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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Here , and in the shops immediately adjoining , the working classes generally purchase their Sunday ' s dinner ; and after pay-time on Saturday night , or early on Sunday morning , the crowd in the New-cut , and the Brill in particular , is almost impassable . Indeed , th j .-cene in these parts has more the character of a fcm than a market . There are hundreds of stalls , and ev < iy stall has its one or two lights ; either it is illuminated hy the intense white light of the new self-generating gas-lamp , of else it is brightened up by the red smoky flame of the old-fashioned grease lamp . One man shows off his yellow haddock with a candle stuck in a bundle of firewood ; his neighbour makes a candlestick of a
huge turnip , and the tallow gutters over its sides ; whilst the boy shouting ' Eight a penny , stunning pears !' has rolled his dip in a thick coat of brown paper , that flares away with the candle . Some stalls are crimson with the fire shining through the holes beneath the baked" chestnut stove ; others have handsome octohedral lamps , wh le a few have a candle shining through a sieve ; these , with the sparkling ground-glass globes of the tea-dealers' shops , and the butchers' gaslights streaming and fluttering in the wind , like flags of flame , pour forth such a flood of light that at a distance the atmosphere immediately above the spot is as lurid as if the street were on fire .
" The pavement and the road are crowded with purchasers and street . sellers . The housewife in her thick shawl , with the market-basket on her arm , walks slowly op , stopping now to look at the stall of caps , and now to cheapen a bunch of greens . Little boys , holding three or four onions in their hand , creep between the people , wriggling their way through every interstice , and asking for custom in whining tones , as if seeking charity . Then the tumult of the thousand different cries of the eager dealers , all shouting at the top of their voices , at one and the same time , is almost bewildering . ' So old a ? ain , ' roars one . ' Chestnuts all ' ot , a penny a score , '
bawls another . 'An ' ajpenny a skin , blacking , ' squeaks a boy . ' Buy , buy . buy , buy , buy—bu-uy ! ' cries the butcher . ' Half-quire of paper for a penny , ' bellows the street stationer . 'An ' aypennya lot ing-uns . ' ' Twopence a pound grapes . ' ' Three a penny Yarmouth bloaters . ' ' Who'll buy a bonnet for fourpence ? ' Pick ' em out cheap here ! three pair for a halfpenny , bootlaces . ' 'Now ' s your time ! beautiful whelks , a penny a lot . ' ' Here ' s ha' [/ orths , ' shouts the perambulating confectioner . ' Come and look at ' em ! here ' s toasters !' bellows one with a Yarmouth bloater stuck on a toastingfork . Penny a lot , fine russets , ' calls the apple woman : and so the Babel goes on .
"One man stands with his red-edged mats hanging over his back and chest , like a herald's coat ; and the girl with her basket of walnuts lifts her brown-stained ringers to rur month , as she screams , Fine warnuts sixteen a penny , fine war-r-nu's . ' A bootmaker , to * ensure custom , ' has illuminated his shop-front with a line of » as , and in its full R larr ? stands a blind beggar , his eyes turned tip so as to show only ' ( he whites , 'and mumbling some l » e lin ing rhynirs , that are drowned in the shrill notes of the bamboo-flu le-player next to him . The boy's sharp cry , the woman ' s cr . ieked voi < : ;» , the gruff , hoarse shout of the man are all mingled together . Sometimes an Irishman is heaidwil . h his , ' fine ating apples ; ' or else he jingling music of an unseen organ bieaks out , as the tiio of street singers l ' est between the verses .
