 Section 7 of London Labour and the London Poor, volume 2 by Henry Mayhew. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Gillian Henry. Of the street sellers of secondhand boots and shoes. The man who gave me the following account of this trade had been familiar with it a good many years, fifteen he believed, but was by no means certain. I saw at his lodgings a man who was finishing his day's work there, in cobbling and translating. He was not in the employ of my informant, who had two rooms, or rather a floor. He slept in one and let the other to the translator, who was a relation he told me. And they went on very well together, as he, the street seller, liked to sit and smoke his pipe of a night, in the translator's room, which was much larger than his own. And sometimes, when times were pretty bobbish, they clubbed together for a good supper of tripe, or had a prime hot jemmy apiece, with a drop of good beer. A jemmy is a baked sheep's head. The room was tidy enough, but had the strong odour of shoemaker's wax proper to the craft. I've been in a good many street trades, and others too, said my informant, since you want to know, and for a good purpose as well as I can understand it. I was apprenticed to a shoemaker in Northampton, with a lot more. Why, it was more like a factory than anything else, was my masters, and the place we worked in was so confined and hot, and we couldn't open the window, that it was worse than the East Injes. Oh, I know what they is, I've been there. I was so badly treated, I ran away from my master, for I had only a father, and he cared nothing about me, and so I broke my indentures. After a good bit of knocking about, and living as I could, and starving when I couldn't, but I never thought of going back to Northampton, I listed, and was a good bit in the Injes. Well, never mind, sir, how long, or what happened to me when I was soldier, I did nothing wrong, and that ain't what you was asking about, and I'd rather say no more about it. I have met with other street folk, who had been soldiers, and who were fond of talking off their service, often enough to grumble about it, so that I am almost tempted to think my informant had deserted, but I questioned him no further on the subject. I had my ups and downs again, sir, he continued, when I got back to England. God bless us all, I am very fond of children, but I never married, and when I've been at the worst, I've been really glad that I hadn't no one depending on me. It's bad enough for oneself, but when there's others as you must love, what must it be then? I've smoked a pipe when I was troubled in mind, and couldn't get a meal, but could only get a pipe, and backies shamefully dear here. But if I'd had a young daughter now, what good would it have been my smoking a pipe to comfort her? I've seen that in people that's akin to me, and has been badly off, and with families. I had a friend or two in London, and I applied to them when I couldn't hold out no longer, and they gave me a bit of a rise, so I began as a costar monger. I was living among them as was in that line. Well now, it's a pleasant life and fine weather. Why, it was only this morning, Joe, the translator, was reading the paper at breakfast time. He gets it from the public house, and if it's two, three or four days old, it's just as good for us. And there was ten thousand pounds had been received from the West Engies. There's a chance for the costar monger, says I, if they don't go off to Rear. Then cherries is in, and I was beginning to wish I was a costar monger myself still, but my present trade is sureer. My boots and shoes'll keep, they don't spoil in hot weather. Cherries and strawberries does, and if it comes thunder and wet, you can't sell. I worked a barrow and sometimes had only a bit of a pitch, for a matter of two year perhaps, and then I got into this trade as I understood it. I sell all sorts, but not so much women's or children's. Why, as to prices, there's two sorts of prices. You may sell as you buy, or you may sell new sold and healed. They're never new-welted for the streets, it wouldn't pay a bit. Not long since I had a pair of very good oxonians that had been new-welted, and the very first day I had them on sale, it was a dull, drizzly day, a lad tried to prig them. I just caught him in time. Did I give him in charge? I hope I've more sense. I've been robbed before, and I've caught young rips in the act. If it's boots or shoes they've tried to prig, I gives them a stirruping, with whichever it is, and a kick, and lets them go. Men's shoes, the regular sort, isn't a very good sale. I get from tenpence to four-shelling sixpence a pair, but the high-priced ones is either sold and healed and muddied well, or they've been real well made things and not much worn. I've had gentlemen's shooting shoes sometimes that's flung aside for the least thing. The plain shoes don't go off at all. I think people like something to cover their stocking feet more. For cloth button boots I get from one shelling, that's the lowest I ever sold at, to two-shelling sixpence. The price is according to what condition the things is in, and what's been done to them, but there's no regular price. They're not such good sale as they would be, because they soon show worn. The black legs gets to look very seamy, and it's a sort of boot that won't stand much knocking about if it ain't right well made at first. I've been selling oxonean button-overs. Note oxonean shoes which cover the instep and are closed by being buttoned instead of being stringed through four or five holes, end-not. At three-shelling sixpence and four-shellings, but they was really good, and sold and healed. Others I sell at one-shelling sixpence, to two-shelling thruppence or two-shelling sixpence. Blutcher's is from one-shelling to three-shelling sixpence. Wellington's from one-shelling. Yes, indeed, I've had them as low as one-shelling, and perhaps they weren't very cheap at that, them very low-priced things never is, neither new nor old, from one-shelling to five-shellings. But Wellington's is more for the shops than the street. I do a little in children's boots and shoes. I sell them from thruppence to 15 pence. Yes, you can buy a lower than thruppence, but I'm not in that way. They sell quite as quick or quicker than anything. I've sold children's boots to poor women that wanted shirring far worse than the child. I many a time, sir. Top boots, they're called jockeys in the trade, isn't sold in the streets. I've never had any, and I don't see them with others in my line. Oh no, there's no such thing as Hessians or backstraps. Note, a top boot without the light-coloured top. End note. In my trade now. Yes, I always have a seat handy, where anybody can try on anything in the street. No sir, no boot hooks, nor shoehorn. Shoehorns is rather going out, I think. If what we sell in the streets won't go on without them, they won't be sold at all. A good many will buy if the things only big enough. They can't bear pinching, and don't care much for a fine fit. Well, I suppose I take from 30 shillings to 40 shillings a week. 14 shillings is about my profit. That's as to the year through. I sell little for women's wear, though I do sell their boots and shoes sometimes. Off the street sellers of old hats. The two street sellers of old coats, waistcoats and trousers, and of boots and shoes, whose statements precede this account, assign their trade generally to the second hand merchandise I have mentioned as more especially constituting their stock. But this arrangement does not wholly prevail. There are many street traders in second hand, perhaps two thirds of the whole number, who sell indiscriminately anything which they can buy, or what they hope to turn out an advantage. But even they prefer to deal more in one particular kind of merchandise than another. And this is most of all the case as concerns the street sale of old boots and shoes. Hats, however, are among the second hand wares which the street seller rarely vends unconnected with other stock. I was told that this might be owing to the hats sold in the street, being usually suitable only for one class, grown men. While clothes and boots and shoes are for boys as well as men. Caps may supersede the use of hats, but nothing can supersede the use of boots or shoes which form the steadiest second hand street trade of any. There are, however, occasions when a street seller exerts himself to become possessed of a cheap stock of hats by the well-known process of taking a quantity, and sells them without or with but a small admixture of other goods. One man who had been lately so occupied gave me the following account. He was of Irish parentage, but there was little distinctive in his accent. Hats, he said, are about the awkwardest things of any for the streets. Do as you will, they require a deal of room so that what you'll mostly see isn't hats quite ready to put on your head and walk away in, but to be made ready. I've sold hats that way though, I mean ready to wear, and my father before me has sold hundreds. Yes, I've been in the trade all my life, the best way for a profit. You get perhaps the old hat in, or you buy it at a penny or tuppence as maybe, and so you kill two birds. But there's very little of that trade except on Saturday nights or Sunday mornings. People want a decent tile for Sundays, and don't care for workdays. I never hawks hats, but I sell to those as do. My customers for hats are mechanics, with an odd clerk or two. Indeed, I sell hats now and then to my own countrymen to go decent to mass in. I go to mass myself as often as I can. Sometimes I go to Vespers. No, the Irish in this trade ain't so good in going to chapel as they ought, but it takes such a time. Not just while you're there, but in shaving and washing and getting ready. My wife helps me in selling secondhand things. She's a better hand than I am. I have two boys, they're young yet, and I don't know what we shall bring them up to, perhaps to our own business. And children seems to fall naturally into it, I think, when their fathers and mothers is in it. They're at school now. I have sold hats from sixpence to three-shelling sixpence, but very seldom three-shelling sixpence. The three-shelling sixpence ones would wear out two new gossipers, I know. It's seldom you see beaver hats in the street trade now. They're nearly all silk. Many the beavers have got scarce in foreign parts where they're caught. I haven't an idea how many hats I sell in a year, for I don't stick to hats, you see, sir, but I like doing in them as well or better than in anything else. Sometimes I've sold nothing but hats for weeks together, wholesale and retail, that is. It's only the regular-shaped hats I can sell. If you offer swells hats, people will say, I may as well buy a new wide-awake, at once. I've made 20 shillings in a week on hats alone, but if I can find my trade to them now, I don't suppose I could clear five shillings one week with another the year through. It's only the hawkers that can sell them in wet weather. I wish we could sell undercover in all the places where there's what you call street markets. It would save poor people that lives by the street many a tuppence by their things not being spoiled by people not heeding the rain to go and examine them. Of the street sellers of women's second-hand apparel. This trade, as regards the sale to retail customers in the streets, is almost entirely in the hands of women, seven-eighths of whom are the wives, relatives or connections of the men who deal in