London Labour and the London Poor: Selection (Classics) (51 page)

The Goose seemed to feel the truth of this reproach, for he said with a sigh, ‘I knows I am fickle-minded.’

He then continued his statement, –

‘I can ‘t tell how many brooms I use; for as fast as I gets one, it is took from me. God help me! They watch me put it away, and then up they comes and takes it. What kinds of brooms is the best? Why, as far as I am
concerned, I would sooner have a stump on a dry day – it’s lighter and handier to carry; but on a wet day, give me a new un.

‘I’m sixteen, your honour, and my name’s George Gandea, and the boys calls me “the Goose” in consequence; for it’s a nickname they gives me, though my name ain ‘t spelt with a
har
at the end, but with a
h’ay
, so that I ain ‘t Gand
er
after all, but Gand
ea
, which is a sell for ’em.

‘God knows what I am – whether I’m h’Irish or h’
I
talian, or what; but I was christened here in London, and that’s all about it.

‘Father was a bookbinder. I’m sixteen now, and father turned me away when I was nine year old, for mother had been dead before that. I was told my right name by my brother-in-law, who had my register. He’s a sweep, sir, by trade, and I wanted to know about my real name when I was going down to the
Waterloo
– that’s a ship as I wanted to get aboard as a cabin-boy.

‘I remember the first night I slept out after father got rid of me. I slept on a gentleman’s door-step, in the winter, on the 15th January. I packed my shirt and coat, which was a pretty good one, right over my ears, and then scruntched myself into a door-way, and the policeman passed by four or five times without seeing on me.

‘I had a mother-in-law at the time; but father used to drink, or else I should never have been as I am; and he came home one night, and says he, “Go out and get me a few ha’pence for breakfast,” and I said I had never been in the streets in my life, and couldn’t; and, says he, “Go out, and never let me see you no more,” and I took him to his word, and have never been near him since.

‘Father lived in Barbican at that time, and after leaving him, I used to go to the Royal Exchange, and there I met a boy of the name of Michael, and he first learnt me to beg, and made me run after people, saying, “Poor boy, sir – please give us a ha’penny to get a mossel of bread.” But as fast as I got anythink, he used to take it away, and knock me about shameful; so I left him, and then I picked up with a chap as taught me tumbling. I soon larnt how to do it, and then I used to go tumbling after busses. That was my notion all along, and I hadn ‘t picked up the way of doing it half an hour before I was after that game.

‘I took to crossings about eight year ago, and the very fust person as I asked, I had a fourpenny-piece give to me. I said to him, “Poor little Jack, yer honour,” and, fust of all, says he, “I haven ‘t got no coppers,” and then he turns back and give me a fourpenny-bit. I thought I was made for life when I got that.

‘I wasn ‘t working in a gang then, but all by myself, and I used to do
well, making about a shilling or ninepence a-day. I lodged in Church-lane at that time.

‘It was at the time of the Shibition year [1851] as these gangs come up. There was lots of boys that came out sweeping, and that’s how they picked up the tumbling off me, seeing me do it up in the Park, going along to the Shibition.

‘The crossing at St Martin’s Church was mine fust of all; and when the other lads come to it I didn’t take no heed of ’em – only for that I’d have been a bright boy by now, but they carnied me over like; for when I tried to turn ’em off they’d say, in a carnying way, “Oh, let us stay on,” so I never took no heed of ’em.

‘There was about thirteen of ’em in my gang at that time.

‘They made me cap’an over the lot – I suppose because they thought I was the best tumbler of ’em. They obeyed me a little. If I told ’em not to go to any gentleman, they wouldn’t, and leave him to me. There was only one feller as used to give me a share of his money, and that was for laming him to tumble – he’d give a penny or twopence, just as he yearnt a little or a lot. I taught ’em all to tumble, and we used to do it near the crossing, and at night along the streets.

‘We used to be sometimes together of a day, some a-running after one gentleman, and some after another; but we seldom kept together more than three or four at a time.

‘I was the fust to introduce tumbling backwards, and I’m proud of it – yes, sir, I’m proud of it. There’s another little chap as I’m laming to do it; but he ain’t got strength enough in his arms like. (“Ah!” exclaimed a lad in the room, “he
is
a one to tumble, is Johnny – go along the streets like anythink.’)

‘He is the King of the Tumblers,’ continued Gander – ‘King, and I’m Cap’an.’

