Old London street cries and cries of to-day

THE “Cries” have been sufficiently well received in bolder form to induce the publication of this additionally illustrated extension at a more popular price.

DATES, unless in the form of the luscious fruit of Smyrna, are generally dry. It is enough therefore to state that the earliest mention of London Cries is found in a quaint old ballad entitled “London Lyckpenny,” or Lack penny, by that prolific writer, John Lydgate, a Benedictine monk of Bury St. Edmunds, who flourished about the middle of the fifteenth century.

These cries are particularly quaint, and especially valuable as a record of the daily life of the time.

* * * * * * *

“I love a Ballad in print, a’life; for then we are sure they are true.”—Winter’s Tale, Act. iv., Sc. iv.

* * * * * * *

Since Lydgate’s time the cries of London have been a stock subject for ballads and children’s books, of which, in various forms, some hundreds must have appeared within the last two centuries. The cuts, unless from the hand of a Rowlandson or a Cruikshank, are usually of the mechanical order; and one finds copies of the same illustrations, though differently treated, constantly reappearing.

In the books there is usually a cut on each page, with a cry printed above or underneath, and in addition a verse of descriptive poetry, which, if not of the highest order, serves its purpose.

A well-known collection is that entitled “Habits & Cryes of the City of London, drawne after the Life; P. [Pearce] Tempest, excudit,” containing seventy-four plates, drawn by Marcellus Laroon [Lauron], and republished in 1711. The first edition, with only fifty illustrations, had appeared some three-and-twenty years earlier; and many of the copper-plates in the later issue were so altered as to bring the costume into the fashion of the time of republication. The hats had their high crowns cut down into low; and shoe-buckles were substituted for laces. Otherwise the plates,—with the exception of some of the faces, which were entirely re-engraved,—were left in their original condition.[4] The letter-press descriptions are in English, French, and Italian. The engraver, Marcellus Lauron, or Captain Laroon, who was born in London, has left on record that his family name was Lauron, but being always called Laroon, he adopted that spelling in early life. Of the seventy-four plates, those representing eccentric characters, etc., are omitted from the list that follows:—

“I remember,” says Hone, “that pins were disposed of in this manner, in the streets by women. Their cry was a musical distich:—

Ripe Strawberryes!

“Three Rows a Penny pins!”

“Buy a fine Singing Bird?”

“Fine Writeing Ink!”

“Buy a Fork or a Fire Shovel?”

In a series of early prints in the Bridgewater library, from copper plates, by an unknown artist, probably engraved between 1650 and 1680, there is one thus titled: “Some broken Breade and meate for ye poore prisoners: for the Lorde’s sake pittey the poore.” Within the memory of our fathers a tin box was put out from a grated window in the Fleet prison, a prisoner meanwhile imploring the public to remember the poor debtors. In the “Cries of York, for the amusement of young children,” undated, but published probably towards the end of the last century, are the following lines:—

“Fine Oysters!”

The cry of “Marking Stones,” which marked black or red, and preceded the daintier cedar-encased lead pencil of our own time, is not mentioned by Laroon. J. T. Smith,[5] says that the colour of the red marking-stone was due to “Ruddle,” a colour not to be washed out, and that fifty years ago (he wrote in 1839) it was the custom at cheap lodging-houses to mark with it on linen the words, “Stop thief!”

The following lines are from a sheet of London Cries, twelve in number, undated, but probably of James the Second’s time:—

In the British Museum is a folio volume containing another curious little collection, on three sheets, of early London cries; also undated and of foreign

“Troope every one!”

workmanship, but attributable to the time of Charles II. The first sheet has a principal representation of a rat-catcher with a banner emblazoned with rats; he is attended by an assistant boy, and underneath are these lines:—

Then come the following cries:

“Milk below, Maids!”

The principal figure on the second sheet is the “Belman,” with halberd, lanthorn, and dog.

This is followed by:

“Sixpence a pound, Fair Cherryes!”

The public “Cryer” on the third sheet, who bears a staff and keys, humorously speaks as follows:

Then follow:

“Songs, penny a sheet!”

From all this it will be seen that merchandise of almost every description was formerly “carried and cried” in the streets. When shops were little more than open shanties, the apprentice’s cry of “What d’ye lack, what d’ye lack, my masters?” was often accompanied by a running description of the goods on sale, together with personal remarks, complimentary or otherwise, to likely and unlikely buyers.

A very puzzling London Cry, yet at one time a very common one, was “A tormentor for your fleas!”[6] What the instrument so heralded could have been, one can but dimly guess. A contributor to Fraser’s Magazine, tells us that in a collection of London Cries appended to Thomas Heywood’s Rape of Lucrece (1608), he gives us this one: “Buy a very fine mouse-trap, or a tormentor for your fleaes;” and the cry of the mouse-trap man in Ben Jonson’s Bartholomew Fair (1614), is, “Buy a mouse-trap, a mouse-trap, or a tormentor for a flea.” The flea-trap is also alluded to in The Bonduca of Beaumont and Fletcher, and in Travels of Twelve-Pence, by Taylor, the Water Poet; and it reappears in a broadside in the Roxburgh Collection of Ballads, “The Common Cries of London” [dated 1662, but probably written a hundred years earlier]: “Buy a trap, a mouse-trap, a torment for the fleas!” When the great Bard of the Lake School was on a tour, he made a call at an inn where Shelley happened to be; but the conversation, which the young man would fain have turned to philosophy and poetry and art, was almost confined to the elder poet’s prosaic description of his dog as “an excellent flea-trap.” It may be assumed that fleas were plentiful when this cry was in vogue; and it may have been that the trap was part of the (undressed?) skin of an animal with the hair left on, in which fleas would naturally take refuge, drowning, perhaps, being their ultimate fate. But all this is mere conjecture.

It was unlikely that so close an observer of London life as Addison should leave unnoticed the Cries of London; and the Spectator is interspersed with occasional allusions to them. In No. ccli. we read: “There is nothing which more astonishes a Foreigner, and frights a Country Squire, than the Cries of London. My good Friend Sir Roger often declares that he cannot get them out of His Head, or go to sleep for them, the first Week that he is in Town. On the contrary, Will Honeycomb calls them the Ramage de la Ville, and prefers them to the Sounds of Larks and Nightingales, with all the Musick of the Fields and Woods.”

In Steele’s comedy of The Funeral, Trim tells some ragged soldiers, “There’s a thousand things you might do to help out about this town, as to cry Puff-Puff Pyes; have you any Knives or Scissors to grind? or late in an evening, whip from Grub Street strange and bloody News from Flanders; Votes from the House of Commons; Buns, rare Buns; Old Silver Lace, Cloaks, Sutes or Coats; Old Shoes, Boots or Hats.”

Gay, too, who, in his microscopic lyric of the streets, Trivia, omitted little, thus sings of various street cries:—

* * * * * * *

“Buy a doll, Miss?”

Sadly he tells the tale of a poor Apple girl who lost her life on the frozen Thames:—

Street cries have, before now, been made the vehicle for Political Caricature, notably in The Pedlars, or Scotch Merchants of London (1763) attributed to the Marquis Townshend, which has particular reference to Lord Bute. Eliminating the political satire, we get a long list of street cries. The pedlars march two and two, carrying, of course, their wares with them. The vendors of food are numerous. One calls out “Dumplings, ho!” another, who carries a large can, wishes to know “Who’l have a dip and a wallop for a bawbee?”[A] Then come “Hogs Puddings;” “Wall Fleet Oysters;” “New Mackrel;” “Sevil Oranges and Lemons;” “Barcelona Philberts;” “Spanish Chestnuts;” “Ripe Turkey Figs;” “Heart Cakes;” “Fine Potatoes;” “New-born Eggs, 8 a groat;” “Bolognia Sausages.” Miscellaneous wants are met with “Weather Cocks for little Scotch Courtiers;” “Bonnets for to fit English heads;” “Laces all a halfpenny a piece;” “Ribbons a groat a yard;” “Fine Pomatum;” “Buy my Wash Balls, Gemmen and Ladies;” “Fine Black Balls” (Blacking); “Buy a Flesh Brush;” “Buy my Brooms;” “Buy any Saveall or Oeconomy Pans, Ladies;” “Water for the Buggs;”[7] “Buy my pack-thread;” “Hair or Combings” (for the manufacture of Wigs); “Any Kitchen Stuff;” “Buy my Matches.”

Addison accuses the London street criers of cultivating the accomplishment of crying their wares so as not to be understood; and in that curious medley of bons-mots and biographical sketches, “The Olio,” by Francis Grose,—dated 1796, but written probably some twenty years earlier,—the author says, “The variety of cries uttered by the retailers of different articles in the streets of London make no inconsiderable part in its novelty to strangers and foreigners. An endeavour to guess at the goods they deal in through the medium of language would be a vain attempt, as few of them convey any articulate sound. It is by their tune and the time of day that the modern cries of London are to be discriminated.”

J. T. Smith says that the no longer heard cry of “Holloway Cheese-Cakes” was pronounced “All my Teeth Ache;” and an old woman who sold mutton dumplings in the neighbourhood of Gravel Lane called, “Hot Mutton Trumpery;” while a third crier, an old man who dealt in brick-dust, used to shout something that sounded exactly like “Do you want a lick on the head?” Another man—a vendor of chickweed—brayed like an ass; while a stentorian bawler, who was described as a great nuisance, shouted “Cat’s Meat,” though he sold cabbages.

