Volume 2 — Of the Streets of London. (continued 2)

Of the proportion sold to builders, plasterers, and brickmakers, severally, I could learn no precise particulars. The general opinion appears to be, that “mac” is sold most to brickmakers, and that it would find even a greater sale with them, were not brick-fields becoming more and more remote. I moreover found it universally admitted, that “mac” was in less demand—some said by one-half—than it was five or six years back.

Such are the uses of “mac,” and we now come to the question of its value.

The price of the purer “mac” seems, from the best information I can procure, to have varied considerably. It is now generally cheap. I did not hear any very sufficing reason advanced to account for the depreciation, but one of the contractors expressed an opinion that this was owing to the “disturbed” state of the trade. Since the passing of the Sanitary Bill, the contractors for the public scavengery have been prevented “shooting” any valueless street-dirt, or dirt “not worth carriage” in convenient waste-places, as they were once in the habit of doing. Their yards and wharfs are generally full, so that, to avoid committing a nuisance, the contractor will not unfrequently sell his “mac” at reduced rates, and be glad thus to get rid of it. To this cause especially Mr. —— attributed the deterioration in the price of “mac,” but if he had convenience, he told me, and any change was made in the present arrangements, he would not scruple to store 1000 loads for the demands of next summer, as a speculation. I am of opinion, moreover, notwithstanding what seemed something very like unanimity of opinion on the part of the sellers of “mac,” that what is given or thrown away is usually, if not always, mixed or inferior “mac,” and that what is sold at the lowest rate is only a degree or two better; unless, indeed, it be under the immediate pressure of some of the circumstances I have pointed out, as want of room, &c.

On inquiring the price of “mac,” I believe the answer of a vendor will almost invariably be found to be “a shilling a load;” a little further inquiry, however, shows that an extra sum may have to be paid. A builder, who gave me the information, asked a parish contractor the price of “mac.” The contractor at once offered to supply him with 500 loads at 1s. a load, if the “mac” were ordered beforehand, and could be shot at once; but it would be 6d. a mile extra if delivered a mile out of the mac-seller’s parish circuit, or more than a mile from his yard; while, if extra care were to be taken in the collection of the “mac,” it would be 2d., 3d., 4d., or 6d. a load higher. This, it must be understood, was the price of “wet mac.”

Good “dry mac,” that is to say, “mac” ready for use, is sold to the builder or the brickmaker at from 2s. to 3s. the load; 2s. 6d., or something very near it, being now about an average price. It is dried in the contractor’s yard by being exposed to the sun, or it is sometimes protected from the weather by a shed, while being dried. More wet “mac” would be shot for the trade, and kept until dry, but for want of room in the contractors’ yards and wharfs; for “mac” must give way to the more valuable dung, and the dust and ashes from the bins. The best “mac” is sometimes described as “country mac,” that is to say, it is collected from those suburban roads where it is likely to be little mixed with dung, &c.

A contractor told me that during the last twelve months he had sold 300 loads of “mac;” he had no account of what he had given away, to be rid of it, or of what he had sold at nominal prices. Another contractor, I was told by his managing man, sold last year about 400 loads. But both these parties are “in a large way,” and do not supply the data upon which to found a calculation as to an average yearly sale; for though in the metropolis there are, according to the list I have given in p. 167 of the present volume, 63 contracts, for cleansing the metropolis, without including the more remote suburbs, such as Greenwich, Lewisham, Tooting, Streatham, Ealing, Brentford, and others—still some of the districts contracted for yield no “mac” at all.

From what I consider good authority, I may venture upon the following moderate computation as to the quantity of “mac” sold last year.

Estimating the number of contracts for cleansing the more central parishes at 35, and adding 20 for all the outlying parishes of the metropolis—in some of which the supply of road “mac” is very fine, and by no means scarce—it may be accurate enough to state that, out of the 55 individual contracts, 300 loads of “mac” were sold by each in the course of last year. This gives 16,500 loads of “mac” disposed of per annum. It may, moreover, be a reasonable estimate to consider this “mac,” wet and dry together, as fetching 1s. 6d. a load, so that we have for the sum realized the following result:—

16,500 loads of “mac,” at 1s. 6d. per load£123710

It may probably be considered by the contractors that 1s. 6d. is too high an average of price per load: if the price be minimized the result will be—

16,500 loads of “mac,” at 1s. per load£825

Then if we divide the first estimate among the 55 contractors, we find that they receive upwards of 22l. each; the second estimate gives nearly 15l. each.

I repeat, that in this inquiry I can but approximate. One gentleman told me he thought the quantity of “mac” thus sold in the year was twice 1600 loads; another asserted that it was not 1000. I am assured, however, that my calculation does not exceed the truth.

I have given the full quantity of “mac,” as nearly, I believe, as it can be computed, to be yielded by the metropolitan thoroughfares; the surplusage, after deducting the 1600 loads sold, must be regarded as consisting of mixed, and therefore useless, “mac;” that is to say, “mac” rendered so thin by continuous wet weather, that it is little worth; “mac” wasted because it is not storeable in the contractor’s yard; and “mac” used as a component part of a barge-load of manure.

In the course of my inquiries I heard it very generally stated that until five or six years ago 2s. 6d. might be considered a regular price for a load of “mac,” while 4s., 5s., or even 6s. have been paid to one contractor, according to his own account, for the better kind of this commodity.

Of the Mud of the Streets.

The dirt yielded by a macadamized road, no matter what the composition, is always termed by the scavengers “mac;” what is yielded by a granite-paved way is always “mud.” Mixed mud and “mac” are generally looked upon as useless.

I inquired of one man, connected with a contractor’s wharf, if he could readily distinguish the difference between “mac” and other street or mixed dirts, and he told me that he could do so, more especially when the stuff was sufficiently dried or set, at a glance. “If mac was darker,” he said, “it always looked brighter than other street-dirts, as if all the colour was not ground out of the stone.” He pointed out the different kinds, and his definition seemed to me not a bad one, although it may require a practised eye to make the distinction readily.

