University of Virginia Library

THE CRIPPLED STREET-SELLER OF NUTMEG-GRATERS.

I now give an example of one of the classes
driven to the streets by utter inability to labour.
I have already spoken of the sterling inde-
pendence of some of these men possessing the
strongest claims to our sympathy and charity,
and yet preferring to sell rather than beg. As I
said before, many ingrained beggars certainly use
the street trade as a cloak for alms-seeking, but
as certainly many more, with every title to our
assistance, use it as a means of redemption from

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beggary. That the nutmeg-grater seller is a
noble example of the latter class, I have not the
least doubt. I have made all due inquiries to
satisfy myself as to his worthiness, and I feel con-
vinced that when the reader looks at the portrait
here given, and observes how utterly helpless the
poor fellow is, and then reads the following plain
unvarnished tale, he will marvel like me, not only
at the fortitude which could sustain him under all
his heavy afflictions, but at the resignation (not to
say philosophy) with which he bears them every
one. His struggles to earn his own living (not-
withstanding his physical incapacity even to put
the victuals to his mouth after he has earned
them), are instances of a nobility of pride that
are I believe without a parallel. The poor
creature's legs and arms are completely withered;
indeed he is scarcely more than head and trunk.
His thigh is hardly thicker than a child's wrist.
His hands are bent inward from contraction of
the sinews, the fingers being curled up and al-
most as thin as the claws of a bird's foot He
is unable even to stand, and cannot move from
place to place but on his knees, which are shod
with leather caps, like the heels of a clog, strap-
ped round the joint; the soles of his boots are
on the upper leathers, that being the part always
turned towards the ground while he is crawling
along. His countenance is rather handsome
than otherwise; the intelligence indicated by his
ample forehead is fully borne out by the testimony
as to his sagacity in his business, and the mild
expression of his eye by the statements as to his
feeling for all others in affliction.

"I sell nutmeg-graters and funnels," said the
cripple to me; "I sell them at 1d. and 1½d. a
piece. I get mine of the man in whose house I
live. He is a tinman, and makes for the street-
trade and shops and all. I pay 7d. a dozen for
them, and I get 12d. or 18d. a dozen, if I can
when I sell them, but I mostly get only a penny
a piece — it's quite a chance if I have a customer
at 1½d. Some days I sell only three — some days
not one — though I'm out from ten o'clock till six.
The most I ever took was 3s. 6d. in a day. Some
weeks I hardly clear my expenses — and they're
between 7s. and 8s. a week; for not being able to
dress and ondress myself, I'm obligated to pay
some one to do it for me — I think I don't clear
more than 7s. a week take one week with another.
When I don't make that much, I go without —
sometimes friends who are kind to me give me
a trifle, or else I should starve. As near as I
can judge, I take about 15s. a week, and out of
that I clear about 6s. or 7s. I pay for my
meals as I have them — 3d. or 4d. a meal. I
pay every night for my lodging as I go in, if
I can; but if not my landlady lets it run a
night or two. I give her 1s. a week for my
washing and looking after me, and 1s. 6d. for
my lodging. When I do very well I have
three meals a day, but it's oftener only two —
breakfast and supper — unless of Sunday. On
a wet day when I can't get out, I often go
without food. I may have a bit of bread and
butter give me, but that's all — then I lie a-bed.
I feel miserable enough when I see the rain
come down of a week day, I can tell you. Ah,
it is very miserable indeed lying in bed all
day, and in a lonely room, without perhaps a
person to come near one — helpless as I am —
and hear the rain beat against the windows, and
all that without nothing to put in your lips.
I've done that over and over again where I
lived before; but where I am now I'm more
comfortable like. My breakfast is mostly bread
and butter and tea; and my supper, bread and
butter and tea with a bit of fish, or a small bit
of meat. What my landlord and landlady has
I share with them. I never break my fast from
the time I go out in the morning till I come
home — unless it is a halfpenny orange I buy in
the street; I do that when I feel faint. I have
only been selling in the streets since this last
winter. I was in the workhouse with a fever
all the summer. I was destitute afterwards, and
obliged to begin selling in the streets. The
Guardians gave me 5s. to get stock. I had
always dealt in tin ware, so I knew where to go
to buy my things. It's very hard work indeed
is street-selling for such as me. I can't walk
no distance. I suffer a great deal of pains in my
back and knees. Sometimes I go in a barrow,
when I'm travelling any great way. When
I go only a short way I crawl along on my
knees and toes. The most I've ever crawled is
two miles. When I get home afterwards, I'm
in great pain. My knees swell dreadfully, and
they're all covered with blisters, and my toes
ache awful. I've corns all on top of them.