Indeed, some of the cries in our own day would appear to be just as difficult to distinguish. A lady tells me that in a poor district she regularly visits, the coal-cart man cries: “I’m on the woolsack!” but what he means is, “Fine Wallsend Coal!” The philologist will find the pronunciation of the peripatetic Cockney vendor of useful and amusing trifles—almost invariably penn’orths, by the way—worthy of careful study. Here are a couple of phonetically rendered examples: “Bettnooks, a penny fer two, two frer penny.” [Button hooks, a penny for two, two for a penny.] “En endy shoo-awn frer penny.” [A handy shoe-horn for a penny.]

Amongst the twelve etched London Cries “done from the life” by Paul Sandby, in 1766, and now scarce, are the following curious examples:—

My pretty little gimy [smart] tarter for a halfpenny stick, or a penny stick, or a stick to beat your Wives or Dust your cloths!

Memorandum books a penny a-piece of the poor blind. God bless you. Pity the blind!

Do you want any spoons—hard metal spoons? Have you any old brass or pewter to sell or change?

All fire and no smoke. A very good flint or a very good steel. Do you want a good flint or steel?

Any tripe, or neat’s foot or calf’s-foot, or trotters, ho! Hearts, Liver or Lights!

The simplers, or herb-gatherers, who were at one time numerous, supplied the herb-shops in Covent Garden, Fleet, and Newgate Markets. They culled from the hedges and brooks not only watercresses, of which London now annually consumes about £15,000 worth, but dandelions, scurvy grass, nettles, bittersweet, red valerian, cough-grass, feverfew, hedge mustard, and a variety of other simples. Notwithstanding the greater pungency of the wild variety, preferred on that account, of late years watercress-growing has been profitably followed as a branch of market gardening. In third-rate “genteel” neighbourhoods, where the family purse is seldom too well filled, “Creeses, young watercreeses,” varied by shrimps or an occasional bloater, would appear to form the chief afternoon solace. Towards the end of the last century scurvy-grass was highly esteemed; and the best scurvy-grass ale is said to have been sold in Covent Garden at the public-house at the corner of Henrietta Street.

The modern dealer in simples, who for a few pence supplies pills and potions of a more or less harmless character, calculated for the cure of every bodily ailment that afflicts humanity, flourishes in the poorer districts of London, and calls himself a herbalist. During the progress of an all too short acquaintanceship struck up with a simpler in an Essex country lane through the medium of a particularly fragrant and soothing herb, the conversation happened on depression of spirits, and dandelion tea was declared to be an unfailing specific. “You know, sir, bad spirits means that the liver is out of order. The doctors gives you a deadly mineral pizen, which they calls blue pill, and it certainly do pizen ’em, but then you run the chance of being pizened yerself.” A look of astonishment caused him to continue. “You’ve noticed the ’oles in a sheep’s liver after it’s cut up, ’aven’t you? Well, them ’oles is caused by slugs, and ’uman bein’s is infested just the same. So is awsiz (horses), but they don’t never take no blue pill. Catch ’em! The doctors knows all about it, bless yer, but they don’t talk so plain as me. I calls out-of-sort-ishness ‘slugs in the liver,’ and pizens ’em with three penn’rth of dandelion tea, for which I charges thrippence. They calls it ‘sluggishness of the liver,’ and pizens ’em with a penn’rth of blue pill, for which they charges a guinea, and as often as not they pizens the patient too.” What a mine of “copy” that simple simpler would have proved to a James Payn or a Walter Besant!

The following at one time popular and often reprinted lines, to the tune of “The Merry Christ Church Bells,” are from the Roxburgh Collection of Ballads:

Less characteristic is an old undated penny ballad from which we cull the following lines:—

The cry of Saloop, a favourite drink of the young bloods of a hundred and fifty years back, conveys no meaning to the present generation. Considered as a sovereign cure for drunkenness, and pleasant withal, saloop, first sold at street corners, where it was consumed principally about the hour of midnight, eventually found its way into the coffee houses. The ingredients used in the preparation of this beverage were of several kinds—sassafras, and plants of the genus known by the simplers as cuckoo-flowers, being the principal among them. Saloop finally disappeared some five and twenty years ago.

The watchman cried the time every half hour. In addition to a lantern and rattle, he was armed with a stout stick. T. L. Busby, who in 1819 illustrated “The Costumes of the Lower Orders of London,” tells us that in March the watchman began his rounds at eight in the evening, and finished them at six in the morning. From April to September his hours were from ten till five; and from November to the end of February, twelve till seven. During the darkest months there was an extra watch from six to twelve, and extra patrols of sergeants walked over the beats at intervals.

One of London’s best known characters, the Waterman, does not appear to have adopted a cry; or, if he did, no mention of it can be found. But a correspondent of Notes and Queries (5th S. I. May 2, 1874) says: “I heard this verse of a very old (waterman’s) song from a very old gentleman on the occasion of the last overflow of the Thames:—

The point of departure, however, is not given.

this was the cry in vogue at a time when everybody, old and young, wore wigs.[8] The price of a common one was a guinea, and every journeyman had a new

“Past one o’clock, an’ a fine morning!”

one every year; each apprentice’s indenture stipulating, in the language of the officials who are still wig-wearers, that his master should find him in “one good and sufficient wig, yearly, and every year, for, and during, and unto, the expiration of the full end and term of his apprenticeship.” A verse of the time tells us:—

“Buy my rumps and burrs!” is a cry requiring a word of explanation. Before the skins of the newly flayed oxen were consigned to the tanner, the inside of the ear, called the burr, and the fleshy part of the tail were removed, and when seasoned and baked are said to have formed a cheap and appetising dish.

Ned Ward, the author of that curious work, “The London Spy” (1703), alludes to the melancholy ditty of “Hot baked Wardens [pears], and Pippins;” and, in describing the amusements of Bartholomew Fair, states that in leaving a booth he was assailed with “Will you buy a Mouse Trap or a Rat Trap? Will you buy a Cloath Brush, or Hat Brush, or a Comb Brush?” The writer possesses a very curious old scenic aquatint print in the form of a fan mount, representing Bartholomew Fair in 1721. The following descriptive matter is printed in the semicircular space under the fan:—

Amongst the numerous figures represented on the fan mount, but not mentioned by its publisher, Mr. Setchel, is that of the crier of apples, whose basket is piled high with tempting fruit. Another woman has charge of a barrow laden with pears as big as pumpkins; and a couple of oyster-women, whose wares are on the same gigantic scale, are evidently engaged in a hot wrangle. Although foreign to our subject, it may be mentioned that the statement as to the portrait of Fawkes the conjuror being the only one known, is incorrect.

“Ye maidens and men, come for what you lack,
And buy the fair Ballads I have in my pack.”
—Pedlar’s Lamentation.

A state of things very graphically delineated in another print of “Barthelemew Fair” (1739), where a ballad singer is roaring out a caveat against cut purses whilst a pick-pocket is operating on one of his audience.

The old cry of “Marking Irons” has died out. The letters were cast in iron, and sets of initials were made up and securely fixed in long-handled iron boxes. The marking irons were heated and impressed as a proof of ownership.

“My name and your name, your father’s name and mother’s name.”

Hone says: “I well remember to have heard this cry when a boy. The type-seller composed my own name for me, which I was thereby enabled to imprint on paper with common writing-ink. I think it has become wholly extinct within the last ten years.”

Amongst later prints of the London Cries, none are at present so highly prized as the folio set engraved in the early part of this century by Schiavonetti and others after Wheatley. Treated in the sentimentally pretty style of the period, they make, when framed, wall decorations which accord well with the prevailing old-fashioned furniture. If in good condition, the set of twelve will now readily fetch £20 at Christie’s; and if coloured, £30 would not be considered too high a price, though five-and-twenty years ago they might easily have been picked up for as many shillings. Their titles are as follows:—

In connection with the last cry, here is Dr. Johnson’s humorous reference thereto:—

The modern bootblack with his “Clean yer boots, shine ’em, sir?” is the successor of the obsolete shoeblack, whose stock-in-trade consisted of liquid blacking, an old wig for removing dust or wet, a knife for use on very muddy days, and brushes. Towards the end of the last century, Finsbury Square—then an open field—was a favourite place for shoeblacks, who intercepted the city merchants and their clerks in their daily walks to and from their residences in the villages of Islington and Hoxton. At that time tight breeches and shoes were worn; and the shoeblack was careful not to smear the buckles or soil the fine white stockings of his patrons. In a print of this period the cry is “Japan your shoes, your honour?” Cake blacking, introduced by that famous, but, as regards the last mentioned, somewhat antagonistic trio, Day, Martin, and Warren, “the most poetical of blacking makers and most transparent of poets,” which was quickly taken into general use, snuffed out the shoeblack; and from about 1820 until the time of the first Exhibition in 1851, when the shoeblack brigade in connection

‘Fresh and sweet!’

with ragged schools was started, London may be said to have blacked its own boots.