Street-mud is only partially mud, for mud is earthy particles saturated with water, and in the composition of the scavenger’s street-mud are dung, general refuse (such as straw and vegetable remains), and the many things which in poor neighbourhoods are still thrown upon the pavement.

In the busier thoroughfares of the metropolis—apart from the City, where there is no macadamization requiring notice—it is almost impossible to keep street “mac” and mud distinct, even if the scavengers cared more to do so than is the case at present; for a waggon, or any other vehicle, entering a street paved with blocks of wrought granite from a macadamized road must convey “mac” amongst mud; both “mac” and mud, however, as I have stated, are the most valuable separately.

In a Report on the Supply of Water, Appendix No. III., Mr. Holland, Upper Stamford-street, Waterloo-road, is stated to have said, in reply to a question on the subject:—“Suppose the inhabitants of one parish are desirous of having their streets in good order and clean: unless the adjoining districts concur, a great and unjust expense is imposed upon the cleaner parish; because every vehicle which passes from a dirty on to a clean street carries dirt from the former to the latter, and renders cleanliness more difficult and expensive. The inhabitants of London have an interest in the condition of other streets besides those of their own parish. Besides the inhabitants of Regent-street, for instance, all the riders in the 5000 vehicles that daily pass through that great thoroughfare are affected by its condition; and the inhabitants of Regent-street, who have to bear the cost of keeping that street in good repair and well cleansed, for others’ benefit as well as for their own, may fairly feel aggrieved if they do not experience the benefits of good and clean streets when they go into other districts.”

In the admixture of street-dirt there is this material difference—the dung, which spoils good “mac,” makes good mud more valuable.

After having treated so fully of the road-produce of “mac,” there seems no necessity to say more about mud than to consider its quantity, its value, and its uses.

In the Haymarket, which is about an eighth of a mile in length, and 18 yards in width, a load and a half of street-mud is collected daily (Sundays excepted), take the year through. As a farmer or market-gardener will give 3s. a load for common street-mud, and cart it away at his own cost, we find that were all this mud sold separately, at the ordinary rate, the yearly receipt for one street alone would be 70l. 4s. This public way, however, furnishes no criterion of the general mud-produce of the metropolis. We must, therefore, adopt some other basis for a calculation; and I have mentioned the Haymarket merely to show the great extent of street-dirt accruing in a largely-frequented locality.

But to obtain other data is a matter of no small difficulty where returns are not published nor even kept. I have, however, been fortunate enough to obtain the assistance of gentlemen whose public employment has given them the best means of forming an accurate opinion.

The street mud from the Haymarket, it has been positively ascertained, is 1¼ load each wet day the year through. Fleet-street, Ludgate-hill, Cheapside, Newgate-street, the “off” parts of St. Paul’s Church-yard, Cornhill, Leadenhall-street, Bishopsgate-street, the free bridges, with many other places where locomotion never ceases, are, in proportion to their width, as productive of street mud as the Haymarket.

Were the Haymarket a mile in length, it would supply, at its present rate of traffic, to the scavenger 6 loads of street mud daily, or 36 loads for the scavenger’s working week. In this yield, however, I am assured by practical men, the Haymarket is six times in excess of the average streets; and when compared with even “great business” thoroughfares, of a narrow character, such as Watling-street, Bow-lane, Old-change, and other thoroughfares off Cheapside and Cornhill, the produce of the Haymarket is from 10 to 40 per cent. in excess.

I am assured, however, and especially by a gentleman who had looked closely into the matter—as he at one time had been engaged in preparing estimates for a projected company purposing to deal with street-manures—that the 50 miles of the City may be safely calculated as yielding daily 1½ load of street mud per mile. Narrow streets—Thames-street for instance, which is about three-quarters of a mile long—yield from 2½ to 3½ loads daily, according to the season; but a number of off-streets and open places, such as Long-alley, Alderman’s-walk, America-square, Monument-yard, Bridgewater-square, Austin-friars, and the like, are either streets without horse-thoroughfares, or are seldom traversed by vehicles. If, then, we calculate that there are 100 miles of paved streets adjoining the City, and yielding the same quantity of street mud daily as the above estimate, and 200 more miles in the less central parts of the metropolis, yielding only half that quantity, we find the following daily sum during the wet season:—

Loads.

150 miles of paved streets, yielding 1½ load of street mud per mile225

200 miles of paved streets, yielding ¾ load of street mud per mile150

375

Weekly amount of street mud during the wet season2,250

Total ditto for six months in the year58,500

63,000 loads of street mud, at 3s. per load£8775

The great sale for this mud, perhaps nineteen-twentieths, is from the barges. A barge of street-manure, about one-fourth (more or less) “mac,” or rather “mac” mixed with its street proportion of dung, &c., and three-fourths mud, dung, &c., contains from 30 to 40 tons, or as many loads. These manure barges are often to be seen on the Thames, but nearly three-fourths of them are found on the canals, especially the Paddington, the Regent’s, and the Surrey, these being the most immediately connected with the interior part of the metropolis. A barge-load of this manure is usually sold at from 5l. to 6l. Calculating its average weight at 35 tons, and its average sale at 5l. 10s., the price is rather more than 3s. a load. “Common street mud,” I have been informed on good authority, “fetches 3s. per load from the farmer, when he himself carts it away.”

The price of the barge-load of manure is tolerably uniform, for the quality is generally the same. Some of the best, because the cleanest, street mud—as it is mixed only with horse-dung—is obtained from the wood streets, but this mode of pavement is so circumscribed that the contractors pay no regard to its manure produce, as a general rule, and mix it carelessly with the rest. Such, at least, is the account they themselves give, and they generally represent that the street manure is, owing to the outlay for cartage and boatage, little remunerative to them at the prices they obtain; notwithstanding, they are paid to remove it from the streets. Indeed, I heard of one contractor who was said to be so dissatisfied with the demand for, and the prices fetched by, his street-manure, that he has rented a few acres not far from the Regent’s Canal, to test the efficacy of street dirt as a fertilizer, and to ascertain if to cultivate might not be more profitable than to sell.