second-hand male apparel. But gowns, cloaks, bonnets and so on are collected more largely by men than by women, and the wholesale old-clothes merchants, of course, deal in every sort of habiliment. Petticoat and Rosemary Lanes are the grand marks for this street sale, but in White Cross Street, Leather Lane, Old Street, St. Luke's and some similar Saturday night markets in poor neighbourhoods, women's second-hand apparel is sometimes offered. It is often of little use offering it in the latter places. I was told by a lace seller who had sometimes tried to do business in second-hand shawls and cloaks. Because you are sure to hear oh, we can get them far cheaper in Petticoat Lane when we like to go as far. The different portions of female dress are shown and sold in the street as I have described in my account of Rosemary Lane and of the trading of the men selling second-hand male apparel. There is not so much attention paid to set-off gowns that there is to set-off coats. If the gown be a washing gown, I was informed, it is sure to have to be washed before it can be worn and so it is no use bothering with it and paying for soap and labour beforehand. If it be woolen or some stuff that won't wash, it has almost always to be altered before it is worn and so it is no use doing it up perhaps to be altered again. Silk goods, however, are carefully enough re-glossed and repaired. Most of the others just take their chance. A good-looking Irish woman gave me the following account. She had come to London and had been a few years in service where she saved a little money when she married a cousin, but in what degree of cousinship she did not know. She then took part in his avocation as a croc man and subsequently as a street seller of second-hand clothes. Why, yes, then, and indeed, sir, she said, I did feel rather queer in my new trade, going about from house to house, the commercial road, and step any way, but I soon got not to mind and indeed, then, it don't matter much what way one gets one's living, so long as it's honest. Oh, yeah, I know there's goings-on in old clothes, that isn't always honest, but my husband's a fair dealing man. I felt queerer, too, when I had to sell in the street, but I soon got used to that, too, and it's not so much slavish work as the crocs, but we sometimes crocs in the mornings a little still and sells in the evenings. No, not what we've collected, for that goes to Mr Isaac's market, almost always, but stock that's ready for wear. For cotton gowns I've got from nine pints to two shillings-thruppins. Oh, yeah, and indeed, then, there's gowns cheaper, four pints and six pints, but there's nothing to be got out of them, and we don't sell them. From nine pints to eighteen pints is the commonest price. It's poor people as buys. Oh, yes, and indeed, then, it is. Them as has families, and must look about them. Many's the poor women that said to me, Well, and indeed, Marm, it isn't my inclination to chape in anybody, as I think's as fair, and I was brought up quite different to buy in old gowns, I assure you. Yes, that's often said. No, sir, it isn't my countrywoman that says it. No, laughing. And no, it's yours. I wouldn't think, says she, of offering you a penny less than one shilling Marm for that frock for my daughter Marm, but it's such a hard fight to live. Oh, then, and it is indeed, but to hear some of them talk, you'd think they was born ladies. Stuff gowns is from tuppins to eight pints higher than cotton, but they don't sell near so well. I hardly know why. Cotton washes, and if a decent woman gets a chape secondhand cotton, she washes and does it up, and it seems to come to her fresh and new. That can't be done with stuff. Silk is very little in my way, but silk gowns sell from three shilling six pints to four shillings. Of satin and velvet gowns, I can tell you nothing. They're never in the streets. Secondhand bonnets is a very poor sale very. The milleners, poor creatures, as makes them up and sells them in the street, has the greatest sale, but they make very little by it. Their bonnets looks new, you see, sir, and close and nice for poor women. I've sold bonnets from six pints to three shilling six pints, and some of them cost three pounds, but when they get faded and out of fashion, they're of no value at all at all. Shoals is a very little sale, very little. I've got from six pints to two shilling six pints for them. Plaid shawls is as good as any at about one shilling six pints, but they're a winter trade. Cloaks. Note, they are what in the dressmaking trade are called mantles, and note, isn't much of a call. I've had them from one shilling six pints as high as seven shillings, but only once seven shillings, and it was good silk. They're not a sort of wear that suits poor people. Well, and indeed, then, you know who buys them secondhand. Perhaps bad women buys a few, or they get men to buy them for them. I think you missies don't buy much secondhand than in general. The less the better the likes of them. Yes, indeed, sir. Stays I don't sell, but you can buy them from frappants to fifteen pints. It's a small trade, and I don't sell under-clothing, or only now and then, except children's. Dear me, I can hardly tell the prices I get for the poor little things dress. I'm a little girl myself. The prices vary so, just as the frocks and other things is made for big children or little, and what they're made of. I've sold frocks. They sell best on Saturday and Monday nights, from tuppence to one shilling six pints. Little petticoats is a penny to thruppence. Shifts is a penny in tuppence, and so is little shirts. If there wasn't so blue, there would be more rags than there is, and sure there's plenty. Well then, and indeed, I don't know what we're making a week, and if I did, why should I tell? Oh, yes, sir. I know from the gentleman that sent you to me that you're asking for a good purpose. Yes, indeed, then. But I really can't say. We do pretty well, God's name be praised. Perhaps a good second hand-gown trade and such like is worth from ten shillings to fifteen shillings a week, and nearer fifteen shillings than ten shillings every week. But that's a good second hand trade, you understand, sir. A poor trade's about half that, perhaps. But then my husband sells menswear as well. Yes, indeed. And I find time to go to mass, and I soon got my husband to go after we was married, for he'd got to neglect it. God be praised. And what's all you can get here compared to making your soul? Note, saving your soul. Making your soul is not an uncommon phrase among some of the Irish people. End note. All can indeed, then, sir. If you've met father, blank, you've met a good gentleman. Of the street-selling of women and children's second-hand boots and shoes, I need say but little, as they form part of the stock of the menswear, and are sold by the same men, not unfrequently assisted by their wives. The best sale is for black cloth boots, whether laced or buttoned, but the prices run only from five pints to one-shelling nine pints. If the legs of a second-hand pair be good, they are worth five pints, no matter what the leather portion, including the soles, may be. Coloured boots sell very indifferently. Children's boots and shoes are sold from tuppence to fifteen pints. Of the street-sellers of second-hand, furge. Of furge, the street sale is prompt enough, or used to be prompt, but not so much so, I am told, last season as formerly. A fur-tipot is readily bought for the sake of warmth by women who thrive pretty well in the keeping of coffee stalls, or any calling which requires attendance during the night, or in the chilliness of early morning, even in summer, by those who go out at early hours to their work. By such persons, a big-tipot is readily bought when the money is not an impediment, as many it is a strong recommendation that when you, the tippet most likely, was worn by a real lady. So I was assured by a person familiar with the trade. One female street-seller had three stalls, or stands, in the new cut, when it was a great street market, about two years back, and all for the sale of second-hand furge. She has now a small shop in second-hand wearing apparel, women's, generally. The furge being, of course, included. The business carried on in the street almost always the cut by the fur-seller in question, who was both industrious and respectable, was very considerable. On a Monday she has not unfrequently taken £5, one half of which, indeed more than half, was profit for the street-seller bought in the summer when furge were no money at all, and sold in the winter when they were really tin and no mistake. Before the season began she sometimes had a small room, nearly full of furge. This trade is less confined to Petticoat Lane and the Old Clothes District as regards a supply to retail customers than is anything else connected with dress. But the fur trade is now small. The money, prudence, and forethought necessary to enable a fur-seller to buy in the summer for ample profit in the winter as regards street trade is not in accordance with the habits of the general run of street-sellers who think but of the present or hardly think even of that. The old furge, like all the other old articles of wearing a pearl, whether garbs or what may be accounted primary necessaries as shoes or mere comforts or adornments as boas or muffs are bought in the first instance at the Old Clothes Exchange and so find their way to the street-sellers. The exceptions as to this first transaction in the trade I now speak of are very trifling and perhaps more trifling than in other articles for one great supply of furge I am informed is from there being swapped in the spring and summer for dowers with the root-sellers who carry them to the exchange. Last winter there were sometimes as many as ten persons three-fourths of the number of hand fur-sellers which fluctuates being women with fur-stands. They frequent the street-markets on the Saturday and Monday nights not confining themselves to any one market in particular. The best sale is for fur-tippets and chiefly of the darker colours. These are bought, one of the dealers informed me, frequently by maid-servants who could run off errands in them in the dark or wear them in wet weather. They are sold from one shilling sixpence to four shilling sixpence about two shillings or two shilling sixpence being a common charge. Children's tippets go off well from sixpence to one shilling thruppence. Boas are not vended to half the extent of tippets although they are lower priced one of the tolerably good gray squirrel being one shilling sixpence. The reason of the difference in the demand is that boas are as much an ornament as a garment while the tippet answers the purpose of a shawl. Muffs are not a tall vendable in the streets the few that are disposed of being principally for children. As muffs are not generally used by maid-servants or by the families of the working classes the absence of demand in the second-hand traffic is easily accounted for. They are bought sometimes to cut up for other purposes. Victorines are disposed of readily enough at from one shilling to two shilling sixpence as are cuffs from fourpence to eightpence. One man who told me that a few years since he and his wife used to sell second-hand furs in the street was of opinion that his best customers were women of the town who were tolerably well-dressed and who required some further protection from the night-air. He could readily sell any tidy article tippet, boa or muff to those females if they had from two