There are now four men carrying on this trade. They wear no particular dress, “just what clothes we can get,” said one of them. One, who has been in the trade twenty-five years, was formerly an inn-porter; the other three are ladies’ shoemakers in the day-time, and pea-sellers in the evening, or at early morning, in any market. Their average sale is three gallons daily, with a receipt of 7s. per man. Seven gallons a day is accounted a large sale; but the largest of all is at Greenwich fair, when each pea-man will take 35s. in a day. Each vendor has his district. One takes Billingsgate, Rosemary-lane, and its vicinity; another, the Old Clothes Exchange, Bishopsgate, Shoreditch, and Bethnal-green; a third, Mile-end and Stepney; and a fourth, Ratcliffe-highway, Limehouse, and Poplar. Each man resides in his “round,” for the convenience of boiling his peas, and introducing them to his customers “hot and hot.”
The peas used in this traffic are all the dried field pea, but dried green and whole, and not split, or prepared, as are the yellow peas for soup or puddings. They are purchased at the corn-chandlers’ or the seed-shops, the price being 2s. the peck (or two gallons.) The peas are soaked before they are boiled, and swell considerably, so that one gallon of the dried peas makes rather more than two gallons of the boiled. The hot green peas are sold in halfpennyworths; a halfpennyworth being about a quarter of a pint. The cry of the sellers is, “Hot green peas! all hot, all hot! Here’s your peas hot, hot, hot!”
Of the Experience of a Hot Green Pea Seller.
The most experienced man in the trade gave me the following account:—
“Come the 25th of March, sir, and I shall have been 26 years in the business, for I started it on the 25th of March—it’s a day easy for to remember, ’cause everybody knows it’s quarter-day—in 1825. I was a porter in coaching-inns before; but there was a mishap, and I had to drop it. I didn’t leave ’cause I thought the pea line might be better, but because I must do something, and knew a man in the trade, and all about it. It was a capital trade then, and for a good many years after I was in it. Many a day I’ve taken a guinea, and, sometimes, 35s.; and I have taken two guineas at Greenwich Fair, but then I worked till one or two in the morning from eleven the day before. Money wasn’t so scarce then. Oh, sir, as to what my profit was or is, I never tell. I wouldn’t to my own wife; neither her that’s living nor her that’s dead.” [A person present intimated that the secret might be safely confided to the dead wife, but the pea-seller shook his head.] “Now, one day with another, except Sundays, when I don’t work, I may take 7s. I always use the dried peas. They pay better than fresh garden-peas would at a groat a peck. People has asked for young green peas, but I’ve said that I didn’t have them. Billingsgate’s my best ground. I sell to the costers, and the roughs, and all the parties that has their dinners in the tap-rooms—they has a bit of steak, or a bit of cold meat they’ve brought with them. There’s very little fish eat in Billingsgate, except, perhaps, at the ord’n’ries (ordinaries). I’m looked for as regular as dinner-time. The landlords tell me to give my customers plenty of pepper and salt, to make them thirsty. I go on board the Billingsgate ships, too, and sometimes sell 6d. worth to captain and crew. It’s a treat, after a rough voyage. Oh, no, sir, I never go on board the Dutch eel-vessels. There’s nothing to be got out of scaly fur’ners (foreigners.) I sell to the herring, and mackarel, and oyster-boats, when they’re up. My great sale is in public-houses, but I sometimes sell 2d. or 3d. worth to private houses. I go out morning, noon, and night; and at night I go my round when people’s having a bite of supper, perhaps, in the public-houses. I sell to the women of the town then. Yes, I give them credit. To-night, now (Saturday), I expect to receive 2s. 3d., or near on to it, that I’ve trusted them this week. They mostly pay me on a Saturday night. I lose very little by them. I’m knocked about in public-houses by the Billingsgate roughs, and I’ve been bilked by the prigs. I’ve known at least six people try my trade, and fail in it, and I was glad to see them broke. I sell twice as much in cold weather as in warm.”
I ascertained that my informant sold three times as much as the other dealers, who confine their trade principally to an evening round. Reckoning that the chief man of business sells 3 gallons a day (which, at 1d. the quarter-pint, would be 8s., my informant said 7s.), and that the other three together sell the same quantity, we find a street-expenditure on hot green peas of 250l. and a street consumption of 1870 gallons. The peas, costing 2s. the two gallons, are vended for 4s. or 5s., at the least, as they boil into more than double the quantity, and a gallon, retail, is 2s. 8d.; but the addition of vinegar, pepper, &c., may reduce the profit to cent. per cent., while there is the heaping up of every measure retail to reduce the profit. Thus, independent of any consideration as to the labour in boiling, &c. (generally done by the women), the principal man’s profit is 21s. a week; that of the others 7s. each weekly.
The capital required to start in the business is—can, 2s. 6d.; vinegar-bottle and pepper-box, 4d.; saucers and spoons, 6d.; stock-money, about 2s.; cloth to wrap over the peas, 4d. (a vendor wearing out a cloth in three months); or an average of 9s. or 10s.
Of Cats’ and Dogs’-meat Dealers.
