University of Virginia Library

5. OF THE STREET-IRISH.

The Irish street-sellers are both a numerous
and peculiar class of people. It therefore be-
hoves me, for the due completeness of this work,
to say a few words upon their numbers, earn-
ings, condition, and mode of life.

The number of Irish street-sellers in the metro-
polis has increased greatly of late years. One
gentleman, who had every means of being well-
informed, considered that it was not too much
to conclude, that, within these five years, the
numbers of the poor Irish people who gain a
scanty maintenance, or what is rather a substi-
tute for a maintenance, by trading, or begging,
or by carrying on the two avocations simulta-
neously in the streets of London, had been
doubled in number.

I found among the English costermongers a
general dislike of the Irish. In fact, next to
a policeman, a genuine London costermonger
hates an Irishman, considering him an intruder.
Whether there be any traditional or hereditary
ill-feeling between them, originating from a
clannish feeling, I cannot ascertain. The coster-
mongers whom I questioned had no know-
ledge of the feelings or prejudices of their pre-
decessors, but I am inclined to believe that the
prejudice is modern, and has originated in the
great inflex of Irishmen and women, intermix-
ing, more especially during the last five years,
with the costermonger's business. An Irish
costermonger, however, is no novelty in the
streets of London. "From the mention of
the costardmonger," says Mr. Charles Knight,
"in the old dramatists, he appears to have been
frequently an Irishman."

Of the Irish street-sellers, at present, it is
computed that there are, including men, women,
and children, upwards of 10,000. Assuming the
street-sellers attending the London fish and
green markets to be, with their families, 30,000
in number, and 7 in every 20 of these to be
Irish, we shall have rather more than the total
above given. Of this large body three-fourths
sell only fruit, and more especially nuts and
oranges; indeed, the orange-season is called the
"Irishman's harvest." The others deal in fish,
fruit, and vegetables, but these are principally
men. Some of the most wretched of the street-
Irish deal in such trifles as lucifer-matches,
water-cresses, &c.

I am informed that the great mass of these
people have been connected, in some capacity or
other, with the culture of the land in Ireland.
The mechanics who have sought the metropolis
from the sister kingdom have become mixed with
their respective handicrafts in England, some of
the Irish — though only a few — taking rank with
the English skilled labourers. The greater
part of the Irish artizans who have arrived
within the last five years are to be found among
the most degraded of the tailors and shoemakers
who work at the East-end for the slop-masters.

A large class of the Irish who were agricul-
tural labourers in their country are to be found
among the men working for bricklayers, as well
as among the dock-labourers and excavators, &c.
Wood chopping is an occupation greatly resorted
to by the Irish in London. Many of the Irish,
however, who are not regularly employed in
their respective callings, resort to the streets
when they cannot obtain work otherwise.

The Irish women and girls who sell fruit,
&c., in the streets, depend almost entirely
on that mode of traffic for their subsistence.
They are a class not sufficiently taught to avail
themselves of the ordinary resources of women
in the humbler walk of life. Unskilled at their
needles, working for slop employers, even at
the commonest shirt-making, is impossible to
them. Their ignorance of household work,
moreover (for such description of work is un-
known in their wretched cabins in many parts of
Ireland), incapacitates them in a great measure
for such employments as "charing," washing,
and ironing, as well as from regular domestic em-
ployment. Thus there seems to remain to them
but one thing to do — as, indeed, was said to me by
one of themselves — viz., "to sell for a ha'pinny
the three apples which cost a farruthing."

Very few of these women (nor, indeed, of the
men, though rather more of them than the wo-
men) can read, and they are mostly all wretchedly
poor; but the women present two characteristics
which distinguish them from the London coster-
women generally — they are chaste, and, unlike
the "coster girls," very seldom form any con-

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nection without the sanction of the marriage
ceremony. They are, moreover, attentive to reli-
gious observances.

The majority of the Irish street-sellers of both
sexes beg, and often very eloquently, as they
carry on their trade; and I was further assured,
that, but for this begging, some of them might
starve outright.

The greater proportion of the Irish street-
sellers are from Leinster and Munster, and a
considerable number come from Connaught.

OF THE CAUSES WHICH HAVE MADE THE
IRISH TURN CONTERMONGERS.

Notwithstanding the prejudices of the Eng-
lish costers, I am of opinion that the Irishmen
and women who have become costermongers,
belong to a better class than the Irish labourers.
The Irishman may readily adapt himself, in a
strange place, to labour, though not to trade;
but these costers are — or the majority at least
are — poor persevering traders enough.

The most intelligent and prosperous of the
street-Irish are those who have "risen" — for so
I heard it expressed — "into regular costers."
The untaught Irishmen's capabilities, as I have
before remarked, with all his powers of speech
and quickness of apprehension, are far less fitted
for "buying in the cheapest market and selling
in the dearest" than for mere physical em-
ployment. Hence those who take to street-
trading for a living seldom prosper in it, and
three-fourths of the street-Irish confine their
dealings to such articles as are easy of sale, like
apples, nuts, or oranges, for they are rarely
masters of purchasing to advantage, and seem to
know little about tale or measure, beyond the
most familiar quantities. Compared with an
acute costermonger, the mere apple-seller is but
as the labourer to the artizan.

One of the principal causes why the Irish
costermongers have increased so extensively of
late years, is to be found in the fact that the
labouring classes, (and of them chiefly the class
employed in the culture of land,) have been
driven over from "the sister Isle" more thickly
for the last four or five years than formerly.
Several circumstances have conspired to effect
this. — First, they were driven over by the famine,
when they could not procure, or began to fear
that soon they could not procure, food to eat.
Secondly, they were forced to take refuge in
this country by the evictions, when their land-
lords had left them no roof to shelter them in
their own. (The shifts, the devices, the plans,
to which numbers of these poor creatures had
recourse, to raise the means of quitting Ireland
for England — or for anywhere — will present a
very remarkable chapter at some future period.)
Thirdly, though the better class of small
farmers who have emigrated from Ireland, in
hopes of "bettering themselves," have mostly
sought the shores of North America, still some
who have reached this country have at last
settled into street-sellers. And, fourthly, many
who have come over here only for the
harvest have been either induced or compelled
to stay.

Another main cause is, that the Irish, as
labourers, can seldom obtain work all the year
through, and thus the ranks of the Irish street-
sellers are recruited every winter by the slack-
ness of certain periodic trades in which they
are largely employed — such as hodmen, dock-
work, excavating, and the like. They are,
therefore, driven by want of employment to the
winter sale of oranges and nuts. These cir-
cumstances have a doubly malefic effect, as
the increase of costers accrues in the winter
months, and there are consequently the most
sellers when there are the fewest buyers.

Moreover, the cessation of work in the con-
struction of railways, compared with the abund-
ance of employment which attracted so many
to this country during the railway mania,
has been another fertile cause of there being so
many Irish in the London streets.

The prevalence of Irish women and children
among street-sellers is easily accounted for —
they are, as I said before, unable to do anything
else to eke out the means of their husbands
or parents. A needle is as useless in their
fingers as a pen.

Bitterly as many of these people suffer in
this country, grievous and often eloquent as are
their statements, I met with none who did not
manifest repugnance at the suggestion of a
return to Ireland. If asked why they objected
to return, the response was usually in the form of
a question: "Shure thin, sir, and what good
could I do there?" Neither can say that I
heard any of these people express any love for
their country, though they often spoke with
great affection of their friends.

From an Irish costermonger, a middle-aged
man, with a physiognomy best known as "Irish,"
and dressed in corduroy trousers, with a loose
great-coat, far too big for him, buttoned about
him, I had the following statement:

"I had a bit o' land, yer honor, in County
Limerick. Well, it wasn't just a farrum, nor
what ye would call a garden here, but my father
lived and died on it — glory be to God! — and
brought up me and my sister on it. It was
about an acre, and the taties was well known
to be good. But the sore times came, and the
taties was afflicted, and the wife and me — I
have no childer — hadn't a bite nor a sup, but
wather to live on, and an igg or two. I filt the
famine a-comin'. I saw people a-feedin' on the
wild green things, and as I had not such a bad
take, I got Mr. — (he was the head master's
agent) to give me 28s. for possission in quiet-
ness, and I sould some poulthry I had — their
iggs was a blessin' to keep the life in us — I
sould them in Limerick for 3s. 3d. — the poor
things — four of them. The furnithur' I sould to
the nabors, for somehow about 6s. Its the thruth
I'm ay-tellin' of you, sir, and there's 2s. owin'
of it still, and will be a perpitual loss. The wife
and me walked to Dublin, though we had betther
have gone by the `long say,' but I didn't under-

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stand it thin, and we got to Liverpool. Then
sorrow's the taste of worruk could I git, beyant
oncte 3s. for two days harrud porthering, that
broke my back half in two. I was tould I'd
do betther in London, and so, glory be to God!
I have — perhaps I have. I knew Mr. — , he
porthers at Covent-garden, and I made him out,
and hilped him in any long distance of a job.
As I'd been used to farrumin' I thought it good
raison I should be a costermonger, as they call
it here. I can read and write too. And some
good Christian — the heavens light him to glory
when he's gone! — I don't know who he was —
advanced me 10s. — or he gave it me, so to spake,
through Father — ," (a Roman Catholic
priest.)" We earrun what keeps the life in us. I
don't go to markit, but buy of a fair dealin' man
— so I count him — though he's harrud sometimes.
I can't till how many Irishmen is in the thrade.
There's many has been brought down to it by
the famin' and the changes. I don't go much
among the English street-dalers. They talk like
haythens. I never miss mass on a Sunday, and
they don't know what the blissed mass manes.
I'm almost glad I have no childer, to see how
they're raired here. Indeed, sir, they're not
raired at all — they run wild. They haven't the
fear of God or the saints. They'd hang a praste
— glory be to God! they would."

HOW THE STREET-IRISH DISPLANTED THE
STREET-JEWS IN THE ORANGE TRADE.

The Jews, in the streets, while acting as cos-
termongers, never "worked a barrow," nor
dealt in the more ponderous and least pro-
fitable articles of the trade, such as turnips
and cabbages. They however, had, at one
period, the chief possession of a portion of
the trade which the "regular hands" do not
consider proper costermongering, and which is
now chiefly confined to the Irish — viz.: orange
selling.