Of the Surface-Water of the Streets of London.

The consideration of what Professor Way has called the “street waters” of the metropolis, is one of as great moment as any of those I have previously treated in my details concerning street refuse, whether “mac,” mud, or dung. Indeed, water enters largely into the composition of the two former substances, while even the street dung is greatly affected by the rain.

The feeders of the street, as regards the street surface-water, are principally the rains. I will first consider the amount of surface-water supplied by the rain descending upon the area of the metropolis: upon the roofs of the houses, and the pavement of the streets and roads.

The depth of rain falling in London in the different months, according to the observations and calculations of the most eminent meteorologists, is as follows:—

Months.Depth of Rain in inches.Quantity of rain falling in the different seasons.Number of days on which rain falls.

Royal Society, according to observation.Howard, according to observation.Daniell, according to calculation.

January1·561·9071·483Winter. 5·86814·4

February1·451·6430·74615·8

March1·361·5421·44012·7

April1·551·7191·786Spring. 4·81314·0

May1·672·0361·85315·8

June1·981·9641·83011·8

July2·442·5922·516Summer. 6·68216·1

August2·372·1341·45316·3

September2·971·6442·19312·3

October2·462·8722·073Autumn. 7·44116·2

November2·582·6372·40015·0

December1·652·4892·42617·7

Totals24·0425·17922·19924·804178·1

The rainfall in London, according to a ten years’ average of the Royal Society’s observations, amounts to 23 inches; in 1848 it was as high as 28 inches, and in 1847 as low as 15 inches. The depth of rain annually falling near London is stated by Mr. Luke Howard to be, on an average of 23 years (1797-1819), as much as 25·179 inches. Mr. Daniell says that the average annual fall is 23⅒ inches. The mean of the observations made at Greenwich between the years 1838 and 1849 was 24·84 inches.

The following extract from an account of the “Soft Water Springs of the Surrey Sands,” by the Hon. Wm. Napier, is interesting.

“The amount of rainfall,” says the Author, “is taken from a register kept at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, from the year 1818 to 1846.

“The average fall of the last 15 years, during which time the register appears to have been correctly kept, is 22·64 inches. I consider this to be a very low estimate, however, of the average rainfall over the whole district. The fall on the ranges of the Hindhead must considerably exceed this amount, for I find in White’s ‘Selborne,’ a register for ten years at that place; the greatest fall being in 1782, 50·26 inches, the lowest, in 1788, 22·50 inches, and the average of all 37·58 inches. The elevation of the Hindhead is about 800 feet above mean tide.

“With reference to the measurement of rainfall, it is difficult indeed to obtain more than a very approximate idea for a given district of not very great extent; the method of measurement is so uncertain, as liable to be affected by currents of air and evaporation. It is well known that elevated regions attract by condensation more rain than low lands, and yet a rain-gauge placed on the ground will register a greater fall than one placed immediately, and even at a small height, above it.

“M. Arago has shown from 12 years’ observations at Paris, that the average depth of rain on the terrace of the Observatory was 19·88 inches, while 30 yards lower it was 22·21 inches. Dr. Heberden has shown the rainfall on the top of Westminster Cathedral, during a certain period to be only 12·09 inches, and at a lower level on the top of a house in the neighbourhood to be 22·608 inches. This fact has been observed all over the world, and I can only account for it as arising partly from the greater amount of condensation the nearer the earth’s surface, but probably also from currents of air depriving a rain-gauge at a high elevation of its fair share.”

The results of the above observations, as to the yearly quantity of rain falling in the metropolis, may be summed up as follows:—

Inches of Rain falling Annually.

Royal Society (average of 20 years)24·04

Mr. Howard (average of 23 years)25·179

Professor Daniell22·199

Dr. Heberden22·608

Mean23·506

The “mean mean,” or average of all the averages here given is within a fraction the average of the Royal Society’s Observations for 10 years, and this is the quantity that I shall adopt in my calculations as to the gross volume of rain falling over the entire area of London.

I have shown, by a detail of the respective districts in the Registrar General’s department, that the metropolis contains 74,070 statute acres. Every square inch of this extent, as garden, arable, or pasture ground, or as road or street, or waste place, or house, or inclosed yard or lawn, of course receives its modicum of rain. Each acre comprises 6,272,640 square inches, and we thus find the whole metropolitan area to contain a number of square inches, almost beyond the terms of popular arithmetic, and best expressible in figures.

Area of metropolis in square inches, 464,614,444,800. Now, multiplying these four hundred and sixty four thousand, six hundred and fourteen millions, four hundred and forty-four thousand, eight hundred square inches, by 23, the number of inches of rain falling every year in London, we have the following result:—

Total quantity of rain falling yearly in the metropolis, 10,686,132,230,400 cubic inches.

Then, as a fraction more than 277¼ cubic inches of water represent a weight of 10 lbs., and an admeasurement of a gallon, we have the following further results:—

Weight in pounds and tons.Admeasurement in gallons.

Yearly Rainfall in the Metropolis385,399,721,220 lbs., or 172,053,447 tons.38,539,972,122 gals.

The total quantity of water mechanically supplied every day to the metropolis is said to be in round numbers 55,000,000 gallons, the amount being made up in the following manner:—

Daily Mechanical Supply of Water to Metropolis.

Sources of Supply.Average No. of Gallons per day.

New River14,149,315

East London8,829,462

Chelsea3,940,730

West Middlesex3,334,054

Grand Junction3,532,013

Lambeth3,077,260

Southwark and Vauxhall6,313,716

Kent1,079,311

Hampstead427,468

Total from Companies44,383,329

Artesian Wells8,000,000

Land Spring Pumps3,000,000

Total daily55,383,329

Yearly Mechanical Supply of Water.