"Often after I've been walking, my limbs and
back ache so badly that I can get no sleep.
Across my lines it feels as if I'd got some great
weight, and my knees are in a heat, and throb,
and feel as if a knife was running into them.
When I go up-stairs I have to crawl upon the
back of my hands and my knees. I can't lift
nothing to my mouth. The sinews of my hands
is all contracted. I am obliged to have things
held to my lipe for me to drink, like a child. I
can use a knife and fork by leaning my arm on
the table and then stooping my head to it. I
can't wash nor ondress myself. Sometimes I
think of my helplessness a great deal. The
thoughts of it used to throw me into fits at one
time — very bad. It's the Almighty's will that
I am so, and I must abide by it. People says, as
they passes me in the streets, `Poor fellow, it's
a shocking thing;' but very seldom they does
any more than pity me; some lays out a half-
penny or a penny with me, but the most of 'em
goes on about their business. Persons looks at
me a good bit when I go into a strange place.
I do feel it very much, that I haven't the power
to get my living or to do a thing for myself, but
I never begged for nothing. I'd sooner starve
than I'd do that. I never thought that people
whom God had given the power to help their-
selves ought to help me. I have thought that
I'm as I am — obliged to go on my hands and
knees, from no fault of my own. Often I've
done that, and I've over and over again laid in

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bed and wondered why the Almighty should
send me into the world in such a state; often
I've done that on a wet day, with nothing to
eat, and no friend to come a-nigh me. When
I've gone along the streets, too, and been in
pain, I've thought, as I've seen the people pass
straight up, with all the use of their limbs, and
some of them the biggest blackguards, cussing
and swearing, I've thought, Why should I be
deprived of the use of mine? and I've felt angry
like, and perhaps at that moment I couldn't
bring my mind to believe the Almighty was so
good and merciful as I'd heard say; but then
in a minute or two afterwards I've prayed to
Him to make me better and happier in the next
world. I've always been led to think He's
afflicted me as He has for some wise purpose or
another that I can't see. I think as mine is so
hard a life in this world, I shall be better off in
the next. Often when I couldn't afford to pay a
boy, I've not had my boots off for four or five
nights and days, nor my clothes neither. Give
me the world I couldn't take them off myself,
and then my feet has swollen to that degree
that I've been nearly mad with pain, and I've
been shivering and faint, but still I was obliged
to go out with my things; if I hadn't I should
have starved. Such as I am can't afford to
be ill — it's only rich folks as can lay up, not
we; for us to take to our beds is to go with-
out food altogether. When I was without
never a boy, I used to tie the wet towel round
the back of one of the chairs, and wash myself
by rubbing my face up against it. I've been
two days without a bit of anything passing
between my lips. I couldn't go and beg for
victuals — I'd rather go without. Then I used
to feel faint, and my head used to ache dreadful.
I used then to drink a plenty of water. The
women sex is mostly more kinder to me than
the men. Some of the men fancies, as I goes
along, that I can walk. They often says to me,
`Why, the sole of your boot is as muddy as
mine;' and one on 'em is, because I always
rests myself on that foot — the other sole, you
see, is as clean as when it was first made. The
women never seem frightened on me. My trade
is to sell brooms and brushes, and all kinds of
cutlery and tin-ware. I learnt it myself. I
never was brought up to nothing, because I
couldn't use my hands. Mother was a cook
in a nobleman's family when I were born. They
say as I was a love-child. I was not brought
up by mother, but by one of her fellow-
servants. Mother's intellects was so weak,
that she couldn't have me with her. She used
to fret a great deal about me, so her fellow-
servant took me when she got married. After
I were born, mother married a farmer in
middling circumstances. They tell me as my
mother was frightened afore I was born. I
never knew my father. He went over to Buonos
Ayres, and kept an hotel there — I've heard
mother say as much. No mother couldn't love
a child more than mine did me, but her feelings
was such she couldn't bear to see me. I never
went to mother's to live, but was brought up by
the fellow-servant as I've told you of. Mother
allowed her 30l. a-year. I was with her till two
years back. She was always very kind to me —
treated me like one of her own. Mother used to
come and see me about once a-year — sometimes
not so often: she was very kind to me then.
Oh, yes; I used to like to see her very much.
Whatever I wished for she'd let me have; if I
wrote to her, she always sent me what I wanted.
I was very comfortably then. Mother died four
years ago; and when I lost her I fell into a fit
— I was told of it all of a sudden. She and the
party as I was brought up with was the only
friends as I had in the world — the only persons
as cared anything about a creature like me.
I was in a fit for hours, and when I came to,
I thought what would become of me: I knew
I could do nothing for myself, and the only
friend as I had as could keep me was gone.
The person as brought me up was very good,
and said, while she'd got a home I should
never want; but, two years after mother's
death, she was seized with the cholera, and
then I hadn't a friend left in the world.
When she died I felt ready to kill myself;
I was all alone then, and what could I do
— cripple as I was? She thought her
sons and daughters as I'd been brought up
with — like brothers and sisters — would look
after me; but it was not in their power —
they was only hard-working people. My
mother used to allow so much a year for my
schooling, and I can read and write pretty well."
(He wrote his name in my presence kneeling
at the table; holding the pen almost as one
might fancy a bird would, and placing the
paper sideways instead of straight before him.)
"While mother was alive, I was always foraging
about to learn something unbeknown to her.
I wanted to do so, in case mother should leave
me without the means of getting a living. I
used to buy old bedsteads, and take them to
a man, and get him to repair them, and then
I'd put the sacking on myself; I can hold a
hammer somehow in my right hand. I used to
polish them on my knees. I made a bench
to my height out of two old chairs. I used to
know what I should get for the bedsteads, and
so could tell what I could afford to give the
man to do up the parts as I couldn't manage.
It was so I got to learn something like a busi-
ness for myself. When the person died as had
brought me up, I could do a little; I had then
got the means. Before her death I had opened
a kind of shop for things in the general line; I
sold tin-ware, and brass-work, and candlesticks,
and fire-irons, and all old furniture, and gown-
prints as well. I went into the tally business,
and that ruined me altogether. I couldn't get
my money in; there's a good deal owing to me
now. Me and a boy used to manage the whole.
I used to make all my account-books and
everything. My lodgers didn't pay me my
rent, so I had to move from the house, and
live on what stock I had. In my new lodging