" Th ^ n the sightR , as you elbow your way through the crowd are equally mid'ifarious . Ileie is a stall glittering with new tin saucepans ; there ai other , bright with its blue and yi-llow crockery , and sparkling with white glass . Now you come to a row of old hIioch arranged along the pavement ; now to a stand of gundy tea trays ; then to a shop with red handkerchiefs and blue checked shirts , fluttering backw irds and forwards * , and a counter built up outside on the kerb , behind wuieb are boys beseeching custom . At the door of a tea-shop , with its hundred white ulnben of light , Mauds a man delivering bill * , thanking the public . lor past favours , and ' defying compcti'ion . ' Here , alongside thero ; id , are floine hall-dozen headless tailorrt' dummies , dressed in Chesterfields and
fu-tii ill jacinth , each labelled , ' Look at the prices , or ' Observe the quality . ' After this is a butclier'M shop , crimson and white with meat , piled up to the fiist-lloor , in front of which the butcher himself , in his blue coat , walks up and down , sharpening his knife on the steel that bangs to his wuint . A little further on stands the clean family , begging ; the father with his head down as if in shame , and a box . of luoifers held forth in his hiinil—the boys in newly washed pinafores , and the tidily got-up mother with a child at her breast . This stall is green and white with bunches of turnips—that red xvith apples , the next yellow with onions , and another purple with pickling cabbages . One minute you pass a man with an umbrella turned inside up and full of prints ; the next , you hear one with a pi-epshow of Ma / . eppa , and
l ' aul Jotit'fl , the pirate , describing the pictures to the boys looking in at the little round windows . Then in heard the sharp snap of the percussion-cap from the crowd of ladn firing at tin ; target for nuts ; mid the moment afterwards , you set- either a black man half clad in white , and shivering in the cold with tracts in his hand , or else yon hear the . sobnds of music from ' I- ' razier' 8 ( , 'ircun , i ; n the other side of the road , and the man outside the door of the penny concert , beseeching you to 4 He in time -be in time ! ' as M r . Somebod y is just about to iiing his favourite song of tin' ' Jvnife ( Jrinder . ' Such , indeed , in the riot , the struggle , and the scramble / or a living that the confusion and uproar of the New-cut on Satuiduy night , have a bewildering and saddening effect open the thoughtful mind . "
On tho Iteli ^ ion of tho (' onIcih Mv . MnyUiwv fijives tiH most interesting dotnils . It in only tin ; Irish who have any religion id- all , in Iho ordinary nchhh of ' . byword , and they are ji I monk all devout <' ,
tibolics , and ' the women chaste , which among the English eosterwomen is scarcely ever the case : — " Religion is a regular puzzle to the costers . They see people come out of church and chapel , and as they ' re mostly well dressed , and there ' s very few of their own sort among the church goers , the costers somehow mix up being religious with being respectable , and so they have a queer sort of feeling about it . It ' s a mystery to them . " Here is a COSTER BOY S VIEW OF XIFE .
" On a Sunday I goes out selling , and all I yarns I keeps . As for going to church , why , I can ' t afford it , — besides , to tell the truth , I don ' t like it well enough . Plays , too , ain ' t in my line much ; I'd sooner go to a dance—its more livelier . The ' penny gaffs' is rather more in my style ; tne songs are out and out , and makes our gals laugh . The smuttier the better , I thinks ; bless you ! the gals likes it as much as we do . If we lads ever has a quarrel , why , we fights for it . If I was to let a cove off once , he'd do it again ; but I never give a lad a chance , so long as I can get anigh him . I never heerd about Christianity ; but if a cove was to fetch me a lick of the head , I'd give it him again , whether he was a big ' un or a little ' un . I'd precious soon see a henemy of
mine shot afore I'd forgive him , —where ' s the use ? Do I understand what behaving to your neighbour is ?—In coorse I do . If a feller as lives next me wanted a basket of mine as I . wasn ' t using , why , he might have it ; if 1 was working it though , I'd see him further ! I can understand that all as lives in a court is neighbours ; but as for policemen , they ' re nothing to me , and I should like to pay ' em all off well . No ; I never heerd about this here creation you speaks about . In coorse God Almighty made the world , and the poor bricklayers' labourers built the houses arterwards—that ' s my opinion ; but I can ' t say , for I ' ve never been in no schools , only always
hard at work , and knows nothing about it . I have ^ heerd a little about our Savioir , —they seem to say he were a goodish kind of a man ; but if he says as how a cove ' s to forgiven feller as hits you , Ishmldsay he know'dnothing about it . In coorse the gals the lads goes an-d lives with thinks our wallopping ' em wery cruel of us , but we don ' t . Why don't we ?—why , because we don't . Before father died , I uged sometimes to say my prayers , but after that mother was too busy getting a living to mind about my praying . Yes , I knows !—in the Lord ' s prayer they says , ' Forgive us our trespasses , as we forgives them as trespasses agin us . ' It ' s a very good thing , in coorse . but no costers can ' t do it . "