The trade was, not many years ago, confined
almost entirely to the Jew boys, who kept aloof
from the vagrant lads of the streets, or mixed
with them only in the cheap theatres and
concert-rooms. A person who had had great
experience at what was, till recently, one of
the greatest "coaching inns," told me that,
speaking within his own recollection and from
his own observation, he thought the sale
of oranges was not so much in the hands of
the Jew lads until about forty years back.
The orange monopoly, so to speak, was
established by the street-Jews, about 1810, or
three or four years previous to that date, when
recruiting and local soldiering were at their
height, and when a great number of the vaga-
bond or "roving" population, who in one
capacity or other now throng the streets, were
induced to enlist. The young Jews never entered
the ranks of the army. The streets were thus
in a measure cleared for them, and the itinerant
orange-trade fell almost entirely into their
hands. Some of the young Jews gained, I am
assured, at least 100l. a year in this traffic.
The numbers of country people who hastened to
London on the occasion of the Allied Sove-
reigns' visit in 1814 — many wealthy persons
then seeing the capital for the first time —
afforded an excellent market to these dealers.

Moreover, the perseverance of the Jew orange
boys was not to be overcome; they would follow
a man who even looked encouragingly at their
wares for a mile or two. The great resort of
these Jew dealers — who eschewed night-work
generally, and left the theatre-doors to old men
and women of all ages — was at the coaching inns;
for year by year, after the peace of 1815, the im-
provement of the roads and the consequent
increase of travellers to London, progressed.

About 1825, as nearly as my informant could
recollect, these keen young traders began to add
the sale of other goods to their oranges, press-
ing them upon the notice of those who were
leaving or visiting London by the different
coaches. So much was this the case, that it was
a common remark at that time, that no one
could reach or leave the metropolis, even for
the shortest journey, without being expected to
be in urgent want of oranges and lemons, black-
lead pencils, sticks of sealing-wax, many-
bladed pen-knives, pocket-combs, razors, strops,
braces, and sponges. To pursue the sale of the
last-mentioned articles — they being found, I
presume, to be more profitable — some of the
street-Jews began to abandon the sale of
oranges and lemons; and it was upon this,
that the trade was "taken up" by the wives
and children of the Irish bricklayers' labourers,
and of other Irish work-people then resident in
London. The numbers of Irish in the metro-
polis at that time began to increase rapidly;
for twenty years ago, they resorted numerously
to England to gather in the harvest, and those
who had been employed in contiguous counties
during the autumn, made for London in the
winter. "I can't say they were well off, sir,"
said one man to me, "but they liked bread
and herrings, or bread and tea — better than
potatoes without bread at home." From 1836
to 1840, I was informed, the Irish gradually
superseded the Jews in the fruit traffic about
the coaching-houses. One reason for this was,
that they were far more eloquent, begging
pathetically, and with many benedictions on
their listeners. The Jews never begged, I was
told; "they were merely traders." Another
reason was, that the Irish, men or lads, who
had entered into the fruit trade in the coach-
yards, would not only sell and beg, but were
ready to "lend a hand" to any over-burthened
coach-porter. This the Jews never did, and in
that way the people of the yard came to en-
courage the Irish to the prejudice of the
Jews. At present, I understand that, with the
exception of one or two in the city, no Jews
vend oranges in the streets, and that the trade
is almost entirely in the hands of the Irish.

Another reason why the Irish could supersede
and even undersell the Jews and regular cos-
termongers was this, as I am informed on ex-

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cellent authority: — Father Mathew, a dozen
years back, made temperance societies popular
in Ireland. Many of the itinerant Irish, espe-
cially the younger classes, were "temperance
men." Thus the Irish could live as sparely as
the Jew, but they did not, like him, squander
any money for the evening's amusement, at the
concert or the theatre.

I inquired what might be the number of the
Jews plying, so to speak, at the coaching inns,
and was assured that it was less numerous than
was generally imagined. One man computed
it at 300 individuals, all under 21; another at
only 200; perhaps the mean, or 250, might be
about the mark. The number was naturally
considered greater, I was told, because the same
set of street traders were seen over and over
again. The Jews knew when the coaches were
to arrive and when they started, and they would
hurry, after availing themselves of a departure,
from one inn — the Belle Sauvage, Ludgate-hill,
for instance — to take advantage of an arrival at
another — say the Saracen's Head, Snow-hill.
Thus they appeared everywhere, but were the
same individuals.

I inquired to what calling the youthful Jews,
thus driven from their partially monopolized
street commerce, had devoted themselves, and
was told that even when the orange and hawk-
ing trade was at the best, the Jews rarely carried
it on after they were twenty-two or twenty-three,
but that they then resorted to some more whole-
sale calling, such as the purchase of nuts or
foreign grapes, at public sales. At present, I
am informed, they are more thickly than ever
engaged in these trades, as well as in two new
avocations, that have been established within
these few years, — the sale of the Bahama pine-
apples and of the Spanish and Portuguese
onions.

About the Royal Exchange, Jew boys still
hawk pencils, etc., but the number engaged in
this pursuit throughout London is not, as far as
I can ascertain, above one-eighth — if an eighth —
of what it was even twelve years ago.

OF THE RELIGION OF THE STREET-IRISH.

Having now given a brief sketch as to how the
Irish people have come to form so large a
proportion of the London street-sellers, I shall
proceed, as I did with the English costermon-
gers, to furnish the reader with a short account
of their religious, moral, intellectual, and phy-
sical condition, so that he may be able to con-
trast the habits and circumstances of the one
class with those of the other. First, of the reli-
gion of the Irish street-folk.

Almost all the street-Irish are Roman Catho-
lics. Of course I can but speak generally; but
during my inquiry I met with only two who
said they were Protestants, and when I came to
converse with them, I found out that they were
partly ignorant of, and partly indifferent to, any
religion whatever. An Irish Protestant gentle-
man said to me: "You may depend upon it, if
ever you meet any of my poor countrymen who
will not talk to you about religion, they either
know or care nothing about it; for the religious
spirit runs high in Ireland, and Protestants and
Catholics are easily led to converse about their
faith."

I found that some of the Irish Roman Catho-
lics — but they had been for many years resident
in England, and that among the poorest or
vagrant class of the English — had become indif-
ferent to their creed, and did not attend their
chapels, unless at the great fasts or festivals, and
this they did only occasionally. One old stall-
keeper, who had been in London nearly thirty
years, said to me: "Ah! God knows, sir, I
ought to attend mass every Sunday, but I
haven't for a many years, barrin' Christmas-day
and such times. But I'll thry and go more
rigular, plase God." This man seemed to re-
sent, as a sort of indignity, my question if he
ever attended any other place of worship. "Av
coorse not!" was the reply.

One Irishman, also a fruit-seller, with a well-
stocked barrow, and without the complaint of
poverty common among his class, entered keenly
into the subject of his religious faith when I
introduced it. He was born in Ireland, but had
been in England since he was five or six. He
was a good-looking, fresh-coloured man, of
thirty or upwards, and could read and write well.
He spoke without bitterness, though zealously
enough. "Perhaps, sir, you are a gintleman
connected with the Protistant clargy," he asked,
"or a missionary?" On my stating that I had
no claim to either character, he resumed: "Will,
sir, it don't matther. All the worruld may know
my riligion, and I wish all the worruld was of
my riligion, and betther min in it than I am; I
do, indeed. I'm a Roman Catholic, sir;" [here
he made the sign of the cross]; "God be praised
for it! O yis, I know all about Cardinal Wise-
man. It's the will of God, I feel sure, that he's
to be 'stablished here, and it's no use ribillin'
against that. I've nothing to say against Pro-
tistints. I've heard it said, `It's best to pray
for them.' The street-people that call thim-
selves Protistants are no riligion at all at all. I
serruve Protistant gintlemen and ladies too, and
sometimes they talk to me kindly about religion.
They're good custhomers, and I have no doubt
good people. I can't say what their lot may be
in another worruld for not being of the true
faith. No, sir, I'll give no opinions — none."

This man gave me a clear account of his
belief that the Blessed Virgin (he crossed him-
self repeatedly as he spoke) was the mother of
our Lord Jesus Christ, and was a mediator with
our Lord, who was God of heaven and earth —
of the duty of praying to the holy saints — of
attending mass — ("but the priest," he said,
"won't exact too much of a poor man, either
about that or about fasting") — of going to con-
fession at Easter and Christmas times, at the
least — of receiving the body of Christ, "the rale
prisince," in the holy sacrament — of keeping
all God's commandments — of purgatory being
a purgation of sins — and of heaven and hell.

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I found the majority of those I spoke with, at
least as earnest in their faith, if they were not
as well instructed in it as my informant, who
may be cited as an example of the better class
of street-sellers.

Another Irishman, — who may be taken as a
type of the less informed, and who had been
between two and three years in England, hav-
ing been disappointed in emigrating to America
with his wife and two children, — gave me the
following account, but not without considering
and hesitating. He was a very melancholy
looking man, tall and spare, and decently clad.
He and his family were living upon 8d. a day,
which he earned by sweeping a crossing. He
had been prevented by ill health from earning
2l., which he could have made, he told me, in
harvest time, as a store against winter. He had
been a street-seller, and so had his wife; and
she would be so again as soon as he could raise
2s. to buy her a stock of apples. He said,
touching his hat at each holy name, —

"Sure, yis, sir, I'm a Roman Cartholic, and
go to mass every Sunday. Jesus Christ? O yis,"
(hesitating, but proceeding readily after a word
of prompting), "he is the Lord our Saviour, and
the Son of the Holy Virgin. The blessed saints?
Yis, sir, yis. The praste prays for them. I —
I mane prays to them. O, yis. I pray to them
mysilf ivery night for a blissin', and to rise me
out of my misery. No, sir, I can't say I know
what the mass is about. I don't know what I'm
prayin' for thin, only that it's right. A poor
man, that can neither read nor write — I wish I
could and I might do betther — can't under-
stand it; it's all in Latin. Iv'e heard about
Cardinal Wiseman. It'll do us no good sir;
it'll only set people more against us. But it
ain't poor min's fault."

