University of Virginia Library

6. OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF GAME, POULTRY (LIVE AND
DEAD), RABBITS, BUTTER, CHEESE, AND EGGS.

The class who sell game and poultry in the
public thoroughfares of the metropolis are styled
hawkers, both in Leadenhall and Newgate-mar-
ket. The number of these dealers in London is
computed at between 200 and 300. Of course,
legally to sell game, a license, which costs 2l. 2s. yearly, is required; but the street-seller laughs
at the notion of being subjected to a direct tax;
which, indeed, it might be impossible to levy on
so "slippery" a class.

The sale of game, even with a license, was not
legalised until 1831; and, prior to that year, the
mere killing of game by an "unqualified" per-
son was an offence entailing heavy penalties.
The "qualification" consisted of the possession
of a freehold estate of 100l. a year, or a leasehold
for ninety-nine years of 150l. a year! By an
Act, passed in the 25th year of George III., it
was provided that a certificate (costing 3l. 13s. 6d.) must be taken out by all qualified persons

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killing game. Since 1831 (1 & 2 William IV.,
c. 32,) a certificate, without any qualification, is
all that is required from the game-killer.

Both sexes carry on the trade in game-hawk-
ing, but there are more than thrice as many men
as women engaged in the business, the weight
occasionally carried being beyond a woman's
strength. The most customary dress of the game
or poultry-hawker is a clean smock-frock cover-
ing the whole of his other attire, except the ends
of his trousers and his thick boots or shoes. In-
deed he often, but less frequently than was the
case five years ago, assumes the dress of a country
labourer, although he may have been for years
a resident in London. About forty years ago, I
am informed, it was the custom for countrymen,
residing at no great distance, to purchase a stock
of chickens or ducks; and, taking their places
in a wagon, to bring their birds to London,
and hawk them from door to door. Some of
these men's smock-frocks were a convenient
garb, for they covered the ample pockets of the
coat beneath, in which were often a store of par-
tridges, or an occasional pheasant or hare. This
game, illegally killed — for it was all poached —
was illegally sold by the hawker, and illegally
bought by the hotel-keepers and the richer
tradesmen. One informant (an old man) was of
opinion that the game was rarely offered for sale
by these countrymen at the West-end mansions
of the aristocracy. "In fact," he said, "I knew
one country fellow — though he was sharp enough
in his trade of game and poultry-selling — who
seemed to think that every fine house, without a
shop, and where there were livery servants, must
needs be inhabited by a magistrate! But, as
the great props of poaching were the rich — for,
of course, the poor couldn't buy game — there
was, no doubt, a West-end as well as a City trade
in it. I have bought game of a country poul-
try-hawker," continued my informant, "when
I lived in the City at the beginning of this cen-
tury, and generally gave 3s. 6d. a brace for
partridges. I have bid it, and the man has left,
refusing to take it; and has told me afterwards,
and, I dare say, he spoke the truth, that he had
sold his partridges at 5s. or 6s. or more. I be-
lieve 5s. a brace was no uncommon price in the
City. I have given as much as 10s. for a phea-
sant for a Christmas supper. The hawker, before
offering the birds for sale, used to peer about him,
though we were alone in my counting-house, and
then pull his partridges out of his pockets, and
say, `Sir, do you want any very young chick-
ens?' — for so he called them. Hares he called
`lions;' and they cost often, enough, 5s. each of
the hawker. The trade had all the charms and
recommendations of a mystery and a risk about
it, just like smuggling."

The sale of game in London, however, was
not confined to the street-hawkers, who generally
derived their stock-in-trade immediately from
the poacher. Before the legalisation of the sale,
the trade was carried on, under the rose, by the
salesmen in Leadenhall-market, and that to an
extent of not less than a fifteenth of the sale now
accomplished there. The purveyors for the
London game-market — I learned from leading
salesmen in Leadenhall — were not then, as now,
noble lords and honourable gentlemen, but pea-
sant or farmer poachers, who carried on the
business systematically. The guards and coach-
men of the stage-coaches were the media of com-
munication, and had charge of the supply to the
London market. The purchasers of the game
thus supplied to a market, which is mostly the
property of the municipality of the City of Lon-
don, were not only hotel-keepers, who required
it for public dinners presided over by princes,
peers, and legislators, but the purveyors for the
civic banquets — such as the Lord Mayor's ninth
of November dinner, at which the Ministers of
State always attended.

This street-hawking of poached game, as far
as I could ascertain from the best -informed
quarters, hardly survived the first year of the
legalised sale.

The female hawkers of game are almost all
the wives of the men so engaged, or are women
living with them as their wives. The trade is
better, as regards profit, than the costermonger's
ordinary pursuits, but only when the season is
favourable; it is, however, more uncertain.

There is very rarely a distinction between the
hawkers of game and of poultry. A man will
carry both, or have game one day and poultry
the next, as suits his means, or as the market
avails. The street-sellers of cheese are gene-
rally costers, while the vendors of butter and
eggs are almost extinct.