shilling sixpence to five shillings at command. He had so sold them in clear market in Tottenham Court Road and the Brill of the second-hand sellers of Smithfield Market. No small part of the second-hand trade of London is carried on in the Marketplace of Smithfield on the Friday afternoons. Here is a mart for almost everything which is required for the harnessing of beasts of draft, or is required for any means of propulsion or locomotion either as a whole vehicle or in its several parts needed by street traders. Also of the machines, vessels, scales, weights, measures, baskets, stands and all other appliances of street trade. The scene is animated and peculiar apart from the horse, ass and goat trade of which I shall account hereafter. It is a grand second-hand costamongers exchange. The trade is not confined to that large body though they are the principal merchants but includes greengrocers, often the costamonger in a shop, carmen and others. It is moreover a favourite resort of the purveyors of street provisions and beverages, of street dainties and luxuries. Of this class, some of the most generous are those who are well known in Smithfield. The space devoted to this second-hand commerce and its accompaniments runs from St Bertholomew's hospital towards Long Lane but isolated peripatetic traders are found in all parts of the space, not devoted to the exhibition of cattle or of horses. The crowd on the day of my visit was considerable but from several I heard the not always very voracious remarks nothing doing and there's nobody at all here today. The weather was sultry and at every few yards arose the cry from men and boys. Ginger beer, hypnia glass, hypnia glass or iced lemonade here, iced raspberry aid, as cold as ice hypnia glass, only a hypny. A boy was elevated on a board at the end of a splendid affair of this kind. It was a square built vehicle the top being about seven feet by four and flat and surmounted by the lemonade fountain long narrow champagne glasses holding a raspberry coloured liquid frost up exceedingly were arranged round and the beverage dispensed by a woman, the mother or employer of the boy who was bawling. The sides of the machine which stood on wheels were a bright shiny blue and on them sprawled the lion and unicorn in gorgeous heraldry, yellow and gold, the artist being according to a prominent announcement a herald painter. The apparatus was handsome but with that exaggeration of handsomeness which attracts the high and low vulgar who cannot distinguish between godiness and beauty. The sale was brisk the ginger beer sold in the market was generally dispensed from carts and here I noticed what occurs yearly in street commerce an innovation on the established system of the trade. Several sellers disposed of their ginger beer in clear glass bottles somewhat larger and fuller necked than those introduced by M. Soye for the sale of his nectar and the liquid was drunk out of the bottle the moment the cork was undrawn and so the necessity of a glass was obviated. Near the herald painter's work of which I have just spoken a very humble stall on which were loaves of bread and round the loaves were pieces of fried fish and slices of bread on plates all remarkably clean. Oysters, penny a lot penny a lot, oysters was the cry the most frequently heard after that of ginger beer and so on. Cherries, tuppin's a pound penny a pound, cherries fruit pies try my fruit pies the most famous dealer in all kinds of penny pies is however not a pedestrian but an equestrian hawker he drives a very smart handsome pie cart sitting behind after the manner of the handsome cabman the lifting up of a lid below his knees displaying his large stock of pies his drag this whisked along rapidly by a brisk chestnut pony well harnessed the whole set out I was informed the money included cost £50 when you the proprietor is a keen chartist and tea totaler and loses no opportunity to inculcate to his customers the excellence of tea totalism as well as of his pies milk, hypnia pint, hypnia pint good milk is another cry raspberry cream iced raspberry cream hypnia glass this street seller had a capital trade street ices or rather ice creams were somewhat of a failure last year more especially in Greenwich park but this year they seem likely to succeed the Smithfield man sold them in very small glasses which he merely dipped into a vessel at his feet and so filled them with the cream the consumers had to use their fingers instead of a spoon and no few seemed puzzled how to eat their ice and were grievously troubled by its getting among their teeth I heard one driver mutter that he felt as if it had snowed in his belly perhaps at Smithfield market on the Friday afternoons every street trade in eatables and drinkables has its representative with the exception of such things as sweet stuff, curds and twae and so on which are bought chiefly by women and children there were plum duff plum cake pastry pea soup whelks ham sandwiches hot eels oranges and so on and so on and so on these things are the usual accompaniment of street markets and I now come to the subject matter of the work the sale of second hand articles in this trade since the introduction of a new arrangement two months ago there has been a great change the vendors are not allowed to put barrels in the market unless indeed with a pony or donkey harness to them or unless they are wheeled about by the owner and they are not allowed to spread their wares on the ground when it is considered of what those wares are composed the awkwardness of the arrangement to the salespeople may be understood they consist of second hand collars, pads, saddles bridles, bits, traces every description of worn harness, whole or in parts the wheels, springs axles and so on of barrels and carts the beams, chains and bodies of scales these perhaps are the chief things which are sold separately as parts of a whole the traders have now no other option but to carry them as they best can and offer them for sale you saw men who really appear clad in harness were fastened round their bodies collars slung on their arms pads or small cart saddles with their shaft gear were planted on their shoulders some carried merely a collar or a harness bridle or even a bit or a pair of spurs it was the same with the springs and so on of the barrels and small carts they were carried under men's arms or poised on their shoulders the wheels and other things which are too heavy for such modes of transport had to be placed in some sort of vehicle and in the vehicles might be seen trestles and so on the complaints on the part of the second hand sellers were neither few nor mild if it had been a fat ox that had to be accommodated said one before he was roasted for an alderman he'd have found some way to do it but it don't matter for poor men though why we shouldn't be suited with a market as well as richer people is not the ticket that's the fact these arrangements are already beginning to be infringed and will be more and more infringed for such is always the case the reason why they were adopted was that the ground was so littered that there was not room for the donkey traffic and other requirements of the market the donkeys when shown under the old arrangement often trod on boards of old metal and so on spread on the ground and tripped sometimes to their injury in consequence prior to the change about 20 persons used to come from petticoat lane and so on and spread their old metal and other stores on the ground of these there are now none these petticoat laners I was told by a Smithfield frequenter were men who knew the price of old rags a new phrase expressive of their knowingness and keenness in trade the statistics of this trade will be found under that head the prices are often much higher and much lower I speak of the regular trades I have not included the sale of the superior butchers carts and so on as that is a traffic not in the hands of the regular second hand street sellers I have not thought it requisite to speak of the hawking of whips sticks, wash leathers, brushes curry combs and so on of which I have already treated distinctively the accounts of the capital and income of the street sellers of second hand articles I am obliged to defer till a future occasion end of section 7 section 8 of London Labour and the London poor volume 2 by Henry Mayhew this LibriVox recording is in the public domain recording by Gillian Henry of the street sellers of live animals the live animals sold in the streets includes beasts, birds, fish and reptiles all sold in the streets of London the class of men carrying on this business for they are nearly all men is mixed but the majority are of a half sporting and half vagrant kind one informant told me that the bird catchers for instance when young as more than three fourths of them are were those who liked to be after a loose end first catching their birds as a sort of sporting business and then sometimes selling them in the streets but far more frequently disposing of them in the bird shops some of these boys a bird seller in a large way of business said to me used to become rat catchers or dog sellers but there's not such great openings now as far as I know they're the same lads or just the same sort of lads anyhow as you may see helping holding horses and things like that at concerns like them small races at Peckham or Chock Farm or helping anyway at the foot races at Camberwell there is in this bird catching a strong manifestation of the vagrant spirit to rise long before daybreak to walk some miles before daybreak the earliest dawn to wait in some field or common or wood watching the capture of the birds then a long trudge to town to dispose of the fluttering captives all this is done cheerfully because there are about it the irresistible charms to this class of excitement, variety and free and open air life nor do these charms appear one-wit weakened when as happens often enough to carry on fasting the old men in the bird catching business are not to be ranked as to their enjoyment of it with the juveniles for these old men are sometimes infirm and can but, as one of them said to me some time ago, hobble about it but they have the same spirit or the sparks of it and in this part of the trade is one of the curious characteristics of a street life or rather of an open air pursuit of the requirements of a street trade a man worn out for other purposes incapable of anything but a passive or sort of lazy labor such as lying in a field and watching the action of his trap cages will yet in a summer's morning decrepit as he may be possess himself of a dozen or even a score of the very freest and most aspiring of all our English small birds a creature of the air beyond other birds of his order to use an ornithological term of skylarks the dog sellers are of a sporting trading idling class their sport is now the rat hunt or the ferret match or the dog fight as it was with the predecessors of their stamp the cock fight the bull, bear and badger bait the shrovetide cock shy or the duck hunt their trading spirit is akin to that of the higher class sporting fraternity the trading members of the turf they love to sell and to bargain always with a quiet exultation at the time a matter of loud tavern boast afterwards perhaps as respects the street folk how they do a customer or do one another it's not cheating was the remark and apology of a very famous jockey of the old times touching such measures it's not cheating, it's outwitting perhaps this expresses the code of honesty of such traders