As I was anxious to witness the religious zeal
that characterizes these people, I obtained per-
mission to follow one of the priests as he made
his rounds among his flock. Everywhere the
people ran out to meet him. He had just re-
turned to them I found, and the news spread
round, and women crowded to their door-steps,
and came creeping up from the cellars through
the trap-doors, merely to curtsey to him. One
old crone, as he passed, cried, "You're a good
father, Heaven comfort you," and the boys play-
ing about stood still to watch him. A lad, in a
man's tail coat and a shirt-collar that nearly
covered in his head — like the paper round a
bouquet — was fortunate enough to be noticed,
and his eyes sparkled, as he touched his hair
at each word he spoke in answer. At a con-
versation that took place between the priest and
a woman who kept a dry fish-stall, the dame
excused herself for not having been up to take
tea "with his rivirince's mother lately, for thrade
had been so bisy, and night was the fullest
time." Even as the priest walked along the
street, boys running at full speed would pull up
to touch their hair, and the stall-women would
rise from their baskets; while all noise — even a
quarrel — ceased until he had passed by. Still
there was no look of fear in the people. He
called them all by their names, and asked after
their families, and once or twice the "father"
was taken aside and held by the button while
some point that required his advice was whis-
pered in his ear.

The religious fervour of the people whom I
saw was intense. At one house that I entered,
the woman set me marvelling at the strength of
her zeal, by showing me how she contrived to
have in her sitting-room a sanctuary to pray
before every night and morning, and even in
the day, "when she felt weary and lonesome."
The room was rudely enough furnished, and the
only decent table was covered with a new piece
of varnished cloth; still before a rude print of
our Saviour there were placed two old plated
candlesticks, pink, with the copper shining
through; and here it was that she told her
beads. In her bed-room, too, was a coloured
engraving of the "Blessed Lady," which she
never passed without curtseying to.

Of course I detail these matters as mere facts,
without desiring to offer any opinion here, either
as to the benefit or otherwise of the creed in
question. As I had shown how the English
costermonger neither had nor knew any religion
whatever, it became my duty to give the reader
a view of the religion of the Irish street-sellers.
In order to be able to do so as truthfully as
possible, I placed myself in communication with
those parties who were in a position to give me
the best information on the subject. The result
is given above, in all the simplicity and impar-
tiality of history.

OF THE EDUCATION, LITERATURE, AMUSEMENTS,
AND POLITICS OF THE STREET-
IRISH.

These several heads have often required from
me lengthened notices, but as regards the class
I am now describing they may be dismissed
briefly enough. The majority of the street-Irish
whom I saw were unable to read, but I found
those who had no knowledge of reading — (and
the same remark applies to the English street-
sellers as well) — regret their inability, and say,
"I wish I could read, sir; I'd be better off
now." On the other hand, those who had a
knowledge of reading and writing, said fre-
quently enough, "Why, yes, sir, I can read
and write, but it's been no good to me," as if
they had been disappointed in their expectations
as to the benefits attendant upon scholarship.
I am inclined to think, however, that a greater
anxiety exists among the poor generally, to
have some schooling provided for their children,
than was the case a few years back. One
Irishman attributed this to the increased number
of Roman Catholic schools, "for the more
schools there are," he said, "the more people
think about schooling their children."

The literature, or reading, of she street-Irish
is, I believe, confined to Roman Catholic books,
such as the "Lives of the Saints," published in
a cheap form; one, and only one, I found with

[Description: 915EAF. Page 109.]

the "Nation" newspaper. The very poor have
no leisure to read. During three days spent in
visiting the slop-workers at the East end of
the town, not so much as the fragment of a
leaf of a book was seen.

The amusements of the street-Irish are not
those of the English costermongers — though
there are exceptions, of course, to the remark.
The Irish fathers and mothers do not allow their
daughters, even when they possess the means, to
resort to the "penny gaffs" or the "twopenny
hops," unaccompanied by them. Some of the
men frequent the beer-shops, and are inveterate
drinkers and smokers too. I did not hear of any
amusements popular among, or much resorted
to, by the Irishmen, except dancing parties at
one another's houses, where they jig and reel
furiously. They frequent raffles also, but the
article is often never thrown for, and the evening
is spent in dancing.

I may here observe — in reference to the
statement that Irish parents will not expose
their daughters to the risk of what they con-
sider corrupt influences — that when a young
Irishwoman does break through the pale of
chastity, she often becomes, as I was assured,
one of the most violent and depraved of, perhaps,
the most depraved class.

Of politics, I think, the street-Irish under-
stand nothing, and my own observations in this
respect were confirmed by a remark made to
me by an Irish gentleman: "Their politics are
either a dead letter, or the politics of their
priests."

THE HOMES OF THE STREET-IRISH.

In almost all of the poorer districts of London
are to be found "nests of Irish" — as they are
called — or courts inhabited solely by the Irish
costermongers. These people form separate
colonies, rarely visiting or mingling with the
English costers. It is curious, on walking
through one of these settlements, to notice
the manner in which the Irish deal among
themselves — street-seller buying of street-seller.
Even in some of the smallest courts there may
be seen stalls of vegetables, dried herrings, or
salt cod, thriving, on the associative principle,
by mutual support.

The parts of London that are the most thickly
populated with Irish lie about Brook-street, Rat-
cliff-cross, down both sides of the Commercial-
road, and in Rosemary-lane, though nearly all
the "coster-districts" cited at p. 47, have their
Irish settlements — Cromer-street, Saffron-hill
and King-street, Drury-lane, for instance, being
thickly peopled with the Irish; but the places
I have mentioned above are peculiarly distin-
guished, by being almost entirely peopled by
visitors from the sister isle.

The same system of immigration is pursued
in London as in America. As soon as the first
settler is thriving in his newly chosen country,
a certain portion of his or her earnings are
carefully hoarded up, until they are sufficient
to pay for the removal of another member of
the family to England; then one of the friends
left "at home" is sent for; and thus by degrees
the entire family is got over, and once more
united.

Perhaps there is no quarter of London where
the habits and habitations of the Irish can be
better seen and studied than in Rosemary-lane,
and the little courts and alleys that spring from
it on each side. Some of these courts have other
courts branching off from them, so that the loca-
lity is a perfect labyrinth of "blind alleys;" and
when once in the heart of the maze it is difficult
to find the path that leads to the main-road.
As you walk down "the lane," and peep through
the narrow openings between the houses, the
place seems like a huge peep-show, with dark
holes of gateways to look through, while the
court within appears bright with the daylight;
and down it are seen rough-headed urchins
running with their feet bare through the pud-
dles, and bonnetless girls, huddled in shawls,
lolling against the door-posts. Sometimes
you see a long narrow alley, with the houses
so close together that opposite neighbours are
talking from their windows; while the ropes,
stretched zig-zag from wall to wall, afford
just room enough to dry a blanket or a couple
of shirts, that swell out dropsically in the
wind.

I visited one of the paved yards round which
the Irish live, and found that it had been turned
into a complete drying-ground, with shirts,
gowns, and petticoats of every description and
colour. The buildings at the end were com-
pletely hidden by "the things," and the air felt
damp and chilly, and smelt of soap-suds. The
gutter was filled with dirty gray water emptied
from the wash-tubs, and on the top were the
thick bubbles floating about under the breath of
the boys "playing at boats" with them.

It is the custom with the inhabitants of these
courts and alleys to assemble at the entrance
with their baskets, and chat and smoke away the
morning. Every court entrance has its little
group of girls and women, lolling listlessly
against the sides, with then heads uncovered,
and their luxuriant hair fuzzy as oakum. It is
peculiar with the Irish women that — after having
been accustomed to their hoods — they seldom
wear bonnets, unless on a long journey. Nearly
all of them, too, have a thick plaid shawl, which
they keep on all the day through, with their
hands covered under it. At the mouth of the
only thoroughfare deserving of the name of
street — for a cart could just go through it — were
congregated about thirty men and women, who
rented rooms in the houses on each side of the
road. Six women, with baskets of dried her-
rings, were crouching in a line on the kerb-
stone with the fish before them; their legs were
drawn up so closely to their bodies that the shawl
covered the entire figure, and they looked very
like the podgy "tombolers" sold by the Italian
boys. As all their wares were alike, it was puz-
zling work to imagine how, without the strongest
opposition, they could each obtain a living. The

[Description: 915EAF. Page 110.]

men were dressed in long-tail coats, with one or
two brass buttons. One old dame, with a face
wrinkled like a dried plum, had her cloak placed
over her head like a hood, and the grisly hair
hung down in matted hanks about her face, her
black eyes shining between the locks like those
of a Skye terrier; beside her was another old
woman smoking a pipe so short that her nose
reached over the bowl.

After looking at the low foreheads and long
bulging upper lips of some of the group, it was
pleasant to gaze upon the pretty faces of the
one or two girls that lolled against the wall.
Their black hair, smoothed with grease, and
shining almost as if "japanned," and their large
gray eyes with the thick dark fringe of lash,
seemed out of place among the hard features
of their companions. It was only by looking at
the short petticoats and large feet you could
assure yourself that they belonged to the same
class.

In all the houses that I entered were traces of
household care and neatness that I had little
expected to have seen. The cupboard fastened
in the corner of the room, and stocked with mugs
and cups, the mantelpiece with its images, and
the walls covered with showy-coloured prints of
saints and martyrs, gave an air of comfort that
strangely disagreed with the reports of the cabins
in "ould Ireland." As the doors to the houses
were nearly all of them kept open, I could, even
whilst walking along, gain some notion of the
furniture of the homes. In one house that I
visited there was a family of five persons, living
on the ground floor and occupying two rooms.
The boards were strewn with red sand, and the
front apartment had three beds in it, with the
printed curtains drawn closely round. In a
dark room, at the back, lived the family itself.
It was fitted up as a parlour, and crowded to
excess with chairs and tables, the very staircase
having pictures fastened against the wooden
partition. The fire, although it was midday,
and a warm autumn morning, served as much
for light as for heat, and round it crouched the
mother, children, and visitors, bending over the
flame as if in the severest winter time. In a
room above this were a man and woman lately
arrived in England. The woman sat huddled
up in a corner smoking, with the husband
standing over her in, what appeared at first, a
menacing attitude; I was informed, however,
that they were only planning for the future.
This room was perfectly empty of furniture, and
the once white-washed walls were black, except-
ing the little square patches which showed
where the pictures of the former tenants had
hung. In another room, I found a home so
small and full of furniture, that it was almost a
curiosity for domestic management. The bed,
with its chintz curtains looped up, filled one
end of the apartment, but the mattress of it
served as a long bench for the visitors to sit on.
The table was so large that it divided the room
in two, and if there was one picture there must
have been thirty — all of "holy men," with yellow
glories round their heads. The window-ledge
was dressed out with crockery, and in a tumbler
were placed the beads. The old dame herself
was as curious as her room. Her shawl was
fastened over her large frilled cap. She had a
little "button" of a nose, with the nostrils enter-
ing her face like bullet holes. She wore over
her gown an old pilot coat, well-stained with
fish slime, and her petticoats being short, she
had very much the appearance of a Dutch fish-
erman or stage smuggler.

