 | OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF MANUFACTURED ARTICLES. London Labour and the London Poor, volume 1 |  |
OF THE BLIND STREET-SELLERS OF TAILORS
NEEDLES, ETC.
It is customary with many trades, for the journey-
men to buy such articles as they require in their
business of those members of their craft who have
become incapacitated for work, either by old age,
or by some affliction. The tailors — the shoe-
makers — the carpenters — and many others do
this. These sellers are, perhaps, the most exem-
plary instances of men driven to the streets, or to
hawking for a means of living; and they, one and
all, are distinguished by that horror of the work-
house which I have before spoken of as consti-
tuting a peculiar feature in the operative's cha-
racter. At present I purpose treating of the
street-sellers of needles and "trimmings" to the
tailors.
There are, I am informed, two dozen "broken-
down" journeymen tailors pursuing this avocation
in and around London. "There may be more,"
said one who had lost his sight stitching, "but I
get my information from the needle warehouse,
where we all buy our goods; and the lady there
told me she knew as many as twenty-four hawkers
who were once tailors. These are all either de-
cayed journeymen, or their widows. Some are
vioapicated by age, being between sixty and
seventy years old; the greater part of the aged
journeymen, however, are inmates of the tailors'
almshouses. I am not aware," said my inform-
ant, "of there being more than one very old man
hawking needles to the tailors, though there may
be many that I know nothing about. The one I
am acquainted with is close upon eighty, and he
is a very respectable man, much esteemed in St.
[Description: 915EAF. Page 341.]
`London Labour and the London Poor' to the jour-
neymen: he is very feeble indeed, and can scarcely
get along." Of the two dozen needle-sellers above
mentioned, there are only six who confine their
"rounds" solely to the metropolis. Out of these
six my informant knew two who were blind
beside himself (one of these sells to the journey-
men in the city). There are other blind tailors
who were formerly hawkers of needles, but being
unable to realize a subsistence thereby, have been
obliged to become inmates of the workhouses; others
have recently gained admission into the almshouses.
Last February, I am assured, there were two blind
needle-sellers, and two decrepit, in St. James's
workhouse. There are, moreover, two widows sell-
ing tailors' needles in London. One of these, I am
told, is wretchedly poor, being "eat up with the
rheumatics, and scarcely able to move" — she is
the relict of a blind journeyman, and well known
in St. James's. The other widow is now in St.
Pancras Workhouse, having been unable, to use
the words of my informant, "to get anything to
keep life and soul together at the needle trade;"
she, too, I am told, is well known to the journey-
men. The tailors' needle-sellers confining them-
selves more particularly to London consist of, at
present, one old man, three blind, one paralyzed,
and one widow; besides these, there are now in
the alms-houses, two decrepit and one paralyzed;
and one widow in the workhouse, all of whom,
till recently, were needle-sellers, and originally
connected with the trade.
"That is all that I believe are now in Lon-
don," said one to me, "I should, I think, know
if there were more; for it is not from one place
we get our articles, but many; and there I hear
that six is about the number of tailors' hawkers in
town; the rest of the two dozen hawkers that I
spoke of go a little way out into the suburbs.
The six, however, stick to London altogether."
The needle-sellers who go into the country, I am
told, travel as far as Reading, westward, and to
Gravesend, in the opposite direction, or Brent-
wood, in Essex, and they will keep going
back'ards and for'ards to the metropolis imme-
diately their stock is exhausted. These persons
sell not only tailors' needles, but women's needles
as well, and staylaces and cottons, and small ware
in general, which they get from Shepherd's, in
Compton Street; they have all been tailors, and
are incapacitated from labour, either by old age or
some affliction. There was one widow of a tailor
among the number, but it is believed she is now
either too old to continue her journeys, or else
that she is deceased. The town-sellers con-
fine their peregrinations mostly to the parishes
of St. James's and St. George's (my informant
was not aware that any went even into Mary-
lebone). One travels the City, while the other
five keep to the West End; they all sell
thimbles, needles, inch-measures, bodkins, inch
sticks, scissars ("when they can get them," I was
told, "and that's very seldom"), and bees'-wax,
basting cotton, and, many of them, publications.
The publications vended by these men are princi-
pally the cheap periodicals of the day, and two of
these street-sellers, I am informed, do much better
with the sale of publications than by the "trim-
mings." "They get money, sir," said one man to
me, "while we are starving. They have their set
customers and have only to go round and leave
the paper, and then to get their money on the
Monday morning."