Game, I may mention, consists of grouse (in-
cluding black-cocks, and all the varieties of
heath or moor-game), partridges, pheasants,
bustards, and hares. Snipe, woodcocks, plovers,
teal, widgeons, wild ducks, and rabbits are not
game, but can only be taken or killed by certi-
ficated persons, who are owners or occupiers of
the property on which they are found, or who
have the necessary permission from such persons
as are duly authorised to accord it. Poultry
consists of chickens, geese, ducks, and turkeys,
while some persons class pigeons as poultry.

Birds are dietetically divided into three classes:
(1) the white-fleshed, as the common fowl and
the turkey; (2) the dark-fleshed game, as the
grouse and the black-cock; and (3) the aquatic
(including swimmers and waders), as the goose
and the duck; the flesh of the latter is pene-
trated with fat, and difficult of digestion.

OF THE QUANTITY OF GAME, RABBITS, AND
POULTRY, SOLD IN THE STREETS.

It appears from inquiries that I instituted, and
from authentic returns which I procured on the
subject, that the following is the quantity of
game and poultry sold yearly, as an average, in
the markets of the metropolis. I give it exclu-
sive of such birds as wild-ducks, woodcocks, &c.,
the supply of which depends upon the severity
of the winter. I include all wild birds or ani-
mals, whether considered game or not, and I use
round numbers, but as closely as possible.

During the past Christmas, however, I may
observe, that the supply of poultry to the
markets has been greater than on any pre-
vious occasion. The immensity of the supply
was favourable to the hawker's profit, as the
glut enabled him to purchase both cheaply and
largely. One young poultry-hawker told me
that he had cleared 3l. in the Christmas week,
and had spent it all in four days — except 5s. reserved for stock-money. It was not spent
entirely in drunkenness, a large portion of it
being expended in treats and amusements. So
great, indeed, has been the supply of game and
poultry this year, that a stranger, unused to the
grand scale on which provisions are displayed
in the great metropolitan marts, on visiting
Leadenhall, a week before or after Christmas,
might have imagined that the staple food of the
London population consisted of turkeys, geese,
and chickens. I give, however, an average yearly supply:

                                                 

Description.	Leadenhall.	Newgate.	Total.	Proportion sold in the Streets.
Game, &c.
Grouse	45,000	12,000	57,000	One-eleventh.
Partridges	85,000	60,000	145,000	One-seventh.
Pheasants	44,000	20,000	64,000	One-fifth.
Snipes	60,000	47,000	107,000	One-twentieth.
Wild Birds	40,000	20,000	60,000	None.
Plovers	28,000	18,000	46,000	None.
Larks	213,000	100,000	313,000	None.
Teals	10,000	5,000	15,000	None.
Widgeons	30,000	8,000	38,000	None.
Hares	48,000	55,000	102,000	One-fifth.
Rabbits	680,000	180,000	860,000	Three-fourths.
	1,283,000	524,000	1,807,000
Poultry.
Domestic Fowls	1,266,000	490,000	1,756,000	One-third.
\s-\\s-\ (alive)	45,000	15,000	60,000	One-tenth.
Geese	888,000	114,000	1,002,000	One-fifth.
Ducks	235,000	148,000	383,000	One-fourth.
\s-\ (alive)	20,000	20,000	40,000	One-tenth.
Turkeys	69,000	55,000	124,000	One-fourth.
Pigeous	285,000	98,000	383,000	None.
	2,808,000	940,000	3,748,000
Game, &c	1,283,000	524,000	1,807,000
	4,091,000	1,464,000	5,555,000

In the above return wild ducks and woodcocks
are not included, because the quantity sent to
London is dependent entirely upon the severity
of the winter. With the costers wild ducks are
a favourite article of trade, and in what those
street tradesmen would pronounce a favourable
season for wild ducks, which means a very
hard winter, the number sold in Londen will,
I am told, equal that of pheasants (64,000).
The great stock of wild ducks for the Lon-
don tables is from Holland, where the duck
decoys are objects of great care. Less than
a fifth of the importation from Holland is
from Lincolnshire. These birds, and even the
finest and largest, have been sold during a
glut at 1s. each. Woodcocks, under similar
circumstances, number with plovers (45,000),
nearly all of which are "golden plovers;" but
of woodcocks the costermongers buy very few:
"They're only a mouthful and a half," said
one of them, "and don't suit our customers."
In severe weather a few ptarmigan are sent to
London from Scotland, and in 1841-2 great
numbers were sent to the London markets from
Norway. One salesman received nearly 10,000
ptarmigan in one day. A portion of these were
disposed of to the costers, but the sale was not
such as to encourage further importations.