Her story was affecting — made more so,
perhaps, by the emotional manner in which she
related it. Nine years ago "the father" of
the district — "the Blissed Lady guard him!" —
had found her late at night, rolling in the
gutter, and the boys pelting her with orange-
peel and mud. She was drunk — "the Lorrud
pass by her" — and when she came to, she
found herself in the chapel, lying before the
sanctuary, "under the shadow of the holy cross."
Watching over her was the "good father,"
trying to bring back her consciousness. He
spoke to her of her wickedness, and before she
left she took the pledge of temperance. From
that time she prospered, and the 1s. 6d. the
"father" gave her "had God's blissin' in it,"
for she became the best dressed woman in the
court, and in less than three years had 15l. in
the savings' bank, "the father — Heaven chirish
him" — keeping her book for her, as he did for
other poor people. She also joined "the Asso-
ciation of the Blissed Lady," (and bought her-
self the dress of the order "a beautiful grane
vilvit, which she had now, and which same
cost her 30s."), and then she was secure against
want in old age and sickness. But after nine
years prudence and comfort, a brother of hers
returned home from the army, with a pension of
1s. a day. He was wild, and persuaded her to
break her pledge, and in a short time he got all
her savings from her and spent every penny. She
could'nt shake him off, "for he was the only
kin she had on airth," and "she must love her
own flish and bones." Then began her misery.
"It plased God to visit her ould limbs with
aches and throubles, and her hips swole with
the cowld," so that she was at last forced into
a hospital, and all that was left of her store was
"aten up by sufferin's." This, she assured
me, all came about by the "good father's"
leaving that parish for another one, but now he
had returned to them again, and, with his help
and God's blessing, she would yet prosper once
more.

Whilst I was in the room, the father entered,
and "old Norah," half-divided between joy
at seeing him and shame at "being again a
beggar," laughed and wept at the same time.
She stood wiping her eyes with the shawl, and
groaning out blessings on "his rivirince's hid,"
begging of him not "to scould her for she was
a wake woman." The renegade brother was
had in to receive a lecture from "his rivirince."
A more sottish idiotic face it would be difficult
to imagine. He stood with his hands hanging

[Description: 915EAF. Page 111.]

down like the paws of a dog begging, and his
two small eyes stared in the face of the priest, as
he censured him, without the least expression
even of consciousness. Old Norah stood by,
groaning like a bagpipe, and writhing while the
father spoke to her "own brother," as though
every reproach were meant for her.

The one thing that struck me during my visit
to this neighbourhood, was the apparent listless-
ness and lazy appearance of the people. The
boys at play were the only beings who seemed
to have any life in their actions. The women
in their plaid shawls strolled along the pave-
ments, stopping each friend for a chat, or
joining some circle, and leaning against the wall
as though utterly deficient in energy. The men
smoked, with their hands in their pockets, lis-
tening to the old crones talking, and only now
and then grunting out a reply when a question
was directly put to them. And yet it is curious
that these people, who here seemed as inactive
as negroes, will perform the severest bodily
labour, undertaking tasks that the English are
almost unfitted for.

To complete this account, I subjoin a brief
description of the lodging-houses resorted to
by the Irish immigrants on their arrival in
this country.

IRISH LODGING-HOUSES FOR IMMIGRANTS.

Often an Irish immigrant, whose object is to
settle in London, arrives by the Cork steamer
without knowing a single friend to whom he
can apply for house-room or assistance of any
kind. Sometimes a whole family is landed late
at night, worn out by sickness and the terrible
fatigues of a three days' deck passage, almost
paralysed by exhaustion, and scarcely able to
speak English enough to inquire for shelter till
morning.

If the immigrants, however, are bound for
America, their lot is very different. Then they
are consigned to some agent in London, who
is always on the wharf at the time the steamer
arrives, and takes the strangers to the homes
he has prepared for them until the New York
packet starts. During the two or three days'
necessary stay in London, they are provided for
at the agent's expense, and no trouble is ex-
perienced by the travellers. A large provision-
merchant in the city told me that he often,
during the season, had as many as 500 Irish
consigned to him by one vessel, so that to
lead them to their lodgings was like walking at
the head of a regiment of recruits.

The necessities of the immigrants in London
have caused several of their countrymen to open
lodging-houses in the courts about Rosemary-
lane; these men attend the coming in of the
Cork steamer, and seek for customers among the
poorest of the poor, after the manner of touters
to a sea-side hotel.

The immigrants'-houses are of two kinds —
clean and dirty. The better class of Irish
lodging-houses almost startle one by the com-
fort and cleanliness of the rooms; for after the
descriptions you hear of the state in which the
deck passengers are landed from the Irish boats,
their clothes stained with the manure of the
pigs, and drenched with the spray, you some-
how expect to find all the accommodations
disgusting and unwholesome. But one in
particular, that I visited, had the floor clean,
and sprinkled with red sand, while the win-
dows were sound, bright, and transparent.
The hobs of the large fire-place were piled
up with bright tin pots, and the chimney
piece was white and red with the china
images ranged upon it. In one corner of
the principal apartment there stood two or
three boxes still corded up, and with bundles
strung to the sides, and against the wall was
hung a bunch of blue cloaks, such as the
Irishwomen wear. The proprietor of the house,
who was dressed in a gray tail-coat and knee-
breeches, that had somewhat the effect of a foot-
man's livery, told me that he had received
seven lodgers the day before, but six were men,
and they were all out seeking for work. In
front of the fire sat a woman, bending over it so
close that the bright cotton gown she had on
smelt of scorching. Her feet were bare, and
she held the soles of them near to the bars,
curling her toes about with the heat. She was
a short, thick-set woman, with a pair of won-
derfully muscular arms crossed over her bosom,
and her loose rusty hair streaming over her
neck. It was in vain that I spoke to her
about her journey, for she wouldn't answer me,
but kept her round, open eyes fixed on my face
with a wild, nervous look, following me about
with them everywhere.

Across the room hung a line, with the newly-
washed and well-patched clothes of the immi-
grants hanging to it, and on a side-table were
the six yellow basins that had been used for
the men's breakfasts. During my visit, the
neighbours, having observed a strange gentle-
man enter, came pouring in, each proferring
some fresh bit of news about their newly-
arrived countrymen. I was nearly stunned by
half-a-dozen voices speaking together, and tell-
ing me how the poor people had been four days
"at say," so that they were glad to get near the
pigs for "warrumth," and instructing me as to
the best manner of laying out the sum of
money that it was supposed I was about to
shower down upon the immigrants.

In one of the worst class of lodging-houses I
found ten human beings living together in a
small room. The apartment was entirely de-
void of all furniture, excepting an old mattrass
rolled up against the wall, and a dirty piece of
cloth hung across one corner, to screen the
women whilst dressing. An old man, the father
of five out of the ten, was seated on a tea-chest,
mending shoes, and the other men were looking
on with their hands in their pockets. Two
girls and a woman were huddled together on
the floor in front of the fire, talking in Irish.
All these people seemed to be utterly devoid
of energy, and the men moved about so lazily

[Description: 915EAF. Page 112.]

that I couldn't help asking some of them if
they had tried to obtain work. Every one
turned to a good-looking young fellow lolling
against the wall, as if they expected him to
answer for them. "Ah, sure, and that they
have," was the reply; "it's the docks they
have tried, worrus luck." The others appeared
struck with the truthfulness of the answer,
for they all shook their heads, and said, "Sure
an' that's thruth, anyhow." Here my Irish
guide ventured an observation, by remarking
solemnly, "It's no use tilling a lie;" to which
the whole room assented, by exclaiming alto-
gether, "Thrue for you, Norah." The chosen
spokesman then told me, "They paid half-a-
crown a week for the room, and that was as much
as they could earrun, and it was starruve they
should if the neighbours didn't hilp them a
bit." I asked them if they were better off
over here than when in Ireland, but could get
no direct answer, for my question only gave
rise to a political discussion. "There's plenty
of food over here," said the spokesman, ad-
dressing his companions as much as myself,
"plenty of 'taties — plenty of mate — plenty of
porruk." "But where the use," observed my
guide, "if there's no money to buy 'em
wid?" to which the audience muttered, "Thrue
for you again, Norah;" and so it went on, each
one pleading poverty in the most eloquent
style.

After I had left, the young fellow who had
acted as spokesman followed me into the street,
and taking me into a corner, told me that he
was a "sailor by thrade, but had lost his `rigis-
thration-ticket,' or he'd have got a berruth long
since, and that it was all for 3s. 6d. he wasn't
at say."

Concerning the number of Irish immigrants,
I have obtained the following information:

The great influx of the Irish into London
was in the year of the famine, 1847-8. This
cannot be better shown than by citing the re-
turns of the number of persons admitted into
the Asylum for the Houseless Poor, in Play-
house-yard, Cripplegate. These returns I ob-
tained for fourteen years, and the average num-
ber of admissions of the applicants from all
parts during that time was 8,794 yearly. Of
these, the Irish averaged 2,455 yearly, or con-
siderably more than a fourth of the whole
number received. The total number of ap-
plicants thus sheltered in the fourteen years was
130,625, of which the Irish numbered 34,378.
The smallest number of Irish (men, women,
and children) admitted, was in 1834-5, about
300; in 1846-7, it was as many as 7,576, while
in 1847-8, it was 10,756, and in 1848-9, 5,068.

But it was into Liverpool that the tide of im-
migration flowed the strongest, in the calamitous
year of the famine. "Between the 13th Jan,
and the 13th Dec., both inclusive," writes Mr.
Rushton, the Liverpool magistrate, to Sir G.
Grey, on the 21st April last, "296,231 persons
landed in this port (Liverpool) from Ireland.
Of this vast number, about 130,000 emigrated to
the United States; some 50,000 were passen-
gers on business; and the remainder (161,231),
mere paupers, half-naked and starving, landed,
for the most part, during the winter, and became,
immediately on landing, applicants for parochial
relief. You already know the immediate results
of this accumulation of misery in the crowded
town of Liverpool; of the cost of relief at once
rendered necessary to prevent the thousands of
hungry and naked Irish perishing in our streets;
and also of the cost of the pestilence which
generally follows in the train of famine and
misery such as we then had to encounter.....
Hundreds of patients perished, notwithstanding
all efforts made to save them; and ten Roman
Catholic and one Protestant clergyman, many
parochial officers, and many medical men, who
devoted themselves to the task of alleviating the
sufferings of the wretched, died in the discharge
of these high duties."