The tailors' hawkers buy their trimmings mostly
at the retail shops. They have not stock-money
sufficient, I am assured, to purchase at the whole-
sale houses, for "such a thing as a paper of
needles large tradesmen don't care about of
selling us poor men." They tell me that if they
could buy wholesale they could get their goods one-
fourth cheaper, and to be "obligated" to purchase
retail is a great drawback on their profits. They
call at the principal tailors' workshops, and solicit
custom of the journeymen; they are almost all
known to the trade, both masters and men, and,
having no other means of living, they are allowed
to enter the masters' shops, though some of the
masters, such as Allen, in Bond-street; Curlewis,
Jarvis, and Jones, in Conduit-street, and others,
refuse the poor fellows even this small privilege.
The journeymen treat them very kindly, the
needle-sellers tell me, and generally give them
part of the provisions they have brought with
them to the shop. If it was not for this the
needle-sellers, I am assured, could hardly live at
all. "There's that boy there," said a blind
tailor, speaking of the youth who had led him
to my house, and who sat on the stool fast asleep
by the fire, — "I'm sure he must have starved
this winter if it hadn't been for the goodness of
the men to us, for it's little that me and his
mother has to give him; she's gone almost as
blind as myself working at the `sank work'
(making up soldiers' clothing). Oh, ours is a
miserable life, sir! — worn out — blind with over
work, and scarcely a hole to put one's head in, or a
bit to put in one's mouth. God Almighty knows
that's the bare truth, sir." Sometimes the hawkers
go on their rounds and take only 2d., but that is
not often; sometimes they take 5s. in a day, and
"that is the greatest sum," said my informant,
"I ever took; what others might do I can't say,
but that I'm confident is about the highest
takings." In the summer three months the average
takings rise to 4s. per day; but in the winter
they fall to 1s., or at the outside 1s. 6d. The
business lasts only for three hours and a half each
day, that is from eight till half-past eleven in
the morning; after that no good is to be
done. Then the needle-sellers, I am told, go
home, and the reason of this is, I am told, if
they appear in the public streets selling or so-
liciting alms, the blind are exempted from be-
coming recipients of the benefits of many of the
charitable institutions. The blind man whom I saw,
told me that after he had done work and returned
home, he occupied himself with pressing the
seams of the soldiers' clothes when his "missus"
had sewed them. The tailors' needle-sellers are
all married, and one of the wives has a mangle;
and "perhaps," said my informant, "the blind
[Description: 915EAF. Page 342.]
but I can't say." Another wife is a bookfolder,
but she has no work. The needles they usually
sell five a penny to the journeymen, but the most
of the journeymen will take but four; they say
"we can't get a living at all if we sell the needles
cheaper. The journeymen are mostly very con-
siderate — very indeed; much more than the
masters; for the masters won't hardly look at
us. I don't know that a master ever gave me a
farden — and yet there's some of them very sooth-
ing and kind in speaking." The profit in the
needles, I am told, is rather more than 100 per
cent.; "but," say the sellers, "only think, sir, we
must get rid of 150 needles even to take 3s.
The most we ever sell in one shop is 6d. worth —
and the usual amount is 2d. worth. You can
easy tell how many shops we must travel round
to, in order to get rid of 3s. worth." Take one shop
with another, the good with the bad, they tell
me they make about 1d. profit from each they
visit. The profit on the rest of the articles they
vend is about 20 per cent., and they calculate
that all the year round, summer and winter, they
may be said to take 2s. a day, or 12s. a week;
out of which they clear from 5s. to 5s. 6d. They
sell far more needles than anything else. Some of
the blind needle-sellers make their own bees'-wax
into "shapes," (pennyworths) themselves, melting
into and pouring into small moulds.
The blind needle-seller whom I saw was a
respectable-looking man, with the same delicacy of
hand as is peculiar to tailors, and which forms
so marked a contrast to the horny palms of
other workmen. He was tall and thin, and had
that upward look remarkable in all blind men.
His eyes gave no signs of blindness (the pupils
being full and black), except that they appeared
to be directed to no one object, and though fixed,
were so without the least expression of observation.
His long black surtout, though faded in colour, was
far from ragged, having been patched and stitched
in many places, while his cloth waistcoat and
trowsers were clean and neat — very different from
the garments of street-sellers in general. In his
hand he carried his stick, which, as he sat, he
seemed afraid to part with, for he held it fast
between his knees. He came to me accompanied
by his son, a good-looking rough-headed lad,
habited in a washed-out-blue French kind of
pinafore, and whose duty it was to lead his
blind father about on his rounds. Though the
boy was decently clad, still his clothes, like those
of his father, bore many traces of that respectable
kind of poverty which seeks by continuous
mending to hide its rags from the world. The
face of the father, too, was pinched, while there
was a plaintiveness about his voice that told
of a wretched spirit-broken and afflicted man.