not to cheat but to outwit or overreach mixed with such traders however are found a few quiet plodding, fair dealing men whom it is difficult to classify otherwise than that they are in the line just because they likes it the idling of these street sellers is a part of their business to walk by the hour up and down a street and with no manual labour except to clean their dog's kennels and to carry them in their arms is but an idleness although as some of these men will tell you they work hard at it under the respective heads of dog and bird sellers I shall give more detailed characteristics of the class as well as of the varying qualities and inducements of the buyers the street sellers of foreign birds such as parrots, parroquettes and cockatoos of goats, tortoises, rabbits leverettes, hedgehogs and the collectors of snails worms, frogs and toads are also a mixed body foreigners, Jews seamen, countrymen costar mungers and boys form a part and of them I shall give a description under the several heads the prominently characterised street sellers are the traders in dogs and birds of the former street sellers finders, stealers and restorers of dogs before I describe the present condition of the street trade in dogs which is principally in spaniels or in the description well known as lap dogs I will give an account of the former condition of the trade if trade it can properly be called for the finders and stealers of dogs were the more special subjects of a parliamentary inquiry from which I derive the official information on the matter the report of the committee was ordered by the House of Commons to be printed July 26th 1844 in their report the committee observed concerning the value of pet dogs quote from the evidence of various witnesses it appears that in one case a spaniel was sold for 105 pounds and in another under a sheriff's execution for 150 pounds at the hammer and 50 pounds or 60 pounds are not unfrequently given for fancy dogs of first rate breed and beauty end quote the 100 guineas dog above alluded to was a black and tan King Charles spaniel indeed Mr. Dowling the editor of Bell's Life in London said in his evidence before the committee quote I have known as much as 150 pounds given for a dog end quote he said afterwards there are certain marks about the eyes and otherwise which are considered properties and it depends entirely upon the property which a dog possesses as to its value I need not dwell on the general fondness of the English for dogs otherwise than as regards what were the grand objects of the dog finders search ladies small spaniels and lap dogs or as they are sometimes called carriage dogs by their being the companions of ladies inside their carriages these animals first became fashionable by the fondness of Charles II for them that monarch allowed them undisturbed possession of the gilded chairs in his palace of Whitehall and seldom took as a custom walk in the park without a tribe of them at his heels so fashionable were spaniels at that time and afterwards Pope made the chief of all his silphs and silphides the guard of a ladies lap dog the fashion has long continued and still continues and it was on this fashionable fondness for a toy and on the regard of many others for the noble and affectionate qualities of the dog that a traffic was established in London which became so extensive and so lucrative that the legislature interfered in 1844 for the purpose of checking it I cannot better show the extent and lucrativeness of this trade than by citing a list which one of the witnesses before parliament Mr. W. Bishop a gun maker delivered in to the committee of cases in which money had recently been extorted from the owners of dogs by dog stealers and their confederates there is no explanation of the space of time included under the vague term recently but the return shows that 151 ladies and gentlemen had been the victims of the dog stealers or dog finders for in this business the words were and still are to a degree synonyms and of these 62 had been so victimised in 1843 and in the 6 months of 1844 from January to July the total amount shown by Mr. Bishop to have been paid for the restoration of stolen dogs was 977 pounds four shillings and sixpence or an average of six pounds ten shillings per individual practised upon this large sum it is stated on the authority of the committee was only that which came within Mr. Bishop's knowledge and formed perhaps at a tenth part in amount of the whole extortion Mr. Bishop was himself in the habit of doing business in obtaining the restitution of dogs and had once known 18 pounds the dog stealers asked 25 pounds given for the restitution of a spaniel the full amount realised by this dog stealing was according to the above proportion 9772 pounds five shillings in 1843 227 pounds three shillings and sixpence was so realised and 97 pounds in the six months of 1844 within Mr. Bishop's personal knowledge and if this be likewise a tenth of the whole of the commerce in this line a years business it appears averaged 2,166 pounds to the stealers or finders of dogs I select a few names from the list of those robbed of dogs either from the amount paid or because the names are well known the first payment cited is from a public board who owned a dog in their corporate capacity board of green cloth eight pounds honourable W. Ashley V. T. note V. T. signifies various times of theft and of restoration end note 15 pounds Sir F. Burdett six pounds six shillings Colonel Udney 12 pounds Duke of Cambridge 30 pounds Count Kilmansig nine pounds Mr. Orby Hunter V. T. 15 pounds Mrs. Holmes V. T. 50 pounds Sir Richard Phillips V. T. 20 pounds the French ambassador one pound 11 shillings and sixpence Sir R. Peel two pounds Sir Edward Morris S. Squire 17 pounds Mrs. Ram V. T. 15 pounds Duchess of Sutherland five pounds Wyndham Bruce S. Squire V. T. 25 pounds Captain Alexander V. T. 22 pounds Sir Delacy Evans three pounds Judge Littledale two pounds Leonino Ipolito S. Squire V. T. 10 pounds Mr. Commissioner Ray five pounds Lord Chumley V. T. 12 pounds Earl Stanhope eight pounds Countess of Charlemont V. T. in 1843 12 pounds Sir Alfred Padgett 10 pounds Count Leodoff V. T. seven pounds Mr. Tharn Whipmaker 12 pounds 12 shillings Mr. White V. T. 15 pounds Colonel Barnard V. T. 14 pounds 14 shillings Mr. T. Holmes 15 pounds Earl of Winchelsea six pounds Lord Warncliffe V. T. 12 pounds Honourable Mrs. Dice Sombra two pounds two shillings Mr. Ud V. T. two shillings Count Vithiani 14 pounds Bishop of Ealy four pounds 10 shillings Count Dorsey 10 pounds Thus these 36 ladies and gentlemen paid 438 pounds five shilling sixpins to rescue their dogs from professional dog stealers or an average per individual of upwards of 12 pounds These dog appropriators found that they could levy contributions not only on royalty for ambassadors, peers courtiers and ladies of rank but on public bodies and on the dignitaries of the state the law, the army and the church became bolder and more expert in their avocations a boldness which was encouraged by the existing law Prior to the parliamentary inquiry dog stealing was not an indictable offence To show this Mr. Commissioner Main quoted Blackstone to the committee quote, as to the animals which do not serve for food and which therefore the law holds to have no intrinsic value as dogs of all sorts and other creatures kept for whim and pleasure though a man may have a base property therein and maintain a simile action for the loss of them yet they are not of such estimation as that the crime of stealing them amounts to larceny end quote The only mode of punishment for dog stealing was by summary conviction the penalty being fine or imprisonment but Mr. Commissioner Main did not know of any instance of a dog stealer being sent to prison in default of payment although the law recognized no property in a dog the animal was taxed and it was complained at the time that an unhappy lady might have to pay tax for the full term upon her dog perhaps a year and a half after he had been stolen from her one old offender who stole the Duke of Beaufort's dog was transported not for stealing the dog but his collar the difficulty of proving the positive theft of a dog was extreme in most cases where the man was not seen actually to seize a dog which could be identified he escaped when carried before a magistrate the dog stealers said Inspector Shackle generally go two together they have a piece of liver they say it is merely Bullock's liver which will entice or tame the wildest or savages dog which there can be in any yard they give it to him and take him from his chain at other times continues Mr. Shackle they will go in the street with a little dog rubbed over with some sort of stuff and will entice valuable dogs away if there is a dog lost or stolen it is generally known within 5 or 6 hours where that dog is and they know almost exactly what they can get for it so that it is a regular system of plunder Mr. G White dealer in livestock, dogs and other animals and at one time a dealer in lions and tigers and all sorts of things said of the dog's dealers in turning the corners of streets there are two or three of them together one will snatch up a dog and put it into his apron and the others will stop the lady and say what is the matter and direct the party who has lost the dog in a contrary direction to that taken end quote in this business were engaged from 50 to 60 men half of them actual stealers of the animals the others were the receivers and the go-betweens or restorers the thief kept the dog perhaps for a day or two at some public house and he then took it to a dog dealer with whom he was connected in the way of business these dealers carried on a trade in honest dogs as one of the witnesses styled them meaning dogs honestly acquired but some of them dealt principally with the dog's dealers their depots could not be entered by the police being private premises without a search warrant and direct evidence was necessary to obtain a search warrant and of course a stranger in quest of a stolen dog would not be admitted some of the dog dealers would not purchase or receive dogs known to have been stolen but others bought and speculated in them if an advertisement appeared offering a reward for the dog a negotiation was entered into if no reward was offered the owner of the dog who was always either known or made out was waited upon by a restorer who took to restore the dog if terms could be come to a dog belonging to Colonel Fox was once kept six weeks before the thieves would consent to the Colonel's terms one of the most successful restorers was a shoemaker and mixed little with the actual dealers the dog dealers however acted as restorers frequently enough if the person robbed paid a good round sum for the restoration of a dog and paid it speedily one was almost certain to be stolen a second time and a higher sum was then demanded sometimes the thieves threatened that if they were any longer trifled with they would inflict torture on the dog or cut its throat one lady, Miss Brown of Bolton Street was so worried by these threats and by having twice to redeem her dog that she has left England said Mr Bishop and I really do believe for the sake of keeping the dog it does not appear as far as the evidence shows that these threats of torture or death were ever carried into execution some of the witnesses had merely heard of such things the shoemaker alluded to was named Taylor and Inspector Shackle thus described this person's way of transacting business in the dog