Great numbers of these people were, at the
same time, also conveyed from Ireland to Wales,
especially to Newport. They were brought over
by coal-vessels as a return cargo — a living ballast
— 2s. 6d. being the highest fare, and were huddled
together like pigs. The manager of the Newport
tramp-house has stated concerning these people,
"They don't live long, diseased as they are.
They are very remarkable; they will eat salt
by basons-full, and drink a great quantity of
water after. I have frequently known those
who could not have been hungry eat cabbage-
leaves and other refuse from the ash-heap."

It is necessary that I should thus briefly
allude to this matter, as there is no doubt that
some of these people, making their way to
London, soon became street-sellers there, and
many of them took to the business subse-
quently, when there was no employment in
harvesting, hop-picking, &c. Of the poor
wretches landed at Liverpool, many (Mr.
Rushton states) became beggars, and many
thieves. Many, there is no doubt, tramped
their way to London, sleeping at the "casual
wards" of the Unions on their way; but I believe
that of those who had become habituated to the
practice of beggary or theft, few or none would
follow the occupation of street-selling, as even
the half-passive industry of such a calling
would be irksome to the apathetic and dis-
honest.

Of the immigration, direct by the vessels
trading from Ireland to London, there are no
returns such has have been collected by Mr.
Rushton for Liverpool, but the influx is com-
paratively small, on account of the greater
length and cost of the voyage. During
the last year I am informed that 15,000 or
16,000 passengers were brought from Ireland
to London direct, and, in addition to these, 500
more were brought over from Cork in connec-
tion with the arrangements for emigration to the
United States, and consigned to the emigration
agent here. Of the 15,500 (taking the mean
between the two numbers above given) 1,000
emigrated to the United States. It appears,

[Description: 915EAF. Page 113.]

on the authority of Mr. Rushton, that even in
the great year of the immigration, more than one-
sixth of the passengers from Ireland to Dublin
came on business. It may, then, be reasonable
to calculate that during last year one-fourth at
least of the passengers to London had the same
object in view, leaving about 10,000 persons
who have either emigrated to British North
America, Australia, &c., or have resorted to
some mode of subsistence in the metropolis or
the adjacent parts. Besides these there are the
numbers who make their way up to London,
tramping it from the several provincial ports —
namely, Liverpool, Bristol, Newport, and Glas-
gow. Of these I have no means of forming any
estimate, or of the proportion who adopt street-
selling on their arrival here — all that can be said
is, that the influx of Irish into the street-trade
every year must be very considerable. I believe,
however, that only those who "have friends in
the line" resort to street-selling on their arrival
in London, though all may make it a resource
when other endeavours fail. The great immi-
gration into London is from Cork, the average
cost of a deck passage being 5s. The immi-
grants direct to London from Cork are rarely
of the poorest class.

OF THE DIET, DRINK, AND EXPENSE OF
LIVING OF THE STREET-IRISH.

The diet of the Irish men, women, and children,
who obtain a livelihood (or what is so designated)
by street-sale in London, has, I am told, on good
authority, experienced a change. In the lodg-
ing-houses that they resorted to, their breakfast,
two or three years ago, was a dish of potatoes —
two, three, or four lbs., or more, in weight — for a
family. Now half an ounce of coffee (half chi-
cory) costs ½d., and that, with the half or quarter
of a loaf, according to the number in family, is
almost always their breakfast at the present time.
When their constant diet was potatoes, there
were frequent squabbles at the lodging-houses
— to which many of the poor Irish on their
first arrival resort — as to whether the potato-
pot or the tea-kettle should have the prefer-
ence on the fire. A man of superior intelli-
gence, who had been driven to sleep and eat
occasionally in lodging-houses, told me of some
dialogues he had heard on these occasions: —
"It's about three years ago," he said, "since I
heard a bitter old Englishwoman say, `To —
with your 'taty-pot; they're only meat for pigs.'
`Sure, thin,' said a young Irishman — he was
a nice 'cute fellow — `sure, thin, ma'am, I
should be afther offering you a taste.' I heard
that myself, sir. You may have noticed, that
when an Irishman doesn't get out of temper, he
never loses his politeness, or rather his blarney."

The dinner, or second meal of the day —
assuming that there has been a breakfast —
ordinarily consists of cheap fish and potatoes.
Of the diet of the poor street-Irish I had
an account from a little Irishman, then keep-
ing an oyster-stall, though he generally sold
fruit. In all such details I have found the
Irish far more communicative than the English.
Many a poor untaught Englishman will shrink
from speaking of his spare diet, and his trouble
to procure that; a reserve, too, much more
noticeable among the men than the women.
My Irish informant told me he usually had his
breakfast at a lodging-house — he preferred a
lodging-house, he said, on account of the
warmth and the society. Here he boiled half
an ounce of coffee, costing a ½d. He pur-
chased of his landlady the fourth of a quartern
loaf (1¼d. or 1½d.), for she generally cut a
quartern loaf into four for her single men
lodgers, such as himself, clearing sometimes a
farthing or two thereby. For dinner, my
informant boiled at the lodging-house two or
three lbs. of potatoes, costing usually 1d. or 1¼d., and fried three, or four herrings, or as many
as cost a penny. He sometimes mashed his
potatoes, and spread over them the herrings, the
fatty portion of which flavoured the potatoes,
which were further flavoured by the roes of the
herrings being crushed into them. He drank
water to this meal, and the cost of the whole
was 2d. or 2½d. A neighbouring stall-keeper
attended to this man's stock in his absence at
dinner, and my informant did the same for
him in his turn. For "tea" he expended 1d. on coffee, or 1½d. on tea, being a "cup" of
tea, or "half-pint of coffee," at a coffee-shop.
Sometimes he had a halfpenny-worth of butter,
and with his tea he ate the bread he had saved
from his breakfast, and which he had carried in
his pocket. He had no butter to his breakfast,
he said, for he could not buy less than a penny-
worth about where he lodged, and this was too
dear for one meal. On a Sunday morning how-
ever he generally had butter, sometimes joining
with a fellow-lodger for a pennyworth; for his
Sunday dinner he had a piece of meat, which
cost him 2d. on the Saturday night. Supper
he dispensed with, but if he felt much tired
he had a half-pint of beer, which was three
farthings "in his own jug," before he went to
bed, about nine or ten, as he did little or
nothing late at night, except on Saturday.
He thus spent 4½d. a day for food, and reckon-
ing 2½d. extra for somewhat better fare on a
Sunday, his board was 2s. 10d. a week. His
earnings he computed at 5s., and thus he had
2s. 2d. weekly for other expenses. Of these
there was 1s. for lodging; 2d. or 3d. for
washing (but this not every week); ½d. for a
Sunday morning's shave; 1d. "for his reli-
gion" (as he worded it); and 6d. for "odds
and ends," such as thread to mend his clothes,
a piece of leather to patch his shoes, worsted
to darn his stockings, &c. He was subject to
rheumatism, or "he might have saved a trifle
of money." Judging by his methodical habits,
it was probable he had done so. He had
nothing of the eloquence of his countrymen,
and seemed indeed of rather a morose turn.

A family boarding together live even cheaper
than this man, for more potatoes and less fish
fall to the share of the children. A meal too is

[Description: 915EAF. Page 114.]

not unfrequently saved in this manner: —
If a man, his wife, and two children, all go
out in the streets selling, they breakfast before
starting, and perhaps agree to re-assemble at
four o'clock. Then the wife prepares the dinner
of fish and potatoes, and so tea is dispensed with.
In that case the husband's and wife's board
would be 4d. or 4½d. a day each, the children's
3d. or 3½d. each, and giving 1½d. extra to each
for Sunday, the weekly cost is 10s. 3d. Sup-
posing the husband and wife cleared 5s. a week
each, and the children each 3s., their earnings
would be 16s. The balance is the surplus left
to pay rent, washing, firing, and clothing.

From what I can ascertain, the Irish street-
seller can always live at about half the cost
of the English costermonger; the Englishman
must have butter for his bread, and meat at no
long intervals, for he "hates fish more than
once a week." It is by this spareness of
living, as well as by frequently importunate
and mendacious begging, that the street-Irish
manage to save money.

The diet I have spoken of is generally, but
not universally, that of the poor street-Irish;
those who live differently, do not, as a rule,
incur greater expense.

It is difficult to ascertain in what proportion
the Irish street-sellers consume strong drink,
when compared with the consumption of the
English costers; as a poor Irishman, if ques-
tioned on that or any subject, will far more
frequently shape his reply to what he thinks will
please his querist and induce a trifle for himself,
than answer according to the truth. The land-
lord of a large public-house, after inquiring of
his assistants, that his opinions might be checked
by theirs, told me that in one respect there was
a marked difference between the beer-drinking
of the two people. He considered that in the
poor streets near his house there were residing
quite as many Irish street-sellers and labourers
as English, but the instances in which the Irish
conveyed beer to their own rooms, as a portion
of their meals, was not as 1 in 20 compared
with the English: "I have read your work,
sir," he said, "and I know that you are quite
right in saying that the costermongers go for a
good Sunday dinner. I don't know what my
customers are except by their appearance, but I
do know that many are costermongers, and by the
best of all proofs, for I have bought fish, fruit,
and vegetables of them. Well, now, we'll take
a fine Sunday in spring or summer, when times
are pretty good with them; and, perhaps, in the
ten minutes after my doors are opened at one on
the Sunday, there are 100 customers for their
dinner-beer. Nearly three-quarters of these are
working men and their wives, working either in
the streets, or at their indoor trades, such as
tailoring. But among the number, I'm satis-
fied, there are not more than two Irishmen.
There may be three or four Irishwomen, but one
of my barmen tells me he knows that two of
them — very well-behaved and good-looking
women — are married to Englishmen. In my
opinion the proportion, as to Sunday dinner-
beer, between English and Irish, may be two
or three in 70."

An Irish gentleman and his wife, who are
both well acquainted with the habits and con-
dition of the people in their own country, in-
formed me, that among the classes who,
though earning only scant incomes, could
not well be called "impoverished," the use
of beer, or even of small ale — known, now
or recently — as "Thunder's thruppeny," was
very unfrequent. Even in many "independ-
ent" families, only water is drunk at din-
ner, with punch to follow. This shows the
accuracy of the information I derived from
Mr. — (the innkeeper), for persons unused to
the drinking of malt liquor in their own coun-
try are not likely to resort to it afterwards,
when their means are limited. I was further
informed, that reckoning the teetotallers among
the English street-sellers at 300, there are 600
among the Irish, — teetotallers too, who, having
taken the pledge, under the sanction of their
priests, and looking upon it as a religious ob-
ligation, keep it rigidly.