Altogether he was one of the better kind of handi-
craftsmen — one of those fine specimens of the
operatives of this country — independent even in
their helplessness, scorning to beg, and proud to
be able to give some little equivalent for the
money bestowed on them. I have already given
accounts of the "beaten-out" mechanic from those
who certainly cannot be accused of an excess of sym-
pathy for the poor — namely the Poor Law Commis-
sioners and masters of workhouses; and I can only
add, that all my experience goes fully to bear out
the justice of these statements. As I said before,
the class who are driven to the streets to which
the beaten-out or incapacitated operative belongs,
is, of all others, the most deserving of our sympathy;
and the following biography of one of this order is
given to teach us to look with a kindly eye upon
the many who are forced to become street-sellers as
the sole means of saving themselves from the de-
gradation of pauperism or beggary.
"I am 45 years of age next June," said
the blind tailor. "It is upwards of 30 years
since I first went to work at the tailoring trade in
London. I learnt my business under one of the
old hands at Mr. Cook's, in Poland-street, and
after that went to work at Guthrie's, in Bond-
street. I belonged to the Society held at the
Old White Hart. I continued working for the
honourable trade and belonging to Society for
about 15 years. My weekly earnings then ave-
raged 1l. 16s. a week while I was at work, and for
several years I was seldom out of work, for when
I got into a shop it was a long time before I got out
again. I was not married them. I lived in a first
floor back room, well-furnished, and could do very
comfortably indeed. I saved often my 15s. or 16s.
in a week, and was worth a good bit of money up
to the time of my first illness. At one period I had
nearly 50l. by me, and had it not been for "vaca-
tions" and "slack seasons" I should have put by
more; but you see to be out of work even a few
weeks makes a large hole in a journeyman's
savings. All this time I subscribed regularly to
Society, and knew that if I got superannuated I
should be comfortably maintained by the trade.
I felt quite happy with the consciousness of being
provided for in my old age or affliction then, and
if it had not been for that perhaps I might have
saved more even than I did. I went on in this
way, as I said before, for 15 years, and no one
could have been happier than I was — not a
working man in all England couldn't. I had
my silver watch and chain. I could lay out my
trifle every week in a few books, and used to have
a trip now and then up and down the river, just
to blow the London smoke off, you know. About
15 years ago my eyes began to fail me without
any pain at all; they got to have as it were a
thick mist, like smoke, before them. I couldn't see
anything clear. Working by gas-light at first
weakened and at last destroyed the nerve altoge-
ther. I'm now in total darkness. I can only tell
when the gas is lighted by the heat of it.
"It is not the black clothes that is trying to the
sight — black is the steadiest of all colours to work
at; white and all bright colours makes the eyes
water after looking at 'em for any long time; but of
all colours scarlet, such as is used for regimentals,
is the most blinding, it seems to burn the eye-
balls, and makes them ache dreadful. After
working at red there's always flying colours
before the eyes; there's no steady colour to be
seen in anything for some time. Everything
[Description: 915EAF. Page 343.]
tint. There's more military tailors blind than any
others. A great number of tailors go blind, but
a great many more has lost their sight since gas-
light has come up. Candle-light was not half so
pernicious to the sight. Gas-light is so very
heating, and there's such a glare with it that it
makes the eyes throb, and shoot too, if you work
long by it. I've often continued working past
midnight with no other light than that, and
then my eyes used to feel like two bits of burning
coals in my head. And you see, sir, the worst of
it was, as I found my sight going bad I was
obliged to try it more, so as to keep up with my
mates in the shop. At last my eyes got so
weak that I was compelled to give up work, and
go into the country, and there I stopped, living
on my savings, and unable to do any work for
fear of losing my sight altogether. I was away
about three years, and then all my money was
gone, and I was obligated, in spite of my eyes, to
go back to work again. But then, with my
sight defective as it was, I could get no employ-
ment at the honourable trade, and so I had to
take a seat in a shop at one of the cheap houses
in the city, and that was the ruin of me entirely;
for working there, of course I got "scratched"
from the trade Society, and so lost all hope of
being provided for by them in my helplessness.