“Fresh Cabbidge!”

Bill Sykes the costermonger, or “costard”-monger, as he was originally called from his trade of selling apples, now flourishes under difficulties. What with the envious complaints of the small shopkeepers whom he undersells, and the supercilious rebuffs of the policeman who keeps him dodging about and always “on the move,” Bill has a hard time of it indeed. Yet he is distinctly a benefactor to the poorer portion of humanity. He changes his cry with the stock on his barrow. He will invest one day in pine-apples, when there is a glut of them—perhaps a little over-ripe—in Pudding Lane; and in stentorian voice will then make known his willingness to exchange slices for a halfpenny each, or a whole one for sixpence. On other days it may be apples, or oranges, fish, vegetables, photographs, or even tortoises; the latter being popularly supposed to earn a free, if uncomfortable, passage to this country in homeward-bound ships as wedges to keep the cargo from shifting in the hold. It is not often that goods intended for the thriving shopkeeper find their way to the barrow of the costermonger. Some time ago amber-tipped cherry or briar-wood pipes were freely offered and as freely bought in the streets at a penny each. Suddenly the supply stopped; for the unfortunate wholesale dealer in Houndsditch, who might have known better, had mistaken “dozen” for “gross” in his advice; and at 6s. 6d. per gross the pipes could readily be retailed for a penny each; whereas at the cost price of 6s. 6d. a dozen, one shilling ought to have been asked. It seems that not only did the importer imagine that the amber mouthpieces were imitation, but Bill Sykes also thought he was “doing” the public when he announced them as real.

In the present race of street criers there are tricksters in a small way; as, for instance, the well known character who picks up a living by selling a bulky-looking volume of songs. His long-drawn and never varied cry of “Three un-derd an’ fif-ty songs for a penny!” is really “Three under fifty songs for a penny.” The book is purposely folded very loosely so as to bulk well; but a little squeezing reduces it to the thickness of an ordinary tract. Street criers are honest enough, however, in the main. If vegetables are sometimes a little stale, or fruit is suspiciously over-ripe, they do not perhaps feel absolutely called upon to mention these facts; but they give bouncing penn’orths, and their clients are generally shrewd enough to take good care of themselves. Petty thieves of the area-sneak type use well-known cries as a blind while pursuing their real calling,—match-selling often serving as an opportunity for pilfering. Blacker sheep than these there are; but fortunately one does not often come across them. Walking one foggy afternoon towards dusk along the Bayswater Road, I was accosted by a shivering and coatless vagabond who offered a tract. Wishing to shake off so unsavoury a companion, I attempted to cross the road, but a few yards from the kerb he barred farther progress “Sixpence, Sir, only sixpence; I must have sixpence!” and as he spoke he bared a huge arm knotted like a blacksmith’s. Raising a fist to match, he more than once shot it out unpleasantly near, exhibiting every time he did so an eruption of biceps perfectly appalling in its magnitude. That tract is at home somewhere.

“Antique Ballads, sung to crowds of old,
Now cheaply bought at thrice their weight in gold.”

There are persons in London who get their living by manufacturing amusing or useful penny articles, with which they supply the wholesale houses in Houndsditch, who in turn find their customers in the hawkers and street criers. The principal supply, however, is imported from the Continent at prices against which English labour cannot compete. Soon forgotten, each novelty has its day, and is cried in a different manner. Until the law stepped in and put a stop to the sale, the greatest favourite on public holidays was the flexible metal tube containing scented water, which was squirted into the faces of passers-by with strict impartiality and sometimes with blinding effect.

“All the fun of the fair,”—a wooden toy which, when drawn smartly down the back or across the shoulders, emits a sound as if the garment were being rent—ranks perhaps second in the estimation of ’Arry and Emma Ann—she generally gets called Emma Ran—when out for a holiday. “The Fun of the Fair” is always about on public holidays, illuminations, Lord Mayor’s day, and in fact whenever people are drawn out of doors in, such multitudes that the pathways are insufficient to hold the slowly moving and densely packed human stream, which perforce slops over and amicably disputes possession of the road with the confused and struggling mass of vehicles composed of everything that goes on wheels. A real Malacca cane, the smallest Bible in the world, a Punch and Judy squeaker, a bird warbler, a gold watch and chain, and Scotch bagpipes, are, with numerous others, at present popular and tempting penn’orths; while the cry of “A penny for shillin’ ’lusterated magazine”—the epitaph on countless unsuccessful literary ventures—seems to many an irresistible attraction.

In connection with ’Arry, the chief producer of street noises, it may be questioned whether London is now much better off than it was before the passing of the Elizabethan Statutes of the Streets, by which citizens were forbidden, under pain of imprisonment, to blow a horn in the night, or to whistle after the hour of nine o’clock p.m. Sudden outcries in the still of the night, and the making of any affray, or the beating of one’s wife—the noise rather than the brutality appears to have been objected to—were also specially forbidden. If this old Act is still on the Statute-book, it is none the less a dead letter. Our streets are now paraded by companies of boys or half-grown men who delight in punishing us by means of that blatant and horribly noisy instrument of dissonant, unchangeable chords, the German concertina. In many neighbourhoods sleep is rendered, until the early hours, impossible by men and women who find their principal and unmolested amusement in the shouting of music-hall songs, with an intermittent accompaniment of shriekings. Professional street music of all kinds requires more stringent regulation; and that produced by perambulating amateurs might with advantage be well-nigh prohibited altogether. The ringing of Church bells in the grey of the morning, and the early habits of the chanticleer, are often among the disadvantages of a closely populated neighbourhood. Nor are these street noises the only nuisance of the kind. London walls and partitions are nearly all thin, and a person whose neighbour’s child is in the habit of practising scale exercises or “pieces,” should clearly have the right to require the removal of the piano a foot or so from the wall, which would make all the difference between dull annoyance and distracting torment.

But we are wandering, and wandering into a dismal bye-way. Returning to our subject, it is impossible to be melancholy in the presence of the facetious salesman of the streets, with his unfailing native wit. Hone tells us of a mildly humorous character, one “Doctor Randal,” an orange-seller, who varied the description of his fruit as circumstances and occasions

“Stinking Fish!”

demanded; as “Oratorio oranges,” and so on. A jovial rogue whose beat extends to numerous courts and alleys on either side of Fleet Street, regularly and unblushingly cries, “Stinking Shrimps,” and by way of addenda, “Lor, ’ow they do stink to-day, to be sure!” His little joke is almost as much relished as his shrimps and bloaters, and they appear to be always of the freshest. Were it not that insufficient clothing and an empty stomach are hardly conducive thereto, the winter cry so generally heard after a fall of snow, “Sweep yer door away, mum?” might fairly be credited to an attempt at facetiousness under difficulties, while the grave earnestness of the mirth-provoking cry of the Cockney boot-lace man, “Lice, lice, penny a pair boot-lice!” is strong evidence that he has no thought beyond turning the largest possible number of honest pennies in the shortest possible space of time.

A search in our collection of books and ballads for London Cries, humorous in themselves, discovers but two,—

“Jaw-work, up and under jaw-work, a whole pot for a halfpenny, hazel-nuts!”

and—

“New laid eggs, eight a groat—crack ’em and try ’em!”

A somewhat ghastly form of facetiousness was a favourite one with a curious City character, now defunct. He was a Jew who sold a nameless toy—a dried pea loose in a pill box, which was fastened to a horse-hair, and on being violently twirled, emitted a vibratory hum that could be heard for some distance. Unless his unvarying cry, “On’y a ’a’penny,” brought buyers to the fore, he gave vent to frequent explosions of strange and impious language, which never failed to provoke the merriment of the passer-by.

Among the many living City characters is the man—from his burr evidently a Northumbrian—who sells boot laces. His cry is, “Boot laces—AND the boot laces.” This man also has a temper. If sales are

“New laid eggs, eight a groat—crack ’em and try ’em!”

slow, as they not uncommonly are, his cry culminates in a storm of muttered abuse; after which mental refreshment he calmly proceeds as before, “The boot laces—AND the boot laces.” Most of us know by sight the penny Jack-in-the-box seller, whose cry, as Jack pops up, on the spring of the lid being released, is a peculiar double squeak, emitted without movement of the lips. The cry is supposed to belong to the internal economy of the toy, and to be a part of the penn’orth; but, alas! Jack, once out of the hands of his music-master, is voiceless. The numerous street sellers of pipe and cigar lights must have a hard time of it. Following the lucifer match, with its attendant choking sulphurous fumes, came the evil-smelling, thick, red-tipped, brown paper slip charged with saltpetre, so that it should smoulder without flaming. These slips, in shape something like a row of papered pins, were divided half through and torn off as required. Like the brimstone match which preceded, and the Vesuvian which followed, these lights (which were sold in the shops at a penny a box, but in the streets at two and sometimes three boxes for the same sum) utterly spoilt the flavour of a cigar; hence the superiority of the now dominant wax vestas. The matches of a still earlier period were long slips of dry wood smeared at either end with brimstone.

Rowlandson Delin 1819

“Letters for post?”

