The sellers of tins, who carry them under their arms, or in any way on a round, apart from the use of a vehicle, are known as hand-sellers. The word hand-seller is construed by the street-traders as meaning literally hand-seller, that is to say, a seller of things held or carried in the hand; but the term is clearly derived from the Scotch handsell, as in “handsell penny.” Handsell, according to Jamieson, the Scotch etymologist, means, (1) “The first money that a trader receives for goods; also a gift conferred at a particular season. (2) A piece of bread given before breakfast.” Ihre, the Gothic lexicographer, views the term handsell as having sprung from the Mæso-Gothic hunsla (sacrifice or offering). This is the same as the Anglo-Sax husl (the Eucharist), whence comes the English housel and unhouseled; and he considers the word to have originally meant a gift or offering of any kind. Hence, the hand-sellers of tin and other wares in the street, would mean simply those who offered such tin or other wares for sale. The goods they dispose of are dripping-pans (sometimes called “square pans”), sold at from 3d. to 18d., the 3d. pans being “6 inch,” and the 18d. “15 inch;” cullenders, 6d. to 9d.; hand-bowls, for washerwomen, 1s. (now a very small portion of the trade); roasting-jacks, with tin bodies, 6d. to 1s. 6d. (this used to be the best article for profit and ready sale in the trade, but “they are going out of date”); and the smaller articles of graters, &c.
The hand-sellers also trade in other articles which are less portable; the principal sale, however, is at “stands,” and there chiefly on a Saturday night, the greatest business-time of street-commerce! These less portable articles are tea-kettles, 10d. to 18d.; saucepans of all sizes, the smallest being the “open pints” at 2d. or 2½d. each (they cost them 20d. a dozen; it’s a bargain to get them at 18d.), and the largest the “nine quart;” but the kinds most in demand are the “three pints” and “two quarts,” sold at 6d. and 8d. There are also fish-kettles in this street-traffic, though to a very limited extent—“one fish-kettle,” I was told, “to four-and-twenty saucepans;” the selling price for the fish-kettles is 5s. and 3s. 6d. each; candlesticks are sold at 4d. to 1s.; and shaving-pots, 4d. A few tin things used to be sold at the mews, but the trade is now almost entirely abandoned. These were tins for singeing horses, 2s. 6d. each when first introduced, ten or twelve years ago, but now 1s., and stable lanterns, of punched tin, which cannot be sold now for more than 1s. each, though they cost 10s. per dozen at a tin-shop.
There are other tin articles vended in the streets, but they will be more properly detailed in my account of street-artisans, as the maker and the street-seller are the same individual. Among these are Dutch ovens, which are rarely offered now by those who purchase their goods at the tin-shops, as the charge there is 6d. “Why,” said a working tinman to me, “I’ve had 10d. many a week for making ovens, and the stuff found. It takes two plates of tin to make an oven, that’s 3d. at any tin-shop, before a minute’s labour is given to it, and yet the men who hawk their own goods sell their ovens regularly enough at 4d. It’s the ruin of the trade.” The tin-shops, I may observe, supply the artisans with the materials they require, as well as the ready-made articles, to the street-seller.
One of the largest street-stands “in tin” is in St. John-street, Clerkenwell, on Saturday evenings, but the proprietor pertains to the artisan class, though he buys some of his goods at the tin-shops.
The hand-sellers of tin are about 100 in number, and 60 of that number may be said to be wives and children of the remaining 40; as the majority of the itinerant vendors of tinware are married men with families. “Tins” are not a heavy carriage, and can very well be borne from house to house by women, while children sell such things as nutmeg-graters, pepper-boxes, extinguishers, and save-alls. Those who sell the larger tin articles in the streets are generally the makers of them. “A dozen years back or more, perhaps, there was,” I was informed, “some prime block-tin tea-pots sold in the streets; there’s none now. Metal’s druv out tin.”