The Irish street-sellers who frequent the gin-
palaces or public-houses, drink a pot of beer, in
a company of three or four, but far more fre-
quently, a quartern of gin (very seldom whisky)
oftener than do the English. Indeed, from all
I could ascertain, the Irish street-sellers, whe-
ther from inferior earnings, their early training,
or the restraints of their priests, drink less beer,
by one-fourth, than their English brethren, but
a larger proportion of gin. "And you must bear
this in mind, sir," I was told by an innkeeper,
"I had rather have twenty poor Englishmen
drunk in my tap-room than a couple of poor
Irishmen. They'll quarrel with anybody —
the Irish will — and sometimes clear the room
by swearing they'll `use their knives, by Jasus;'
and if there's a scuffle they'll kick like devils,
and scratch, and bite, like women or cats, in-
stead of using their fists. I wish all the drunk-
ards were teetotallers, if it were only to be rid
of them."

Whiskey, I was told, would be drunk by the
Irish, in preference to gin, were it not that gin
was about half the price. One old Irish fruit-
seller — who admitted that he was fond of a
glass of gin — told me that he had not tasted
whiskey for fourteen years, "becase of the
price." The Irish, moreover, as I have shown,
live on stronger and coarser food than the
English, buying all the rough (bad) fish, for, to
use the words of one of my informants, they
look to quantity more than quality; this may
account for their preferring a stronger and fiercer
stimulant by way of drink.

OF THE RESOURCES OF THE STREET-IRISH
AS REGARDS "STOCK-MONEY," SICKNESS,
BURIALS, &c.

It is not easy to ascertain from the poor Irish
themselves how they raise their stock-money,
for their command of money is a subject on

[Description: 915EAF. Page 115.]

which they are not communicative, or, if com-
municative, not truthful. "My opinion is,"
said an Irish gentleman to me, "that some of
these poor fellows would declare to God that
they hadn't the value of a halfpenny, even if
you heard the silver chink in their pockets."
It is certain that they never, or very rarely,
borrow of the usurers like their English
brethren.

The more usual custom is, that if a poor Irish
street-seller be in want of 5s., it is lent to him
by the more prosperous people of his court —
bricklayers' labourers, or other working-men —
who club 1s. a piece. This is always repaid.
An Irish bricklayer, when in full work, will
trust a needy countryman with some article to
pledge, on the understanding that it is to be
redeemed and returned when the borrower is
able. Sometimes, if a poor Irishwoman need 1s. to buy oranges, four others — only less poor than
herself, because not utterly penniless — will
readily advance 3d. each. Money is also ad-
vanced to the deserving Irish through the
agency of the Roman Catholic priests, who are
the medium through whom charitable persons
of their own faith exercise good offices. Money,
too, there is no doubt, is often advanced out of
the priest's own pocket.

On all the kinds of loans with which the poor
Irish are aided by their countrymen no interest
is over charged. "I don't like the Irish,"
said an English costermonger to me; "but they
do stick to one another far more than we do."

The Irish costers hire barrows and shallows
like the English, but, if they "get on" at
all, they will possess themselves of their own
vehicles much sooner than an English coster-
monger. A quick-witted Irishman will begin
to ponder on his paying 1s. 6d. a week for
the hire of a barrow worth 20s., and he will
save and hoard until a pound is at his com-
mand to purchase one for himself; while an
obtuse English coster (who will yet buy cheaper
than an Irishman) will probably pride himself
on his cleverness in having got the charge for
his barrow reduced, in the third year of its hire,
to 1s. a week the twelvemonth round!

In cases of sickness the mode of relief
adopted is similar to that of the English. A
raffle is got up for the benefit of the Irish
sufferer, and, if it be a bad case, the subscribers
pay their money without caring what trifle they
throw for, or whether they throw at all. If
sickness continue and such means as raffles
cannot be persevered in, there is one resource
from which a poor Irishman never shrinks — the
parish. He will apply for and accept paro-
chial relief without the least sense of shame,
a sense which rarely deserts an English-
man who has been reared apart from pau-
pers. The English costers appear to have a
horror of the Union. If the Irishman be
taken into the workhouse, his friends do not
lose sight of him. In case of his death, they
apply for, and generally receive his body,
from the parochial authorities, undertaking the
expence of the funeral, when the body is duly
"waked." "I think there's a family contract
among the Irish," said a costermonger to me;
"that's where it is."

The Irish street-folk are, generally speaking,
a far more provident body of people than the
English street-sellers. To save, the Irish will
often sacrifice what many Englishmen consider
a necessary, and undergo many a hardship.

From all I could ascertain, the saving of
an Irish street-seller does not arise from any
wish to establish himself more prosperously in
his business, but for the attainment of some
cherished project, such as emigration. Some
of the objects, however, for which these strug-
gling men hoard money, are of the most praise-
worthy character. They will treasure up half-
penny after halfpenny, and continue to do so
for years, in order to send money to enable their
wives and children, and even their brothers and
sisters, when in the depth of distress in Ireland,
to take shipping for England. They will save
to be able to remit money for the relief of their
aged parents in Ireland. They will save to
defray the expense of their marriage, an expense
the English costermonger so frequently dispenses
with — but they will not save to preserve either
themselves or their children from the degra-
dation of a workhouse; indeed they often,
with the means of independence secreted on
their persons, apply for parish relief, and that
principally to save the expenditure of their
own money. Even when detected in such an
attempt at extortion an Irishman betrays no
passion, and hardly manifests any emotion — he
has speculated and failed. Not one of them
but has a positive genius for begging — both the
taste and the faculty for alms-seeking developed
to an extraordinary extent.

Of the amount "saved" by the patience of
the poor Irishmen, I can form no conjecture.

OF THE HISTORY OF SOME IRISH STREET-
SELLERS.

In order that the following statements might be
as truthful as possible, I obtained permission to
use the name of a Roman Catholic clergyman,
to whom I am indebted for much valuable
information touching this part of my subject.

A young woman, of whose age it was not easy
to form a conjecture, her features were so em-
browned by exposure to the weather, and per-
haps when I saw her a little swollen from cold,
gave me the following account as to her living.
Her tone and manner betrayed indifference to
the future, caused perhaps by ignorance, — for
uneducated persons I find are apt to look on
the future as if it must needs be but a repe-
tition of the present, while the past in many
instances is little more than a blank to them.
This young woman said, her brogue being little
perceptible, though she spoke thickly:

"I live by keepin' this fruit stall. It's a poor
livin' when I see how others live. Yes, in
thruth, sir, but it's thankful I am for to be able

[Description: 915EAF. Page 116.]

to live at all, at all; troth is it, in these sore times.
My father and mother are both did. God be
gracious to their sowls! They was evicted. The
family of us was. The thatch of the bit o' home
was tuk off above our hids, and we were lift to the
wide worruld — yis, indeed, sir, and in the open
air too. The rint wasn't paid and it couldn't be
paid, and so we had to face the wither. It was
a sorrowful time. But God was good, and so
was the neighbours. And when we saw the
praste, he was a frind to us. And we came to
this counthry, though I'd always heard it called
a black counthry. Sure, an' there's much in it
to indhure. There's goin's on it, sir, that the
praste, God rewarrud him! wouldn't like to see.
There's bad ways. I won't talk about thim,
and I'm sure you are too much of a gintlemin
to ask me; for if you know Father — , that
shows you are the best of gintlemin, sure. It
was the eviction that brought us here. I don't
know about where we was just; not in what
county; nor parish. I was so young whin we
lift the land. I belave I'm now 19, perhaps
only 18" (she certainly looked much older,
but I have often noticed that of her class). "I
can't be more, I think, for sure an its only
5 or 6 years since we left Watherford and come
to Bristol. I'm sure it was Watherford, and a
beautiful place it is, and I know it was Bristol
we come to. We walked all the long way to
London. My parints died of the cholera, and
I live with mysilf, but my aunt lodges me and
sees to me. She sills in the sthreets too. I
don't make 7d. a day. I may make 6d. There's
a good many young payple I know is now
sillin' in the streets becase they was evicted
in their own counthry. I suppose they had no
where ilse to come to. I'm nivir out of a night.
I sleep with my aunt, and we keep to oursilves
sure. I very sildom taste mate, but perhaps
I do oftener than before we was evicted — glory
be to God."

One Irish street-seller I saw informed me
that she was a "widdy wid three childer."
Her husband died about four years since.
She had then five children, and was near her
confinement with another. Since the death of
her husband she had lost three of her children;
a boy about twelve years died of stoppage on
his lungs, brought on, she said, through being
in the streets, and shouting so loud "to get sale
of the fruit." She has been in Clare-street,
Clare-market, seven years with a fruit stall.
In the summer she sells green fruit, which she
purchases at Covent-garden. When the nuts,
oranges, &c., come in season, she furnishes
her stall with that kind of fruit, and continues
to sell them until the spring salad comes in.
During the spring and summer her weekly
average income is about 5s., but the remaining
portion of the year her income is not more
than 3s. 6d. weekly, so that taking the year
through, her average weekly income is about
4s. 3a.; out of this she pays 1s. 6d. a week rent,
leaving only 2s. 9d. a week to find necessary
comforts for herself and family. For fuel the
children go to the market and gather up the
waste walnuts, bring them home and dry them,
and these, with a pennyworth of coal and coke,
serve to warm their chilled feet and hands. They
have no bedstead, but in one corner of a room is
a flock bed upon the floor, with an old sheet,
blanket, and quilt to cover them at this incle-
ment season. There is neither chair nor table;
a stool serves for the chair, and two pieces of
board upon some baskets do duty for a table,
and an old penny tea-canister for a candlestick.
She had parted with every article of furniture
to get food for her family. She received nothing
from the parish, but depended upon the sale of
her fruit for her living.

The Irishmen who are in this trade are also
very poor; and I learned that both Irishmen
and Irishwomen left the occupation now and
then, and took to begging, as a more profitable
calling, often going begging this month and
fruit-selling the next. This is one of the
causes which prompt the London costermon-
gers' dislike of the Irish. "They'll beg them-
selves into a meal, and work us out of one,"
said an English coster to me. Some of them
are, however, less "poverty-struck" (a word
in common use among the costermongers);
but these for the most part are men who have
been in the trade for some years, and have got
regular "pitches."