The supply of food for cats and dogs is far greater than may be generally thought. “Vy, sir,” said one of the dealers to me, “can you tell me ’ow many people’s in London?” On my replying, upwards of two millions; “I don’t know nothing vatever,” said my informant, “about millions, but I think there’s a cat to every ten people, aye, and more than that; and so, sir, you can reckon.” [I told him this gave a total of 200,000 cats in London; but the number of inhabited houses in the metropolis was 100,000 more than this, and though there was not a cat to every house, still, as many lodgers as well as householders kept cats, I added that I thought the total number of cats in London might be taken at the same number as the inhabited houses, or 300,000 in all.] “There’s not near half so many dogs as cats. I must know, for they all knows me, and I sarves about 200 cats and 70 dogs. Mine’s a middling trade, but some does far better. Some cats has a hap’orth a day, some every other day; werry few can afford a penn’orth, but times is inferior. Dogs is better pay when you’ve a connection among ’em.”
The cat and dogs’-meat dealers, or “carriers,” as they call themselves, generally purchase the meat at the knackers’ (horse-slaughterers’) yards. There are upwards of twenty of such yards in London; three or four are in Whitechapel, one in Wandsworth, two in Cow-cross—one of the two last mentioned is the largest establishment in London—and there are two about Bermondsey. The proprietors of these yards purchase live and dead horses. They contract for them with large firms, such as brewers, coal-merchants, and large cab and ’bus yards, giving so much per head for their old live and dead horses through the year. The price varies from 2l. to 50s. the carcass. The knackers also have contractors in the country (harness-makers and others), who bring or send up to town for them the live and dead stock of those parts. The dead horses are brought to the yard—two or three upon one cart, and sometimes five. The live ones are tied to the tail of these carts, and behind the tail of each other. Occasionally a string of fourteen or fifteen are brought up, head to tail, at one time. The live horses are purchased merely for slaughtering. If among the lot bought there should chance to be one that is young, but in bad condition, it is placed in the stable, fed up, and then put into the knacker’s carts, or sold by them, or let on hire. Occasionally a fine horse has been rescued from death in this manner. One person is known to have bought an animal for 15s., for which he afterwards got 150l. Frequently young horses that will not work in cabs—such as “jibs”—are sold to the horse-slaughterers as useless. They are kept in the yard, and after being well fed, often turn out good horses. The live horses are slaughtered by the persons called “knackers.” These men get upon an average 4s. a day. They begin work at twelve at night, because some of the flesh is required to be boiled before six in the morning; indeed, a great part of the meat is delivered to the carriers before that hour. The horse to be slaughtered has his mane clipped as short as possible (on account of the hair, which is valuable). It is then blinded with a piece of old apron smothered in blood, so that it may not see the slaughterman when about to strike. A pole-axe is used, and a cane, to put an immediate end to the animal’s sufferings. After the animal is slaughtered, the hide is taken off, and the flesh cut from the bones in large pieces. These pieces are termed, according to the part from which they are cut, hind-quarters, fore-quarters, cram-bones, throats, necks, briskets, backs, ribs, kidney pieces, hearts, tongues, liver and lights. The bones (called “racks” by the knackers) are chopped up and boiled, in order to extract the fat, which is used for greasing common harness, and the wheels of carts and drags, &c. The bones themselves are sold for manure. The pieces of flesh are thrown into large coppers or pans, about nine feet in diameter and four feet deep. Each of these pans will hold about three good-sized horses. Sometimes two large brewers’ horses will fill them, and sometimes as many as four “poor” cab-horses may be put into them. The flesh is boiled about an hour and 20 minutes for a “killed” horse, and from two hours to two hours and 20 minutes for a dead horse (a horse dying from age or disease). The flesh, when boiled, is taken from the coppers, laid on the stones, and sprinkled with water to cool it. It is then weighed out in pieces of 112, 56, 28, 21, 14, 7, and 3½ lbs. weight. These are either taken round in a cart to the “carriers,” or, at about five, the carriers call at the yard to purchase, and continue doing so till twelve in the day. The price is 14s. per cwt. in winter, and 16s. in summer. The tripe is served out at 12 lb. for 6d. All this is for cats and dogs. The carriers then take the meat round town, wherever their “walk” may lie. They sell it to the public at the rate of 2½d. per lb., and in small pieces, on skewers, at a farthing, a halfpenny, and a penny each. Some carriers will sell as much as a hundred-weight in a day, and about half a hundred-weight is the average quantity disposed of by the carriers in London. Some sell much cheaper than others. These dealers will frequently knock at the doors of persons whom they have seen served by another on the previous day, and show them that they can let them have a larger quantity of meat for the same money. The class of persons belonging to the business are mostly those who have been unable to obtain employment at their trade. Occasionally a person is bred to it, having been engaged as a lad by some carrier to go round with the barrow and assist him in his business. These boys will, after a time, find a “walk” for themselves, beginning first with a basket, and ultimately rising to a barrow. Many of the carriers give light weight to the extent of 2 oz. and 4 oz. in the pound. At one yard alone near upon 100 carriers purchase meat, and there are, upon an average, 150 horses slaughtered there every week. Each slaughter-house may be said to do, one with another, 60 horses per week throughout the year, which, reckoning the London slaughter-houses at 12, gives a total of 720 horses killed every week in the metropolis, or, in round numbers, 37,500 in the course of the year.