From Companies16,200,000,000gals.

„Artesian Wells1,920,000,000„

„Land Spring Pumps1,095,000,000„

Total yearly19,215,000,000„

Hence it would appear that the rain falling in London in the course of the year is rather more than double that of the entire quantity of water annually supplied to the metropolis by mechanical means, the rain-water being to the other as 2·005 to 1·000.

Now, in order to ascertain what proportion of the entire volume of rain comes under the denomination of street surface-water, we must first deduct from the gross quantity falling the amount said to be caught, and which, in contradistinction to that mechanically supplied to the houses of the metropolis is termed, “catch.” This is estimated at 1,000,000 gallons per diem, or 365,000,000 gallons yearly.

But we must also subtract from the gross quantity of rain-water that which falls on the roofs as well as on the “back premises” and yards of houses, and is carried off directly to the drains without appearing in the streets. This must be a considerable proportion of the whole, since the streets themselves, allowing them to be ten yards wide on an average, would seem to occupy only about one-tenth part of the entire metropolitan area, so that the rain falling directly upon the public thoroughfares will be but a tithe of the aggregate quantity. But the surface-water of the streets is increased largely by tributary shoots from courts and drainless houses, and hence we may fairly assume the natural supply to be doubled by such means. At this rate the volume of rain-water annually poured into and upon the metropolitan thoroughfares by natural means, will be between five and six thousand millions of gallons, or one hundred times the quantity that is daily supplied to the houses of the metropolis by mechanical agency.

Still only a part of this quantity appears in the form of surface-water, for a considerable portion of it is absorbed by the ground on which it falls—especially in dry weather—serving either to “lay the dust,” or to convert it into mud. Due regard, therefore, being had to all these considerations, we cannot, consistently with that caution which is necessary in all statistical inquiries, estimate the surface-water of the London streets at more than one thousand millions of gallons per annum, or twenty times the daily mechanical supply to the houses of the entire metropolis, and which it has been asserted is sufficient to exhaust a lake covering the area of St. James’s-park, 30 inches in depth.

The quantity of water annually poured upon the streets in the process of what is termed “watering” amounts, according to the returns of the Board of Health, to 275,000,000 gallons per annum! But as this seldom or never assumes the form of street surface-water, it need form no part of the present estimate.

What proportion of the thousand million gallons of “slop dirt” produced annually in the London streets is carried off down the drains, and what proportion is ladled up by the scavengers, I have no means of ascertaining, but that vast quantities run away into the sewers and there form large deposits of mud, everything tends to prove.

Mr. Lovick, on being asked, “How many loads of deposit have been removed in any one week in the Surrey and Kent district? What is the total quantity of deposit removed in any one week in the whole of the metropolitan district?” replied:

“It is difficult, if not impossible, to ascertain correctly the quantity removed, owing to the variety of forms of sewers and the ever-varying forms assumed by the deposit from the action of varying volumes of water; but I have had observations made on the rate of accumulation, from which I have been enabled roughly to approximate it. In one week, in the Surrey and Kent district, about 1000 yards were removed. In one week, in the whole of the metropolitan districts, including the Surrey and Kent district, between 4000 and 5000 yards were removed; but in portions of the districts these operations were not in progress.”

It is not here stated of what the deposit consisted, but there is no doubt that “mac” from the streets formed a great portion of it. Neither is it stated what period of time had sufficed for the accumulation; but it is evident enough that such deposits in the course of a year must be very great.

The street surface-water has been analyzed by Professor Way, and found to yield different constituents according to the different pavements from which it has been discharged. The results are as follows:—

“Examination of Samples of Water from Street Drainage, taken from the Gullies in the Sewers during the rain of 6th May, 1850.

“The waters were all more or less turbid, and some of them gave off very noxious odours, due principally to the escape of sulphuretted hydrogen gas.

“Some of them were alkaline to test-paper, but the majority were neutral.

“The following table exhibits the quantity of matter (both in solution and in solid state) contained in an imperial gallon of each specimen.

“STREET WATERS.

Number of Bottle.Name of Street.Quality of Paving.Quality of Traffic.Residue in an Imperial Gallon.

Soluble.Insoluble.Both.

Grains.Grains.Grains.

1Duke-street, Manchester-squareMacadamMiddling92·80105·95198·75

7Foley-street (upper part)„Little95·13116·30211·43

5Gower-streetGraniteMiddling126·00168·30294·30

12Norton-street„Little123·873·00126·87

3Hampstead-road (above the canal)BallastedGreat96·0084·00180·00

4Ferdinand-street„Middling44·0048·3092·30

2Ferdinand-place„Little50·8034·3085·10

10Oxford-streetGraniteGreat276·23537·10813·33

6 „Macadam„194·62390·30584·92

11 „Wood„34·005·0039·00

“The influence of the quality of the paving on the composition of the drainage water,” says Professor Way, “is well seen in the specimens Nos. 10, 6, and 11, all of them from Oxford-street, the traffic being described as ‘Great.’

“The quantity of soluble salts is here found to be greatest from the granite matter from the macadamized road, and very inconsiderable from the wood pavement.

“The same relation between the granite and macadam pavement seems to hold good in the other instances; the granite for any quality of traffic affording more soluble salts to the water than the macadam.

“The ballasted pavement holds a position intermediate between the macadam and the wood, giving more soluble salts than the wood, but less than the macadam.

“The quantity of solid (insoluble) matter in the different samples of water, which is a measure of the mechanical waste of the different kinds of pavement, appears also to follow the same relation as that of the soluble salts; that is to say, granite greatest, next macadam, then ballasted, and, lastly, wood pavement, which affords a quantity of solid deposit almost too small to deserve notice.

“The influence of the quality of traffic on the composition of the different specimens of drainage is well marked in nearly all cases; the greatest amount of matter both insoluble and soluble being found in the water obtained from the streets of great traffic.