The returns I give show, that, at the two great
game and poultry-markets, 5,500,000 birds and
animals, wild and tame, are yearly sent to Lon-
don. To this must be added all that may be
consigned direct to metropolitan game-dealers
and poulterers, besides what may be sent as
presents from the country, &c., so that the
London supply may be safely estimated, I am
assured, at 6,000,000.

It is difficult to arrive at any very precise
computation of the quantity of game and poul-
try sold by the costers, or rather at the money

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value (or price) of what they sell. The most
experienced salesmen agree, that, as to quan-
tity, including everything popularly considered
game (and I have so given it in the return),
they sell one-third. As regards value, how-
ever, their purchases fall very short of a third.
Of the best qualities of game, and even more
especially of poultry, a third of the hawkers
may buy a fifteenth, compared with their pur-
chases in the lower-priced kinds. The others buy
none of the best qualities. The more "aristo-
cratic" of the poultry-hawkers will, as a rule,
only buy, "when they have an order" or a
sure sale, the best quality of English turkey-
cocks; which cannot be wondered at, seeing that
the average price of the English turkey-cock
is 12s. One salesman this year sold (at Lead-
enhall) several turkey-cocks at 30s. each, and
one at 3l. The average price of an English
turkey-hen is 4s. 6d., and of these the costers
buy a few: but their chief trade is in foreign
turkey-hens; of which the average price (when
of good quality and in good condition) is 3s. The foreign turkey-cocks average half the price
of the English (or 6s.). Of Dorking fat
chickens, which average 6s. the couple, the
hawkers buy none (save as in the case of the
turkey-cocks); but of the Irish fowls, which,
this season, have averaged 2s. 6d. the couple,
they buy largely. On the other hand they buy
nearly all the rabbits sent from Scotland, and
half of those sent from Ostend, while they
"clear the market" — no matter of what the
glut may consist — when there is a glut. There
is another distinction of which the hawker avails
himself. The average price of young plump
partridges is 2s. 6d. the brace, of old partridges,
2s.; accordingly, the coster buys the old. It is
the same with pheasants, the young averaging
7s. the brace, the old 6s.: "And I can sell them
best," said one man; "for my customers say
they're more tastier-like. I've sold game for
twelve years, or more, but I never tasted any of
any kind, so I can't say who's right and who's
wrong."

The hawkers buy, also, game and poultry
which will not "keep" another day. Some-
times they puff out the breast of a chicken with
fresh pork fat, which melts as the bird roasts.
"It freshens the fowl, I've been told, and im-
proves it," said one man; "and the shopkeepers
now and then, does the same. It's a improve-
ment, sir."

In the present season the costers have bought
of wild ducks, comparatively, none, and of teal,
widgeons, wild birds, and larks, none at all; or
so sparely, as to require no notice.

OF THE STREET-PURCHASERS OF GAME AND
POULTRY.

As the purchasers of game and poultry are of
a different class to the costermongers' ordinary
customers, I may devote a few words to them.
From all the information that I could acquire,
they appear to consist, principally, of those who
reside at a distance from any cheap market, and
buy a cheap luxury when it is brought to
their doors, as well as of those who are "always
on the look-out for something toothy, such as
the shabby genteels, as they're called, who never
gives nothing but a scaly price. They've bar-
gained with me till I was hard held from pitch-
ing into them, and over and over again I should,
only it would have been fourteen days anyhow.
They'll tell me my birds stinks, when they're as
sweet as flowers. They'd go to the devil to
save three farthings on a partridge." Other
buyers are old gourmands, living perhaps on
small incomes, or if possessed of ample incomes,
but confining themselves to a small expendi-
ture; others, again, are men who like a cheap
dinner, and seldom enjoy it, at their own cost,
unless it be cheap, and who best of all like
"such a thing as a moor bird (grouse)," said
one hawker, "which can be eat up to a man's
own cheek." This was also the opinion of a
poulterer and game-dealer, who sometimes sold
"goods" to the hawkers. Of this class of "pa-
trons" many shopkeepers, in all branches of
business, have a perfect horror, as they will
care nothing for having occupied the trades-
men's time to no purpose.

The game and poultry street-sellers, I am
told, soon find out when a customer is bent
upon a bargain, and shape their prices accord-
ingly. Although these street-sellers may gene-
rally take as their motto the announcement so
often seen in the shops of competitive trades-
men, "no reasonable offer refused," they are
sometimes so worried in bargaining that they do refuse.