The old grandmother here joined in. ‘He was taught by a furreign gintleman, sir, whose wife rode at a circus. He used to come here twice a-day and give him lessons in this here very room, sir. That’s how he got it, sir.’

‘Ah,’ added another lad, in an admiring tone,‘see him and the Goose have a race! Away they goes, but Jacky will leave him a mile behind.’

The history then continued: ‘People liked the tumbling backards and forards, and it got a good bit of money at fust, but they is getting tired with it, and I’m growing too hold, I fancy. It hurt me awful at fust. I tried it fust under a railway arch of the Blackwall Railway; and when I goes backards, I thought it’d cut my head open. It hurts me if I’ve got a thin cap on.

‘The man as taught me tumbling has gone on the stage. Fust he went about with swords, fencing, in public-houses, and then he got engaged. Me and him once tumbled all round the circus at the Rotunda one night wot was a benefit, and got one-and-eightpence a-piece, and all for only five hours and a half – from six to half-past eleven, and we acting and tumbling, and all that. We had plenty of beer, too. We was wery much applauded when we did it.

‘I was the fust boy as ever did ornamental work in the mud of my crossings. I used to be at the crossing at the corner of Regent-suckus; and that’s the wery place where I fust did it. The wery fust thing as I did was a hanker (anchor) – a regular one, with turn-up sides and a rope down the centre, and all. I sweeped it away clean in the mud in the shape of the drawing I’d seen. It paid well, for I took one-and-ninepence on it. The next thing I tried was writing “God save the Queen”; and that, too, paid capital, for I think I got two bob. After that I tried We Har (V. R.) and a star, and that was a sweep too. I never did no flowers, but I’ve done imitations of laurels, and put them all round the crossing, and very pretty it looked, too, at night. I’d buy a farthing candle and stick it over it, and make it nice and comfortable, so that the people could look at it easy. Whenever I see a carriage coming I used to douse the glim and run away with it, but the wheels would regularly spile the drawings, and then we’d have all the trouble to put it to rights again, and that we used to do with our hands.

‘I fust learnt drawing in the mud from a man in Adelaide-street, Strand; he kept a crossing, but he only used to draw ’em close to the kerb-stone. He used to keep some soft mud there, and when a carriage come up to the Lowther Arcade, after he’d opened the door and let the lady out, he would set to work, and by the time she come back he’d have some flowers, or a We Har, or whatever he liked, done in the mud, and underneath he’d write, “Please to remember honnest hindustry.”

‘I used to stand by and see him do it, until I’d learnt, and when I knowed, I went off and did it at my crossing.

‘I was the fust to light up at night though, and now I wish I’d never done it, for it was that which got me turned off my crossing, and a capital one it was. I thought the gentlemen coming from the play would like it, for it looked very pretty. The policeman said I was destructing (obstructing) the thoroughfare, and making too much row there, for the people used to stop in the crossing to look, it were so pretty. He took me in charge three times on one night, cause I wouldn’t go away; but he let me go again, till at last I thought he would lock me up for the night, so I hooked it.

‘It was after this as I went to St Martin’s Church, and I haven’t done half as well there. Last night I took three-ha’pence; but I was larking, or I might have had more.’

As a proof of the very small expense which is required for the toilette of a crossing-sweeper, I may mention, that within a few minutes after Master Gander had finished his statement, he was in possession of a coat, for which he had paid the sum of fivepence.

When he brought it into the room, all the boys and the women crowded round to see the purchase.

‘It’s a very good un,’ said the Goose. ‘It only wants just taking up here and there; and this cuff putting to rights.’ And as he spoke he pointed to tears large enough for a head to be thrust through.

‘I’ve seen that coat before, sum ‘ares,’ said one of the women; ‘where did you get it?’

‘At the chandly-shop,’ answered the Goose.

The ‘King’ of the Tumbling-boy Crossing-sweepers

[pp. 567–9] The young sweeper who had been styled by his companions the ‘King’ was a pretty-looking boy, only tall enough to rest his chin comfortably on the mantel-piece as he talked to me, and with a pair of grey eyes that were as bright and clear as drops of sea-water. He was clad in a style in no way agreeing with his royal title; for he had on a kind of dirt-coloured shooting-coat of tweed, which was fraying into a kind of cobweb at the edges and elbows. His trousers too, were rather faulty, for there was a pink-wrinkled dot of flesh at one of the knees; while their length was too great for his majesty’s short legs, so that they had to be rolled up at the end like a washer-woman’s sleeves.

