London Labour and the London Poor, Volume 1
Mayhew, Henry
1861
Of the Street-Sellers of Tools.
THESE people are of the same class as the sellers of hardware articles, though so far a distinct body that they generally sell tools only. | |
The tools are of the commonest kind, and supplied by the cheapest swag-shops, from which establishments the majority of the street-traders derive their supplies. They are sometimes displayed on a small barrow, sometimes on a stall, and are mostly German-made. | |
The articles sold and the price asked—and generally obtained, as no extravagant profit is demanded—is shown by the following:— | |
Claw hammers, Large claw, black and glaze-faced, Pincers, ; larger ones, Screw-drivers, from to ! Flat-nose pliers, a pair; squares, to Carpenters' oilcans, from to Nests of brad-awls (for joiners, and in wooden cases), to Back saws, to | |
While many of the street-sellers of tools travel the several thoroughfares and suburbs of the metropolis, others vend tools of a particular kind in particular localities. These localities and sellers may be divided into distinct classes:— () The street-sellers of tools in the markets; () The street-sellers of tools at the docks and warehouses; () The street-sellers of tools at mews, stable-yards, and job-masters'; and () The streetsellers of tools to working men at their workshops. | |
The markets which are usually frequented by the vendors of tools are Newgate and Leadenhall. There are, I am informed, only or streetsellers who at present frequent these markets on the busy days. The articles in which they deal are butchers' saws, cleavers, steels, meat-hooks, and knives; these saws they sell from to each; knives and steels, from to each; cleavers, from to each; and meat-hooks at , , and each, according to the size. It is very seldom, however, that cleavers are sold by the street-sellers, as they are too heavy to carry about. I am told that the trade of the tool-sellers in Newgate and Leadenhall markets is now very indifferent, owing chiefly to the butchers having been so frequently imposed upon by the street-sellers, that they are either indisposed or afraid to deal with them. When the itinerant tool-sellers are not occupied at the markets they vend their wares to tradesmen at private shops, but often without success. "It is a poor living," said of the hawkers to me; "sometimes little better than starving. I have gone out a whole day and haven't taken a farthing." I am informed that the greater portion of these street-sellers are broken-down butchers. The tools they vend are purchased at the Brummagem warehouses. To start in this branch of the street-business or usually constitutes the amount of capital invested in stock, and the average takings of each are about or a day. | |
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The only street-seller of tools at present frequenting Billingsgate-market is an elderly man, who is by trade a working cutler. The articles he displays upon his tray are oyster-knives, fishknives, steels, scissors, packing-needles, and hammers. This tradesman makes his own oysterknives and fish-knives; the scissors and hammers are -hand; and the packing-needles are bought at the ironmongers. Sometimes brad-awls, gimlets, nails, and screws form a part of his stock. He informed me that he had frequented Billingsgate-market upwards of years. "Wet or dry," he said, "I am here, and I often suffer from rheumatics in the head and limbs. Sometimes I have taken only a few pence; on other occasions I have taken or , but this is not very often. However, what with the little I take at , and at other places, I can just get a crust, and go on from day to day." | |
The itinerant saw-sellers offer their goods to any in the street as well as at the shops, and are at the street markets on Saturday evenings with small saws for use in cookery. With the butchers they generally barter rather than sell, taking any old saw in exchange with so much money, for a new . "I was brought up a butcher," said of these saw-sellers, "and worked as a journeyman, off and on, between and year. But I grew werry delicate from rheumaticks, and my old 'ooman was bad too, so that we once had to go into Marylebone work 'us. I had no family living, perhaps they're better as it is. We discharged ourselves after a time, and they gave us I then thought I'd try and sell a few saws and things. A master-butcher that's been a friend to me, lent me another , and I asked a man as sold saws to butchers to put me in the way of it, and he took me to a swag-shop. I do werry badly, sir, but I'll not deny, and I can't deny—not anyhow—when you tell me Mr. ——told you about me—that there's 'elps to me. If I make a bargain, for so much; or for old saws or cleavers, or any old butcher thing, and so much; a man wot knows me says, 'Well, old boy, you don't look satisfied; here's a bit of steak for you.' Sometimes it's a cut off a scrag of mutton, or weal; that gives the old 'ooman and me a good nourishing bit of grub. I can work at times, and every Saturday a'most I'm now a porter to a butcher. I carries his meat from Newgate, when he's killed hisself, and wants no more than a man's weight from the market; and when he 'asn't killed hisself in course he hires a cart. I makes a day the year round, I think, on saws, and my old 'ooman makes more than 'arf as much at charing, and there's the 'elps, and then I gets and my | |
362 | grub every Saturday. It's no use grumbling; lots isn't grubbed 'arf so well as me and my old 'ooman. My rent's a week." |
