University of Virginia Library

OF THE EDUCATION OF THE "COSTER-
LADS."

Among the costers the term education is (as I
have already intimated) merely understood as
meaning a complete knowledge of the art of
"buying in the cheapest market and selling in
the dearest." There are few lads whose training
extends beyond this. The father is the tutor,
who takes the boy to the different markets,
instructs him in the art of buying, and when
the youth is perfect on this point, the parent's
duty is supposed to have been performed.
Nearly all these boys are remarkable for their
precocious sharpness. To use the words of one
of the class, "these young ones are as sharp
as terriers, and learns every dodge of business
in less than half no time. There's one I knows
about three feet high, that's up to the business
as clever as a man of thirty. Though he's only
twelve years old he'll chaff down a peeler so
uncommon severe, that the only way to stop
him is to take him in charge!"

It is idle to imagine that these lads, possessed
of a mental acuteness almost wonderful, will
not educate themselves in vice, if we neglect

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to train them to virtue. At their youthful
age, the power of acquiring knowledge is the
strongest, and some kind of education is con-
tinually going on. If they are not taught by
others, they will form their own characters —
developing habits of dissipation, and educing
all the grossest passions of their natures, and
learning to indulge in the gratification of every
appetite without the least restraint.

As soon as a boy is old enough to shout well
and loudly, his father takes him into the streets.
Some of these youths are not above seven years
of age, and it is calculated that not more than
one in a hundred has ever been to a school of
any kind. The boy walks with the barrow, or
guides the donkey, shouting by turns with the
father, who, when the goods are sold, will as a
reward, let him ride home on the tray. The
lad attends all markets with his father, who
teaches him his business and shows him his
tricks of trade; "for," said a coster, "a governor
in our line leaves the knowledge of all his
dodges to his son, jist as the rich coves do their
tin."

The life of a coster-boy is a very hard one.
In summer he will have to be up by four
o'clock in the morning, and in winter he is
never in bed after six. When he has re-
turned from market, it is generally his duty
to wash the goods and help dress the barrow.
About nine he begins his day's work, shouting
whilst the father pushes; and as very often the
man has lost his voice, this share of the
labour is left entirely to him. When a coster
has regular customers, the vegetables or fish
are all sold by twelve o'clock, and in many
coster families the lad is then packed off with
fruit to hawk in the streets. When the work
is over, the father will perhaps take the boy to
a public-house with him, and give him part of
his beer. Sometimes a child of four or five is
taken to the tap-room, especially if he be pretty
and the father proud of him. "I have seen,"
said a coster to me, "a baby of five year old
reeling drunk in a tap-room. His governor
did it for the lark of the thing, to see him chuck
hisself about — sillyfied like."

The love of gambling soon seizes upon the
coster boy. Youths of about twelve or so will
as soon as they can get away from work go to
a public-house and play cribbage for pints of
beer, or for a pint a corner. They generally
continue playing till about midnight, and
rarely — except on a Sunday — keep it up all
night.

It ordinarily happens that when a lad is
about thirteen, he quarrels with his father, and
gets turned away from home. Then he is
forced to start for himself. He knows where
he can borrow stock-money and get his barrow,
for he is as well acquainted with the markets is
the oldest hand at the business, and children
may often be seen in the streets under-selling
their parents. "How's it possible," said a
woman, "for people to live when there's their
own son at the end of the court a-calling his
goods as cheap again as we can afford to sell
ourn."

If the boy is lucky in trade, his next want is
to get a girl to keep home for him. I was
assured, that it is not at all uncommon for a
lad of fifteen to be living with a girl of the
same age, as man and wife. It creates no
disgust among his class, but seems rather to
give him a position among such people. Their
courtship does not take long when once the
mate has been fixed upon. The girl is invited
to "raffles," and treated to "twopenny hops,"
and half-pints of beer. Perhaps a silk neck
handkerchief — a "King's-man" is given as
a present; though some of the lads will, when
the arrangement has been made, take the gift
back again and wear it themselves. The boys
are very jealous, and if once made angry behave
with great brutality to the offending girl. A
young fellow of about sixteen told me, as he
seemed to grow angry at the very thought,
"If I seed my gal a talking to another chap
I'd fetch her sich a punch of the nose as
should plaguy quick stop the whole business."
Another lad informed me, with a knowing look,
"that the gals — it was a rum thing now he
come to think on it — axully liked a feller for
walloping them. As long as the bruises hurted,
she was always thinking on the cove as gived
'em her." After a time, if the girl continues
faithful, the young coster may marry her; but
this is rarely the case, and many live with
their girls until they have grown to be men,
or perhaps they may quarrel the very first
year, and have a fight and part.

These boys hate any continuous work. So
strong is this objection to continuity that they
cannot even remain selling the same article for
more than a week together. Moreover none of
them can be got to keep stalls. They must be
perpetually on the move — or to use their own
words "they like a roving life." They all
of them delight in dressing "flash" as they
call it. If a "governor" was to try and
"palm off" his old cord jacket upon the lad
that worked with him, the boy wouldn't take
it. "Its too big and seedy for me," he'd say,
"and I aint going to have your leavings."
They try to dress like the men, with large
pockets in their cord jackets and plenty of
them. Their trowsers too must fit tight at the
knee, and their boots they like as good as pos-
sible. A good "King's-man," a plush skull
cap, and a seam down the trowsers are the great
points of ambition with the coster boys.

A lad about fourteen informed me that "brass
buttons, like a huntman's, with foxes' heads on
em, looked stunning flash, and the gals liked
em." As for the hair, they say it ought to be
long in front, and done in "figure-six" curls,
or twisted back to the ear "Newgate-knocker
style." "But the worst of hair is," they add,
"that it is always getting cut off in quod, all
along of muzzling the bobbies."

The whole of the coster-boys are fond of
good living. I was told that when a lad started

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for himself, he would for the first week or so
live almost entirely on cakes and nuts. When
settled in business they always manage to have
what they call "a relish" for breakfast and
tea, "a couple of herrings, or a bit of bacon, or
what not." Many of them never dine except-
ing on the Sunday — the pony and donkey pro-
prietors being the only costers whose incomes
will permit them to indulge in a "fourpenny
plate of meat at a cook's shop." The whole
of the boys too are extremely fond of pudding,
and should the "plum duff" at an eating-
house contain an unusual quantity of plums,
the news soon spreads, and the boys then
endeavour to work that way so as to obtain
a slice. While waiting for a market, the lads
will very often spend a shilling in the cakes
and three cornered puffs sold by the Jews.
The owners toss for them, and so enable the
young coster to indulge his two favourite
passions at the same time — his love of pastry,
and his love of gambling. The Jews crisp
butter biscuits also rank very high with the
boys, who declare that they "slip down like
soapsuds down a gully hole." In fact it is
curious to notice how perfectly unrestrained
are the passions and appetites of these youths.
The only thoughts that trouble them are for
their girls, their eating and their gambling —
beyond the love of self they have no tie that
binds them to existence.