London Labour and the London Poor, volume 1

"I have sold `wet fish' in the streets for more
than fourteen years," he said; "before that I
was a gentleman, and was brought up a gentle-
man, if I'm a beggar now. I bought fish largely
in the north of England once, and now I must
sell it in the streets of London. Never mind
talking about that, sir; there's some things
won't bear talking about. There's a wonderful
difference in the streets since I knew them first;
I could make a pound then, where I can hardly
make a crown now. People had more money,
and less meanness then. I consider that the rail-
ways have injured me, and all wet fish-sellers, to
a great extent. Fish now, you see, sir, comes in
at all hours, so that nobody can calculate on the
quantity that will be received — nobody. That's
the mischief of it; we are afraid to buy, and miss
many a chance of turning a penny. In my time,
since railways were in, I've seen cod-fish sold at
a guinea in the morning that were a shilling at
noon; for either the wind and the tide had
served, or else the railway fishing-places were
more than commonly supplied, and there was a
glut to London. There's no trade requires
greater judgment than mine — none whatever.
Before the railways — and I never could see the
good of them — the fish came in by the tide, and
we knew how to buy, for there would be no more
till next tide. Now, we don't know. I go to
Billingsgate to buy my fish, and am very well
known to Mr. — and Mr. — (mentioning
the names of some well-known salesmen). The
Jews are my ruin there now. When I go to
Billingsgate, Mr. — will say, or rather, I
will say to him, `How much for this pad of
soles?' He will answer, `Fourteen shillings.'
`Fourteen shillings!' I say, `I'll give you seven
shillings, — that's the proper amount;' then
the Jew boys — none of them twenty that are
there — ranged about will begin; and one says,
when I bid 7s., `I'll give 8s;' `nine,' says
another, close on my left; `ten,' shouts another,
on my right, and so they go offering on; at last
Mr. — says to one of them, as grave as a
judge, `Yours, sir, at 13s,' but it's all gammon.
The 13s. buyer isn't a buyer at all, and isn't
required to pay a farthing, and never touches
the goods. It's all done to keep up the price to
poor fishmen, and so to poor buyers that are
our customers in the streets. Money makes
money, and it don't matter how. Those Jew
boys — I dare say they're the same sort as once
sold oranges about the streets — are paid, I know
1s. for spending three or four hours that way in
the cold and wet. My trade has been injured,
too, by the great increase of Irish coster-
mongers; for an Irishman will starve out an
Englishman any day; besides if a tailor can't
live by his trade, he'll take to fish, or fruit
and cabbages. The month of May is a fine
season for plaice, which is bought very largely
by my customers. Plaice are sold at ½d. and
1d. a piece. It is a difficult fish to manage, and
in poor neighbourhoods an important one to
manage well. The old hands make a profit out
of it; new hands a loss. There's not much
cod or other wet fish sold to the poor, while plaice
is in. "My customers are poor men's wives,
— mechanics, I fancy. They want fish at most
unreasonable prices. If I could go and pull them
off a line flung off Waterloo-bridge, and no other
expense, I couldn't supply them as cheap as they
expect them. Very cheap fish-sellers lose their
customers, through the Billingsgate bummarees,
for they have pipes, and blow up the cod-fish,
most of all, and puff up their bellies till they
are twice the size, but when it comes to table,
there's hardly to say any fish at all. The Bil-
lingsgate authorities would soon stop it, if they
knew all I know. They won't allow any roguery,
or any trick, if they only come to hear of it.
These bummarees have caused many respectable
people to avoid street-buying, and so fair traders
like me are injured. I've nothing to complain of
about the police. Oft enough, if I could be al-
lowed ten minutes longer on a Saturday night,
I could get through all my stock without loss.
About a quarter to twelve I begin to halloo away
as hard as I can, and there's plenty of customers
that lay out never a farthing till that time, and
then they can't be served fast enough, so they
get their fish cheaper than I do. If any halloos
out that way sooner, we must all do the same.
Anything rather than keep fish over a warm
Sunday. I have kept mine in ice; I haven't
opportunity now, but it'll keep in a cool place
this time of year. I think there's as many
sellers as buyers in the streets, and there's scores
of them don't give just weight or measure. I
wish there was good moral rules in force, and
everybody gave proper weight. I often talk to
street-dealers about it. I've given them many a
lecture; but they say they only do what plenty
of shopkeepers do, and just get fined and go on
again, without being a pin the worse thought of.
They are abusive sometimes, too; I mean the
street-sellers are, because they are ignorant. I
have no children, thank God, and my wife helps
me in my business. Take the year through, I
clear from 10s. to 12s. every week. That's not

069

[Description: 915EAF. Page 069.]

much to support two people. Some weeks I earn
only 4s., — such as in wet March weather. In
others I earn 18s. or 1l. November, December,
and January are good months for me. I wouldn't
mind if they lasted all the year round. I'm
often very badly off indeed — very badly; and
the misery of being hard up, sir, is not when
you're making a struggle to get out of your
trouble; no, nor to raise a meal off herrings that
you've given away once, but when your wife and
you's sitting by a grate without a fire, and put-
ting the candle out to save it, a planning how to
raise money. `Can we borrow there?' `Can
we manage to sell if we can borrow?' `Shall
we get from very bad to the parish?' Then,
perhaps, there's a day lost, and without a bite in
our mouths trying to borrow. Let alone a little
drop to give a body courage, which perhaps is
the only good use of spirit after all. That's the
pinch, sir. When the rain you hear outside puts
you in mind of drownding!"

Subjoined is the amount (in round numbers)
of wet fish annually disposed of in the metro-
polis by the street-sellers:

	No. of Fish.	lbs. weight.
Salmon	20,000	175,000
Live-cod	100,000	1,000,000
Soles	6,500,000	1,650,000
Whiting	4,440,000	1,680,000
Haddock	250,000	500,000
Plaice	29,400,000	29,400,000
Mackarel	15,700,000	15,700,000
Herrings	875,000,000	210,000,000
Sprats	"	3,000,000
Eels, from Holland	400,000	65,000
Flounders	260,000	43,000
Dabs	270,000	48,000
Total quantity of wet fish sold in the streets of London	932,340,000	263,281,000

From the above Table we perceive that the fish,
of which the greatest quantity is eaten by the
poor, is herrings; of this, compared with plaice
there is upwards of thirty times the number
consumed. After plaice rank mackerel, and of
these the consumption is about one-half less in
number than plaice, while the number of soles
vended in the streets, is again half of that of
mackerel. Then come whiting, which are
about two-thirds the number of the soles, while
the consumption to the poor of haddock, cod,
eels, and salmon, is comparatively insignificant.
Of sprats, which are estimated by weight, only
one-fifth of the number of pounds are consumed
compared with the weight of mackerel. The
pounds' weight of herrings sold in the streets, in
the course of a year, is upwards of seven times
that of plaice, and fourteen times that of
mackerel. Altogether more than 260,000,000
pounds, or 116,000 tons weight of wet fish are
yearly purchased in the streets of London, for
the consumption of the humbler classes. Of
this aggregate amount, no less than five-sixths
consists of herrings; which, indeed, constitute
the great slop diet of the metropolis.

	OF THE STREET-SELLERS OF FISH. London Labour and the London Poor, volume 1

University of Virginia Library

OF "WET" FISH-SELLERS IN THE STREETS.