“The following table shows the composition of the soluble salts of four specimens, two of them being from the granite, and two from the macadam pavement.

“It appears from the table that the granite furnishes little or no magnesia to the water, whilst the quantity from the macadam is considerable.

“On the other hand, the quantity of potash is far greatest in the water derived from the granite.

“The traffic, as was before seen, has a very great influence on the quantity of the soluble salts. It seems also to influence their composition, for we find no carbonates either in the water from the granite, or that from the macadam, where the traffic is little; whereas, when it is great, carbonates of lime and potash are found in the water in large quantity, a circumstance which is no doubt attributable to the action of decaying organic matter on the mineral substances of the pavement.

“ANALYSIS OF THE SOLUBLE MATTER IN DIFFERENT SPECIMENS OF STREET DRAINAGE WATER.

Grains in an Imperial Gallon.

Great Traffic.Little Traffic.

Granite. No. 10.Macadam. No. 6.Granite. No.12.Macadam. No. 7.

Water of combination and some soluble organic matter77·5629·0722·7213·73

Silica·512·81......

Carbonic Acid15·8412·23NoneNone

Sulphuric Acid36·4938·2346·4834·08

Lime6·6513·3825·9016·10

MagnesiaNone23·51Trace3·50

Oxide of Iron and Alumina, with a little Phosphate of Lime2·581·25......

Chloride of PotassiumNone10·99None2·79

„ Sodium53·8444·8818·4419·70

Potash82·7618·278·755·23

Soda......1·58...

276·23194·62123·8795·13

“The insoluble matter in the waters consists of the comminuted material of the road itself, with small fragments of straw and broken dung.

“The quantity of soluble salts (especially of salts of potash) in many of these samples of water is quite as great, and in some cases greater, than that found in the samples of sewer-water that have been examined; and it is open to question and further inquiry, whether the water obtained from the street-drainage of a crowded city might not often be of nearly equal value as liquid manure with the sewer-water with which it is at present allowed to mix.”

With regard to the “ballasted pavement” mentioned by Professor Way, I may observe that it cannot be considered a street-pavement, unless exceptionally. It is formed principally of Thames ballast mixed with gravel, and is used in the construction of what are usually private or pleasure walks, such as the “gravel walks” in the inclosures of some of the parks, and upon Primrose-hill, &c.

Of the Master Scavengers in former Times.

Degraded as the occupation of the scavenger may be in public estimation; though “I’d rather sweep the streets” may be a common remark expressive of the lowest deep of humiliation among those who never handled a besom in their lives; yet the very existence of a large body who are public cleansers betokens civilization. Their occupation, indeed, was defined, or rather was established or confirmed, in the early periods of our history, when municipal regulations were a sort of charter of civic protection, of civic liberties, and of general progress.

The noun Scavenger is said by lexicographers to be derived from the German schaben, to shave or scrape, “applied to those who scrape and clear away the filth from public streets or other places.” The more direct derivation, however, is from the Danish verb skaver, the Saxon equivalent of which is sceafan, whence the English shave. Formerly the word was written Scavager, and meant simply one who was engaged in removing the Scrapeage or Rakeage (the working men, it will be seen, were termed also “rakers”) from the surface of the streets. Hence it would appear that there is no authority for the verb to scavenge, which has lately come into use. The term from which the personal substantive is directly made, is scavage, a word formed from the verb in the same manner as sewage and rubbage (now fashionably corrupted into rubbish), and meaning the refuse which is or should be scraped away from the roads. The Latin equivalent from the Danish verb skave, is scabere.

I believe that the first mention of a scavenger in our earlier classical literature, is by Bishop Hall, one of the lights of the Reformation, in one of his “Satires.”

Many similar passages from the old poets and dramatists might be adduced, but I will content myself with one from the “Martial Maid” of Beaumont and Fletcher, as bearing immediately on the topic I have to discuss:—

Johnson defines a scavenger to be “a petty magistrate, whose province is to keep the streets clean;” and in the earlier times, certainly the scavenger was an officer to whom a certain authority was deputed, as to beadles and others.

One or two of these officials were appointed, according to the municipal or by-laws of the City of London, not to each parish, but to each ward. Of course, in the good old days, nothing could be done unless under “the sanction of an oath,” and the scavengers were sworn accordingly on the Gospel, the following being the form as given in the black letter of the laws relating to the city in the time of Henry VIII.

“The Oath of Scavagers, or Scavengers, of the Ward.

“Ye shal swear, That ye shal wel and diligently oversee that the pavements in every Ward be wel and rightfully repaired, and not haunsed to the noyaunce of the neighbours; and that the Ways, Streets, and Lanes, be kept clean from Donge and other Filth, for the Honesty of the City. And that all the Chimneys, Redosses, and Furnaces, be made of Stone for Defence of Fire. And if ye know any such ye shall shew it to the Alderman, that he may make due Redress therefore. And this ye shall not lene. So help you God.”[14]

To aid the scavengers in their execution of the duties of the office, the following among others were the injunctions of the civic law. They indicate the former state of the streets of London better than any description. A “Goung (or dung) fermour” appears to be a nightman, a dung-carrier or bearer, the servant of the master or ward scavenger.

“No Goungfermour shall spill any ordure in the Street, under pain of Thirteen Shillings and Four Pence.

“No Goungfermour shall carry any ordure till after nine of the clock in the Night, under pain of Thirteen Shillings and Four Pence. No man shall cast any urine boles, or ordure boles, into the Streets by Day or Night, afore the Hour of nine in the Night. And also he shall not cast it out, but bring it down and lay it in the Canel, under Pain of Three Shillings and Four Pence. And if he do so cast it upon any Person’s Head, the Person to have a lawful Recompense, if he have hurt thereby.

“No man shall bury any Dung, or Goung, within the Liberties of this City, under Pain of Forty Shillings.”

I will not dwell on the state of things which caused such enactments to be necessary, or on the barbarism of the law which ordered a lawful recompense to any person assailed in the manner intimated, only when he had “hurt thereby.”