In a conversation I had with a "retired"
game salesman, he said it might be curious
to trace the history of a brace of birds — of
grouse, for instance — sold in the streets; and he
did it after this manner. They were shot in
the Highlands of Scotland by a member of
parliament who had gladly left the senate for
the moors. They were transferred to a trades-
man who lived in or near some Scotch town
having railway communication, and with whom
"the honourable gentleman," or "the noble
lord," had perhaps endeavoured to drive a hard
bargain. He (the senator) must have a good
price for his birds, as he had given a large sum
for the moor: and the season was a bad one:
the birds were scarce and wild: they would
soon be "packed" (be in flocks of twenty or
thirty instead of in broods), and then there
would be no touching a feather of them. The
canny Scot would quietly say that it was early
in the season, and the birds never packed so
early; that as to price, he could only give what
he could get from a London salesman, and
he was "nae just free to enter into any agree-
ment for a fixed price at a'." The honour-
able gentleman, after much demurring, gives
way, feeling perhaps that he cannot well do
anything else. In due course the grouse are
received in Leadenhall, and unpacked and
flung about with as little ceremony as if they
had been "slaughtered" by a Whitechapel

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journeyman butcher, at so much a head. It
is a thin market, perhaps, when they come to
hand. A dealer, fashionable in the parish of
St. George, Hanover-square, has declined to
give the price demanded; they were not his
money; "he had to give such long credit."
A dealer, popular in the ward of Cheap, has
also declined to buy, and for the same alleged
reason. The salesman, knowing that some of
these dealers must buy, quietly says that he
will take no less, and as he is known to be
a man of his word, little is said upon the
subject. As the hour arrives at which fashion-
able game-dealers are compelled to buy, or
disappoint customers who will not brook such
disappointment, the market, perhaps, is glutted,
owing to a very great consignment by a later
railway train. The Inverness Courier, or the
North of Scotland Gazette, are in due course
quoted by the London papers, touching the
"extraordinary sport" of a party of lords and
gentlemen in the Highlands; and the "heads"
of game are particularized with a care that would
do honour to a Price Current. The salesman
then disposes rapidly of divers "brace" to the
"hawkers," at 1s. or 2s. the brace, and the
hawker offers them to hotel-keepers, and shop-
keepers, and housekeepers, selling some at
3s. 6d. the brace, some at 3s., at 2s. 6d., at 2s. and at less. "At last," said my informant,
"he may sell the finest brace of his basket,
which he has held back to get a better price for,
at 6d. a-piece, rather than keep them over-night,
and that to a woman of the town, whom he may
have met reeling home with money in her
purse. Thus the products of an honourable
gentleman's skilful industry, on which he
greatly prided himself, are eaten by the woman
and her `fancy man,' grumblingly enough, for
they pronounce the birds inferior to tripe."

The best quarters for the street-sale of game and
poultry are, I am informed from several sources,
either the business parts of the metropolis, or
else the houses in the several suburbs which are
the furthest from a market or from a business
part. The squares, crescents, places, and streets,
that do not partake of one or the other of these
characteristics, are pronounced "no good."

OF THE EXPERIENCE OF A GAME HAWKER.

The man who gave me the following informa-
tion was strong and robust, and had a weather-
beaten look. He seemed about fifty. He wore
when I saw him a large velveteen jacket, a cloth
waistcoat which had been once green, and brown
corduroy trousers. No part of his attire, though
it seemed old, was patched, his shirt being clean
and white. He evidently aimed at the game-
keeper style of dress. He affected some humour,
and was dogged in his opinions:

"I was a gentleman's footman when I was a
young man," he said, "and saw life both in
town and country; so I knows what things
belongs." [A common phrase among persons
of his class to denote their being men of the
world.] "I never liked the confinement of ser-
vice, and besides the upper servants takes on so.
The others puts up with it more than they would,
I suppose, because they hopes to be butlers
themselves in time. The only decent people in
the house I lived in last was master and mis-
sus. I won 20l., and got it too, on the Colonel,
when he won the Leger. Master was a bit of
a turf gentleman, and so we all dabbled — like
master like man, you know, sir. I think that
was in 1828, but I'm not certain. We came to
London not long after Doncaster" [he meant
Doncaster races], "something about a lawsuit,
and that winter I left service and bought the
goodwill of a coffee-shop for 25l. It didn't
answer. I wasn't up to the coffee-making, I
think; there's a deal of things belongs to all
things; so I got out of it, and after that I was
in service again, and then I was a boots at an
inn. But I couldn't settle to nothing long; I'm
of a free spirit, you see. I was hard up at last,
and I popped my watch for a sovereign, because
a friend of mine — we sometimes drank together
of a night — said he could put me in the pigeon
and chicken line; that was what he called it, but
it meant game. This just suited me, for I'd been
out with the poachers when I was a lad, and
indeed when I was in service, out of a night on
the sly; so I knew they got stiffish prices. My
friend got me the pigeons. I believe he cheated
me, but he's gone to glory. The next season
game was made legal eating. Before that I
cleared from 25s. to 40s. a week by selling my
`pigeons.' I carried real pigeons as well, which
I said was my own rearing at Gravesend. I sold
my game pigeons — there was all sorts of names
for them — in the City, and sometimes in the
Strand, or Charing-cross, or Covent-garden. I
sold to shopkeepers. Oft enough I've been of-
fered so much tea for a hare. I sometimes had
a hare in each pocket, but they was very awk-
ward carriage; if one was sold, the other sagged
so. I very seldom sold them, at that time, at
less than 3s. 6d., often 4s. 6d., and sometimes
5s. or more. I once sold a thumping old jack-
hare to a draper for 6s.; it was Christmas
time, and he thought it was a beauty. I went
into the country after that, among my friends,
and had a deal of ups and downs in different
parts. I was a navvy part of the time, till five
or six year back I came to London again, and
got into my old trade; but it's quite a different
thing now. I hawks grouse, and every thing,
quite open. Leadenhall and Newgate is my
markets. Six of one and half-a-dozen of
t'other. When there's a great arrival of game,
after a game battle" (he would so call a battue)
"and it's-warm weather, that's my time of day,
for then I can buy cheap. A muggy day, when
it's close and warm, is best of all. I have a tidy
bit of connection now in game, and don't touch
poultry when I can get game. Grouse is the
first thing I get to sell. They are legal eating
on the 12th of August, but as there's hundreds
of braces sold in London that day, and as
they're shot in Scotland and Yorkshire, and
other places where there's moors, in course

