London Labour and the London Poor, Vol. 1

by Henry Mayhew

The trade in oysters is unquestionably one of the oldest with which the London—or rather the English—markets are connected; for oysters from Britain were a luxury in ancient Rome.

Oysters are now sold out of the smacks at Billingsgate, and a few at Hungerford. The more expensive kind such as the real Milton, are never bought by the costermongers, but they buy oysters of a “good middling quality.” At the commencement of the season these oysters are 14s. a “bushel,” but the measure contains from a bushel and a half to two bushels, as it is more or less heaped up. The general price, however, is 9s. or 10s., but they have been 16s. and 18s. The “big trade” was unknown until 1848, when the very large shelly oysters, the fish inside being very small, were introduced from the Sussex coast. They were sold in Thames-street and by the Borough-market. Their sale was at first enormous. The costermongers distinguished them by the name of “scuttle-mouths.” One coster informant told me that on the Saturdays he not unfrequently, with the help of a boy and a girl, cleared 10s. by selling these oysters in the streets, disposing of four bags. He thus sold, reckoning twenty-one dozen to the bag, 2,016 oysters; and as the price was two for a penny, he took just 4l. 4s. by the sale of oysters in the streets in one night. With the scuttle-mouths the costermonger takes no trouble: he throws them into a yard, and dashes a few pails of water over them, and then places them on his barrow, or conveys them to his stall. Some of the better class of costermongers, however, lay down their oysters carefully, giving them oatmeal “to fatten on.”

In April last, some of the street-sellers of this article established, for the first time, “oyster-rounds.” These were carried on by costermongers whose business was over at twelve in the day, or a little later; they bought a bushel of scuttle-mouths (never the others), and, in the afternoon, went a round with them to poor neighbourhoods, until about six, when they took a stand in some frequented street. Going these oyster-rounds is hard work, I am told, and a boy is generally taken to assist. Monday afternoon is the best time for this trade, when 10s. is sometimes taken, and 4s. or 5s. profit made. On other evenings only from 1s. to 5s. is taken—very rarely the larger sum—as the later the day in the week the smaller is the receipt, owing to the wages of the working classes getting gradually exhausted.

The women who sell oysters in the street, and whose dealings are limited, buy either of the costermongers or at the coal-sheds. But nearly all the men buy at Billingsgate, where as small a quantity as a peck can be had.

An old woman, who had “seen better days,” but had been reduced to keep an oyster-stall, gave me the following account of her customers. She showed much shrewdness in her conversation, but having known better days, she declined to enter upon any conversation concerning her former life:—