They would neither “light only on the box,” nor off it, unless aided by the uncertain and always troublesome flint, steel, and tinder, or the direct application of flame. “Clean yer pipe; pipe-cleaner, a penny for two!” is a cry seldom absent from the streets. The pipe-cleaner is a thin, flexible, double-twisted wire, about a foot long, with short bristles interwoven at one end, and now, “when everybody smokes who doesn’t,” the seller is sure of a more or less constant trade.

The buyers of the so-called penny ices sold in the London streets during the summer months are charged only a halfpenny; and the numerous vendors, usually Italians, need no cry; for the street gamins and errand boys buzz around their barrows like flies about a sugar barrel. For obvious reasons, spoons are not lent. The soft and half-frozen delicacy is consumed by the combined aid of tongue and fingers. Parti-coloured Neapolitan ices, vended by unmistakable natives of Whitechapel or the New Cut, whose curious cry of “‘Okey Pokey” originated no one knows how, have lately appeared in the streets. Hokey Pokey is of a firmer make and probably stiffer material than the penny ice of the Italians, which it rivals in public favour; and it is built up of variously flavoured layers. Sold in halfpenny and also penny paper-covered

“Knives and Scissors to Grind?”

squares, kept until wanted in a circular metal refrigerating pot surrounded by broken ice, Hokey Pokey has the advantage over its rival eaten from glasses, inasmuch as it can be carried away by the purchaser and consumed at leisure. Besides being variously flavoured, Hokey Pokey is dreadfully sweet, dreadfully cold, and hard as a brick. It is whispered that the not unwholesome Swede turnip, crushed into pulp, has been known to form its base, in lieu of more expensive supplies from the cow, whose complex elaboration of cream from turnips is thus unceremoniously abridged.

Another summer cry recalls to memory a species of house decoration, which we may hope is rapidly becoming a thing of the past. “Ornaments for yer fire stoves,” are usually either cream-tinted willow shavings, brightened by the interspersion of a few gold threads, or mats thickly covered with rose-shaped bows and streamers of gaily-coloured tissue papers. Something more ornate, and not always in better taste, is now the fashion; the trade therefore has found its way from the streets to the shops, and the old cry, “Ornaments for yer fire stoves,” is likely to be seldomer heard.

Many of the old cries, dying out elsewhere, may still be familiar, however, in the back streets of second

“O’ Clo!”

“Dust, O!”

and third rate neighbourhoods. The noisy bell[9] of the privileged muffin-man can hardly be counted; but “dust, O,”—the dustman’s bell is almost a thing of the past—“knives and scissors,”—pronounced sitthers—“to grind,” “chairs to mend,” “cat’s and dawg’s meat,” the snapped-off short “o’ clo” of the Jewish dealer in left-off garments, “fine warnuts, penny for ten, all cracked,” “chestnuts all ’ot,” “fine ripe strawberries,” “rabbit or ’air skins,” “fine biggaroon cherries,” “fine oranges, a penny for three,” and many others, are still shouted in due season by leathern-lunged itinerant traders. The “O’ clo” man is nearly always historically represented, as in the Catnach illustration, wearing

“Cat’s and Dog’s Meat!”

several hats; but, though he may often be met with more than one in his possession, he is now seldom seen with more than one on his head. Calling the price before the quantity, though quite a recent innovation, or more probably the revival of an old style, is almost universal. The cry of “Fine warnuts, ten a penny,” is now “A penny for ten, fine warnuts,” or “A penny for ’arf a score, fine warnuts.”

The cat’s meat man has never, like some of his colleagues, aspired to music, but apparently confines himself to the one strident monosyllable. It has been stated, by the way, that the London cats, of which it seems there are at present some 350,000, annually consume £100,000 worth of boiled horse. Daintily presented on a skewer, pussy’s meat is eaten without salt; but, being impossible of verification, the statistics presented in the preceding sentence may be taken with a grain.

“Soot” or “Sweep, ho!” The sweep, accompanied by two or three thinly-clad, half-starved, and generally badly-treated apprentices, who ascended the chimneys and acted as human brushes, turned out in old times long before daylight. It was owing to the exertions of the philanthropist, Mr. Jonas Hanway, and before the invention of the jointed chimney sweeping machine, that an Act was passed at the beginning of

“Sw-e-e-p!”

this century, providing that every chimney-sweeper’s apprentice should wear a brass plate in front of his cap, with the name and abode of his master engraved thereon. The boys were accustomed to beg for food and money in the streets; but by means of the badges, the masters were traced, and an improvement in the general condition of the apprentices followed. But the early morning is still disturbed by the long-drawn cry, “Sw-e-e-p.” This, and the not unmusical “ow-oo,” of the jodeling milkman—all that is left of “milk below maids,”—the London milk-maids are usually strongly-built Irish or Welsh girls—and the tardier and rather too infrequent “dust-o” are amongst the few unsuppressed Cries of London-town. They are tolerated and continued because they are convenient, and from a vague sense of prescriptive right dear to the heart of an Englishman.

“Ow-oo!”

Until quite recently, the flower girls at the Royal Exchange—decent and well-behaved Irishwomen who work hard for an honest living—were badgered and driven about by the police. They are now allowed to collect and pursue their calling in peace by the Wellington statue, where their cry, “Buy a flower, sir,” is heard, whatever the weather, all the year round. “Speshill ’dishun, ’orrible railway haccident,” the outcome of an advanced civilization, is a cry that was unknown to our forefathers. Our forebears had often to pay a shilling for a newspaper, and the newsman made known his progress through the streets by sound of tin trumpet: as shown in Rowlandson’s graphic illustration, a copy of the newspaper was carried in the hatband.

Rowlandson Delin. 1819.

“Great News!”

“C’gar lights, ’ere y’ar, sir; ’apenny a box,” and “Taters all ’ot,” also belong to the modern school of London Cries; while the piano-organ is a fresh infliction in connection with the new order of street noises. And although a sort of portable penthouse was used in remote times for screening from heat and rain, the ribbed and collapsible descendant thereof did not come into general use much before the opening of the present century; hence the cry, “Any umbrellas-termend,” may properly be classed as a modern one.

In the crowded streets of modern London the loudest and most persistent cry is that of the omnibus conductor—“Benk,” “Chairin’ Krauss,” “Pic’dilly”; or it may be, “Full inside,” or “’Igher up”; to which the cabman’s low-pitched and persuasive “Keb, sir?”—he is afraid to ply too openly for hire—plays an indifferent second. Judging from Rowlandson’s illustration, his predecessor the hackney coachman shared cabby’s sometimes too pointedly worded objection to a strictly legal fare.

The “under-street” Cries heard in our own time at the various stations on the railway enveloping London, in what by courtesy is termed a circle—the true shape would puzzle a mathematician to define—form an interesting study. While a good many of the porters

Rowlandson Delin. 1819.

“Wot d’yer call that?”

are recruited from the country, it is a curious fact that in calling the names of the various “sty-shuns” they mostly settle down—perhaps from force of association “downt-tcher-now”—into one dead level of Cockney pronunciation.

As one seldom realizes that there is anything wrong with one’s own way of speaking, pure-bred Cockneys may be expected to quarrel with the phonetic rendering given; however, as Dr. James Cantlie, in his interesting and recently published “Degeneration amongst Londoners,”[10] tells us that a pure-bred Cockney is a rara avis indeed, the quarrelsomely inclined may not be numerous, and they may be reminded that the writer is not alone in his ideas as to Cockney pronunciation. Appended to Du Maurier’s wonderfully powerful picture of “The Steam Launch in Venice” (Punch’s Almanac, 1882), is the following wording:—

This paragraph is from the London Globe of January 26th, 1885: “Spelling reformers take notice. The English alphabet—diphthongs and all—does not contain any letters which, singly or in combination, can convey with accuracy the pronunciation given by the newsboys to the cry, ‘A-blowin’ up of the ’Ouses of Parliament!’ that rent the air on Saturday. The word ‘blowin’’ is pronounced as if the chief vowel sound were something like ‘ough’ in ‘bough’; and even then an ‘e’ and a ‘y’ ought to be got in somewhere.”

There are twenty-seven stations on the London Inner Circle Railway—owned by two companies, the Metropolitan and District—and the name of one only—Gower Street—is usually pronounced by “thet tchung men,” the railway porter, as other people pronounce it. [“Emma Smith,”[11] while not a main line station, may be cited here simply as a good example of Cockney, for ’Arry and ’Arriet are quite incapable of any other verbal rendering.] They are cried as follows:—

Country cousins may be reminded that the guiding letters I or O so boldly marked on the tickets issued on the London underground railway, and, in the brightest vermilion, as conspicuously painted up in the various stations, do not mean “Inner” or “Outer” Circle, but the inner and outer lines of rails of the Inner Circle Railway. Though sanctioned by Parliament more than twenty years ago, the so-called Outer Circle Railway is still incomplete, its present form being that of a horse-shoe, with termini at Broad Street and Mansion House, and some of its principal stations at Dalston, Willesden, and Addison Road, Kensington.

It has before been said that everything that could be carried has, at some time or other, been sold in the streets; and it follows that an approximately complete list of London Cries would reach a very large total. From its mere length and sameness such a list would moreover be apt to weary the reader; for not all cries have the interest of a traditional phrase or intonation which gives notice of the nature of the wares, even when the words are rendered unintelligible by the necessity of vociferation. But a few of the most constant and curious cries may be interesting to note.