The articles vended by the class of the street-sellers of tools, or those whose purchasers are mostly connected with the docks and warehouses, consist of iron-handled claw-hammers, spanners, bed-keys, and corkscrews. Of these street-traders there are or , and the greater portion of them are blacksmiths out of employ. Some make their own hammers, whereas others purchase the articles they vend at the swag-shops. "We sell more hammers and bedkeys than other things," said , "and sometimes we sells a corkscrew to the landlord of a public-house, and then we have pernaps halfa- pint of beer. Our principal customers for spanners are wheelwrights. Those for hammers are egg-merchants, oilmen, wax and tallow-chandlers, and other tradesmen who receive or send out goods in wooden cases; as well as chance customers in the streets." The amount of capital required to start in the line is from to : "it is not much use," said , "to go to shop with less than " | |
A class of the street-sellers of tools are the vendors of curry-combs and brushes, manecombs, scrapers, and clipping instruments; and these articles are usually sold at the several mews, stable-yards, and jobbing-masters' in and about the metropolis. The sellers are mostly broken-down grooms, who, not being able to obtain a situation, resort to street-selling as a last shift. "It is the last coach, when a man takes to this kind of living," said of my informants, a groom in a "good place;" "and it's getting worse and worse. The poor fellows look half-starved. Why, what do you think I gave for these scissors? I got 'em for and a pint of beer, and I should have to give perhaps half-a-crown for 'em at a shop." The trade is fast declining, and to gentlemen's carriage mews the street-sellers of such tools rarely resort, as the instruments required for stable-use are now bought, by the coachmen, of the tradesmen who supply their masters. At the mixed mews," as I heard them called, there are men who, along with razors, knives, and other things, occasionally offer "clipping" and "trimming" scissors. or years ago there were of these streetsellers. The trimming-scissors are, in the shops, to a pair. There is trade still carried on in these places, although it is diminutive compared to what it was: I allude to the sale of curry-combs. Those vended by street-sellers at the mews are sold at or The best sale for these curry-combs is about and the , and at the livery-stables generally. Along with curry-combs, the street-vendors sell washleathers, mane-combs (horn), sponges (which were like dried moss for awhile, I was told, got up by the Jews, but which are now good), dandy-brushes (whalebone-brushes, to scrape dirt from a horse's legs, before he is groomed), spoke-brushes (to clean carriage-wheels), and coach-mops. dweller in a large West-end mews computed that different street-traders resorted thither daily, and that sold the articles I have specified. In this trade, I am assured, there are no broken-down coachmen or grooms, only the regular street-sellers. A commoner curry-comb is sold at (prime cost a dozen), at , on market-days, and to the carmen, and the owners of the rougher sort of horses; but this trade is not extensive. | |
There may be men, I am told, selling common "currys;" and they also sell other articles (often horse oil-cloths and nose-bags) along with them. | |
The last class of street-sellers is the beaten-out mechanic or workman, who, through blindness, age, or infirmities, is driven to obtain a livelihood by supplying his particular craft with their various implements. Of this class, as I have before stated, there are men in London who were brought up as tailors, but are now, through some affliction or privation, incapacitated from following their calling. These men sell needles at and for ; thimbles to each; scissors from to ; and wax the lump. There are also old and blind shoemakers, who sell a few articles of grindery to their shopmates, as they term them, as well as a few decayed members of other trades, hawking the implements of the handicraft to which they formerly belonged. But as I have already given a long account of of this class, under the head of the blind needle-seller, there is no occasion for me to speak further on the subject. | |
From of the street-traders in saws I had the following account of his struggles, as well as the benefit he received from teetotalism, of which he spoke very warmly. His room was on the floor of a house in a court near , and was clean and comfortable-looking. There were goodsized pictures, in frames, of the Queen, the Last Supper, and a Rural Scene, besides minor pictures: some of these had been received in exchange for saws with street-picture-sellers. A shelf was covered with china ornaments, such as are sold in the streets; the table had its oil-skin cover, and altogether I have seldom seen a more decent room. The rent, unfurnished, was a week. | |
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The saws sold are inch, which cost at the swag-shops and a dozen; inch, and ; and so on, the price advancing according to the increased size, to inch, the dozen. Larger sizes are seldom sold in the streets. The man's earnings, my informant believed, were the same as his own. | |
The wife of my informant, when she got-work as an embroideress, could earn and At present she was at work braiding dresses for a dressmaker, at each. By hard work, and if she had not her baby to attend to, she could earn no more than a day. As it was she did not earn | |