restoring line quote there is a man named Taylor who is one of the greatest restorers in London of stolen dogs through Mr Bishop note Mr Bishop was a gun maker in Bond Street end note it is a disgrace to London that any person should encourage a man like that to go to extort money from ladies and gentlemen especially a respectable man a gentleman applied to me to get a valuable dog that was stolen with a chain on his neck and the name on the collar and I heard Mr Bishop himself say that it cost £6 not for less Captain Vance Dirt the owner of the dog came out I asked him particularly will you give me a description of the dog on a piece of paper and that is his writing note producing a paper end note I went and made enquiry and the captain himself who lives in Belgrave Square said he had no objection to give £4 for the recovery of the dog but would not give the £6 I went and took a good deal of trouble about it I found out that Taylor first went to ascertain what the owner of the dog would give for it and then went and offered £1 for the dog then £2 and at last purchased it for £3 and went and told Captain Vance Dirt that he had given £4 for the dog and the dog went back through the hands of Mr Bishop end quote the restorer had it appears the lion's share in the profits of this business one witness had known of as much as 10 guineas being given for the recovery of a favourite spaniel or as the witness styled it for working a dog back and only 2 of these guineas being received by the party the wronged individual thus delicately intimated as the party was the thief the same witness, Mr Hobdell knew £14 given for the restoration of a little red scotch terrier which he as a dog dealer valued at 4 shillings one of the coolest instances of the organisation and boldness of the dog dealers was in the case of Mr Fitzroy Kelly's favourite scotch terrier the parties possessing it through theft asked £12 for it and urged that it was a reasonable offer considering the trouble they were obliged to take quote the dog dealers were obliged to watch every night they contended through Mr Bishop and very diligently Mr Kelly kept them out very late from their homes before they could get the dog he used to go out to dinner or down to the temple and take the dog with him they had a deal of trouble before they could get it so Mr Kelly was expected not only to pay more than the value of his dog but an extra amount on account of the care he had taken of his terrier and for the trouble his vigilance had given to the thieves the matter was settled at £6 Mr Kelly's case was but one instance among the most successful of the practitioners in this street finding business were Mr's ginger and carrots but a parliamentary witness was inclined to believe that ginger and carrots were nicknames for the same individual one Barrett although he had been in custody several times he was considered a very superior dog dealer if the stolen dog were of little value it was safest for the stealers to turn him loose if he were of value and unowned and unsought for there was a ready market abroad the stewards stokers or seamen of the Ostend, Antwerp, Rotterdam Hamburg and all the French teamers readily bought stolen fancy dogs sometimes 20 to 30 were taken at a voyage a steward indeed has given £12 for a stolen spaniel as a private speculation dealers too came occasionally from Paris and bought numbers of these animals and at what the dog foragers considered fair prices one of the witnesses Mr Baker a game dealer in Leddenhall market said I have seen perhaps 20 or 30 dogs tied up in a little room and I should suppose every one of them was stolen a reward not sufficiently high being offered for their restoration the parties get more money by taking them on board the different steamships and selling them to persons on board or to people coming to this country to buy dogs and take them abroad the following statement derived from Mr Main's evidence shows the extent of the dog's dealing business but only as far as came under the cognisance of the police it shows the number of dogs lost or stolen and of persons charged with the offence and convicted or discharged nearly all the dogs returned as lost I may observe were stolen but there was no evidence to show the positive theft 1841 dog stolen 43 dogs lost 521 persons charged 51 convicted 19 discharged 32 1842 dogs stolen 54 dogs lost 561 persons charged 45 convicted 17 discharged 28 1843 dogs stolen 60 dogs lost 606 persons charged 38 convicted 18 discharged 20 in what proportion the police known thefts stood to the whole number there was no evidence given nor I suppose could it be given the dog stealers were not considered to be connected with housebreakers though they might frequent the same public houses Mr Main pronounced these dog stealers a genus a peculiar class what they called dog fanciers and dog stealers a sort of half sporting betting characters the law on the subject of dog stealing 8th and 9th year of the reign of victoria chapter 47 now is that quote if any person shall steal any dog every such offender shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor and being convicted thereof before any two or three justices of the peace shall for the first offence at the discretion of the said justices either be committed to the common jail or house of correction there to be imprisoned only or be imprisoned and kept to hard labour for any term not exceeding six calendar months or shall forfeit and pay over and above the value of the said dog such some of money not exceeding 20 pounds as to the said justices shall seem meet and if any person so convicted shall afterwards be guilty of the same offence every such offender shall be guilty of an indictable misdemeanor and being convicted thereof shall be liable to suffer such punishment by fine or imprisonment with or without hard labour or by both as the court in its discretion shall award provided such imprisonment do not exceed 18 months end quote of a dog finder a lurker's career concerning a dog finder I received the following account from one who had received the education of a gentleman but whom circumstances had driven to an association with a vagrant class and who has written the dog finder's biography from personal knowledge a biography which shows the variety that often characterises the career of the lurker or street adventurer if your readers, writes my informant have passed the rubicon of 40 years in the wilderness memory must bring back the time when the feet of their childish pilgrimage have trodden a beautiful grass-plot now converted into Belgrave Square when Pimlico was a village out of town and the five fields of Chelsea were fields indeed to write the biography of a living character is always delicate as to embrace all its particulars is difficult but of the truthfulness of my account there is no question probably about the year of the great frost 1814 a French Protestant refugee named La Roche sought asylum in this country not from persecution but from difficulties of a commercial character he built for himself in Chelsea a cottage of wood nondescript in shape but pleasant in locality and with ample accommodations for himself and his son wife he had none this little bizarre of mud and sticks to the construction on which the Sunday visitors to Ranila used to sit and sip their curds and whey while from the entrance far removed in those days from competition there stood up reared as ensign of the place of blue and red and white a checkered mace on which the paper lantern hung to tell how cheap its owner shaved you and how well things went on smoothly for a dozen years when the old Frenchman lived this life his body carried on the business for a few months when frequent complaints of Sunday gambling on the premises and loud whispers of suspicion relative to the concealment of stolen goods induced Chelsea George the name the youth had acquired to sell the goodwill of the house fixtures and all and at the eastern extremity of London to embark in business as a mush or mushroom faker independently of his appropriation of umbrellas proper to the mushroom fakers calling Chelsea George was by no means scrupulous concerning other little matters within his reach and if the proprietors of the swell cribs within his beat had no umbrellas to mend or oldens to sell he would ease the pegs in the passage of the encumbrance of a great coat and telegraph the same out of sight by a colleague while the servant went in to make the desired enquiries at last he was bowled out in the very act of nailing a yak note stealing a watch and note he expiated as it is called this offence by three months exercise on the cock chaffer note treadmill and note unaccustomed as yet to the novelty of the exercise he fell through the wheel and broke one of his legs he was of course permitted to finish his time in the infirmary of the prison and on his liberation was presented with five pounds out of the sheriff's fund although as I have before stated he had never been out of England since his childhood he had some little hereditary knowledge of the French language and by the kind and voluntary recommendation of one of the police magistrates of the metropolis he was engaged by an Irish gentleman proceeding to the continent as a sort of supernumerary servant to make himself generally useful as the gentleman was unmarried and mostly stayed at hotels George was to have permanent wages and find himself a condition he invariably fulfilled if anything was left in his way frequent intemperance neglect of duty and unaccountable departures of property from the portmanteau of his master led to his dismissal and Chelsea George was left without friends or character to those resources which have supported him for some thirty years during his umbrella enterprise he had lived in lodging houses of the lowest kind and of course mingled with the most depraved society especially with the vast army of trading sturdy mendicants male and female, young and old who assume every guys of property, misfortune and disease which craft and ingenuity can devise or well-tutored hypocrisy can imitate thus initiated Chelsea George could go upon any lurk could be in the last stage of consumption actually in his dying hour but now and then convalescent for years and years together he could take fits and counterfeit blindness be a respectable broken down tradesman or a soldier maimed in the service and dismissed without a pension thus qualified this could be either very new or very perplexing and he commenced operations without delay and pursued them long without desertion the first move in his mendicant career was taking them on the fly which means meeting the gentry on their walks and beseaching or at times menacing them till something is given something in general was given to get rid of the annoyance and till the game got stale morning and evening produced a harvest of success and ministered to an occasion of debauchery his less popular but more upright father had once been a dog fancier and George after many years with his attitude at length took a fancy to the same profession but not on any principles recognised by commercial laws with what success he has practised the ladies and gentlemen about the west end have known to their loss and disappointment for more than 15 years past although the police have been and still are on the alert George has in every instance hitherto escaped punishment while numerous detections connected with escape have enabled the offender to hold these officials at defiance the modus operandi