“Hot Spice Gingerbread!”

“Old Cloaths!”

“Knives to Grind!”

“Cabbages O! Turnips!”

“Sand ’O!”

“Buy a Live Goose?”

“Cherries, O! ripe cherries, O!”

A whole market hand for a halfpenny—young radishes, ho!

Sw-e-ep!

Covent Garden.

“Fine Strawberries!”

“Sweet Lavender! ”

Probably of Norman-French origin, the term “beau-pot” is still in use in out-of-the-way country districts, to signify a posy or nosegay, in which sweet-smelling herbs and flowers, as rosemary, sweet-briar, balm,

“Chairs to mend!”

roses, carnations, violets, wall-flowers, mignonette, sweet-William, and others that we are now pleased to designate “old fashioned,” would naturally predominate.

“All a blowin’!”

Come buy my sweet-briar!

Rowlandson Delin. 1819.

“Any Earthen Ware; buy a jug or a tea pot?”

Any old flint glass or broken bottles for a poor woman to-day?

“Fresh Oysters! penny a lot!”

Rowlandson Delin. 1819.

“Buy my Sweet Roses?”

“Fine large Cucumbers!”

Brick-dust was carried on the backs of asses and sold for knife-cleaning purposes at a penny a quart.

“’Ere’s yer toys for girls an’ boys!”

The bellows-mender, who sometimes also followed the trade of a tinker, carried his tools and apparatus buckled in a leathern bag at his back, and practised his profession in any convenient corner of the street.

Door-mats of all shapes were made of rushes or rope, and were sold at from sixpence to several shillings each.

The earliest green pea brought to the London market—a dwarf variety—was distinguished by the name of Hasteds, Hastens, Hastins, or Hastings, and was succeeded by the Hotspur. The name of Hastings was, however, indiscriminately given to all peas sold in the streets, and the cry of “green Hastings” was heard in every street and alley until peas went out of season.

The crier of hair brooms, who usually travelled with a cart, carried a supply of brushes, sieves, clothes-horses, lines, and general turnery.

His cry took the form of the traditional tune “Buy a broom,” which may even now be occasionally heard—perhaps the last survival of a street trade tune—taken

Rowlandson Delin. 1819.

“Curds and Whey!”

up separately or in fitful chorus by the men and women of a travelling store. The Flemish “Buy a Broom” criers, whose trade is gone, generally went in couples or threes. Their figures are described by Hone as exactly miniatured in the unpainted wooden doll, shaped the same before and behind, and sold in the toy shops for the amusement of the little ones. In the comedy of “The Three Ladies of London,” printed in quarto in Queen Elizabeth’s reign (A.D. 1584), is this passage:—

“Enter Conscience with brooms at her back, singing as follows:—

Hot rolls, which were sold at one and two a penny, were carried during the summer months between the hours of 8 and 9 in the morning, and from 4 to 6 in the afternoon.

Muffins and crumpets were then, as now, principally cried during the winter months.

Hot pudding, sweet, heavy and indigestible, was sold in halfpenny slabs.

The cry “One-a-penny, two-a-penny, hot CROSS BUNS!” which,—now never heard from the sellers on Good Friday,—is still part of a child’s game, remains as one of the best instances of English quantitative metre, being repeated in measured time, and not merely by the ordinary accent. The rhubarb-selling Turk, who appeared in turban, trousers, and—what was then almost unknown amongst civilians—moustaches, was, fifty years ago or more, a well known character in the metropolis.

Sand was generally used in London, not only for cleaning kitchen utensils, but for sprinkling over uncarpeted floors as a protection against dirty footsteps. It was sold by measure—red sand, twopence halfpenny, and white a penny farthing per peck. The very melodious catch, “White Sand and Grey Sand, Who’ll buy my White Sand!” was evidently harmonized on the sand-seller’s traditional tune.

“Buy a bill of the play!” In the time of our great grandfathers, there were no scented programmes, and the peculiar odour of the play-bills was not due to the skill of a Rimmel. Vilely printed with the stickiest of ink, on the commonest of paper, they were disposed of both in and outside the theatre by orange-women, who would give one to a purchaser of half a dozen oranges or so. In Hogarth’s inimitably amusing and characteristic print of The Laughing Audience, a couple of robustly built orange-women are contending, with well-filled baskets, for the favour of a bewigged beau of the period, who appears likely to become an easy victim to their persuasions.

“Knives to grind” is still occasionally heard, and the grinder’s barrow (vide that depicted in Rowlandson’s illustration on p. 59), is much the same as it was a hundred years ago. At the beginning of the century the charge for grinding and setting scissors was a penny or twopence a pair; penknives a penny a blade, and table-knives one and sixpence and two shillings a dozen.

Rabbits were carried about the streets suspended at either end of a pole which rested on the shoulder.

The edible marine herb samphire, immortalized in connection with “Shakespeare’s Cliff” at Dover, was at one time regularly culled and as regularly eaten.

The once familiar cry of “Green rushes O!” is

“Cherries, fourpence a pound!”

preserved only in verse. In Queen Elizabeth’s time the floors of churches as well as private houses were carpeted with rushes, and in Shakespeare’s day the stage was strewn with them. Rush-bearing, a festival having its origin in connection with the annual renewal of rushes in churches, was kept up until quite recently, and may even still be practised in out-of-the-way villages.

The stock of the “’arthstone” woman, who is not above doing a stroke of business in bones, bottles, and kitchen stuff, is usually on a barrow, drawn by a meek-eyed and habitually slow-paced donkey.

The London Barrow Woman (“Ripe Cherries”), as preserved in the cut from the inimitable pencil of George Cruikshank, has long since disappeared. In 1830, when this sketch was made, the artist had to rely on his memory, for she then no longer plied her trade in the streets. Her wares changed with the seasons; but here a small schoolboy is being tempted by ripe cherries tied on a stick. There being no importation of foreign fruit, the cherries were of prime quality. May dukes, White heart, Black heart, and the Kentish cherry, succeeded each other—and, when sold by weight, and not tied on sticks, fetched sixpence, fourpence, or threepence per lb., which was at least twopence or threepence less than charged at the shops.

“Ripe Cherries!”

The poor Barrow Woman appears to have been treated very much in the same manner as the modern costermonger; but was without his bulldog power of resistance. If she stopped to rest or solicit custom, street keepers, “authorized by orders unauthorized by law,” drove her off, or beadles overthrew her fruit into the road. Nevertheless, if Cruikshank has not idealized his memories, she was more wholesomely and stoutly clad than any street seller of her sex—with the one exception of the milkmaid—who is to be seen in our day, when the poor London woman has lost the instinct of neatness and finish in attire.

“Hot spiced gingerbread,” still to be found in a cold state at village fairs and junketings, used to be sold in winter time in the form of flat oblong cakes at a halfpenny each, but it has long since disappeared from our streets.

“Tiddy Diddy Doll, lol, lol, lol” was a celebrated vendor of gingerbread, and, according to Hone, was always hailed as the king of itinerant tradesmen. It must be more than a century since this dandified character ceased to amuse the populace. He dressed as a person of rank—ruffled shirt, white silk stockings, and fashionable laced suit of clothes surmounted by a wig and cocked hat decorated with a feather. He was sure to be found plying his trade on Lord Mayor’s

“Tiddy Diddy Doll.”

day, at open air shows, and on all public occasions. He amused the crowd to his own profit; and some of his humorous nonsense has been preserved.

“Mary, Mary, where are you now, Mary?”

“I live two steps underground, with a wiscom riscom, and why not. Walk in, ladies and gentlemen. My shop is on the second floor backwards, with a brass knocker at the door. Here’s your nice gingerbread, your spiced gingerbread, which will melt in your mouth like a red-hot brickbat, and rumble in your inside like Punch in his wheelbarrow!” He always finished up by singing the fag end of a song—“Tiddy Diddy Doll, lol, lol, lol;” hence his nickname of Tiddy Doll. Hogarth has introduced this character in his Execution scene of the Idle Apprentice at Tyburn. Tiddy Doll had many feeble imitators; and the woman described in the lines that follow, taken from a child’s book of the period, must have been one of them.

“Large silver eels!”

Fifty years ago “Young Lambs to Sell, two for a penny,” which still lingers, was a well known cry. They were children’s toys, the fleece made of white cotton-wool, attractively but perhaps a trifle too unnaturally spangled with Dutch gilt. The head was of composition, the cheeks were painted red, there were two black spots to do duty for eyes, and the horns and legs were of tin, which latter adornment, my younger readers may suggest, foreshadowed the insufficiently appreciated tinned mutton of a later period. The addition of a bit of pink tape tied round the neck by way of a collar made a graceful finish, and might be accepted as a proof that the baby sheep was perfectly tame.

The later song—

—is obviously copied from the original cry of “Young Lambs to Sell.” In addition to a few tools, the stock-in-trade of the travelling chair-mender principally consisted of rushes, which in later days gave place to cane split into strips of uniform width—a return to more

“Young lambs to sell.”