Among the street tin-sellers I heard many complaints of the smallness, and the constantly diminishing rate of their earnings. “Our people has bad luck, too,” said one man, “or they isn’t wide awake. You may remember, sir, that a few weeks back, a new save-all came in, and was called candle-wedges, and went off well. It was a tin thing, and ought by rights to have been started by the tin-shops for us. But it was first put out by the swag-men at 3s. the gross. The first and second days the men were soon sold out. Them as could patter tidy did the best—I tried, but you see, sir, I’m no scholar. Well, they went at night to Mr. ——’s, in Houndsditch, I think it is, and he says, ‘I’m out of them, but I’ll have some in the morning.’ They goes in the morning, and the swag says: ‘O, I can’t afford ’em at three shillings, you can have ’em at four.’ He put 1s. exter on the gross, cause they sold, nothing else, sir; and a relation of mine heard the swag shopkeeper say, ‘Why, they’re cheap at four; Jim (the street-seller) there made 3s. 3d. on ’em yesterday. I ain’t a going to slave, and pay rent, and rates, and taxes, to make your fortens; it ain’t likely.’ You see, sir, they was sold at ½d. each, and cost ¼d., which is 3d. a dozen, and so the swag got a higher profit, while the poor fellows had to sell for less profit.”
From the most reliable information which I could acquire, it appears that these tin-sellers, taken altogether, do not earn above 6s. a week each, as regards the adult men, and half that as regards the children and women. To realize this amount, the adults must take 13s., and the women and children 7s., for the latter are less “priced down.” Thus, if we calculate an average receipt, per individual, of 10s. weekly, reckoning 100 sellers, we find a yearly expenditure on tins, bought in the street, of 2500l. The trade is greatest in the suburbs, and some men, who have become “known on their rounds,” supply houses, by order, with all the tins they require.
There is a branch of the tin-trade carried on in a way which I have shown prevailed occasionally among the costermongers, viz., the selling of goods on commission. This system is now carried on among all the parties who trade “from” swag-barrows.
The word “swag” which has been so often used in this work of late, is, like many other of the street-terms, of Scotch origin (as handseller, and busker). The Scotch word is sweg or swack, and means, according to Jamieson, a quantity, a considerable number, a large collection of any kind. (The root appears to be an ancient German term, sweig—a flock, a herd.) Hence a Swag Warehouse is a warehouse containing a large collection of miscellaneous goods; and a Swag Barrow, a barrow laden with a considerable assortment of articles. The slang term swag means booty, plunder—that is to say, the collection of goods—the “lot,” the “heap” stolen.
Of these swag-barrowmen, there are not less than 150, and the barrows are mostly the property of three individuals, who are not street-sellers themselves. One of these men has 50 barrows of his own, and employs 50 men to work them. The barrow proprietor supplies not only the vehicle, but the stock, and the men’s remuneration is 3d. in the 1s. on the amount of sales. Each article they sell is charged to the public 1d. The tin-wares of the swag-barrows are nutmeg-graters, bread-graters, beer-warmers, fish-slices, goblets, mugs, save-alls, extinguishers, candle-shades, money-boxes, children’s plates, and rattles. In addition to the tin-wares, the swag-barrows are stocked with brooches, rings, pot-ornaments, plates, small crockeryware, toys, &c., each article being also vended at 1d. The trade is so far stationary, that the men generally confine themselves to one neighbourhood, if not to one street. The majority of the swag-barrowmen have been costermongers, and nearly the whole have been engaged in street avocations all their lives. One man familiar with the trade thought I might state that the whole were of this description; for though there was lately a swag-barrowman who had been a tradesman in an extensive way, there was, he believed, no such exception at the present time. These barrowmen are nearly all uneducated, and are plodding and persevering men, though they make few exertions to better their condition. As the barrow and stock are supplied to them, without any outlay on their part, their faculties are not even sharpened, as among many of the costermongers, by the necessity of providing stock-money, and knowing how to bargain and buy to advantage. They have merely to sell. Their commission furnishes little or nothing more than the means of a bare subsistence. The great sale is on Saturday nights at the street-markets, and to the working people, who then crowd those places, and, as one said to me, “has a few pennies to lay out.” At such times as much as 3l. has been taken by a swag-barrowman. During the other days of the week their earnings are small. It is considered a first-rate week, and there must be all the facilities for street-trade afforded by fine weather, to take 2s. a day (clearing 6d.), and 3l. on a Saturday night. This gives the swag-barrowman a commission of 18s.; but I am informed, by competent persons, that the average of the weekly profits of these street-traders does not exceed 10s. a week. This shows a yearly receipt, by the men working the barrows, of 3900l. as their profit or payment, and a gross receipt of 11,700l. Of this large amount nearly two-thirds, I am assured, is expended on tin-wares.