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I went on as well as I could for a little while;
but about eighteen months ago I could hold on
no longer. Then I borrowed a little, and went
hawking tin-ware and brushes in the country.
I sold baking-dishes, Dutch ovens, roasting-
jacks, skewers and gridirons, teapots, and sauce-
pans, and combs. I used to exchange some-
times for old clothes. I had a barrow and a
boy with me; I used to keep him, and give him
1s. a week. I managed to get just a living
that way. When the winter came on I gave it
up; it was too cold. After that I was took bad
with a fever; my stock had been all gone a
little while before, and the boy had left because
I couldn't keep him, and I had to do all for
myself. All my friends was dead, and I had no
one to help me, so I was obligated to lay about
all night in my things, for I couldn't get them
off alone; and that and want of food brought on
a fever. Then I was took into the workhouse,
and there I stopped all the summer, as I told
you. I can't say they treated me bad, but
they certainly didn't use me well. If I could
have worked after I got better, I could have
had tea; but 'cause I couldn't do nothing, they
gave me that beastly gruel morning and night.
I had meat three times a week. They would
have kept me there till now, but I would die in
the streets rather than be a pauper. So I told
them, if they would give me the means of
getting a stock, I would try and get a living
for myself. After refusing many times to let me
have 10s., they agreed to give me 5s. Then I
came out, but I had no home, and so I crawled
about till I met with the people where I am now,
and they let me sit up there till I got a room of
my own. Then some of my friends collected for
me about 15s. altogether, and I did pretty well
for a little while. I went to live close by the
Blackfriars-road, but the people where I lodged
treated me very bad. There was a number of girls
of the town in the same street, but they was too
fond of their selves and their drink to give nothing.
They used to buy things of me and never pay
me. They never made game of me, nor played
me any tricks, and if they saw the boys doing it
they would protect me. They never offered to
give me no victuals; indeed, I shouldn't have
liked to have eaten the food they got. After
that I couldn't pay my lodgings, and the parties
where I lodged turned me out, and I had to crawl
about the streets for four days and nights. This
was only a month back. I was fit to die with
pain all that time. If I could get a penny I
used to go into a coffee-shop for half-a-pint of
coffee, and sit there till they drove me out,
and then I'd crawl about till it was time for me
to go out selling. Oh! dreadful, dreadful, it
was to be all them hours — day and night — on
my knees. I couldn't get along at all, I was
forced to sit down every minute, and then I
used to fall asleep with my things in my hand,
and be woke up by the police to be pushed
about and druv on by them. It seemed like
as if I was walking on the bare bones of my
knees. The pain in them was like the cramp,
only much worse. At last I could bear it no
longer, so I went afore Mr. Secker, the magis-
trate, at Union Hall, and told him I was destitute,
and that the parties where I had been living
kept my bed and the few things I had, for 2s. 6d. rent, that I owed them. He said he couldn't
believe that anybody would force me to crawl
about the streets, for four days and nights,
cripple as I was, for such a sum. One of the
officers told him I was a honest and striving
man, and the magistrate sent the officer, with
the money, to get my things, but the landlady
wouldn't give them till the officer compelled
her, and then she chucked my bed out into
the middle of the street. A neighbour took
it in for me and took care of it till I found
out the tinman who had before let me sit
up in his house. I should have gone to him
at first, but he lived farther than I could
walk. I am stopping with him now, and he
is very kind to me. I have still some rela-
tions living, and they are well to do, but, being
a cripple, they despise me. My aunt, my
mother's sister, is married to a builder, in
Petersham, near Richmond, and they are rich
people — having some houses of their own besides
a good business. I have got a boy to wheel me
down on a barrow to them, and asked assistance
of them, but they will have nothing to do with
me. They won't look at me for my affliction.
Six months ago they gave me half-a-crown. I
had no lodgings nor victuals then; and that I
shouldn't have had from them had I not said
I was starving and must go to the parish. This
winter I went to them, and they shut the door
in my face. After leaving my aunt's, I went
down to Ham Common, where my father-in-law
lives, and there his daughter's husband sent for
a policeman to drive me away from the place.
I told the husband I had no money nor food;
but he advised me to go begging, and said I
shouldn't have a penny of them. My father-
in-law was ill up-stairs at the time, but I don't
think he would have treated me a bit better —
and all this they do because the Almighty has
made me a cripple. I can, indeed, solemnly
say, that there is nothing else against me, and
that I strive hard and crawl about till my limbs
ache enough to drive me mad, to get an honest
livelihood. With a couple of pounds I could, I
think, manage to shift very well for myself.
I'd get a stock, and go into the country with a
barrow, and buy old metal, and exchange tin
ware for old clothes, and with that, I'm almost
sure I could get a decent living. I'm accounted
a very good dealer."