The woman who gave me the following state-
ment seemed about twenty-two or twenty-three.
She was large-boned, and of heavy figure and
deportment. Her complexion and features were
both coarse, but her voice had a softness, even in
its broadest brogue, which is not very frequent
among poor Irishwomen. The first sentence she
uttered seems to me tersely to embody a deplor-
able history of the poverty of a day. It was
between six and seven in the evening when I
saw the poor creature: —

"Sure, thin, sir, it's thrippince I've taken to-
day, and tuppince is to pay for my night's lodg-
in'. I shall do no more good to-night, and shall
only stay in the cowld, if I stay in it, for nothing.
I'm an orphand, sir," (she three or four times
alluded to this circumstance,) "and there's no-
body to care for me but God, glory be to his
name! I came to London to join my brother,
that had come over and did will, and he sint for
me, but whin I got here I couldn't find him in
it anyhow. I don't know how long that's ago.
It may be five years; it may be tin; but" (she
added, with the true eloquence of beggary,)
"sure, thin, sir, I had no harrut to keep count,
if I knew how. My father and mother wasn't
able to keep me, nor to keep thimsilves in
Ireland, and so I was sint over here. They was
counthry payple. I don't know about their
landlorrud. They died not long afther I came
here. I don't know what they died of, but sure
it was of the will of God, and they hadn't much
to make them love this worruld; no more have
I. Would I like to go back to my own counthry?
Will, thin, what would be the use? I sleep
at a lodging-house, and it's a dacint place.

[Description: 915EAF. Page 117.]

It's mostly my own counthrywomen that's in it;
that is, in the women's part. I pay 1s. a week,
that's 2d. a night, for I'm not charged for Sun-
days. I live on brid, and 'taties and salt, and a
herrin' sometimes. I niver taste beer, and not
often tay, but I sit here all day, and I feel the
hunger this day and that day. It goes off though,
if I have nothin' to ate. I don't know why, but
I won't deny the goodness of God to bring such
a thing about. I have lived for a day on a pinny,
sir: a ha'pinny for brid, and a ha'pinny for a
herrin', or two herrin's for a ha'pinny, and 'taties
for the place of brid. I've changed apples for a
herrin' with a poor man, God rewarrud him.
Sometimes I make on to 6d. a day, and some-
times I have made 1s. 6d., but I think that I
don't make 5d. a day — arrah, no, thin, sir! one
day with the other, and I don't worruk on Sunday,
not often. If I've no mate to ate, I'd rather rist.
I never miss mass on a Sunday. A lady gives
me a rag sometimes, but the bitther time's
comin'. If I was sick I don't know what I'd
do, but I would sind for the praste, and he'd
counsil me. I could read a little oncte, but
I can't now."

OF THE IRISH "REFUSE"-SELLERS.

There still remains to be described one branch
of the Irish street-trade which is peculiar to the
class — viz., the sale of "refuse," or such fruit
and vegetables as are damaged, and suited only
to the very poorest purchasers.

In assorting his goods, a fruit-salesman in
the markets generally throws to one side the
shrivelled, dwarfish, or damaged fruit — called
by the street-traders the "specks." If the
supply to the markets be large, as in the pride
of the season, he will put his several kinds of
specks in separate baskets. At other times
all kinds are tossed together, and sometimes
with an admixture of nuts and walnuts. The
Irish women purchase these at a quarter, or
within a quarter, of the regular price, paying
from 6d. to 1s. a bushel for apples; 9d. to
1s. 6d. for pears; 1s. 6d. to 2s. 6d. for plums.
They are then sorted into halfpenny-worths for
sale on the stalls. Among the refuse is always
a portion of what is called "tidy" fruit, and this
occupies the prominent place in the "halfpenny
lots" — for they are usually sold at a halfpenny.
Sometimes, too, a salesman will throw in among
the refuse a little good fruit, if he happen to
have it over, either gratuitously or at the refuse
price; and this, of course, is always made the
most conspicuous on the stalls. Of other fruits,
perhaps, only a small portion is damaged, from
over-ripeness, or by the aggression of wasps and
insects, the remainder being very fine, so that
the retail "lots" are generally cheap. The
sellers aim at "half profits," or cent. per cent.

The "refuse" trade in fruit — and the refuse-
trade is mainly confined to fruit — is principally
in the hands of the Irish. The persons carrying
it on are nearly all middle-aged and elderly
women. I once or twice saw a delicate and
pretty-looking girl sitting with the old "re-
fuse" women; but I found that she was not
a "regular hand," and only now and then
"minded the stall" in her mother's absence.
She worked with her needle, I was told.

Of the women who confine themselves to
this trade there are never less than twenty,
and frequently thirty. Sometimes, when the
refuse is very cheap and very abundant, as
many as 100 fruit-sellers, women and girls, will
sell it in halfpenny-worths, along with better
articles. These women also sell refuse dry-
fruit, purchased in Duke's-place, but only
when they cannot obtain green-fruit, or cannot
obtain it sufficiently. All is sold at stalls; as
these dealers seem to think that if it were
hawked, the police might look too inquisitively
at a barrow stocked with refuse. The "refuse-
sellers" buy at all the markets. The poorer
street-sellers, whose more staple trade is in
oranges or nuts, are occasional dealers in it.

Perhaps the regular refuse-buyers are not
among the very poorest class, as their sale is
tolerably quick and certain, but with the usual
drawbacks of wet weather. They make, I
was told, from 4d. to 1s. a day the year round,
or perhaps 7d. or 8d. a day, Sunday included.
They are all Roman Catholics, and resort
to the street-sale after mass. They are mostly
widows, or women who have reached mid-
dle-age, unmarried. Some are the wives of
street-sellers. Two of their best pitches are
on Saffron-hill and in Petticoat-lane. It is
somewhat curious to witness these women
sitting in a line of five or six, and notwith-
standing their natural garrulity, hardly ex-
changing a word one with another. Some of
them derive an evident solace from deliberate
puffs at a short black pipe.

A stout, healthy-looking woman of this class
said: — "Sure thin, sir, I've sat and sould my
bit of fruit in this place, or near it, for twinty
year and more, as is very well known indeed,
is it. I could make twice the money twinty
year ago that I can now, for the boys had the
ha'pinnies more thin than they has now, more's
the pity. The childer is my custhomers, very
few beyant — such as has only a ha'pinny now
and thin, God hilp them. They'll come a mile
from any parrut, to spind it with such as me, for
they know it's chape we sill! Yis, indeed, or
they'll come with a fardin either, for it's a
ha'pinny lot we'll split for them any time. The
boys buys most, but they're dridful tazes. It's
the patience of the divil must be had to dale
wid the likes of thim. They was dridful about
the Pope, but they've tired of it now. O, no,
it wasn't the boys of my counthry that de-
maned themselves that way. Well, I make
4d. some days, and 6d. some, and 1s. 6d. some,
and I have made 3s. 6d., and I have made
nothing. Perhaps I make 5s. or 6s. a week
rigular, but I'm established and well-known
you see."

The quantity of refuse at the metropolitan
"green" markets varies with the different de-
scriptions of fruit. Of apples it averages one-

[Description: 915EAF. Page 118.]

twentieth, and of plums and greengages one-
fifteenth, of the entire supply. With pears,
cherries, gooseberries, and currants, however,
the damaged amounts to one-twelfth, while of
strawberries and mulberries it reaches as high
as one-tenth of the aggregate quantity sent to
market.

The Irish street-sellers, I am informed, buy
full two-thirds of all the refuse, the other third
being purchased by the lower class of English
costermongers — "the illegitimates," — as they
are called. We must not consider the sale of
the damaged fruit so great an evil as it would,
at the first blush, appear, for it constitutes per-
haps the sole luxury of poor children, as well
as of the poor themselves, who, were it not for
the halfpenny and farthing lots of the refuse-
sellers, would doubtlessly never know the taste
of such things.

Before leaving this part of the subject, it may
be as well to say a few words concerning the
curious revelations made by the returns from
Billingsgate, Covent-garden, and the other Lon-
don markets, as to the diet of the poor. In the
first place, then, it appears that in the matter
of fish, herrings constitute the chief article
of consumption — no less than 210,000,000 lbs.
weight of this fish in a "fresh" state, and
60,000,000 lbs. in a "dried" state, being an-
nually eaten by the humbler classes of the
metropolis and the suburbs. Of sprats there
are 3,000,000 lbs. weight consumed — and these,
with the addition of plaice, are the staple
comestibles at the dinners and suppers of the
ichthyophagous part of the labouring popu-
lation of London. One of the reasons for this
is doubtless the extraordinary cheapness of
these kinds of fish. The sprats are sold at a
penny per pound; the herrings at the same
rate; and the plaice at a fraction less, per-
haps; whereas a pound of butcher's meat, even
"pieces," or the "block ornaments," as they are
sometimes called, cannot be got for less than
twopence-halfpenny or threepence. But the
relative cheapness of these two kinds of food
can only be tested by the proportionate quantity
of nutrition in each. According to Liebig,
butcher's meat contains 26 per cent. of solid
matter, and 74 per cent. of water; whereas, ac-
cording to Brande, fish consists of 20 parts of
solid matter, and 80 parts water in every 100.
Hence it would appear that butcher's meat
is five per cent more nutritive than fish — or,
in other words, that if the two were equally
cheap, the prices, according to the quantity of
nutrition in each, should be for fish one penny
per pound, and butcher's meat not five farthings;
so that even at twopence-halfpenny the pound,
meat is more than twice as dear an article of diet
as fish.

But it is not only on account of their cheap-
ness that herrings and sprats are consumed in
such vast quantities by the labouring people of
London. Salmon, eels, herrings, pilchards, and
sprats, Dr. Pereira tells us, abound in oil; and
oleaginous food, according to Leibig, is an
"element of respiration," consisting of nearly
80 per cent. charcoal, which burns away in the
lungs, and so contributes to the warmth of
the system. Fat, indeed, may be said to act as
fuel to the vital fire; and we now know, from
observations made upon the average daily con-
sumption of food by 28 soldiers of the Grand
Duke of Hesse Darmstadt, in barracks, for a
month — which is the same as 840 men for one
day — that an adult taking moderate exercise
consumes, in the act of respiration, very nearly
a pound of charcoal every day, which of course
must be supplied in his food. "But persons
who take much exercise, or labour hard," says
Dr. Pereira, "require more frequent and copi-
ous meals than the indolent or sedentary. In
the active man the number of respirations is
greater than in the inactive, and therefore a
more frequent supply of food is required to
furnish the increased quantity of carbon and
hydrogen to be consumed in the lungs." "A
bird deprived of food," says Liebig, "dies on
the third day; while a serpent, with its sluggish
respiration, can live without food three months,
or longer."