[Description: 915EAF. Page 125.]

they're killed before it's legal. It's not often
I can get them early in the season; not the
first week, but I have had three brace two
days before they were legal, and sold them
at 5s. a brace; they cost me 3s. 3d., but I was
told I was favoured. I got them of a dealer,
but that's a secret. I sold a few young par-
tridges with grouse this year at 1s. 6d. and
1s. 9d. a piece, allowing 2d. or 3d. if a brace
was taken. They weren't legal eating till the
1st of September, but they was shot by grouse
shooters, and when I hawked them I called
them quails. Lord, sir, gentlefolks — and I
serve a good many, leastways their cooks, and
now and then themselves — they don't make a
fuss about Game Laws; they've too much
sense. I've bought grouse quite fresh and
fine when there's been a lot, and bad keeping
weather, at 1s. and 15d. each. I've sold them
sometimes at 1s. 6d. and 2s. each, and 2s. 6d. the big ones, but only twice or thrice. If you
ask very low at first, people won't buy, only
a few good judges, 'cause they think something
must be amiss. I once bought a dozen good
hares, on a Saturday afternoon, for 10s. 6d. It
was jolly hot, and I could hardly sell them.
I got 1s. 6d. a piece for three of them; 2s. for
the finest one; 1s. 3d. for five, no, for four; 1s. 10d. for two; and I had a deal of trouble to
get a landlord to take the last two for 1s. 6d., to wipe off a bit of a drink score. I didn't
do so bad as it was, but if it hadn't been Sa-
turday, I should have made a good thing of
'em. It's very hard work carrying a dozen
hares; and every one of that lot — except two,
and they was fine leverets — was as cheap as
butcher's meat at half-a-crown a piece. I've
done middling in partridges this year. I've
bought them, but mixed things they was, as
low as from 10d. to 16d. a brace, and have made
a profit, big or little as happened, on every one.
People that's regular customers I always charge
6d. profit in 2s. 6d. to, and that's far cheaper
than they can get served other ways. It's chiefly
the game battles that does so much to cheapen
partridges or peasants" (so he always called
pheasants); "and it's only then I meddles with
peasants. They're sold handier than the other
birds at the shops, I think. They're legal eating
on the 1st of October. Such nonsense! why isn't
mutton made legal eating, only just at times, as
well? In very hard weather I've done well on
wild ducks. They come over here when the
weather's a clipper, for you see cold weather
suits some birds and kills others. It aint hard
weather that's driven them here; the frost has
drawed them here, because it's only then they're
cheap. I've bought beauties at 1s. a piece, and
one day I cleared 10s. 6d. out of twelve brace of
them. I've often cleared 6s. and 7s. — at least
as often as there's been a chance. I knew a man
that did uncommon well on them; and he once
told a parson, or a journeyman parson, I don't
know what he was, that if ever he prayed it was for
a hard winter and lots of wild ducks. I've done
a little sometimes in plover, and woodcock, and
snipe, but not so much. I never plays no tricks
with my birds. I trims them up to look well,
certainly. If they won't keep, and won't sell,
I sticks them into a landlord I knows, as likes
them high, for a quartern or a pot, or anything.
It's often impossible to keep them. If they're
hard hit it's soon up with them. A sportsman,
if he has a good dog — but you'll know that if
you've ever been a shooting, sir — may get close
upon a covey of young partridges before he
springs them, and then give them his one, two,
with both barrels, and they're riddled to bits.
I may make 18s. a week all the year round,
because I have a connection. I'm very much
respected, I thinks, on my round, for I deal
fair; that there, sir, breeds respect, you know.
When I can't get game (birds) I can some-
times, indeed often, get hares, and mostly rab-
bits. I've hawked venson, but did no good —
though I cried it at 4d. the lb. My best weeks
is worth 30s. to 35s., my worst is 6s. to 10s. I'm
a good deal in the country, working it. I'm
forced to sell fish sometimes. Geese I sometimes
join a mate in selling. I don't mix much with
the costermongers; in coorse I knows some. I
live middling. Do I ever eat my own game if
it's high? No, sir, never. I couldn't stand such
cag-mag — my stomach couldn't — though I've
been a gentleman's servant. Such stuff don't
suit nobody but rich people, whose stomach's
diseased by over-feeding, and that's been brought
up to it, like. I've only myself to keep now.
I've had a wife or two, but we parted" (this
was said gravely enough); "there was nothing
to hinder us. I see them sometimes and treat
them."