His royal highness was of a restless disposition, and, whilst talking, lifted up, one after another, the different ornaments on the mantel-piece, frowning and looking at them side-ways, as he pondered over the replies he should make to my questions.

When I arrived at the grandmother’s apartment the ‘king’ was absent, his majesty having been sent with a pitcher to fetch some spring-water.

The ‘king’ also was kind enough to favour me with samples of his wondrous tumbling powers. He could bend his little legs round till they curved like the long German sausages we see in the ham-and-beef shops; and when he turned head over heels, he curled up his tiny body as closely as a wood-louse, and then rolled along, wabbling like an egg.

‘The boys call me Johnny,’ he said; ‘and I’m getting on for eleven, and
I goes along with the Goose and Harry, a-sweeping at St Martin’s Church, and about there. I used, too, to go to the crossing where the statute is, sir, at the bottom of the Haymarket. I went along with the others; sometimes there were three or four of us, or sometimes one, sir. I never used to sweep unless it was wet. I don’t go out not before twelve or one in the day; it ain’t no use going before that; and beside, I couldn’t get up before that, I’m too sleepy. I don’t stop out so late as the other boys; they sometimes stop all night, but I don’t like that. The Goose was out all night along with Martin; they went all along up Piccirilly, and there they climbed over the Park railings and went a birding all by themselves, and then they went to sleep for an hour on the grass – so they says. I likes better to come home to my bed. It kills me for the next day when I do stop out all night. The Goose is always out all night; he likes it.

‘Neither father nor mother’s alive, sir, but I lives along with grandmother and aunt, as owns this room, and I always gives them all I gets.

‘Sometimes I makes a shilling, sometimes sixpence, and sometimes less. I can never take nothink of a day, only of a night, because I can’t tumble of a day, and I can of a night.

‘The Gander taught me tumbling, and he was the first as did it along the crossings. I can tumble quite as well as the Goose; I can turn a caten-wheel, and he can’t, and I can go further on forards than him, but I can’t tumble backards as he can. I can’t do a handspring, though. Why, a handspring’s pitching yourself forards on both hands, turning over in front, and lighting on your feet; that’s very difficult, and very few can do it. There’s one little chap, but he’s very clever, and can tie himself up in a knot a’most. I’m best at caten-wheels; I can do ’em twelve or fourteen times running – keep on at it. It just
does
tire you, that’s all. When I gets up I feels quite giddy. I can tumble about forty times over head and heels. I does the most of that, and I thinks it’s the most difficult, but I can’t say which gentlemen likes best. You see they are anigh sick of the head-and-heels tumbling, and then werry few of the boys can do caten-wheels on the crossings – only two or three besides me.

‘When I see anybody coming, I says, “Please, sir, give me a halfpenny,” and touches my hair, and then I throws a caten-wheel, and has a look at ’em, and if I sees they are laughing, then I goes on and throws more of ’em. Perhaps one in ten will give a chap something. Some of ’em will give you a threepenny-bit or p’rhaps sixpence, and others only give you a kick. Well, sir, I should say they likes tumbling over head and heels; if you can keep it up twenty times then they begins laughing, but if you only
does it once, some of ’em will say, “Oh, I could do that myself,” and then they don’t give nothink.

‘I know they calls me the King of Tumblers, and I think I can tumble the best of them; none of them is so good as me, only the Goose at tumbling backards.

‘We don’t crab one another when we are sweeping; if we was to crab one another, we’d get to fighting and giving slaps of the jaw to one another. So when we sees anybody coming, we cries, “My gentleman and lady coming here”; “My lady”; “My two gentlemens”; and if any other chap gets the money, then we says, “I named them, now I’ll have halves.” And if he won’t give it, then we’ll smug his broom or his cap. I’m the littlest chap among our lot, but if a fellow like the Goose was to take my naming then I’d smug somethink. I shouldn’t mind his licking me, I’d smug his money and get his halfpence or somethink. If a chap as can’t tumble sees a sporting gent coming and names him, he says to one of us tumblers, “Now, then, who’ll give us halves?” and then we goes and tumbles and shares. The sporting gentlemens likes tumbling; they kicks up more row laughing than a dozen others.