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

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

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

Yes, sir," he said, "I've had a turn at live poultry for—let me see—someways between twenty and twenty-five years. The business is a sweater, sir; it's heavy work, but 'live' aint so heavy as 'dead.' There's fewer of them to carry in a round, that's it. Ah! twenty years ago, or better, live poultry was worth following. I did a good bit in it. I've sold 160 fowls and ducks, and more, in a week, and cleared about 4l. But out of that I had to give a man 1s. a day, and his peck, to help me. At that time I sold my ducks and chickens—I worked nothing else—at from 2s. to 3s. 6d. a piece, according to size and quality. Now, if I get from 14d. to 2s. it's not so bad. I sell more, I think, however, over 1s. 6d. than under it, but I'm perticler in my 'live.' I never sold to any but people out of town that had convenience to keep them, and Lord knows, I've seen ponds I could jump over reckoned prime for ducks. Them that keeps their gardens nice won't buy live poultry. I've seldom sold to the big houses anything like to what I've done to the smaller. The big houses, you see, goes for fancy bantems, such as Sir John Seabright's, or Spanish hens, or a bit of a game cross, or real game—just for ornament, and not for fighting—or for anything that's got its name up. I've known young couples buy fowls to have their breakfast eggs from them. One young lady told me to bring her—that's fifteen year ago, it is so—six couples, that I knew would lay. I told her she'd better have five hens to a cock, and she didn't seem pleased, but I'm sure I don't know why, for I hope I'm always civil. I told her there would be murder if there was a cock to every hen. I supplied her, and made 6s. by the job. I have sold The Wallflower Girl. [From a Daguerreotype by Beard.] live fowls to the Jews about Whitechapel, on my way to Stratford and Bow, but only when I've bought a bargain and sold one. I don't know nothing how the Jews kills their fowls. Last summer I didn't make 1s. 6d. a day; no, nor more than three half-crowns a week in 'live.' But that's only part of my trade. I don't complain, so it's nothing to nobody what I makes. From Beever (De Beauvoir) Town to Stamford Hill, and on to Tottenham and Edmonton, and turning off Walthamstow way is as good a round as any for live; it is so; but nothing to what it was. Highgate and Hampstead is middling. The t'other side the water isn't good at all.

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

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