“Buy my fine Myrtles and Roses!”

ancient practice. The use of rush-bottomed chairs, which are again coming into æsthetic fashion, cannot be traced back quite a century and half. The chairs in Queen Anne’s time were seated and backed with cane; and in the days of Elizabeth the seats were cushioned and the backs stuffed. Many years ago an old chair-mender occupied a position by a stone fixed in the wall of one of the houses in Panyer Alley, on which is cut the following inscription:—

When y have sovghᵀ..
The City Rovnd
Yet Still this is
The HighSᵀ.. Grovnd
Avgvst the 27
1688

Being entirely unprotected and close to the ground, this curious relic of bygone times, which is surmounted by a boldly carved figure of a nude boy seated on a panyer pressing a bunch of grapes between his hand and foot, is naturally much defaced; and that it has not been carried away piecemeal by iconoclastic curiosity-hunters, is probably due to its out-of-the-way position. Panyer Alley, the most eastern turning leading from Paternoster Row to Newgate Street, slightly rises towards the middle; but is not, according to Mr. Loftie, an undoubted authority on all matters pertaining to old London, the highest point in the city, there being higher ground both in Cornhill and Cannon Street. In describing Panyer Alley, Stow indirectly alludes to a “signe” therein, and it is Hone’s opinion that this stone may have been the ancient sign let into the wall of a tavern. While the upper is in fair preservation, the lower part of the inscription can hardly be read. When last examined, a street urchin was renovating the figure by a heartily-laid-on surface decoration of white chalk; and unless one of the numerous antiquarian or other learned societies interested in old London relics will spare a few pounds for the purchase of a protective grating, there will shortly be nothing left worth preserving.

“New-laid eggs, eight a groat,” takes us back to a time when the best joints and fresh country butter were both sixpence a pound.

Years ago the tin oven of the peripatetic penny pieman was found to be too small to meet the constant and ever-increasing strain made upon its resources; and the owner thereof has now risen to the dignity of a shop, where, in addition to stewed eels, he dispenses what Albert Smith happily termed “covered uncertainties,” containing messes of mutton, beef, or seasonable fruit. Contained in a strong wicker basket with legs, or in a sort of tin oven, the pieman’s wares were formerly kept hot by means of a small charcoal fire. A sip of a warm stomachic liquid of unknown but apparently acceptable constituents was sometimes offered gratuitously by way of inducement to purchase. The cry of “Hot Pies” still accompanies one of the first and most elementary games of the modern baby learning to speak, who is taught by his nurse to raise his hand to imitate a call now never heard.

The specimens of versification that follow are culled from various books of London Cries, written for the amusement of children, towards the end of the last century, and now in the collection of the writer:—

Buy my nice Drops—twenty a penny, Peppermint drops!

Rowlandson Delin 1819

“Pots and Kettles to Mend!”

“Six bunches a penny, sweet blooming Lavender!”

Any Earthen Ware, Plates, Dishes, or Jugs to-day,—any Clothes to exchange, Madam?

Ten of the illustrations by that great master of the art of caricature, Thomas Rowlandson, are copied in facsimile from a scarce set, fifty-four in all, published in 1820, entitled “Characteristic Sketches of the Lower Orders,” to which there is a powerful preface, as follows:—

“The British public must be already acquainted with numerous productions from the inimitable pencil of Mr. Rowlandson, who has particularly distinguished himself in this department.

“There is so much truth and genuine feeling in his delineations of human character, that no one can inspect the present collection without admiring his masterly style of drawing and admitting his just claim to originality. The great variety of countenance, expression, and situation, evince an active and lively feeling, which he has so happily infused into the drawings as to divest them of that broad caricature which is too conspicuous in the works of those artists who have followed his manner. Indeed, we may venture to assert that, since the time of Hogarth, no artist has appeared in this country who could be considered his superior or even his equal.”

The two illustrations—“Lavender,” with a background representing Temple Bar, and “Fine Strawberries,” with a view of Covent Garden—are from “Plates Representing the Itinerant Traders of London in their ordinary Costume. Printed in 1805 as a supplement to ‘Modern London’ (London: printed for Charles Phillips, 71, St. Paul’s Churchyard).” The set is chiefly interesting as representing London scenes of the period; many parts of which are now no longer recognisable.

The crudely drawn, but picturesquely treated “Catnach” cuts, from the celebrated Catnach press in Seven Dials, now owned by Mr. W. S. Fortey, hardly require separately indicating.

The four oval cuts, squared by the addition of perpendicular lines, “Hot spice gingerbread!” “O’ Clo!” “Knives to Grind!” and “Cabbages O! Turnips!” are facsimiled from a little twopenny book, entitled, “The Moving Market; or, Cries of London, for the amusement of good children,” published in 1815 by J. Lumsden and Son, of Glasgow. It has a frontispiece representing a curious little four-in-hand carriage with dogs in place of horses, underneath which is printed this triplet:—

The quaint cuts, “’Ere’s yer toys for girls an’ boys!” “New-laid eggs, eight a groat,—crack ’em and try ’em!” “Flowers, penny a bunch!” (frontispiece), and the three ballad singers, apparently taken from one of the earliest chap-books, are really but of yesterday. For these the writer is indebted to his friend, Mr. Joseph Crawhall, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, who uses his cutting tools direct on the wood without any copy. Mr. Crawhall’s “Chap-book Chaplets,” and “Old ffrendes wyth newe Faces,” quaint quartos each with many hundreds of hand-coloured cuts in his own peculiar and inimitable style, and “Izaak Walton, his Wallet Book,” are fair examples of his skill in this direction.

Two plates unenclosed with borders—“Old Chairs to mend!” and “Buy a Live Goose?” are from that once common and now excessively scarce child’s book, The Cries of London as they are Daily Practised, published in 1804 by J. Harris, the successor of “honest John Newbery,” the well-known St. Paul’s Churchyard bookseller and publisher.

George Cruikshank’s London Barrow-woman (“Ripe Cherries”), “Tiddy Diddy Doll,” and other cuts, are from the original illustrations to Hone’s delightful “Every-Day Book,” recently republished by Messrs. Ward, Lock & Co.

The cuts illustrating modern cries—“Sw-e-e-p!”; “Dust, O!”; “Ow-oo!”; “Fresh Cabbidge!”; and “Stinking Fish!” are from the facile pencil of Mr. D. McEgan.

Finally, in regard to the business card of pussy’s butcher, the veracious chronicler is inclined to think that an antiquarian might hesitate in pronouncing it to be quite so genuine as it looks. This opinion coincides with his own. In fact he made it himself. As a set-off, however, to the confession, let it be said that this is the sole fantaisie d’occasion set down herein.

From “Notes and Queries.”

London Street Cry.—What is the meaning of the old London cry, “Buy a fine mousetrap, or a tormentor for your fleas”? Mention of it is found in one of the Roxburghe ballads dated 1662, and, amongst others, in a work dated about fifty years earlier. The cry torments me, and only its elucidation will bring ease.

Andrew W. Tuer.

The Leadenhall Press, E.C.

London Street Cry (6th S. viii. 348).—Was not this really a “tormentor for your flies”? The mouse-trap man would probably also sell little bunches of butcher’s broom (Ruscus, the mouse-thorn of the Germans), a very effective and destructive weapon in the hands of an active butcher’s boy, when employed to guard his master’s meat from the attacks of flies.

Edward Solly.

London Street Cry (6th S. viii. 348, 393).—The following quotations from Taylor, the Water Poet, may be of interest to Mr. Tuer:—

I notice a query from you in N. and Q. about a London Street Cry which troubles you. Many of the curious adjuncts to Street Cries proper have, I apprehend, originally no meaning beyond drawing attention to the Crier by their whimsicality. I will give you an instance. Soon after the union between England and Ireland, a man with a sack on his back went regularly about the larger streets of Dublin. His cry was:

Party feeling against Lord Castlereagh ran very high at the time, I believe, and the political adjunct to his cry probably brought the man more shillings than he got by his regular calling.

H. G. W.

P.S.—I find I have unconsciously made a low pun. The cry alluded to above would probably be understood and appreciated in the streets of Dublin at the present with reference to the Repeal of the Union.

London Street Cry.
88, Friargate, Derby.

Dear Sir,—

The “Tormentor,” concerning which you inquire in Notes and Queries of this date, was also known as a “Scratch-back,” and specimens are occasionally to be seen in the country. I recollect seeing one, of superior make, many years ago. An ivory hand, the fingers like those of “Jasper Packlemerton of atrocious memory,” were “curled as in the act of” scratching, a finely carved wrist-band of lace was the appropriate ornament, and the whole was attached to a slender ivory rod of say eighteen inches in length. The finger nails were sharpened, and the instrument was thus available for discomfiting “back-biters,” even when engaged upon the most inaccessible portions of the human superficies. I have also seen a less costly article of the same sort carved out of pear-wood (or some similar material). It is probable that museums might furnish examples of the “back scratcher,” “scratch back,” or “tormentor for your fleas.”

Very truly yours,
Alfred Wallis.

Junior Athenæum Club,

Piccadilly, W.

