London Labour and the London Poor, Vol. 1

by Henry Mayhew

Tracts they will rarely listen to, but if any persevering man will read tracts, and state that he does it for their benefit and improvement, they listen without rudeness, though often with evident unwillingness. “Sermons or tracts,” said one of their body to me, “gives them the ’orrors.” Costermongers purchase, and not unfrequently, the first number of a penny periodical, “to see what it’s like.”

The tales of robbery and bloodshed, of heroic, eloquent, and gentlemanly highwaymen, or of gipsies turning out to be nobles, now interest the costermongers but little, although they found great delight in such stories a few years back. Works relating to Courts, potentates, or “harristocrats,” are the most relished by these rude people.

Of the Honesty of Costermongers.

I heard on all hands that the costers never steal from one another, and never wink at any one stealing from a neighbouring stall. Any stall-keeper will leave his stall untended to get his dinner, his neighbour acting for him; sometimes he will leave it to enjoy a game at skittles. It was computed for me, that property worth 10,000l. belonging to costers is daily left exposed in the streets or at the markets, almost entirely unwatched, the policeman or market-keeper only passing at intervals. And yet thefts are rarely heard of, and when heard of are not attributable to costermongers, but to regular thieves. The way in which the sum of 10,000l. was arrived at, is this: “In Hooper-street, Lambeth,” said my informant, “there are thirty barrows and carts exposed on an evening, left in the street, with nobody to see to them; left there all night. That is only one street. Each barrow and board would be worth, on the average, 2l. 5s., and that would be 67l. 10s. In the other bye-streets and courts off the New-cut are six times as many, Hooper-street having the most. This would give 405l. in all, left unwatched of a night. There are, throughout London, twelve more districts besides the New-cut—at least twelve districts—and, calculating the same amount in these, we have, altogether, 4,860l. worth of barrows. Taking in other bye-streets, we may safely reckon it at 4,000 barrows; for the numbers I have given in the thirteen places are 2,520, and 1,480 added is moderate. At least half of those which are in use next day, are left unwatched; more, I have no doubt, but say half. The stock of these 2,000 will average 10s. each, or 1,000l.; and the barrows will be worth 4,500l.; in all 5,500l., and the property exposed on the stalls and the markets will be double in amount, or 11,000l. in value, every day, but say 10,000l.

“Besides, sir,” I was told, “the thieves won’t rob the costers so often as they will the shopkeepers. It’s easier to steal from a butcher’s or bacon-seller’s open window than from a costermonger’s stall or barrow, because the shopkeeper’s eye can’t be always on his goods. But there’s always some one to give an eye to a coster’s property. At Billingsgate the thieves will rob the salesmen far readier than they will us. They know we’d take it out of them readier if they were caught. It’s Lynch law with us. We never give them in charge.”

The costermongers’ boys will, I am informed, cheat their employers, but they do not steal from them. The costers’ donkey stables have seldom either lock or latch, and sometimes oysters, and other things which the donkey will not molest, are left there, but are never stolen.

Of the Conveyances of the Costermongers and other Street-sellers.

We now come to consider the matters relating more particularly to the commercial life of the costermonger.

All who pass along the thoroughfares of the Metropolis, bestowing more than a cursory glance upon the many phases of its busy street life, must be struck with astonishment to observe the various modes of conveyance, used by those who resort to the public thoroughfares for a livelihood. From the more provident costermonger’s pony and donkey cart, to the old rusty iron tray slung round the neck by the vendor of blacking, and down to the little grey-eyed Irish boy with his lucifer-matches, in the last remains of a willow hand-basket—the shape and variety of the means resorted to by the costermongers and other street-sellers, for carrying about their goods, are almost as manifold as the articles they vend.

The pony—or donkey—carts (and the latter is by far the more usual beast of draught), of the prosperous costermongers are of three kinds:—the first is of an oblong shape, with a rail behind, upon which is placed a tray filled with bunches of greens, turnips, celery, &c., whilst other commodities are laid in the bed of the cart. Another kind is the common square cart without springs, which is so constructed that the sides, as well as the front and back, will let down and form shelves whereon the stock may be arranged to advantage. The third sort of pony-cart is one of home manufacture, consisting of the framework of a body without sides, or front, or hind part. Sometimes a coster’s barrow is formed into a donkey cart merely by fastening, with cord, two rough poles to the handles. All these several kinds of carts are used for the conveyance of either fruit, vegetables, or fish; but besides those, there is the salt and mustard vendor’s cart, with and without the tilt or covering, and a square piece of tin (stuck into a block of salt), on which is painted “salt 3 lbs. a penny,” and “mustard a penny an ounce.” Then there is the poultry cart, with the wild-ducks, and rabbits dangling at its sides, and with two uprights and a cross-stick, upon which are suspended birds, &c., slung across in couples.