The quantity of game annually sold in the
London streets is as follows: —

         

Grouse	5,000
Partridges	20,000
Pheasants	12,000
Snipes	5,000
Hares	20,000

STATEMENT OF TWO POULTRY HAWKERS.

Two brothers, both good-looking and well-
spoken young men — one I might characterise
as handsome — gave me the following account.
I found them unwilling to speak of their youth,
and did not press them. I was afterwards in-
formed that their parents died within the same
month, and that the family was taken into the
workhouse; but the two boys left it in a little
time, and before they could benefit by any
schooling. Neither of them could read or write.
They left, I believe, with some little sum in
hand, to "start theirselves." An intelligent
costermonger, who was with me when I saw the
two brothers, told me that "a costermonger
would rather be thought to have come out of
prison than out of a workhouse," for his
"mates" would say, if they heard he had been
locked up, "O, he's only been quodded for
pitching into a crusher." The two brothers
wore clean smock country frocks over their
dress, and made a liberal display of their clean,

[Description: 915EAF. Page 126.]

but coarse, shirts. It was on a Monday that
I saw them. What one brother said, the other
confirmed: so I use the plural "we."

"We sell poultry and game, but stick most
to poultry, which suits our connection best. We
buy at Leadenhall. We're never cheated in
the things we buy; indeed, perhaps, we could'nt
be. A salesman will say — Mr. H — will —
`Buy, if you like, I can't recommend them.
Use your own judgment. They're cheap.' He
has only one price, and that's often a low one.
We give from 1s. to 1s. 9d. for good chickens,
and from 2s. 6d. mostly for geese and turkeys.
Pigeons is 1s. 9d. to 3s. a dozen. We aim at
6d. profit on chickens; and 1s., if we can get it,
or 6d. if we can do no better, on geese and
turkeys. Ducks are the same as chickens. All
the year through, we may make 12s. a week a
piece. We work together, one on one side of
the street and the other on the other. It
answers best that way. People find we can't
undersell one another. We buy the poultry,
whenever we can, undressed, and dress them
ourselves; pull the feathers off and make them
ready for cooking. We sell cheaper than the
shops, or we couldn't sell at all. But you
must be known, to do any trade, or people will
think your poultry's bad. We work game as
well, but mostly poultry. We've been on
hares to-day, mostly, and have made about
2s. 6d. a piece, but that's an extra day. Our
best customers are tradesmen in a big way, and
people in the houses a little way out of town.
Working people don't buy of us now. We're
going to a penny gaff to-night" (it was then
between four and five); "we've no better way of
spending our time when our day's work is done."

From the returns before given, the street-sale
of poultry amounts yearly to

• 500,000 fowls.

• 80,000 ducks.

• 20,000 geese.

• 30,000 turkeys.

OF THE STREET SALE OF LIVE POULTRY.

The street trade in live poultry is not con-
siderable, and has become less considerable every
year, since the facilities of railway conveyance
have induced persons in the suburbs to make
their purchases in London rather than of the
hawkers. Geese used to be bought very largely
by the hawkers in Leadenhall, and were driven
in flocks to the country, 500 being a frequent
number of a flock. Their sale commenced about
six miles from town in all directions, the pur-
chasers being those who, having the necessary
convenience, liked to fatten their own Christmas
geese, and the birds when bought were small and
lean. A few flocks, with 120 or 150 in each,
are still disposed of in this way; but the trade
is not a fifth of what it was. As this branch of
the business is not in the hands of the hawkers,
but generally of country poulterers resident in
the towns not far from the metropolis, I need
but allude to it. A few flocks of ducks are
driven in the same way.

The street trade in live poultry continues only
for three months — from the latter part of June
to the latter part of September. At this period,
the hawkers say, as they can't get "dead" they
must get "live." During these three months
the hawkers sell 500 chickens and 300 ducks
weekly, by hawking, or 10,400 in the season
of 13 weeks. Occasionally, as many as 50 men
and women — the same who hawk dead game
and poultry — are concerned in the traffic I am
treating of. At other times there are hardly 30,
and in some not 20 so employed, for if the wea-
ther be temperate, dead poultry is preferred to
live by the hawkers. Taking the average of
"live" sellers at 25 every week, it gives only a
trade of 32 birds each weekly. Some, however,
will sell 18 in a day; but others, who occasionally
resort to the trade, only a dozen in a week. The
birds are sometimes carried in baskets on the
hawker's arm, their heads being let through net-
work at the top; but more frequently they are
hawked in open wicker-work coops carried on
the head. The best live poultry are from Surrey
and Sussex; the inferior from Ireland, and per-
haps more than three-fourths of that sold by the
hawkers is Irish.