We who grumble at the weather because it spoils our pic-nics , or " ruins us in cabs , " how little do we think of the appalling consequences to the poor : — " ' Three wet days , ' I was told by a clergyman , who is now engaged in selling stenographic cards jn the streets , ' will bring the greater part of . 30 , 000 street-people to the brink of starvation . ' This statement , terrible as it is , is not exaggerated . The average number of wet days every year in London is , according to the records of the lloyal Society , 1 G 1—that is to say , rain falls in the metropolis more than three days in each week , and very nearly every other day throughout the year . How precarious a means of living then must street-selling be !" Here is a touch worthy- of Thackeray : —
"Ah ! sir , I wish the parson of the parish , or any parson , sat with me a fortnight ; he'd see what life is then . ' It ' s different , ' a learned man used to say to methat ' s long ago — ' from what ' s noticed from the pew or the pulpit . ' I ' ve missed tho gentleman as used to say that , now many years —1 dont know how many . I never knew his name . lie was drunk now and then , and used to tell me he wa . i mi author . 1 felt for him . A dozen oysters wasn ' t much for him . " Read this account of a laborious life , and then compare the astonishing smallness of crime in proportion to the temptation—the rarity of criminals among so manjr thousands whose honest lives are so precarious : —
" My Irish informant told me he usually had his breakfast at a lodging-house—he preferred a lodginghouse , he said , on account of the warmth and the society . Here he boiled half an ounce of coffee , costing a id . Me purchased of his lundludy the fourth of a quartern loaf ( l . Jd . or l . Jd . ) , for she generally cut a quartern loaf into four for her single nu .-n lodgers , such as himself , clearing sometimes a farthing or two thereby . For dinner , my informant boiled at ( lie lodging-house two or three lb . of potatoes , costing usually Id . or l . Jd ., and fried three , or four herrings , or a « many us cost a penny . He noun-times mashed his potatoes , und . spread over them the herrings , the fatty portion of which flavoured the putiit . oes , which were further flavoured by the roes of the herrings being crushed into them . He drank water to thin meal , and the cost of the whole was
'id . or 2 Jd . A neighbouring nUll-keeper attended to this man ' s mock in hi-s Absence at dinner , and my informant did the Name for him in hi . s turn . l '' or ' tea' he expended Id . on coffee , or l . Jd . on tea , being a ' cup ' of tea , or ' half-pint of , " at a coffee-shop . Sometimes he had a halfpenny-worth of butter , and with bin lea lu- ate the bread he bad nuvcmI from his breakfaHt , and which lie had carried in bin pocket . He liad not butter to liin breukfast , he Hiiid , for In ; could not buy Ichh than a pennyworth about whero he lodged , and thin was too dear for one meal . On a Sunday morning , however , ho freiu--rully hud bum r , Hoincliinen joining wit h a fellow-lodger for a pennyworth ; for hi » Sunday dinner lie had a piece of incut , which ooHt him ' 2 d . on ( he , Saturday iiiirnt Supper ho dispensed with , but if he felt , mucli tireel ho had n hidl-jnntof heer , which was three fiirthiiii » s'' iii bin
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own jug , ' before he went to bed , about nine or ten , as he did little or nothing late at night , except on Saturday . He thus spent 4 $ d . a-day for food , and reckoning 2 $ d . extra for somewhat better fare on a Sunday , his board was 2 s . lOd . a-week . His earnings he computed at 5 s ., and thus he had 2 s . 2 d . weekly for other expenses . Of these there was Is . for lodging ; 2 d . or 3 d . for , washing ( but this not every week ); Jd . for a Sundav morning ' s shave ; Id . ? for his religion' ( as he worded it ) ; and 6 d . for odds and ends , ' such as thread to mend his clothes , a piece of leather to patch hi « shoes , worsted to darn his stockings , &c . "
Books On Our Table
BOOKS ON OUR TABLE
White ' s Natural History of Selborne . "With Additions and Supplementary Notes . By Sir William Jardine . ( Bonn ' s Illustrated Library . ) H - * B ° hn . Among the most charming works on natural history in any language is that universal delight of boyhood and manhood White ' s Selborne , and Mr . Bonn would have issued no more acceptable volume than this , which is illustrated by forty exquisite engravings on tinted paper ; has the notes of Sir William Jardine , and further note * by Edward Jesse * who adds also a biographical sketch of Gilbert White , and an inde ' x . It is a nandsome volume , got up with proper respect for its delightfal contents . Lives of the most Eminent Painters , Sculptors , and Architects . Translated from the Italian of Georgio yasari . With Notes and Illustrations from various Commentators . By Mrs . Jonathan Forster . Vol . II . ( Boan ' s Standard Library . ) H . G . Bohn .