“As to my customers, sir,” she said, “why, indeed, they’re all sorts. It’s not a very few times that gentlemen (I call them so because they’re mostly so civil) will stop—just as it’s getting darkish, perhaps,—and look about them, and then come to me and say very quick: ‘Two penn’orth for a whet.’ Ah! some of ’em will look, may be, like poor parsons down upon their luck, and swallow their oysters as if they was taking poison in a hurry. They’ll not touch the bread or butter once in twenty times, but they’ll be free with the pepper and vinegar, or, mayhap, they’ll say quick and short, ‘A crust off that.’ I many a time think that two penn’orth is a poor gentleman’s dinner. It’s the same often—but only half as often, or not half—with a poor lady, with a veil that once was black, over a bonnet to match, and shivering through her shawl. She’ll have the same. About two penn’orth is the mark still; it’s mostly two penn’orth. My son says, it’s because that’s the price of a glass of gin, and some persons buy oysters instead—but that’s only his joke, sir. It’s not the vulgar poor that’s our chief customers. There’s many of them won’t touch oysters, and I’ve heard some of them say: ‘The sight on ’em makes me sick; it’s like eating snails.’ The poor girls that walk the streets often buy; some are brazen and vulgar, and often the finest dressed are the vulgarest; at least, I think so; and of those that come to oyster stalls, I’m sure it’s the case. Some are shy to such as me, who may, perhaps, call their own mothers to their minds, though it aint many of them that is so. One of them always says that she must keep at least a penny for gin after her oysters. One young woman ran away from my stall once after swallowing one oyster out of six that she’d paid for. I don’t know why. Ah! there’s many things a person like me sees that one may say, ‘I don’t know why’ to; that there is. My heartiest customers, that I serve with the most pleasure, are working people, on a Saturday night. One couple—I think the wife always goes to meet her husband on a Saturday night—has two, or three, or four penn’orth, as happens, and it’s pleasant to hear them say, ‘Won’t you have another, John?’ or, ‘Do have one or two more, Mary Anne.’ I’ve served them that way two or three years. They’ve no children, I’m pretty sure, for if I say, ‘Take a few home to the little ones,’ the wife tosses her head, and says, half vexed and half laughing, ‘Such nonsense.’ I send out a good many oysters, opened, for people’s suppers, and sometimes for supper parties—at least, I suppose so, for there’s five or six dozen often ordered. The maid-servants come for them then, and I give them two or three for themselves, and say, jokingly-like, ‘It’s no use offering you any, perhaps, because you’ll have plenty that’s left.’ They’ve mostly one answer: ‘Don’t we wish we may get ’em?’ The very poor never buy of me, as I told you. A penny buys a loaf, you see, or a ha’porth of bread and a ha’porth of cheese, or a half-pint of beer, with a farthing out. My customers are mostly working people and tradespeople. Ah! sir, I wish the parson of the parish, or any parson, sat with me a fortnight; he’d see what life is then. ‘It’s different,’ a learned man used to say to me—that’s long ago—‘from what’s noticed from the pew or the pulpit.’ I’ve missed the gentleman as used to say that, now many years—I don’t know how many. I never knew his name. He was drunk now and then, and used to tell me he was an author. I felt for him. A dozen oysters wasn’t much for him. We see a deal of the world, sir—yes, a deal. Some, mostly working people, take quantities of pepper with their oysters in cold weather, and say it’s to warm them, and no doubt it does; but frosty weather is very bad oyster weather. The oysters gape and die, and then they are not so much as manure. They are very fine this year. I clear 1s. a day, I think, during the season—at least 1s., taking the fine with the wet days, and the week days with the Sundays, though I’m not out then; but, you see, I’m known about here.”

The number of oysters sold by the costermongers amounts to 124,000,000 a year. These, at four a penny, would realise the large sum of 129,650l. We may therefore safely assume that 125,000l. is spent yearly in oysters in the streets of London.

Of Periwinkle Selling in the Streets.

There are some street people who, nearly all the year through, sell nothing but periwinkles, and go regular rounds, where they are well known. The “wink” men, as these periwinkle sellers are called, generally live in the lowest parts, and many in lodging-houses. They are forced to live in low localities, they say, because of the smell of the fish, which is objected to. The city district is ordinarily the best for winkle-sellers, for there are not so many cheap shops there as in other parts. The summer is the best season, and the sellers then make, upon the average, 12s. a week clear profit; in the winter, they get upon the average, 5s. a week clear, by selling mussels and whelks—for, as winkles last only from March till October, they are then obliged to do what they can in the whelk and mussel way. “I buy my winks,” said one, “at Billingsgate, at 3s. and 4s. the wash. A wash is about a bushel. There’s some at 2s., and some sometimes as low as 1s. the wash, but they wouldn’t do for me, as I serve very respectable people. If we choose we can boil our winkles at Billingsgate by paying 4d. a week for boiling, and ½d. for salt, to salt them after they are boiled. Tradesmen’s families buy them for a relish to their tea. It’s reckoned a nice present from a young man to his sweetheart, is winks. Servant girls are pretty good customers, and want them cheaper when they say it’s for themselves; but I have only one price.”

One man told me he could make as much as 12s. a week—sometimes more and sometimes less.