The workshop at this cheap house was both
small and badly ventilated. It was about seven
foot square, and so low, that as you sot on the
floor you could touch the ceiling with the tip
of your finger. In this place seven of us
worked — three on each side and one in the
middle. Two of my shopmates were boys, or
else I am sure it would not have held us
all. There was no chimney, nor no window that
could be opened to let the air in. It was lighted
by a skylight, and this would neither open nor
shut. The only means for letting out the foul
air was one of them working ventilators — like
cockades, you know, sir — fixed in one of the
panes of glass; but this wouldn't work, so there
we were, often from 5 in the morning till 10 at
night, working in this dreadful place. There was
no fire in the winter, though we never needed
one, for the workshop was over-hot from the
suffocation, and in the summer it was like an
oven. This is what it was in the daytime, but
mortal tongue can't tell what it was at night, with
the two gas-lights burning away, and almost
stifling us. Many a time some of the men has
been carried out by the others fainting for air.
They all fell ill, every one of them, and I lost
my eyes and my living entirely by it. We spoke
to the master repeatedly, telling him he was
killing us, and though when he came up to the
workshop hisself, he was nearly blown back by
the stench and heat, he would not let us
have any other room to work in — and yet
he'd plenty of convenience up stairs. He paid
little more than half the regular wages, and
employed such men as myself — only those who
couldn't get anything better to do. What with ill-
ness and all, I don't think my wages there averaged
above 12s. a week: sometimes I could make
1l. in the week, but then, the next week, maybe
I'd be ill, and would get but a few shillings. It
was impossible to save anything then — even to
pay one's way was a difficulty, and, at last, I was
seized with rheumatics on the brain, and obliged
to go into St. Thomas's Hospital. I was there
eleven months, and came out stone blind. I am
convinced I lost my eyesight by working in that
cheap shop; nothing on earth will ever persuade
me to the contrary, and what's more, my master
robbed me of a third of my wages and my sight
too, and left me helpless in the world, as, God
knows, I am now. It is by the ruin of such men
as me that these masters are enabled to undersell
the better shops; they get hold of the men whose
eyes are just beginning to fail them, like mine did,
because they know they can get them to cheapwork,
and then, just at the time when a journeyman re-
quires to be in the best of shops, have the best of
air, and to work as little by gas-light as possible,
they puts him into a hole of a place that would
stifle a rat, and keeps him working there half the
night through. That's the way, sir, the cheap
clothes is produced, by making blind beggars of
the workmen, like myself, and throwing us on the
parish in our old age. You are right, sir, they
not only robs the men but the ratepayers too.
"Well, sir, as I said, I come out of the hospi-
tal stone blind, and have been in darkness ever
since, and that's near upon ten years ago. I often
dream of colours, and see the most delightful pic-
tures in the world; nothing that I ever beheld
with my eyes can equal them — they're so brilliant,
and clear and beautiful. I see then the features
and figures of all my old friends, and I can't tell
you how pleasureable it is to me. When I have
such dreams they so excite me that I am ill all
the next day. I often see, too, the fields, with the
cows grazing on a beautiful green pasture, and the
flowers, just at twilight like, closing up their
blossoms as they do. I never dream of rivers;
nor do I ever remember seeing a field of corn in
my visions; it's strange I never dreamt in any
shape of the corn or the rivers, but maybe I
didn't take so much notice of them as of the others.
Sometimes I see the sky, and very often indeed
there's a rainbow in it, with all kinds of beautiful
colours. The sun is a thing I often dream about
seeing, going down like a ball of fire at the close
of the day. I never dreamt of the stars, nor the
moon — it's mostly bright colours that I see.
"I have been under all the oculists I could hear
of — Mr. Turnbull, in Russell-square, but he did
me no good; then I went to Charing-cross, under
Mr. Guthrie, and he gave me a blind certificate,
and made me a present of half-a-sovereign; he
told me not to have my eyes tampered with again,
as the optic nerve was totally decayed. Oh, yes;
if I had all the riches in the world I'd give them
every one to get my sight back, for it's the
greatest pressure to me to be in darkness. God
help me! I know I am a sinner, and believe
I'm so afflicted on account of my sins. No, sir,
it's nothing like when you shut your eyes; when
I had my sight, and closed mine, I remember I
[Description: 915EAF. Page 344.]
same as when you hold your hand up before the
candle; but mine's far darker than that — pitch
black. I see a dark mass like before me, and
never any change — everlasting darkness, and no
chance of a light or shade in this world. But I
feel consolated some how, now it is settled; al-
though it's a very poor comfort after all. I go along
the streets in great fear. If a baby have hold
of me, I am firm, but by myself, I reel about
like a drunken man. I feel very timid unless
I have hold of something — not to support me,
but to assure me I shall not fall. If I was
going down your staircase, sir, I should be all
right so long as I touched the bannister, but if I
missed that, I'm sure I should grow so giddy and
nervous I should fall from the top to the bottom.