These laws were for the government of the city, where a body of scavengers was sometimes called a “street-ward.” Until about the reign of Charles II., however, to legislate concerning such matters for the city was to legislate for the metropolis, as Southwark was then more or less under the city jurisdiction, and the houses of the nobility on the north bank of the Thames (the Strand), would hardly require the services of a public scavenger.

As new parishes or districts became populous, and established outside the city boundaries, the authorities seem to have regulated the public scavengery after the fashion of the city; but the whole, in every respect of cleanliness, propriety, regularity, or celerity, was most grievously defective.

Some time about the middle of the last century, the scavengers were considered and pronounced by the administrators or explainers of municipal law, to be “two officers chosen yearly in each parish in London and the suburbs, by the constables, churchwardens, and other inhabitants,” and their business was declared to be, that they should “hire persons called ‘rakers,’ with carts to clean the streets, and carry away the dirt and filth thereof, under a penalty of 40s.”

The scavengers thus appointed we should now term surveyors. There is little reason to doubt that in the old times the duly-appointed scavagers or scavengers, laboured in their vocation themselves, and employed such a number of additional hands as they accounted necessary; but how or when the master scavenger ceased to be a labourer, and how or when the office became merely nominal, I can find no information. So little attention appears to have been paid to this really important matter, that there are hardly any records concerning it. The law was satisfied to lay down provisions for street-cleansing, but to enforce these provisions was left to chance, or to some idle, corrupt, or inefficient officer or body.

Neither can I find any precise account of what was formerly done with the dirt swept and scraped from the streets, which seems always to have been left to the discretion of the scavenger to deal with as he pleased, and such is still the case in a great measure. Some of this dirt I find, however, promoted “the goodly nutriment of the land” about London, and some was “delivered in waste places apart from habitations.” These waste places seem to have been the nuclei of the present dust-yards, and were sometimes “presented,” that is, they were reported by a jury of nuisances (or under other titles), as “places of obscene resort,” for lewd and disorderly persons, the lewd and disorderly persons consisting chiefly of the very poor, who came to search among the rubbish for anything that might be valuable or saleable; for there were frequent rumours of treasure or plate being temporarily hidden in such places by thieves. Some outcast wretches, moreover, slept within the shelter of these scavengers’ places, and occasionally a vigilant officer—even down to our own times, or within these few years—apprehended such wretches, charged them with destitution, and had them punished accordingly. Much of the street refuse thus “delivered,” especially the “dry rubbish,” was thrown into the streets from houses under repair, &c., (I now speak of the past century,) and no use seems to have been made of any part of it unless any one requiring a load or two of rubbish chose to cart it away.

I have given this sketch to show what master scavengers were in the olden times, and I now proceed to point out what is the present condition of the trade.

Of the Several Modes and Characteristics of Street-Cleansing.

We here come to the practical part of this complex subject. We have ascertained the length of the streets of London—we have estimated the amount of daily, weekly, and yearly traffic—calculated the quantity of mud, dung, “mac,” dust, and surface-water formed and collected annually throughout the metropolis—we have endeavoured to arrive at some notion as to the injury done by all this vast amount of filth owing to what the Board of Health has termed “imperfect scavenging,”—and we now come to treat of the means by which the loads of street refuse—the loads of dust—loads of “mac” and mud, and the tons of dung, are severally and collectively removed throughout the year.

There are two distinct, and, in a measure, diametrically opposed, methods of street-cleansing at present in operation.

1. That which consists in cleaning the streets when dirtied.

2. That which consists in cleaning them and keeping them clean.

These modes of scavenging may not appear, to those who have paid but little attention to the matter, to be very widely different means of effecting the same object. The one, however, removes the refuse from the streets (sooner or later) after it has been formed, whereas the other removes it as fast as it is formed. By the latter method the streets are never allowed to get dirty—by the former they must be dirty before they are cleansed.

The plan of street-cleansing before dirtied, or the pre-scavenging system, is of recent introduction, being the mode adopted by the “street-orderlies;” that of cleansing after having dirtied, or the post-scavenging system, is (so far as the more general or common method is concerned) the same as that pursued two centuries ago. I shall speak of each of these modes in due course, beginning with that last mentioned.

By the ordinary method of scavenging, the dirt is still swept or scraped to one side of the public way, then shovelled into a cart and conveyed to the place of deposit. In wet weather the dirt swept or scraped to one side is so liquified that it is known as “slop,” and is “lifted” into the cart in shovels hollowed like sugar-spoons. The only change of which I have heard in this mode of scavenging was in one of the tools. Until about nine years ago birch, or occasionally heather, brooms or besoms were used by the street-sweepers, but they soon became clogged in dirty weather, and then, as one working scavenger explained it to me, “they scattered and drove the dirt to the sides ’stead of making it go right a-head as you wants it.” The material now used for the street-sweeper’s broom is known as “bass,” and consists of the stems or branches of a New Zealand plant, a substance which has considerable strength and elasticity of fibre, and both “sweeps” and “scrapes” in the process of scavenging. The broom itself, too, is differently constructed, having divisions between the several insertions of bass in the wooden block of the head, so that clogging is less frequent, and cleaning easier, whereas the birch broom consisted of a close mass of twigs, and thus scattered while it swept the dirt. There was, of course, some outcry on the part of the “established-order-of-things” gentry among scavengers, against the innovation, but it is now general. As all the scavengers, no matter how they vary in other respects, work with the brooms described, this one mention of the change will suffice. No doubt the cleansing of the streets is accomplished with greater efficiency and with greater celerity than it was, but the mere process of manual toil is little altered.

In a work like the present, however, we have more particularly to deal with the labourers engaged; and, viewing the subject in this light, we may arrange the several modes of street-cleansing into the four following divisions:—

1. By paid manual-labourers, or men employed by the contractors, and paid in the ordinary ways of wages.

2. By paid “Machine”-labourers, differing from the first only or mainly in the means by which they attain their end.

3. By pauper labourers, or men employed by the parishes in which they are set to work, and either paid in money or in food, or maintained in the workhouses.