The further nature of the trade, and the class
of customers, is shown in the following state-
ment, given to me by a middle-aged man, who
had been familiar with the trade from his youth.

"Yes, sir," he said, "I've had a turn at live
poultry for — let me see — someways between
twenty and twenty-five years. The business is
a sweater, sir; it's heavy work, but `live' aint so
heavy as `dead.' There's fewer of them to carry
in a round, that's it. Ah! twenty years ago, or
better, live poultry was worth following. I did
a good bit in it. I've sold 160 fowls and ducks.
and more, in a week, and cleared about 4l. But
out of that I had to give a man 1s. a day, and his
peck, to help me. At that time I sold my ducks
and chickens — I worked nothing else — at from
2s. to 3s. 6d. a piece, according to size and quality.
Now, if I get from 14d. to 2s. it's not so bad. I
sell more, I think, however, over 1s. 6d. than un-
der it, but I'm perticler in my `live.' I never
sold to any but people out of town that had conve-
nience to keep them, and Lord knows, I've seen
ponds I could jump over reckoned prime for
ducks. Them that keeps their gardens nice won't
buy live poultry. I've seldom sold to the big houses
anything like to what I've done to the smaller.
The big houses, you see, goes for fancy bantems,
such as Sir John Seabright's, or Spanish hens, or
a bit of a game cross, or real game — just for orna-
ment, and not for fighting — or for anything that's
got its name up. I've known young couples buy
fowls to have their breakfast eggs from them.
One young lady told me to bring her — that's
fifteen year ago, it is so — six couples, that I
knew would lay. I told her she'd better have
five hens to a cock, and she didn't seem pleased,
but I'm sure I don't know why, for I hope I'm
always civil. I told her there would be murder
if there was a cock to every hen. I supplied
her, and made 6s. by the job. I have sold

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[Description: 915EAF. Page 129.]

live fowls to the Jews about Whitechapel,
on my way to Stratford and Bow, but only when
I've bought a bargain and sold one. I don't
know nothing how the Jews kills their fowls.
Last summer I didn't make 1s. 6d. a day; no,
nor more than three half-crowns a week in `live.'
But that's only part of my trade. I don't
complain, so it's nothing to nobody what I
makes. From Beever (De Beauvoir) Town to
Stamford Hill, and on to Tottenham and Ed-
monton, and turning off Walthamstow way is as
good a round as any for live; it is so; but
nothing to what it was. Highgate and Hamp-
stead is middling. The t'other side the water
isn't good at all."

Fancy chickens, I may add, are never hawked,
nor are live pigeons, nor geese, nor turkeys.

The hawkers' sale of live poultry may be
taken, at a moderate computation, as 6,500
chickens, and 3,900 ducks.

OF RABBIT SELLING IN THE STREETS.

Rabbit-selling cannot be said to be a distinct
branch of costermongering, but some street-
sellers devote themselves to it more exclusively
than to other "goods," and, for five or six
months of the year, sell little else. It is not
often, though it is sometimes, united with the
game or poultry trade, as a stock of rabbits, of
a dozen or a dozen and a half, is a sufficient
load for one man. The best sale for rabbits is in
the suburbs. They are generally carried slung
two and two on a long pole, which is supported
on the man's shoulders, or on a short one which
is carried in the hand. Lately, they have been
hawked about hung up on a barrow. The trade
is the briskest in the autumn and winter months;
but some men carry them, though they do not
confine themselves to the traffic in them, all the
year round. The following statement shows the
nature of the trade.