upon which George proceeds is to varishes hands with a sort of gelatine composed of the coarsest pieces of liver fried pulverised and mixed up with tincture of myrrh note this is the composition of which inspector shackle spoke before the select committee but he did not seem to know of what the lure was concocted my correspondent continues end note Chelsea George caresses every animal who seems a likely speck and when his fingers have been rubbed over the dog's noses they become easy and perhaps willing captives a bag carried for the purpose receives the victim and away goes George bag and all to his printers in seven dials two bills and no less two and no more for such is George's style of work are issued to describe the animal that has thus been found and which will be restored to its owner on payment of expenses one of these George puts in his pocket the other he pastes up at a public house whose landlord is fly to its meaning and poor Balwell is sold to a dealer in dogs not very far from sharps alley in course of time the dog is discovered the possessor refers to the establishment where he bought it the dealer makes himself square by giving the address of the chap he bought him off and Chelsea George shows a copy of the advertisement calls in the publican as a witness and leaves the place without the slightest imputation on his character of this man's earnings I cannot speak with precision it is probable that in a good year his clear income is 200 pounds in a bad year but 100 pounds but as he is very adroit I am inclined to believe that the good years somewhat predominate and that the average income may therefore exceed 150 pounds yearly of the present street sellers of dogs it will have been noticed that in the accounts I have given of the former street transactions in dogs there is no mention of the sellers the information I have adduced is a condensation of the evidence given before the select committee of the House of Commons and the inquiry related only to the stealing, finding and restoring of dogs the selling being but an incidental part of the evidence then however as now the street sellers were not implicated in the thefts or restitution of dogs just accept, one man told me as there was a black sheep or two in every flock the black sheep however of this street calling more frequently meddled with restoring than with finding another street dog seller, an intelligent man who however did not know so much as my first informant of the state of the trade in the olden time expressed a positive opinion that no dog stealer was now a street hawker note hawker was the word I found these men use and note his reasons for this opinion in addition to his own judgment from personal knowledge are cogent enough it isn't possible sir he said and this is the reason why we are not a large body of men we stick pretty closely when we are out to the same places it's well known to the police as any men whom they most know by sight at any rate from meeting them every day now if a lady or gentleman has lost a dog or it's been stolen or strayed and the most petted will sometimes stray unaccountably and follow some stranger or other why where does she and he and all the family and all the servants first look for the lost animal why where but at the dogs we are hawking I'd rather be done now and it isn't done in my knowledge and it oughtn't to be done I'd rather make five shillings on an honest dog than five pounds on one that wasn't if there was no risk about it either other information convinces me that this statement is correct of these street sellers or hawkers there are now about 25 there may be however but 20 if so many on any given day in the streets as there are always some chained at home by other avocations connected with their line of life the places they chiefly frequent are the quadrant and Regent Street generally but the quadrant far the most indeed before the removal of the colonnade one half at least of all the dog sellers of London would resort there on a very wet day as they had the advantage of shelter and generally of finding a crowd assembled either lounging to pass the time or waiting for a fair lift and so with leisure to look at dogs the other places are the West End Squares the Banks of the Certain Time Charing Cross the Royal Exchange and the Bank of England and the Parks generally they visit to any public place to which there may be a temporary attraction of the classes likely to be purchasers a mere crowd of people I was told was no good to the dog hawkers it must be a crowd of people that had money such as the assemblage of ladies and gentlemen who crowd the windows of Whitehall and Parliament Street when the Queen opens or prorogues the houses these spectators fill the street and the horse guards portion of the park as soon as the street mass has dispersed and they often afford the means of a good day's work to the dog people two dogs carefully cleaned and combed or brushed are carried in a man's arms for street vending a fine chain is generally attached to a neat collar so that the dog can be relieved from the cramped feel he will experience if kept off his feet too long in carrying these little animals for sale for it is the smaller dogs which are carried the men certainly display them to the best advantage they are longer silken ears they are prominent dark eyes and noses and the delicacy of their fore paws are made as prominent as possible and present what the masses very well call quite a picture I have alluded to the display of the spaniels as they constitute considerably more than half of the street trade in dogs the King Charles's and the Blenheim's being disposed of in nearly equal quantities they are sold for lap dogs pets, carriage companions or companions in a walk and are often intelligent and affectionate their colours are black black and tan white and liver colour chestnut, black and white and entirely white with many shades of these hues and interblendings of them one with another and with grey the small terriers are however coming more into fashion or as the hawkers call it into vogue they are usually black with large muscles and feet and with a keen look their hair being short and smooth some however are preferred with long and somewhat wiry hair and the colour is often strongly mixed with grey a small isle of sky terrier but few I was informed know a real sky is sometimes carried in the streets as well as the little rough dogs known as scotch terriers when a street seller has a litter of terrier pups he invariably selects the handsomest for the streets for it happens, my informant did not know why but he and others were positive that so it was that the handsomest is the worst the worst it must be understood as regards the possession of choice sporting qualities more especially of pluck this terrier's education as regards his prowess in a rat pit is accordingly neglected and if a gentleman ask will he kill rats the answer is in the negative but this is no disparagement to the sale because the dog is sold perhaps for a ladies pet and is not wanted to kill rats or to fight any dog of his weight the pugs for which 40 to 50 years ago and in a diminished degree 30 years back there was in the phrase of the day quite a rage provided only the pug was hideous and no one ever offered in the streets or so rarely that a well known dealer assured me he had only sold one in the streets for two years a leidenhall tradesman fond of dogs but in no way connected with the trade told me that it came to be looked upon that a pug was a fit companion for only snappish old maids and so the women wouldn't have them any longer least of all the old maids french puddles are also of rare street sale one man had a white puddle two or three years ago so fat and so round that a lady who priced it was told by a gentleman with her that if the head and the short legs were removed and the inside scooped out the animal would make a capital muff yet even that puddle was difficult of sale at 50 shillings occasionally also an italian greyhound seeming cold and shivery on the warmest days is born in a hawker's arms or if following on foot trembling and looking sad as if mentally murmuring at the climate in such places as the banks of the serpentine or in the regents park the hawker does not carry his dogs in his arms so much as let them trot along with him in a body and they are sure to attract attention or he sits down and they play or sleep about him one dealer told me that children often took such a fancy for a pretty spaniel that it was difficult for either mother, governess or nurse to drag them away until the man was requested to call in the evening bringing with him the dog which was very often bought or the hawker recompensed for his loss of time but sometimes the dog dealers I heard from several meet with great shabbiness among rich people who recklessly give them no small trouble sometimes put them to expense without the slightest return or even an acknowledgement or a word of apology there's one advantage in my trade said a dealer in live animals we always has to do with principles there's never a lady would let her most favouriteest maid choose her dog for her so no purchases the species which I have enumerated are all that are now sold in the streets with the exception of an odd plum pudding or coach dog note the white dog with dark spots which runs after carriages end note or an odd bulldog or bull terrier or indeed with the exception of odd dogs of every kind the hawkers are however connected with the trade in sporting dogs and often through the medium of their street traffic as I shall show under the next head of my subject there is one peculiarity the hawking of fancy dogs which distinguishes it from all other branches of street commerce the purchasers are all of the wealthier class this has had its influence on the manners of the dog sellers they will be found in the majority of cases quiet and differential men but without servility and with little of the quality of speech and I speak only of speech which among English people is known as gammon Irish people as larney this manner is common to many to the established trainer of race horses for instance who is in constant communication with persons in a very superior position in life to his own and to whom he is exceedingly differential but the trainer feels that in all points connected with his not very easy business as well perhaps as in general turf knowingness his royal highness as was the case once his grace or my lord or Sir John was inferior to himself and so with all his deference there mingles a strain of quiet contempt or rather perhaps of conscious superiority which is one ingredient in the formation of the manners I have hastily sketched the customers of the street hawkers of dogs are ladies and gentlemen who by what may have attracted their admiration the kept mistresses of the wealthier classes are often excellent customers many of them I know was said to me yes and I've known gentlemen by dogs for their misses I couldn't be mistaken when I might be sent on with them which was part of the bargain if it was a too guinea dog or so I was told never to give a hint of the price to the servant or to anybody I know why and not to lay out any great matter of tin to say that what had really cost him two guineas cost him twenty if one of the working classes or a small tradesman by a dog in the streets it is generally because he is off a fancy turn and breeds a few dogs and traffic's in them in hopes of profit the homes of the dog hawkers as far as I had