4. By street-orderlies, or men employed by philanthropists—a body of workmen with particular regulations and more organized than other scavengers.

By one or other of these modes of scavengery all the public ways of the metropolis are cleansed; and the subject is most peculiar, as including within itself all the several varieties of labour, if we except that of women and children—viz., manual labour, mechanical labour, pauper labour, and philanthropic labour.

By these several varieties of labour the highways and by-ways of the entire metropolis are cleansed, with one exception—the Mews, concerning which a few words here may not be out of place. All these localities, whether they be what are styled Private or Gentlemen’s Mews, or Public Mews, where stables, coach-houses, and dwelling-rooms above them, may be taken by any one (a good many of such places being, moreover, public or partial thoroughfares); or whether they be job-masters’ or cab-proprietors’ mews; are scavenged by the occupants, for the manure is valuable. The mews of London, indeed, constitute a world of their own. They are tenanted by one class—coachmen and grooms, with their wives and families—men who are devoted to one pursuit, the care of horses and carriages; who live and associate one among another; whose talk is of horses (with something about masters and mistresses) as if to ride or to drive were the great ends of human existence, and who thus live as much together as the Jews in their compulsory quarters in Rome. The mews are also the “chambers” of unemployed coachmen and grooms, and I am told that the very sicknesses known in such places have their own peculiarities. These, however, form matter for future inquiry.

Concerning the private scavenging of the metropolitan mews, the Medical Times, of July 26, 1851, contains a letter from Mr. C. Cochrane, in which that gentleman says:—

“It will be found, that in all the mews throughout the metropolis, the manure produced from each stable is packed up in a separate stack, until there is sufficient for a load for some market-gardener or farmer to remove. The groom or stable-man makes an arrangement, or agreement as it is called, with the market-gardener, to remove it at his convenience, and a gratuity of 1s. or 1s. 6d. per load is usually presented to the stable-man. In some places there are dung-pits containing the collectings of a fortnight’s dung, which, when disturbed for removal, casts out an offensive effluvium, as sickening as it is disgusting to the whole neighbourhood. In consequence of the arrangement in question, if a third party wished to buy some of this manure, he could not get it; and if he wished to get rid of any by giving it away, the stable-man would not receive it, as it would not be removed sufficiently quick by the farmer. The result is, that whilst the air is rendered offensive and insalubrious, manure becomes difficult to be removed or disposed of, and frequently is washed away into the sewer.

“Of this manure there are always (at a moderate computation) remaining daily, in the mews and stable-yards of the metropolis, at least 2000 cart-loads.

“To remedy these evils, I would suggest that a brief Act of Parliament should be passed, giving municipal and parochial authorities the same complete control over the manure as they have over the ‘ashes,’ with the provision, that owners should have the right of removing it themselves for their own use; but if they did not do so daily, then the control to return to the above authorities, who should have the right of selling it, and placing the proceeds in the parish funds. By this simple means immense quantities of valuable manure would be saved for the purposes of agriculture—food would be rendered cheaper and more abundant—more people would be employed—whilst the metropolis would be rendered clean, sweet, and healthy.”

I may dismiss this part of the subject with the remark, that I was informed that the mews’ manure was in regular demand and of ready sale, being removed by the market-gardeners with greater facility than can street-dirt, which the contractors with the parishes prefer to vend by the barge-load.

Having enumerated the four several modes of street-cleansing, I will now proceed to point out briefly the characteristics of each class of cleansing. This will also denote the quality of the employers and the nature of the employment.

1. The Paid Manual Labourers constitute the bulk of those engaged in scavenging, and the chief pay-masters are the contractors. Many of these labourers consider themselves the only “regular hands,” having been “brought up to the business;” but unemployed or destitute labourers or mechanics, or reduced tradesmen, will often endeavour to obtain employment in street-sweeping; this is the necessary evil of all unskilled labour, for since every one can do it (without previous apprenticeship), it follows that the beaten-out artisans or discarded trade assistants, beggared tradesmen, or reduced gentlemen, must necessarily resort to it as their only means of independent support; and hence the reason why dock labour and street labour, and indeed all the several forms of unskilled work, have a tendency to be overstocked with hands—the unskilled occupations being, as it were, the sink for all the refuse skilled labour and beggared industry of the country.

The “contractors,” like other employers, are separated by their men into two classes—such as, in more refined callings, are often designated the “honourable” and “dishonourable” traders—according as they pay or do not pay what is reputed “fair wages.”

I cannot say that I heard any especial appellation given by the working scavengers to the better-paying class of employers, unless it were the expressive style of “good-’uns.” The inferior paying class, however, are very generally known among their work-people as “scurfs.”

2. The Street-sweeping Machine Labourers.—Of the men employed as “attendant” scavengers, for so they may be termed, in connection with these mechanical and vehicular street-sweepers, little need here be said, for they are generally of the class of ordinary scavengers. It may, however, be necessary to explain that each of those machines must have the street refuse, for the “lick-in” of the machine, swept into a straight line wherever there is the slightest slope at the sides of a street towards the foot-path; the same, too, must sometimes be done, if the pavement be at all broken, even when the progress of the machine is, what I heard, not very appropriately, termed “plain sailing.” Sometimes, also, men follow the course of the street-sweeping machine, to “sweep up” any dirt missed or scattered, as the vehicle proceeds on a straightforward course, for at all to diverge would be to make the labour, where the machine alone is used, almost double.

3. The Pauper, or Parish-employed Scavengers present characteristics peculiarly their own, as regards open-air labour in London. They are employed less to cleanse the streets, than to prevent their being chargeable to the poor’s rate as out-door recipients, or as inmates of the workhouses. When paid, they receive a lower amount of wages than any other scavengers, and they are sometimes paid in food as well as in money, while a difference may be made between the wages of the married and of the unmarried men, and even between the married men who have and have not children; some, again, are employed in scavenging without any money receipt, their maintenance in the workhouse being considered a sufficient return for the fruits of their toil.