Dear Sir,—

On turning over the leaves of Notes and Queries I happened on your enquiry re “Tormentor for your fleas.” May I ask, have you succeeded in getting at the meaning or origin of this curious street cry? I have tried to trace it, but in vain. It occurs to me as just possible that the following circumstance may bear on it:—

The Japanese are annoyed a good deal with fleas. They make little cages of bamboo—such I suppose as a small bird cage or mouse-trap—containing plenty of bars and perches inside. These bars they smear over with bird-lime, and then take the cage to bed with them. Is it not, as I say, just possible, that one of our ancient mariners brought the idea home with him and started it in London? If so, a maker of bird cages or mouse-traps is likely to have put the idea into execution, and cried his mouse-traps and “flea tormentors” in one breath.

Faithfully yours,
Douglas Owen.

From “Notes and Queries,” April 18th, 1885.

London Cries.—A cheap and extended edition of my London Street Cries being on the eve of publication, I shall be glad of early information as to the meaning of “A dip and a wallop for a bawbee”[A] and “Water for the buggs.”[12] I recollect many years ago reading an explanation of the former, but am doubtful as to its correctness.

Andrew W. Tuer.

The Leadenhall Press, E.C.

One who was an Edinburgh student towards the end of last century told me that a man carrying a leg of mutton by the shank would traverse the streets crying “Twa dips and a wallop for a bawbee.” This brought the gude-wives to their doors with pails of boiling water, which was in this manner converted into “broth.”

Norman Chevers, M.D.

32, Tavistock Road, W.
April 18th, 1885.

25, Argyll Road, Kensington, W.,

24th April, 1885.

Dear Mr. Tuer,—

The Cockney sound of long ā which is confused with received ī, is very different from it, and where it approaches that sound, the long ī is very broad, so that there is no possibility of confusing them in a Cockney’s ear. But is the sound Cockney? Granted it is very prevalent in E. and N. London, yet it is rarely found in W. and S.W. My belief is that it is especially an Essex variety. There is no doubt about its prevalence in Essex, so that [very roughly indeed] “I say” there becomes “oy sy.” Then as regards the ō and ou. These are never pronounced alike. The ō certainly often imitates received ow, though it has more distinctly an ō commencement; but when that is the case, ou has a totally different sound, which dialect-writers usually mark as aow, having a broad ā commencement, almost a in bad. Finer speakers—shopmen and clerks—will use a finer a. The sound of short u in nut, does not sound to me at all like e in net. There are great varieties of this “natural vowel,” as some people call it, and our received nut is much finer than the general southern provincial and northern Scotch sounds, between which lie the mid and north England sounds rhyming to foot nearly, and various transitional forms. Certainly the sounds of nut, gnat are quite different, and are never confused by speakers; yet you would write both as net.

The pronunciation of the Metropolitan area is extremely mixed; no one form prevails. We may put aside educated or received English as entirely artificial. The N., N.E., and E. districts all partake of an East Anglian character; but whether that is recent, or belongs to the Middle Anglian character of Middlesex, is difficult to say. I was born in the N. district, within the sound of Bow Bells (the Cockney limits), over seventy years ago, and I do not recall the i pronunciation of ā in my boyish days, nor do I recollect having seen it used by the older humourists. Nor do I find it in “Errors of Pronunciation and Improper Expressions, Used Frequently and Chiefly by the Inhabitants of London,” 1817, which likewise does not note any pronunciation of ō like ow. Hence I am inclined to believe that both are modernisms, due to the growing of London into the adjacent provinces. They do not seem to me yet prevalent in the W. districts, though the N.W. is transitional. South of the Thames, in the S.W. districts, I think they are practically unknown. In the S.E. districts, which dip into N. Kent, the finer form of aow for ou is prevalent. The uneducated of course form a mode of speech among themselves. But I am sorry to find even school teachers much infected with the ī, ow, aow, pronunciations of ā, ō, ou, in N. districts.

Of course your Cockney orthography goes upon very broad lines, and you are quite justified in raising a laugh by apparent confusions, where no confusions are made by the speakers themselves, as Hans Breitmann did with the German. The confusion is only in our ears. They speak a language we do not use. To write the varieties of sounds, especially of diphthongs, with anything like correctness, requires a phonetic alphabet which cannot even be read, much less written, without great study, such as you cannot look for in readers who want only to be amused. But another question arises, Should we lay down a pronunciation? There never has been any authority capable of doing so. Orthoepists may protest, but the fashion of pronunciation will again change, as it has changed so often and so markedly during the last six hundred years; see the proofs in my Early English Pronunciation. Why should we not pronounce ā as we do ī, pronouncing ī as we do oy? Why should we not call ō as we now call ow, pronouncing that as aow? Is not our ā a change from ī (the German ei, ai) in say, away, pain, etc.? Is not our ou a change from our sound of oo in cow, etc.? Again, our oo replaces an old oh sound. There is nothing but fashion which rules this. But when sounds are changed in one set of vowels, a compensating change takes place in another set, and so no confusion results. In one part of Cheshire I met with four sounds of y in my, never confused by natives, although a received speaker hears only one, and all arose from different sources. Why is one pronunciation horrid (or aw-ud), and another not? Simply because they mark social grades. Of course I prefer my own pronunciation, it’s been my companion for so many years. But others, just as much of course, prefer theirs. When I brought out the Phonetic News, in phonetic spelling, many years ago, a newsvendor asked me, “Why write neewz? We always say nooze.”

Very truly yours,
Alexander J. Ellis.

A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, Y.

A dip and a wallop for a bawbee!, 29, 125, 126
Act, Chimney Sweeps’, 64
Addison, Cries of London, 25, 30
Albert Smith’s “Covered Uncertainties”, 111
Ale Scurvy-grass, 32
All my teeth ache!, 30
All the fun of the fair!, 50
Ancient tavern sign, 110
Anecdote of a simpler, 32
Aphorisms, Book of, 36
Area sneak thieves, 48
’Arry and Emma Ann, 50

Bartholomew Fair, 38, 39, 42
Bartholomew Fair, Ben Jonson’s (1614), 25
Beating of one’s wife, 51
Beaumont and Fletcher’s Bonduca, 25
Beau pot? Will you buy a, 86
Bellows-mender, 94
Bells, Merry Christ Church, 33
Belman, 20
Blacking, cake, 44
Black sheep, 48
Blowing a horn in the night, 51
Bonduca, Beaumont and Fletcher’s, 25
Book of Aphorisms, 36
Boot-black, The modern, 44
Boot laces—AND the boot laces!, 54
Brickdust, 92
Bridgwater Library, 14
British Museum, Collection of cries in, 16
Buggs! Water for the, 29, 125, 126
Buns! Hot cross, 97
Busby’s Costumes of the Lower Orders, 35
Business card of pussy’s butcher, 65, 120
Buy a beau pot?, 86
Buy a bill of the play?, 97
“Buy a broom” criers, Flemish, 96
Buy a flower, sir?, 68
Buy my rumps and burrs?, 38
Buy my singing glasses?, 12

Cake blacking, 44
Calling price before quantity, 64
Candlewick, 5
Cantlie’s (Dr. J.) “Degeneration among Londoners”, 72
Canwyke Street, 5
Caricature, political, Cries the vehicle for, 29
Catnach illustrations, 118
Cats, London, 64
Caveat against cut-purses, 42
Chairs in Queen Anne’s time, 108
Chairs in Queen Elizabeth’s time, 108
Chairs, rush-bottomed, 108
Characteristic sketches of the lower orders (1820), 117
Characters, Humorous, 52
Charles II., Cries in the time of, 18
Cherryes in the ryse, 3
Chimney Sweeps’ Act, 64
Clean yer boots?, 44
Coachman, Hackney, 70
Cockney pronunciation, 31, 53, 72, 73, 74, 126-129
Cockney pronunciation, London Globe, 78
Colly Molly Puffe! Spectator, 12
Costermonger, or Costardmonger, 46
Costumes of the Lower Orders, Busby’s, 35
“Covered Uncertainties,” Albert Smith’s, 111
Crawhall’s (Joseph) illustrations, 119
Cream made of turnips, 60
Cries—Collection in British Museum, 16
Cries, Old London Street—Examples of, 76-92
Cries, Tempest’s, 6
Cries in the time of Charles the Second, 18
Cries, Under-street, 70
Cries, vehicle for political caricature, 29
Cries of London, Addison’s mention of, 25, 30
Cries of London as they are daily Practised, J. Harris (1804), 120
Cries of London, earliest mention of, 3
Cries of London, engraved by Schiavonetti and Wheatley, 42
Cries of London for the amusement of good children, 119
Cries of London, Humorous, 52, 53, 54
Cries of London, Lumsden’s, 119
Cries of London, Roxburgh collection of, 25-33
Cries of London, Sandby’s, 31
Cries of London (J. T.) Smith’s, 16
Cries of London. Specimens of versification, 111-117
Cries of London, Spectator, 25
Cries of York, 14
Cruikshank’s London barrow-woman, 100
“Cryer,” Public, 22
Cryes, Tempest’s, 6
Cuckoo flowers, 35
Cut-purses, Caveat against, 42

Dead letter act, A, 51
“Degeneration amongst Londoners,” Dr. Jas. Cantlie’s, 72
Description of Illustrations, 117-120
“Doing” the public, 47
Door Mats, 94
Doublets, Old, 10
Do you want a lick on the head?, 30
Du Maurier’s Steam Launch in Venice, 72