means of ascertaining and all I saw were of the same character are comfortable and very cleanly the small spaniels, terriers and so on I do not now allude to sporting dogs are generally kept in kennels or in small wooden houses erected for the purpose in a back garden or yard these abodes are generally in some open court or little square or grove where there is a free access of air an old man who was sitting at his door in the summer evening when I called upon a dog cellar and had to wait a short time told me that so quiet were his next door neighbours the street hawkers, dogs that for some weeks he did not know his newly come neighbour was a dog man although he was an old, nervous man himself and couldn't bear any unpleasant noise or smell the scrupulous observance of cleanliness is necessary in the rearing or keeping of small fancy dogs without such observance the dog would have a disagreeable odour about it enough to repel any lady buyer it is a not uncommon declaration among dog cellars that the animals are as sweet as nuts let it be remembered that I have been describing the class of regular dog cellars making by an open and established trade a tolerable livelihood the spaniels, terriers and so on the stock of these hawkers are either bred by them and they all breed a few or a good many dogs or they are purchased of dog dealers not street cellars or of people who having a good fancy breed of King Charles's or Blenheim's rear dogs and sell them by the litter to the hawkers the hawkers also buy dogs brought to them in the way of business but they are wary how they buy any animal suspected to be stolen or they may get into trouble one man, a carver and gilder I was informed some ten years back made a good deal of money by his black patched spaniels these dogs had a remarkable black patch over their eyes and so fond was the dog fancier or breeder of them that when he disposed of them to street cellars or others he usually gave a portrait of the animals of his own rude painting these paintings he also sold slightly framed and I have seen them but not so much lately offered in the streets and hung up in poor persons rooms this man lived in York Square behind the Colosseum then a not very reputable quarter it is now Munster Square and of a reformed character but the seller of dogs and the donor of their portraits has for some time been lost sight of the prices at which fancy dogs are sold in the streets are about the same for all towns they run from ten shillings to five pounds five shillings but are very rarely so low as ten shillings as it's only a very scrubby thing for that two and three guineas are frequent street prices for a spaniel or small terrier of the dogs sold as I have before stated more than one half are spaniels of the remainder more than one half are terriers and the surplusage after this reckoning is composed in about equal numbers of the other dogs I have mentioned the exportation of dogs is not above a twentieth of what it was before the appointment of the select committee but a French or Belgium dealer sometimes comes to London to buy dogs it is not easy to fix upon any percentage as to the profit of the street dog sellers there is the keep and the rearing of the animal to consider and there is the same uncertainty in the traffic as in all traffics which depend not upon a demand for use but on the caprices of fashion or to use the more appropriate word when writing on such a subject of fancy a hawker may sell three dogs in one day without any extraordinary effort or in the same manner of trading the very same places may sell only one in three days in the winter the dogs are sometimes offered in public houses but seldom as regards the higher priced animals from the best data I can command it appears that each hawker sells three dogs and a half if you take it that way splitting a dog like every week the year through that is sir four or five one week in the summer when trades brisk are long and only two or three the next week when trade may be flat and in winter when there isn't the same chance end quote calculating then that seven dogs are sold by each hawker in a fortnight at an average price of 50 shillings each which is not a high average and supposing that but 20 men are trading in this line the year through we find that no less a sum than 9100 pounds is yearly expended in the street trade the weekly profit of the hawker is from 25 shillings to 40 shillings more than 7 eighths of these dogs are bred in this country Italian greyhounds included a hawker of dogs gave me a statement of his life but it presented so little of incident or of change that I need not report it he had assisted and then succeeded his father in the business the painstaking, temperate and industrious man sold him taking even a glass of ale so that the tenor of his way had been even and he was prosperous enough I will next give an account of the connection of the hawkers of dogs with the sporting or fancy part of the business and of the present state of dog finding to show the change since the parliamentary investigation I may observe that in this traffic the word fancy has two significations a dog recommended by its beauty or any peculiarity so that it be suitable for a pet dog is a fancy animal so is he if he be a fighter or a killer of rats however ugly or common looking but the term sporting dog seems to become more and more used in this case nor is the first mentioned use of the word fancy at all strained or very original for it is lexical graphically defined as an opinion bread rather by the imagination than the reason inclination liking, caprice, humour, whim, frolic, idle scheme, vagary End of section 8 Section 9 of London Labour and the London Poor Volume 2 by Henry Mayhew this LibriVox recording is in the public domain recording by Gillian Henry of the street sellers of sporting dogs the use, if use it may be styled of sporting or fighting dogs is now a mere nothing to what it once was there are many sports an appellation of many a brute cruelty which have become extinct some of them long extinct herds of bears for instance were once maintained in this country merely to be baited by dogs part of royal merry making it was a sport altogether congenial to the spirit of Henry the 8th and when his daughter then Queen Mary visited her sister Elizabeth at Hatfield House now the residence of the Marques of Salisbury there was a bear baiting for their delectation after mass Queen Elizabeth on her accession to the throne seems to have been very partial to the baiting of bears and of bulls for she not unfrequently welcomed a foreign ambassador with such exhibitions the historians of the day intimate they dared do no more that Elizabeth affected these rough sports the most in the decline of life when she wished to seem still sprightly, active and healthful in the eyes of her courtiers and her subjects Lainham, whose veracity has not been impeached though Sir Walter Scott has pronounced him to be as thorough a coxcomb as ever blotted paper thus describes a bear bait in presence of the Queen and after quoting his description I gladly leave the subject I make the citation in order to show and contrast the former with the present use of sporting dogs quote it was a sport very pleasant to see the bear with his pink eyes leering after his enemies approach the nimbleness and weight of the dog and the advantage and the force and experience of the bear again to avoid his assaults if he were bitten in one place how he would pinch in another to get free that if he were taken once then by what shift with biting with clawing, with roaring and tossing and tumbling he would work and wind himself from them and when he was loose to shake his ears twice or thrice with the blood and the slaver at his physiognomy end quote the suffering which constituted the great delight of the sport was even worse than this in bull baiting for the bull gored or tossed the dogs to death more frequently than the bear worried or crushed them the principal place for the carrying on of these barbarities was at Paris garden not far from Saint Saviour's church Sutherk with and without blows at these places gave a proverbial expression to the language the place was like a bear garden for gardens they were called these pastimes beguiled the Sunday afternoons more than any other time and were among the chief delights of the people until writes Dr Henry collating the opinions of the historians of the day until the refined amusements of the drama possessing themselves by degrees of the public taste if they did not mend the morals of the age at least forced brutal barbarity to quit the stage of this sport in Queen Anne's days struts industry has collected advertisements telling of bear and bull baiting at Hockley in the hole and Tuttlefields Westminster and of dogfights at the same place Marley bone was another locality famous for these pastimes and for its breed of mastiffs which dogs were most used for baiting the bears whilst bull dogs were the antagonists of the bull gay who was a sufficiently close observer and a close observer of street life too as is well shown in his trivia specifies these localities in one of his fables quote both Hockley hole and Mary bone the combats of my dog have known end quote hole was not far from Smithfield market in the same localities the practice of these sports lingered becoming less and less every year until about the middle of the last century in the country bull baiting was practised 20 times more commonly than bear baiting for bulls were plentiful and bears were not there are perhaps none of our older country towns without the relic of its bull ring a strong iron ring made into a large stone in the pavement to which the baited bull was tied or a knowledge of the site where the bull ring was the deets of the baiting dogs were long talked of by the vulgar these sports and the dogfights maintained the great demand for sporting dogs in former times the only sporting dogs now in request a part of course from hunting and shooting remnants of the old barbarous delight in torture or slaughter for I am treating only of the street trade to which foxhounds, harriers, pointers setters, cockers and so on and so on are unknown are terriers and bull terriers bull dogs cannot now be classed as sporting but only as fancy dogs for they are not good fighters I was informed one with another their mouths being too small the way in which the sale of sporting dogs is connected with street traffic is in this wise occasionally a sporting dog is offered for sale in the streets and then of course the trade is direct at other times gentlemen buying or pricing the smaller dogs ask the cost of a bulldog or a bull terrier or rat terrier and the street seller at once offers to supply them and either conducts them to a dog dealers with whom he may be commercially connected and where purchase those dogs or he waits upon them at their residencies with some likely animals a dog dealer told me that he hardly knew what made many gentlemen so fond of bull dogs and they were the funder on them the more black ardour and environment looking the creature was although now they were useless for sport and the great praise of a bulldog never flew but at head in his life was no longer to be given to him as there were no bulls at whose head he could now fly another dog dealer informed me with what truth as to the judgment concerning horses I do not know but no doubt with accuracy as to the purchase of the dogs that Ibrahim Pacha when in London thought little of the horses which he