Of this class perhaps there is less to be said than of others. Drunken parents allow their children to run about the streets, and often to shift for themselves. If such parents have any sense of shame, unextinguished by their continued besottedness, they may feel relieved by not having their children before their eyes, for the very sight of them is a reproach, and every rag about such helpless beings must carry its accusation to a mind not utterly callous.
Among such children there is not, perhaps, that extreme pressure of wretchedness or of privation that there is among the orphans, or the utterly deserted. If a “neglected child” have to shift, wholly or partly, for itself, it is perhaps with the advantage of a shelter; for even the bare room of the drunkard is in some degree a shelter or roof. There is not the nightly need of 2d. for a bed, or the alternative of the Adelphi arches for nothing.
I met with one little girl ten or eleven years of age, whom some of the street-sellers described to me as looking out for a job every now and then. She was small-featured and dark-eyed, and seemed intelligent. Her face and hands were brown as if from exposure to the weather, and a lack of soap; but her dress was not dirty. Her father she described as a builder, probably a bricklayer’s labourer, but he could work, she said, at drains or such like. “Mother’s been dead a long time,” the child continued, “and father brought another woman home and told me to call her mother, but she soon went away. I works about the streets, but only when there’s nothing to eat at home. Father gets drunk sometimes, but I think not so oft as he did, and then he lies in bed. No, sir, not all day, but he gets up and goes out and gets more drink, and comes back and goes to bed again. He never uses me badly. When he’s drinking and has money, he gives me some now and then to get bread and butter with, or a halfpenny pudding; he never eats anything in the house when he’s drinking, and he’s a very quiet man. Sometimes he’s laid in bed two or three days and nights at a time. I goes to school when father has money. We lives very well then. I’ve kept myself for a whole week. I mind people’s stalls, if they’re away a bit, and run for them if they’re wanted; and I go errands. I’ve carried home flower-pots for a lady. I’ve got a halfpenny on a day, and a penny, and some bread perhaps, and I’ve lived on that. I should like very well to have a pitch of my own. I think I should like that better than place. But I have a sister who has a place in the country; she’s far older than I am, and perhaps I shall get one. But father’s at work now, and he says he’ll take the pledge. Five or six times I’ve sold oranges, and ingans as well, and carried the money to Mrs. ——, who gave me all I took above 4d. for myself.”
It could surprise no one if a child so neglected became so habituated to a street life, that she could not adapt herself to any other. I heard of other children thus or similarly neglected, but boys far more frequently than girls, who traded regularly in apples, oranges, &c., on their own account. Some have become regular street-sellers, and even in childhood have abandoned their homes and supported themselves.
Of a Hired Coster Boy.
One shell-fish seller, who has known street-commerce and street-folk for many years, thought, although he only hazarded an opinion, that there was less drinking among the young costers, and less swearing, than he had known in a preceding generation.
A young coster boy living with his parents, who had a good business, told me that he would never be nothing but a “general dealer,” (which among some of these people is the “genteel” designation for a costermonger,) as long as he lived, unless, indeed, he rose to a coal shed and a horse and cart; a consummation, perhaps with the addition of a green-grocery, a fried fish, and a gingerbeer trade, not unfrequently arrived at by the more prudent costermongers. This boy could neither read nor write; he had been sent to school, and flogged to school (he grinned as he told me) by his mother, who said his father wouldn’t have been “done” so often by fine folks, when he sold “grass” (asparagus) and such things as cost money, if he could have kept ’count. But his father only laughed, and said nothing, when the boy “cut away” from school, which he did so continuously, that the schoolmaster at length declined the charge of the young coster’s further education. This stripling, who was about fourteen, seemed very proud of a pair of good half-boots which his mother had bought him, and which he admired continually as he glanced at his feet. His parents, from his account, were indulgent, and when they got farthings in change or in any manner, kept them for him; and so he got treats, and smart things to wear now and then. “We expects to do well,” he said, for he used the “we” when he spoke of his parents’ business, “when it’s peas and new potatoes, cheap enough to cry. It’s my dodge to cry. I know a man as says, ‘May month ought to be ashamed on itself, or things ’ud a been herlier.’ Last week I sung out, it was the same man’s dodge, he put me up to it—‘Here’s your Great Exhibition mackarel.’ People laughed, but it weren’t no great good. I’ve been to Penny Gaffs, but not this goodish bit. I likes the singing best as has a stunnin chorus. There’s been a deal of hard up lately among people as is general dealers. Things is getting better, I think, and they must. It wouldn’t do at all if they didn’t. It’s no use your a-asking me about what I thinks of the Queen or them sort of people, for I knows nothing about them, and never goes among them.”
The Hired boys, for the service of the costermongers, whether hired for the day, or more permanently, are very generally of the classes I have spoken of. When the New Cut, Lambeth, was a great street-market, every morning, during the height of the vegetable and fruit seasons, lads used to assemble in Hooper-street, Short-street, York-street, and, indeed, in all the smaller streets or courts, which run right and left from the “two Cuts.” When the costermonger started thence, perhaps “by the first light,” to market, these boys used to run up to his barrow, “D’you want me, Jack?” or, “Want a boy, Bill?” being their constant request. It is now the same, in the localities where the costermongers live, or where they keep their ponies, donkeys, and barrows, and whence they emerge to market. It is the same at Billingsgate and the other markets at which these traders make their wholesale purchases. Boys wait about these marts “to be hired,” or, as they may style it, to “see if they’re wanted.” When hired, there is seldom any “wage” specified, the lads seeming always willing to depend upon the liberality of the costermonger, and often no doubt with an eye to the chances of “bunse.” A sharp lad thus engaged, who may acquit himself to a costermonger’s liking, perhaps continues some time in the same man’s employ. I may observe, that in this gathering, and for such a purpose, there is a resemblance to the simple proceedings of the old times, when around the market cross of the nearest town assembled the population who sought employment, whether in agricultural or household labour. In some parts of the north of England these gatherings are still held at the two half-yearly terms of May-day and Martinmas.
A lad of thirteen or fourteen, who did not look very strong, gave me the following account: “I helps, you see, sir, where I can, for mother (who sells sheep’s-trotters) depends a deal on her trotters, but they’re not great bread for an old ’oman, and there’s me and Neddy to keep. Father’s abroad and a soger. Do I know he is? Mother says so, sir. I looks out every morning when the costermongers starts for the markets and wants boys for their barrows. I cried roots last: ‘Here’s your musks, ha’penny each. Here’s yer all agro’in’ and all a blo’in’.’ I got my grub and 3d. I takes the tin home. If there’s a cabbage or two left, I’ve had it guv to me. I likes that work better nor school. I should think so. One sees life. Well, I don’t know wot one sees perticler; but it’s wot people calls life. I was a week at school once. I has a toss up sometimes when I has a odd copper for it. I ’aven’t ’ad any rig’lar work as yet. I shall p’raps when it’s real summer.” [Said, May 24th.] “This is the Queen’s birthday, is it, sir? Werry likely, but she’s nothing to me. I can’t read, in coorse not, after a week’s schooling. Yes, I likes a show. Punch is stunnin’, but they might make more on the dog. I would if I was a Punch. O, I has tea, and bread and butter with mother, and gets grub as I jobs besides. I makes no bargain. If a cove’s scaly, we gets to know him. I hopes to have a barrer of my own some day, and p’raps a hass. Can I manage a hass? In coorse, and he don’t want no groomin’. I’d go to Hepsom then; I’ve never been yet, but I’ve been to Grinnage fairs. I don’t know how I can get a barrer and a hass, but I may have luck.”