Mrs . Forster continues her careful translation of Vasari , the notes to which form a valuable addition . But the getting up of this volume is not in Mr . Bonn ' s usual style ; the paper is inferior , and the pressing careless . Cesar ' s Commentaries on the Gallic and Civil Wars . With the Supplementary Books attributed to Hirtius , including the Alexandrian , African , and Spanish Wars . With Notes . ( Bohn ' a Classical Library . ) H . G . Bohn . For the first time , a complete translation of Caesar ' s writings is presented us . It includes the authentic and
the doubtful books , with the books attributed to Hirtius and others , besides the fragments quoted in various ancient authors . The translation is by Mr . W . A . M'Devitte , in conjunction with Mr . W . G . Bohn , the eldest son of the publisher We shall offer an opinion after a more careful examination than we have as yet been able to give it . Meanwhile , we may add that the notes are brief and to the purpose—for use not for display—and that there is an index of thirty-two doublecolurnned pages .
Land Drainage , Embankment , and Irrigation . By James Donald , Civil . Engineer . W . S . Orr and Co . A . compact little volumej which sets forth full information on the theory and practice of land drainage in a clear methodical style . It is a handbook , not a treatise , and is meant for practical men . The Pictorial Family Bible , with copious original Notes by J Kitto , D . D . Parti . W . S . Orr and Co . Dr . Kitto ' s edition of the Bible is a work of great reputation for its exhaustive erudition upon . all points illustrative of the manners , hahits , customs , geography , and , so to speak , secular parts of this great record of a great people . Doctrinal interpretation being carefully excluded , the notes may be read by all .
The present edition is a cheap—excessively cheapreissue of the work in thirty monthly parts . The profusion of woodcuts justify the term pictorial , and comprise copies—very rude it is true , yet preserving the design of celeb / ated paintings by the Great Masters ; Michael Angelo ' s Prophets and Patriarchs ; scenes , ceremonies , costumes , coins , and antiquities . It is a fine work to orientalize the mind . Poems . By a Prisoner in Bethlehem . Kilited by John Percival , Kan ., and published for ' the benefit of the Author .
hilingliam Wilson . This is an appeal to charity , and we trust the charitable will answer it . Mr . Pearoe is an inmate of a lunatic asylum , and solaces the weary hours by composing Foetry , which Mr . Percival has published for his benefit , f these poems do not reveal a genius , assuredly they are no less sane than thousands of the volumes which fall from the press . They have even occasional passages of curious felicity , such as we do not always meet with in " poems . " Into the merits of Mr . Percival ' a preliminary essay we cannot enter .
The Receipt-hook for the Million . Containing upwards of 4000 lteeciplH . Dipple , Btrimd . Receipts at a halfpenny each would certainly be cheap enough , and here we have ten pounds' worth at that price for half-a-crown . If a moiety of these are what they profess to be , " attested" and reliable , the book must be a treasure to the housewife .
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The l'hilosojihy of Living . Uy Herbert Mayo , M . I ) . J . W . Parkor . Tail ' s Edinbiiryh Magazine . No . 207 . Himpkin , Jtfaraliall , and Co . Le Juillct , Journal tin ( irand Monde . Kimpkin , Mamhnll , and Co . Thr Development nf IMigum * Lift , in the Modern Christian Church . lllimlruMMl by tin , | , || ,. „ , „! Work of tlrunt Mun . Uy ilcury tfoll > y , Author of " Tl , « Great Atonement . " Hu :. C . 10 . Mudie . Mitccllanirs . Hy WalllM-fd ^ o Imnii . ( TIio Popular Library . )
( iuorgc ltotitl \; being a . Comtm-hennivv . Summary oj the Colonial I'ouseinunu of Great lirltain . (; . Cox . The Dramatic Work * if Shakipeare ; from the text ( J Johnson . ' ^' m ?* ' "'"'/ ' <• ' •<*• Wild ( iiohHariid Not « H . Ufa , See . Uy Willln . iilla / lHt . Vol . I . ( Popular Library . ) ,, i f i » r . George Koiltledrfi anil Co . Ilo'iseholil Narrative , llint . ic / illld H ' inilx
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204 CD * itLt&Htt . [ Saturday ,
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 1, 1851, page 204, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1872/page/16/
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