In answer to my inquiries concerning the
character of this man, I received the following
written communication:

"C — H — , Tinman."

From the writer of the above testimonial I

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received the following account of the poor
cripple: —

"He is a man of generous a disposition, and
very sensitive for the afflictions of others. One
day while passing down the Borough he saw
a man afflicted with St. Vitus's dance shaking
from head to foot, and leaning on the arm of a
woman who appeared to be his wife." The
cripple told my informant that he should never
forget what he felt when he beheld that poor
man. "I thought," he said, "what a blessing
it is I am not like him." Nor is the cripple, I
am told, less independent than he is generous.
In all his sufferings and privations he never
pleads poverty to others; but bears up under
the trials of life with the greatest patience and
fortitude. When in better circumstances he
was more independent than at present, having
since, through illness and poverty, been much
humbled.

"His privations have been great," adds my
informant. "Only two months back, being in a
state of utter destitution and quite worn out
with fatigue, he called at the house of a person
(where my informant occupied a room) about
ten o'clock at night, and begged them to let him
rest himself for a short while, but the inhuman
landlady and her son laid hold of the wretched
man, the one taking him by the arms and the
other by the legs, and literally hurled him into
the street. The next morning," my informant
continued, "I saw the poor creature leaning
against a lamp-post, shivering with the cold,
and my heart bled for him; and since that he
has been living with me."