Earliest mention of London Cries, 3
Early green peas, 94
Early matches, 56
Early umbrellas, 70
Elizabethan Statutes of the streets, 51
Everyday Book, Hone’s, 36, 42, 52, 96, 102, 110, 120

Facetious salesmen of the streets, 52
Fair, Bartholomew, 38, 39, 42
Faux, the Conjurer, 40
Fine tie or a fine bob, sir?, 36
Fleas! Tormentor for, 24, 121-125
Flea trap, 25
Flemish “Buy a broom” criers, 96
Flower girls at the Royal Exchange, 68
“Flowers, Penny a Bunch!” (frontispiece), 119
Frontispiece, “Flowers, Penny a Bunch!”, 119

Gardner’s Collection of Prints, 7
Gay’s poor apple girl, 28
Gay’s Trivia, 26
Gazette, London, 14
Gingerbread, Hot spiced, 102
Green peas, Early, 94
Green rushes, O!, 98
Grose, Francis—The Olio, 30, 62

Ha! ha! Poor Jack!, 8
Hackney Coachman, 70
Hanway (Jonas) the philanthropist, 64
Herb gatherers, 32
Heywood’s Rape of Lucrece, 24
Highest ground in London, 109, 110
Hokey-pokey, 58
Hone’s Everyday Book, 36, 42, 52, 96, 102, 110, 120
Honest John Newbery, 120
Hot-baked wardens!, 38
Hot cross buns!, 97
Hot mutton trumpery!, 30
Hot pies, 111
Hot pudding, 96
Hot rolls, 96
Hot spiced gingerbread, 102
Hogarth’s Idle Apprentice, 104
Hogarth’s Laughing Audience, 98
Houndsditch, 47, 50
Humorous characters, 52
Humorous Cries of London, 52, 53, 54
Humorous nonsense, 104

Ices, Neapolitan, 58
Ices, penny, 58
Idle Apprentice, Hogarth’s, 104
Illustrations, Catnach, 118
Illustrations, Crawhall’s, 119
Illustrations, Description of, 117-120
Illustrations, McEgan’s, 120
Illustrations, Rowlandson’s, 117
I’m on the woolsack!, 31
Imitators of Tiddy Diddy Doll, 104
Inner and Outer Circle Railway, 75
Inner Circle Railway, 73
Irons! Marking, 42
Itinerant traders, Plates representing (1805), 118

Jack-in-the-box seller, 56
Japan your shoes, your honour?, 44
Jaw-work, up and under jaw-work!, 54
Johnson (Dr.), Turnips and carrots, O!, 43
Jonson’s (Ben) Bartholomew Fair (1614), 25

Knives to grind!, 98

Laughing Audience, Hogarth’s, 98
Laroon, Capt., 7
Laroon, Marcellus, 6
Lice, penny a pair, boot lice!, 53
Lights—pipe and c’gar, 56
Loftie’s Old London, 110
London barrow-woman, Cruikshank’s, 100
London cats, 64
London Cries, as they are daily Practised, J. Harris (1804), 120
London Cries, earliest mention of, 3
London Cries, engraved by Schiavonetti and Wheatley, 42
London Cries, Humorous, 52, 53, 54
London, Cries of—for the Amusement of Good Children, 119
London Cries, Sandby’s, 31
London Cries, Specimens of versification, 111-117
London Gazette, 14
London, Highest ground in, 109, 110
London Lyckpenny, 3
London Spy (1703) Ned Ward’s, 38
London street cries, Old, Examples of, 76, 92
London, The Three Ladies of (1584), 96
Lord Mayor’s day, 50
Lower Orders, Busby’s Costumes of the, 35
Lower orders, Characteristic sketches of (1820), 117
Lucifer match, The, 56
Lumsden’s Cries of London, 119
Lyckpenny, London, 3
Lydgate, John, 3

Marking irons!, 42
Marking stones, 16
Marquis Townshend’s, The Pedlars (1763), 29
Match, Brimstone, 56
Match, Lucifer, 56
Match-selling, 48
Match, Vesuvian, 56
Matches, Early, 56
McEgan’s illustrations, 120
Merry Christ Church bells, 33
Metropolitan and District Railways, 73
Milk below, maids!, 67
Modern boot-black, 44
Modern street cries, 62, 64, 67-70
Morning in Town, Swift’s, 10
Muffin man, 62
My name and your name, etc., 42

Nameless toy, A, 54
Neapolitan ices, 58
New laid eggs, crack ’em and try ’em!, 54
New laid eggs, eight a groat, 110
Newsman, The, 68
Newspaper, Shilling for a, 68
Nonsense, Humorous, 104
Notes and Queries, References to, 36, 121, 122, 125
Novelties from the continent, 50
Newbery, Honest John, 120

O’ Clo!, 62
Old chairs to mend!, 106
Old doublets, 10
’Okey-pokey, 58
Old London, Loftie’s, 110
Old London street cries, Examples of, 76-92
Olio, The—Francis Grose, 30, 62
On the bough, 3
On’y a ha’penny!, 54
Orange seller, Dr. Randal, The, 52
Oranges! Oratorio, 53
Ornaments for your fire stoves!, 60
’Orrible railway haccident—speshill ’dishun, 68
Outcries in the night, 51

Panyer Alley, 109
Pedlars, The (1763) List of Cries in, 29
Penny for a shillin’ ’lusterated magazine!, 51
Penny ices!, 58
Penny pieman, The, 111
Philanthropist, Jonas Hanway, The 64
Pieman, The penny, 111
Pins, Hone’s Reference to, 7
Pipe cleaner—penny for two!, 58
Pipe-lights, 56
Plates representing itinerant traders (1805), 118
Play! Buy a bill of the, 97
Political caricature, Cries the vehicle for, 29
Poor apple girl, Gay’s, 28
Prisoners! Remember the poor, 14
Pronunciation, Cockney, 31, 53, 72, 73, 74, 127-130
Pronunciation (Cockney) London Globe, 73
Public “Cryer”, 22
Pudding, Hot, 96
Pussy’s butcher, Business card of, 65, 120

Queen Anne’s time, Chairs in, 108
Queen Elizabeth’s time, Chairs in, 108

Rabbits, 98
Railway, Underground, 70
Railways, Inner and Outer Circle, 75
Railways, Metropolitan and District, 73
Randal (Dr.), the orange seller, 52
Rape of Lucrece, Heywood’s, 24
Rat-catcher, 18
Remember the poor prisoners!, 14
Rolls, Hot, 96
Rowlandson’s illustrations, 117
Roxburgh Collection, Cries of London, 25-33
Royal Exchange, Flower girls at the, 68
Ruddle, 16
Rumps and burrs! Buy my, 38
Rush-bearing, 100
Rush-bottomed chairs, 108
Rushes, green, 5
Ryster grene 5

Salesmen of the streets, Facetious, 52
Saloop, 35
Samphire, 98
Sandby’s (Paul) London Cries, 31
Scurvy-grass, Ale, 32
Shilling for a newspaper, 68
Shrimps! Stinking, 53
Simpler, Anecdote of a, 32
Simplers, 32
Singing glasses! Buy my, 12
Small coale, Swift’s reference to, 10
Smith (J. T.) Cries of London, 16
Soot! or Sweep O!, 64
Spectator—Colly Molly Puffe!, 12
Spectator, Cries of London, 25
Speshill ’dishun, ’orrible railway haccident!, 68
Statutes of the streets, Elizabethan, 51
Steam Launch in Venice, Du Maurier’s, 72
Steele’s comedy of The Funeral, 26
Stinking shrimps!, 53
Stones, Marking, 16
Stop thief!, 16
Street cries, Modern, 62, 64, 67-70
Street music, Regulation of, 52
Sweep your door away, mum?, 53
Swift’s Morning in Town, 10
Swift’s reference to small coale, 10

Tavern sign, Ancient 110
Taylor’s Travels of Twelvepence, 25
Tempest’s Cryes, 6
The Funeral, Steele’s comedy of, 26
Thieves, Area sneak, 48
Three ladies of London (1584), 96
Tiddy Diddy Doll, 102
Tiddy Diddy Doll’s imitators, 104
Tinker, 94
Tormentor for your fleas!, 24, 121-125
Townshend, Marquis—The Pedlars, 29
Toy, A nameless, 54
Travels of Twelvepence, Taylor’s, 25
Tricksters, 47, 48
Trivia, Gay’s, 26
Troope every one!, 12
Turnips and carrots, O! Dr. Johnson’s reference thereto, 43
Turnips, Cream made of, 60
Type seller, 42

Umbrellas, Early, 70
Underground Railway, 70
Under-street Cries, 70

Versification, Specimens of, in London Cries, 111-117

Wardens! Hot baked, 38
Ward’s (Ned) London Spy (1703), 38
Watchman, 35
Water for the Buggs!, 29, 125, 126
Waterman, The, 36
“What d’ye ack?”, 24
Whistling prohibited after 9 o’clock, 51
White sand and grey sand!, 97
Wigs, The best, 36
Woolsack! I’m on the, 31

York, Cries of, 14
Young lambs to sell!, 105

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