwell; tanners and leather-dressers, in Bermondsey; bird and bird-cage sellers, in Seven Dials; statuaries, in the Euston Road; sugar-refiners, in and near Whitechapel; furniture-dealers, in Tottenham Court Road; hat-makers, in Bermondsey and Southwark; dentists, about St. Martin’s Lane; &c. There is one bazaar, if so we may term it, of a very remarkable character—namely, Paternoster Row. This street is a continuation of Cheapside, but is not used much as a thoroughfare, though it communicates by transverse alleys or courts with St. Paul’s Churchyard, and, at its western extremity, by means of Ave-Maria Lane, leads into Ludgate Hill. Paternoster Row, or ‘the Row,’ as it is familiarly termed, is a dull street, only wide enough at certain points to permit two vehicles to pass each other, with a narrow pavement on each side. The houses are tall and sombre in their aspect, and the shops below have a dead look, in comparison with those in the more animated streets. But the deadness is all on the outside. For a considerable period this street has been the head-quarters of booksellers and publishers, who, till the present day, continue in such numbers as to leave little room for other tradesmen—transacting business in the book-trade to a prodigious amount. At the western extremity of Paternoster Row a passage leads from Amen Corner to Stationers’ Hall Court, in which is situated Stationers’ Hall, and also several publishing-houses.
Mudie’s Library.—While on the subject of books, we may remind the visitor that the most remarkable lending library in the world is situated in London. Mudie’s, at the corner of New Oxford Street and Museum Street, affords a striking example of what the energy of one man can accomplish. At this vast establishment the volumes are reckoned by hundreds of thousands; and the circulation of them, on easy terms, extends to every part of the kingdom. The chief portion of the building is a lofty central gallery, of considerable beauty.
CLUBS; HOTELS; INNS; CHOP-HOUSES; TAVERNS; COFFEE-HOUSES; COFFEE-SHOPS.
Club-houses.—During the last forty or fifty years new habits amongst the upper classes have led to the establishment of a variety of Club-houses—places of resort unknown to our ancestors. There are at present, including many fifth-rate clubs, about 84 clubs in London. A London club-house is either the property of a private person, who engages to furnish subscribers with certain accommodation, on paying a fixed sum as entrance-money, and a specified annual subscription; or else it belongs to a society of gentlemen who associate for the purpose. Of the first class, the most noted are Brookes’s and White’s, both situated in St. James’s Street, The second class of clubs is most numerous: the principal among them being the Carlton, Junior Carlton, Reform, Athenæum, Oriental, Conservative, Travellers’, United University, Oxford and Cambridge, Army and Navy, Guards’, United Service, Junior United Service, Union, Arthur’s, and Windham clubs. The houses belonging to these clubs respectively are among the finest at the West-end of London, and may easily be distinguished in and about Pall Mall, St. James’s Street, and Waterloo Place. No member sleeps at his club; the accommodation extends to furnishing all kinds of refreshments, the use of a library, and an ample supply of newspapers and periodicals in the reading-room. The real object of these institutions is to furnish a place of resort for a select number of gentlemen, on what are really moderate terms. The Athenæum Club, (near the York Column,) which consists chiefly of scientific and literary men, is one of the most important. It has 1,200 members, each of whom pays thirty guineas entrance-money, and seven guineas yearly subscription. As in all other clubs, members are admitted only by ballot. The expense of the house in building was £35,000, and £5,000 for furnishing; the plate, linen, and glass cost £2,500; library, £5,000; and the stock of wine in cellar is usually worth about £4,000. The other principal clubs vary from nine to thirty guineas entrance-fee, from six to eleven guineas annual subscription, and from 600 to 1,500 members. During part of the life of the late M. Soyer, the kitchen of the Reform Club-house was one of the sights of the West-end. The Garrick Club, in Garrick Street, W.C., consists chiefly of theatrical and literary men. The same remark applies to the Arundel, in Salisbury Street, Strand. The Whittington Club, in the Strand, was the humblest of its class, and bore little resemblance to the others; it was rather a literary and scientific institution, with a refreshment department added.