saw but was delighted with the bulldogs and he weren't so very unlike one in the face himself was said at the time by some of the fancy Ibrahim it seems but two of the finest and largest bulldogs in London of Bill George giving no less than 70 pounds for the twain the bulldogs now sold by the street folk or through their agency in the way I have described are from £5 to £25 each the bull terriers of the best blood are about the same price or perhaps 10 to 15% lower and rarely attaining the tip top price the bull terriers as I have stated are now the chief fighting dogs but the patrons of those combats of those small imitations of the savage tastes of the Roman Coliseum made a plur the decay of the amusement from the beginning until well on to the termination of the last century it was not uncommon to see announcements of 20 dogs to fight for a collar such advertisements were far more common at the commencement than towards the close of the century until within these 12 years indeed dog matches were not unfrequent in London and the favourite time for the regalment was on Sunday mornings there were dog pits in Westminster and elsewhere to which the admission was not very easy for only known persons were allowed to enter the expense was considerable the risk of punishment was not a trifle and it is evident that this Sunday game was not supported by the poor or working classes now dog fights are rare there's not any public dog fights I was told and very seldom any in a pit at a public house but there's a good deal of it I know at the private houses of the knobs I may observe that the knobs is a common designation for the rich among these sporting people there are however occasionally dog fights in a sporting house and the order of the combat is thus described to me quote or more than a minute if a dog won't go to the scratch out of his corner he loses the fight if they fight on why to settle it one must be killed though that very seldom happens for if a dog's very much punished he creeps to his corner and don't come out to time and so the fight settled sometimes it's agreed beforehand that the master of a dog may give in for him sometimes that isn't to be allowed but there's next to nothing of this now unless it's in private among the knobs end quote it has been said that a sportsman perhaps in the relations of life a benevolent man when he has failed to kill a grouse or pheasant outright and proceeds to grasp the fluttering and agonized bird and smash its skull against the barrel of his gun reconciles himself to the sufferings he inflicts by the pride of art the consciousness of skill that has brought down his bird at a long shot that too when he cares nothing for the possession of the bird the same feeling hardens him against the most piteous women like cry of the hare so shot that it cannot run be this as it may it cannot be urged that in matching a favourite dog there can be any such feeling to destroy the sympathy the men who thus amuse themselves are then utterly insensible to any pang at the infliction of pain upon animals witnessing the affliction of it merely for a passing excitement and in this insensibility the whole race who cater to such recreations of the wealthy as well as the wealthy themselves participate there is another feeling too at work and one proper to the sporting character every man of this class considers the glories of his horse or his dog his own feeling very dear to selfishness the main sport now however in which dogs are the agents is rat hunting it is called hunting but as the rats are all confined in a pit it is more like mere killing of this sport I have given some account under the head of rat catching the dogs used are all terriers and are often the property of the street sellers the most accomplished of this terrier race was the famous dog the eclipse of the rat pit he is now enshrined for a stuffed carcass is all that remains of Billy in a case in the possession of Charlie Hyslop of the seven bells behind St. Giles church with whom Billy lived and died his great feat was that he killed 100 rats in five minutes I understand however that it is still a moot point in the sporting world whether Billy did or did not exceed the five minutes by a very few seconds a merely average terrier will easily kill 50 rats in a pit in eight minutes but many far exceed such a number one dealer told me that he would back a terrier bitch which did not weigh 12 pounds to kill 100 rats in six minutes the price of these dogs ranges with that of the bull terriers the passion for rat hunting is evidently on the increase and seems to have attained the popularity once vouchsafed to cock fighting there are now about 70 regular pits in London besides a few that are run up for temporary purposes the landlord of a house in the borough familiar with these sports told me that they would soon have to breed rats for a sufficient supply but it is not for the encounter with dogs alone the issue being that so many rats shall be killed in a given time that these vermin are becoming a trade commodity another use for them is announced in the following card a ferret match a rare evening sport for the fancy will take place at the Blank Blank Street, New Road on Tuesday evening next May 27th Mr Blank has backed his ferret against Mr WB's ferret to kill six rats each for 10 shillings aside he is still open to match his ferret for £1 to £5 to kill against any other ferret in London two other matches with terriers will come off the same evening matches take place every Blank evening, rats always on hand for the accommodation of gentlemen to try their dogs under the management of Blank as a rat killer a ferret is not to be compared to a dog but his use is to kill rats in holes inaccessible to dogs or to drive the vermin out of their holes into some open space where they can be destroyed ferrets are worth from £1 to £4 they are not animals of street sale the management of these sports is principally in the hands of the street dog sellers as indeed is the dog trade generally they are the breeders dealers and sellers they are compelled as it were to put their dogs in the streets that they may attract the attention of the rich who would not seek them in their homes in the suburbs the evening business in rat hunting and so on for such it is principally perhaps doubles the incomes I have specified as earned merely by street sale the amount turned over in the trade in sporting dogs yearly in London was computed for me by one of the traders at from £12,000 to £15,000 he could not however lay down any very precise statistics as some bull dogs bull terriers and so on were bred by butchers, tanners publicans, horse dealers and others and disposed of privately in my account of the former condition of the dog trade I had to dwell principally on the stealing and restoring of dogs this is now the least part of the subject the alteration in the law consequent upon the parliamentary inquiry soon wrought a great change especially the enactment of the sixth section in the act of the eighth and ninth reign of Victoria, Chapter 47 quote end quote there may now I am informed be half a dozen fellows who make a precarious living by dog stealing these men generally keep out of the way of the street dog sellers who would not scruple they assure me to denounce their practices as the more security a purchaser feels in the property and possession of a dog the better it is for the regular business one of these dog stealers dressed like a line burner they generally appear as mechanics was lately seen to attempt the enticing away of a dog any idle good for nothing fellow slinking about the streets would also I was informed sees any stray dog within his reach and sell it for any trifle he could obtain one dealer told me that there might still be a little doing in the restoring way and with that way of life were still mixed up names in the parliamentary inquiry but it was a mere nothing to what it was formerly from a man acquainted with the dog business I had the following account my informant was not at present connected with the dog and rat business but he seemed to have what is called a hankering after it he had been a pot boy in his youth and had assisted at the bar of public houses and so had acquired a taste for sporting as some fancy coves were among the frequenters of the tap room and skittle ground he had speculated a little in dogs which a friend reared and he sold to the public house customers at last I went slap into the dog trade he said but I did no good at all there's a way to do it I dare say or perhaps you must wait to get known but then you may starve as you wait I tried Smithfield first it's a good bit since but I can't say how long and I had a couple of tidy little terriers that we'd bred I thought I'd begin cheap to turn over money quick so I asked 12 shillings a piece for them oh and course they weren't a very pure sort but I couldn't sell at all if a grazier or a butcher or anybody looked at them and asked their figure they'd say 12 shillings a dog what ain't worth more nor 12 shillings ain't worth a damn I asked one gent a sovereign but there was a lad near that sung out why you only asked 12 shillings a bit since ain't you a coming yet after that I was glad to get away I had five dogs when I started and about one pound eight shilling sixpence and money and some middling clothes but my money soon went for I could do no business and there was the rent and then the dogs must be properly fed or they'd soon show it at last when things grew uncommon taper I almost grudged the poor things their meat and their sop for they were filling their bellies and I was an hungry I got so seedy too that it was no use trying the streets for anyone would think I'd stole the dogs so I sold them one by one I think I got about five shillings a piece for them for people took their advantage on me after that I fasted often enough I helped about the pits of any kind cleaning knives and spittoons at a public house and such like for a bite and sop and I sometimes got leave to sit up all night in a stable or any outhouse with a live rat trap that I could always borrow and catch rats to sell to the dealers if I could get three lively rats in a night it was good work for it was as good as a shilling to me I sometimes won a pint or a tanner when I could cover it by betting on a rat hunt with helpers like myself but it was only a few places we were let into just where I was known because I'm a good judge of a dog you see and if I had it to try over again I think I could knock a tidy living out of dog selling yes I'd like to try well enough but it's no use trying if you haven't a fairish bit of money I'd only myself to keep all this time but that was one too many I got leave to sleep in haylofts or stables or anywhere and I have slept in the park I don't know how many months I was living this way I got not to mind it much at last then I got to carry out the day and night beers for a potman which had hurt his foot and couldn't walk quick and long enough for supplying his beer as there was five rounds every day he lent me an apron and a jacket to be decent after that I got a Potsman's situation no I'm not much in the dog and rat line now and I don't see much of it for a very little opportunity but I have a very nice scotch terrier to sell if you should be wanting such a thing or hear of any of your friends wanting one it's dirt cheap at 30 shillings just about a year old yes I generally has a dog and swaps and sells most masters allows that in a quiet respectable way end quote