Captain Parry, in his account of one of the
Polar expeditions (1827), states, that both him-
self and Mr. Beverley, the surgeon, were of
opinion, that, in order to maintain the strength
of the men during their harassing journey across
the ice, living constantly in the open air, and
exposed to the wet and cold for twelve hours a
day, an addition was requisite of at least one-
third to the quantity of provisions daily issued.
So, in the gaol dietaries, the allowance to prison-
ers sentenced to hard labour for three months is
one-third more than the scale for those sentenced
to hard labour for three days — the former hav-
ing 254 ounces, and the latter only 168 ounces
of solid food served out to them every week.

But the hard-working poor not only require
more food than the non-working rich, but it is
mainly because the rich are better fed that they
are more lethargic than the poor; for the greater
the supply of nutriment to the body, the more
inactive does the system become. From experi-
ments made a few years ago at the Zoological
Gardens, it was found, that, by feeding the ani-
mals twice, instead of once, in the twenty-four
hours, their habits, as regards exercise, were
altered — a fact which readily explains how the
fat and overfed are always the least energetic;
fat being at once the cause and consequence of
inaction. It is well to hear an obese citizen tell
a hollow-cheeked man, who begs a penny of
him, "to go and work — a lazy scoundrel;" but
physiology assures us that the fat tradesman
is naturally the laziest of the two. In a word,
he is fat because he is lazy, and lazy because he
is fat.

The industrious poor, however, not only re-
quire more food than the indolent rich, but, get-
ting less, they become more susceptible of cold,
and, therefore, more eager for all that tends to

[Description: 915EAF. Page 119.]

promote warmth. I have often had occasion to
remark the sacrifices that the ill-fed will make
to have "a bit of fire." "He who is well
fed," observes Sir John Ross, "resists cold
better than the man who is stinted, while starva-
tion from cold follows but too soon a starvation
in food. This doubtlessly explains in a great
measure the resisting powers of the natives of
frozen climates, their consumption of food being
enormous, and often incredible." Captain
Cochrane, in his "Journey through Russia and
Siberian Tartary," tells us that he has repeatedly
seen a Yakut or Tongouse devour forty pounds
of meat in a day; and one of the Yakuti he
speaks of as having consumed, in twenty-four
hours, "the hind-quarter of a large ox, twenty
pounds of fat, and a proportionate quantity of
melted butter for his drink." (Vol. i. p. 255)
Much less heat is evolved, physiologists tell us,
where there is a deficiency of food. "During
the whole of our march," says Sir John Frank-
lin, "we experienced that no quantity of cloth-
ing could keep us warm while we fasted; but,
on those occasions on which we were enabled to
go to bed with full stomachs, we passed the
night in a warm and comfortable manner."
Hence, it is evident, that in summer a smaller
quantity of food suffices to keep up the tempera-
ture of the body. I know of no experiments to
show the different proportions of aliment re-
quired at different seasons of the year. In
winter, however, when a greater supply is cer-
tainly needed, the labouring man, unfortunately,
has less means of obtaining it — nearly all trades
slacken as the cold weather comes on, and
some, as brick-making, market-gardening, build-
ing, &c., then almost entirely cease — so that,
were it not for the cheapness of fish, and, more-
over, the oleaginous quality of those kinds which
are most plentiful in the winter time, the metro-
politan poor would be very likely to suffer that
"starvation from cold which," in the words of
Sir John Ross, "follows but too soon a starva-
tion in food." Hence we can readily understand
the remark of the enthusiastic street-seller —
"Sprats is a blessing to the poor."

The returns as to the other articles of food
sold in the streets are equally curious. The
1,500,000l. spent yearly in fish, and the compa-
ratively small amount expended on vegetables,
viz., 290,000l., is a circumstance which seems to
show that the labouring population of London
have a greater relish for animal than vegetable
diet. "It is quite certain," says Dr. Carpenter,
"that the most perfect physical development
and the greatest intellectual vigour are to be
found among those races in which a mixed diet
of animal and vegetable food is the prevalent
habit." And yet, in apparent contradiction
to the proposition asserted with so much confi-
dence by Dr. Carpenter, we have the following
curious fact cited by Mr. Jacob Bentley: —

Of vegetables we have seen that the greatest
quantity consumed by the poor consists of
potatoes, of which 60,500,000 lbs. are annually
sold in the streets; but ten pounds of potatoes
are only equal in nutritive power to one pound of
butcher's meat, which contains one-fifth more
solid food than fish, — so that a pound of fish
may be said to equal eight pounds of potatoes,
and thus the 60,000,000 lbs. of vegetable is
dietetically equivalent to nearly 7,000,000
lbs. of fish diet. The cost of the potatoes,
at five pounds for 2d., is, as we have seen,
100,000l.; whereas the cost of the same amount
of nutritive matter in the form of fish, at 1d. per
pound, would have been only 30,000l., or up-
wards of two -thirds less. The vegetable of
which there is the next greatest street sale is
onions, upon which 90,000l. are annually ex-
pended. This has been before accounted for,
by saying, that a piece of bread and an onion are
to the English labourer what bread and grapes
are to the Frenchman — oftentimes a meal. The
relish for onions by the poorer classes is not
difficult to explain. Onions are strongly stimu-
lating substances, and they owe their peculiar
odour and flavour, as well as their pungent and
stimulating qualities, to an acrid volatile oil
which contains sulphur. This oil becomes
absorbed, quickens the circulation, and occasions
thirst. The same result takes place with the
oil of fish. It not only proves a stimulant to
the general system, but we are told that the
thirst and uneasy feeling at the stomach, fre-
quently experienced after the use of the richer
species of fish, have led to the employment of
spirit to this kind of food. Hence, says Dr.
Pereira, the vulgar proverb, "Brandy is Latin
for Fish." Moreover, the two classes of food
are similar in their comparative indigestibility,
for the uneducated palates of the poor not only
require a more pungent kind of diet, but their
stronger stomachs need something that will
resist the action of the gastric juice for a con-
siderable time. Hence their love of shell-fish.

The small quantity of fruit, too, sold to the
poor is a further proof of what is here stated.
The amount of the street sale of this luxury is
no criterion as to the quantity purchased by the
London labourers; for according to all accounts
the fruit-buyers in the streets consist mostly of
clerks, shopmen, small tradesmen, and the chil-

[Description: 915EAF. Page 120.]

dren of mechanics or the lower grade of middle
class people. Those who may be said strictly
to belong to the poor, — viz. those whose incomes
are barely sufficient for their support — seldom
purchase fruit. In the first place they have
no money to spend on such a mere toothsome
extravagance; and, secondly, they require a
stronger and more stimulating, and "staying" kind of food. The delights of the palate, we
should remember, are studied only when the
cravings of the stomach are satisfied, so that
those who have strong stomachs have necessarily
dull palates, and, therefore, prefer something
that "bites in the mouth," — to use the words
of one of my informants — like gin, onions,
sprats, or pickled whelks. What the poor term
"relishes" are very different things from what
the rich style the "delicacies of the season."

I have no means of ascertaining the average
number of ounces of solid food consumed by the
poorer class of the metropolis. The whole of
the fish, fruit, and vegetables, sold to the London
costermongers, is not disposed of in the London
streets — many of the street-sellers going, as we
have seen, country excursions with their goods.
According to the result of the Government
Commissioners of Inquiry, the labourers in the
country are unable to procure for themselves
and families an average allowance of more than
122 ounces of solid food — principally bread —
every week; hence it has been justly said we
may infer that the man consumes, as his
share, 140 ounces (134 bread and 6 meat).
The gaol dietaries allow 254 ounces, or nearly
twice as much to all prisoners, who undergo
continuous hard labour. In the construction of
these dietaries Sir James Graham — the then
Secretary of State — says, in his "Letter to the
Chairman of Quarter Sessions" (January 27th,
1843), "I have consulted not only the Prison
Inspectors, but medical men of the greatest
eminence possessing the advantage of long
experience." They are proposed, he adds, "as
the minimum amount which can be safely
afforded to prisoners without the risk of inflict-
ing a punishment not contemplated by law and
which it is unjust and cruel to inflict; namely,
loss of health and strength through the inade-
quacy of the food supplied." Hence it appears
not that the thief gets too much, but the honest
working man too little — or, in other words, that
the labourer of this country is able to pro-
cure, by his industry, only half the quantity of
food that is considered by "medical men of
the greatest eminence" to be "the minimum amount" that can be safely afforded for the
support of the criminals — a fact which it would
be out of place to comment upon here.

One word concerning the incomes of the Lon-
don costermongers, and I have done. It has been
before shown that the gross sum of money taken yearly, in the streets, by the sale of fish, fruit,
and vegetables, amounts, in round numbers,
to two million pounds — a million and a half
being expended in fish, and a quarter of a
million upon fruit and vegetables respectively.
In estimating the yearly receipts of the coster-
mongers, from their average gains, the gross
"takings" of the entire body were concluded to
be between a million and a quarter and a million
and a half sterling — that is to say, each one of
the 10,000 street-sellers of fish, fruit, and vege-
tables, was supposed to clear ten shillings a
week all the year through, and to take fifty
shillings. But, according to the returns fur-
nished me by the salesmen, at the several metro-
politan markets, the weekly "takings" of the
ten thousand men and their families — for often
both wife and children sell — cannot be less than
four pounds per week all the year round, out
of which it would seem that the clear weekly
gains are about fifteen shillings. (Some costers
we have seen take pounds in a day, others — as
the nut and orange-women and children — only
a few shillings a week; some, again, make cent.
per cent. profit, whilst others are obliged to sell
at a loss.) This, from all I can gather, as well
as from a comparison of the coster's style of
living with other classes whose weekly income
is nearly the same, appears to be very close
upon the truth.

We may then, I think, safely assert, that the
gross yearly receipts of the London coster-
mongers are two millions of money; that their
clear annual gain, or income, is 425,000l.; and
that the capital invested in their business, in
the form of donkey -carts, barrows, baskets,
weights, and stock-money, is 25,000l.; — half of
this being borrowed, for which they pay upwards
of 20,000l. interest per annum.