After losing my sight, I found a great difficulty
in putting my food into my mouth, for a long
time — six months or better — and I was obliged to
have some one to guide my hand, for I used often
to put the fork up to my forehead instead of
my mouth. Shortly after my becoming quite blind,
I found all my other senses much quickened —
my hearing — feeling — and reckoning. I got to like
music very much indeed; it seemed to elevate me
— to animate and cheer me much more than it
did before, and so much so now, that when it
ceases, I feel duller than ever. It sounds as if it
was in a wilderness to me — I can't tell why, but
that's all I can compare it to; as if I was quite
alone with it. My smell and taste is very acute"
(he was given some violets to smell) — "Oh, that's
beautiful," he cried, "very reviving indeed. Often
of an evening, I can see things in my imagination,
and that's why I like to sit alone then; for
of all the beautiful thoughts that ever a man
possessed, there's none to equal a blind man's,
when he's by hisself.
"I don't see my early home, but occurrences
that has recently took place. I see them all plain
before me, in colours as vivid as if I had my
sight again, and the people all dressed in the
fashion of my time; the clothes seem to make a
great impression on me, and I often sit and see in
my mind master tailors trying a coat on a gen-
tleman, and pulling it here and there. The figures
keep passing before me like soldiers, and often
I'm so took by them that I forget I'm blind, and
turn my head round to look after them as they
pass by me. But that sort of thinking would
throw me into a melancholly — it's too exciting
while it lasts, and then leaves me dreadful dull
afterwards. I have got much more melancholy
since my blindness; before then, I was not se-
riously given, but now I find great consolation in
religion. I think my blindness is sent to try my
patience and resignation, and I pray to the Al-
mighty to give me strength to bear with my
affliction. I was quick and hot-tempered before I
was blind, but since then, I have got less hasty
like; all other troubles appears nothing to me.
Sometimes I revile against my affliction — too fre-
quently — but that is at my thoughtless moments,
for when I'm calm and serious, I feel thankful
that the Almighty has touched me with his cor-
recting rod, and then I'm happy and at peace
with all the world. If I had run my race, and
not been stopped, I might never have believed
there was a God. My wife works at the
`sank work.' She makes soldiers' coats; she
gets 1s. 1d. for making one, and that's nearly
a day and a half's work; then she has to
find her own trimmings, and they're 1d. It
takes her 16 hours to finish one garment, and
the over-work at that is beginning to make her
like as I was myself. If she takes up a book to
read to me now, it's all like a dirty mass before
her, and that's just as my sight was before I lost
it altogether. She slaves hard to help me; she's
anxious and willing — indeed too much so. If she
could get constant work, she might perhaps make
about 7s. a week; but as it is, her earnings are,
take one week with another, not more than 3s.
Last week she earned 5s.; but that was the first
job of work she'd had to do for two months. I
think the two of us make on an average about 8s.;
and out of that there is three people to keep — our
two selves and our boy. Our rent is 2s. 6d., so
that after paying that, we has about 5s. 6d. left
for food, firing, and clothing for the whole of us.
How we do it I can't tell; but I know we live
very, very hard: mostly on pieces of bread that
the men gives to me and my boy, as we go round
to the workshops. If we was any of us to fall ill,
we must all go to the parish; if my boy was to
go sick, I should be left without any one to lead
me about, and that would be as bad as if I was
laid-up myself; and if anything was to happen to
my wife, I'd be done clean altogether. But yet
the Lord is very good, and we'd get out of that,
I dare say. If anything was to drive me to the
parish, I should lose all hopes of getting some
help from the blind institutions; and so I dread
the workhouse worse than all. I'd sooner die
on the step of a door, any time, than go there
and be what they call well kept. I don't know
why I should have a dislike to going there, but
yet I do possess it. I do believe, that any one
that is willing to work for their bread, hates a
workhouse; for the workhouse coat is a slothful,
degrading badge. After a man has had one on
his back, he's never the same. I would'nt go for
an order for relief so long as I could get a half-
penny loaf in twenty-four hours. If I could only
get some friend to give me a letter of recommenda-
tion to Mr. Day's Charity for the Blind, I should
be happy for the rest of my days. I could give
the best of references to any one who would take
pity on me in my affliction."
| OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF MANUFACTURED ARTICLES. London Labour and the London Poor, volume 1 | |