"I was born and bred a costermonger," he
said, "and I've been concerned with everything
in the line. I've been mostly `on rabbits' these
five or six years, but I always sold a few, and
now sometimes I sell a hare or two, and, if
rabbits is too dear, I tumble on to fish. I buy
at Leadenhall mainly. I've given from 6s. to
14s. a dozen for my rabbits. The usual price is
from 5s. to 8s. a dozen. [I may remark that
the costers buy nearly all the Scotch rabbits, at
an average of 6s. the dozen; and the Ostend
rabbits, which are a shilling or two dearer.]
They're Hampshire rabbits; but I don't know
where Hampshire is. I know they're from
Hampshire, for they're called `Wild Hampshire
rabbits, 1s: a pair.' But still, as you say, that's
only a call. I never sell a rabbit at 6d., in
course — it costs more. My way in business
is to get 2d. profit, and the skin, on every
rabbit. If they cost me 8d., I try to get 10d. It's the skins is the profit. The skins now brings
me from 1s. to 1s. 9d. a dozen. They're best
in frosty weather. The fur's thickest then. It
grows best in frost, I suppose. If I sell a
dozen, it's a tidy day's work. If I get 2d. a-piece on them, and the skins at 1s. 3d., it's
3s. 3d., but I dont sell above 5 dozen in a week
— that's 16s. 3d. a week, sir, is it? Wet and
dark weather is against me. People won't often
buy rabbits by candlelight, if they're ever so
sweet. Some weeks in spring and summer I
can't sell above two dozen rabbits. I have sold
two dozen and ten on a Saturday in the country,
but then I had a young man to help me. I sell
the skins to a warehouse for hatters. My old
'oman works a little fish at a stall sometimes,
but she only can in fine weather, for we've a kid
that can hardly walk, and it don't do to let it
stand out in the cold. Perhaps I may make
10s. to 14s. a week all the year round. I'm
paying 1s. a week for 1l. borrowed, and paid 2s. all last year; but I'll pay no more after Christ-
mas. I did better on rabbits four or five year
back, because I sold more to working-people and
small shopkeepers than I do now. I suppose
it's because they're not so well off now as they
was then, and, as you say, butchers'-meat may
be cheaper now, and tempts them. I do best
short ways in the country. Wandsworth way
ain't bad. No more is parts of Stoke-Newing-
ton and Stamford-hill. St. John's Wood and
Hampstead is middling. Hackney's bad. I
goes all ways. I dont know what sort of peo-
ple's my best customers. Two of 'em, I've been
told, is banker's clerks, so in course they is rich."

There are 600,000 rabbits sold every year in
the streets of London; these, at 7d. a-piece, give
17,500l. thus expended annually in the metro-
polis.

OF THE STREET SALE OF BUTTER, CHEESE,
AND EGGS.

All these commodities used to be hawked in
the streets, and to a considerable extent. Until,
as nearly as I can ascertain, between twenty
and thirty years back, butter was brought from
Epping, and other neighbouring parts, where
good pasture existed, and hawked in the streets
of London, usually along with poultry and
eggs. This trade is among the more ancient
of the street-trades. Steam-vessels and rail-
ways, however, have so stocked the markets,
that no hawking of butter or eggs, from any
agricultural part, even the nearest to London,
would be remunerative now. Eggs are brought
in immense quantities from France and Bel-
gium, though thirty, or even twenty years ago
the notion having of a good French egg, at a Lon-
don breakfast-table, would have been laughed
at as an absurd attempt at an impossible
achievement. The number of eggs now annu-
ally imported into this kingdom, is 98,000,000,
half of which may be said to be the yearly con-
sumption of London. No butter is now hawked,
but sometimes a few "new laid" eggs are car-
ried from a rural part to the nearest metropo-
litan suburb, and are sold readily enough, if the
purveyor be known. Mr. M`Culloch estimates
the average consumption of butter, in London,
at 6,250,000 lbs. per annum, or 5 oz., weekly,
each individual.

The hawking of cheese was never a promi-
nent part of the street-trade. Of late, its sale
in the streets, may be described as accidental.
A considerable quantity of American cheese
was hawked, or more commonly sold at a stand-
ing, five or six years ago; unto December last,
and for three months preceding, cheese was
sold in the streets which had been rejected from
Government stores, as it would not "keep"
for the period required; but it was good for
immediate consumption, for which all street-
goods are required. This, and the American
cheese, were both sold in the streets at 3d. the
pound; usually, at fair weights, I am told, for it
might not be easy to deceive the poor in a thing
of such frequent purchase as "half a quarter or
a quarter" (of a pound) of cheese.

The total quantity of foreign cheese con-
sumed, yearly, in the metropolis may be esti-
mated at 25,000,000 lbs. weight, or half of the
gross quantity annually imported.

The following statement shows the quantity
and sum paid for the game and poultry sold in
London streets:

                         

	\cp\
5,000 grouse, at 1s. 9d. each	437
20,000 partridges, at 1s. 6d.	1,500
12,000 pheasants, at 3s. 6d.	2,100
5,000 snipes, at 8d.	160
20,000 hares, at 2s. 3d.	2,250
600,000 rabbits, at 7d.	17,500
500,000 fowls, at 1s. 6d.	37,500
20,000 geese, at 2s. 6d.	2,500
80,000 ducks, at 1s. 6d.	6,000
30,000 turkeys, at 3s. 6d.	5,250
10,000 live fowls and ducks, at 1s. 6d.	750
	\cp\75,953

In this table I do not give the refuse game
and poultry, bought sometimes for the mere
feathers, when "undressed;" neither are the
wild ducks nor woodcocks, nor those things of
which the costers buy only exceptionally, in-
cluded. Adding these, it may be said, that
with the street sale of butter, cheese, and eggs,
80,000l. are annually expended in the streets on
this class of articles.