Some of these men are feeble, some are unskilful (even in tasks in which skill is but little of an element), and most of them are dissatisfied workmen. Their ranks comprise, or may comprise, men who have filled very different situations in life. It is mentioned in the second edition of one of the publications of the National Philanthropic Association, “Sanatory Progress” (1850), “that the once high-salaried cashier of a West-end bank died lately in St. Pancras-workhouse;—that the architect of several of the most fashionable West-end club-houses is now an inmate of St. James’s-workhouse;—and that the architect of St. Pancras’ New Church lately died in a back garret in Somers-town.” “These recent instances (a few out of many)” says the writer, “prove that ‘wealth has wings,’ and that Genius and Industry have but leaden feet, when overtaken by Adversity. A late number of the Globe newspaper states that, ‘among the police constables on the Great Western Railway, there are at present eight members of the Royal College of Surgeons, and three solicitors;’—and the Limerick Examiner, a few weeks ago, announced the fact, that ‘a gentlewoman is now an inmate of the workhouse of that city, whose husband, a few years ago, filled the office of High Sheriff of the county.’”

I do not know that either the cashier or the architect in the two workhouses in question was employed as a street-sweeper.

This second class, then, are situated differently to the paid street-sweepers (or No. 1 of the present division), who may be considered, more or less, independent or self-supporting labourers, while the paupers are, of course, dependent.

4. The “Street Orderlies.”—These men present another distinct body. They are not merely in the employment, but many of them are under the care, of the National Philanthropic Association, which was founded by, and is now under the presidency of, Mr. Cochrane. The objects of this society, as far as regards the street orderlies’ existence as a class of scavengers, are sufficiently indicated in its title, which declares it to be “For the Promotion of Street Cleanliness and the Employment of the Poor; so that able-bodied men may be prevented from burthening the parish rates, and preserved independent of workhouse alms and degradation. Supported by the contributions of the benevolent.”

The street orderlies, men and boys, are paid a fixed weekly wage, a certain sum being stopped from those single men who reside in houses rented for them by the association, where their meals, washing, &c., are provided. Among them are men of many callings, and some educated and accomplished persons.

The system of street orderlyism is, moreover, distinguished by one attribute unknown to any other mode; it is an effort, persevered in, despite of many hindrances and difficulties, to amend our street scavengery, indeed to reform it altogether; so that dust and dirt may be checked in their very origination.

The corporation, if I may so describe it, of the street orderlies, presents characteristics, again, varying from the other orders of what can only be looked upon either as the self-supporting or pauper workers.

These, then, are the several modes or methods of street-scavengery, and they show the following:—

Classes of Street-Sweeping Employers.

(1.) Traders, who undertake contracts for scavengery as a speculation. Under this denomination may be classed the contractors with parishes, districts, boards, liberties, divisions and subdivisions of parishes, markets, &c.

(2.) Parishes, who employ the men as a matter of parochial policy, with a view to the reduction of the rates, and with little regard to the men.

(3.) Philanthropists, who seek, more particularly, to benefit the men whom they employ, while they strive to promote the public good by increasing public cleanliness and order.

Under the head of “Traders” are the contractors with the parishes, &c., and the proprietors of the sweeping-machines, who are in the same capacity as the “regular contractors” respecting their dealings with labourers, but who substitute mechanical for manual operations.

Of these several classes of masters engaged in the scavengery of the metropolis I have much to say, and, for the clearer saying of it, I shall treat each of the several varieties of labour separately.

Of the Contractors for Scavengery.

The scavenging of the streets of the metropolis is performed directly or indirectly by the authorities of the several parishes “without the City,” who have the power to levy rates for the cleansing of the various districts; within the City, however, the office is executed under the direction of the Court of Sewers.

When the cleansing of the streets is performed indirectly by either the parochial or civic authorities, it is effected by contractors, that is to say, by traders who undertake for a certain sum to remove the street-refuse at stated intervals and under express conditions, and who employ paid servants to execute the work for them. When it is performed directly, the authorities employ labourers, generally from the workhouse, and usually enter into an agreement with some contractor for the use of his carts and appliances, together with the right to deposit in his wharf or yard the refuse removed from the streets.

I shall treat first of the indirect mode of scavenging—that is to say, of cleansing the streets by contract—beginning with the contractors, setting forth, as near as possible, the receipts and expenditure in connection with the trade, and then proceeding in due order to treat of the labourers employed by them in the performance of the task.

Some of the contractors agree with the parochial or district authorities to remove the dust from the house-bins as well as the dirt from the streets under one and the same contract; some undertake to execute these two offices under separate contracts; and some to perform only one of them. It is most customary, however, for the same contractor to serve the parish, especially the larger parishes, in both capacities.

There is no established or legally required form of agreement between a contractor and his principals; it is a bargain in which each side strives to get the best of it, but in which the parish representatives have often to contend against something looking like a monopoly; a very common occurrence in our day when capitalists choose to combine, which is legal, or unnoticed, but very heinous on the part of the working men, whose capital is only in their strength or skill. One contractor, on being questioned by a gentleman officially connected with a large district, as to the existence of combination, laughed at such a notion, but said there might be “a sort of understanding one among another,” as among people who “must look to their own interests, and see which way the cat jumped;” concluding with the undeniable assertion that “no man ought reasonably to be expected to ruin himself for a parish.”

There does not appear, however, to have been any countervailing qualities on the part of the parishes to this understanding among the contractors; for some of the authorities have found themselves, when a new or a renewed contract was in question, suddenly “on the other side of the hedge.” Thus, in the south-west district of St. Pancras, the contractor, five or six years ago, paid 100l. per annum for the removal and possession of the street-dirt, &c.; but the following year the district authorities had to pay him 500l. for the same labour and with the same privileges! Other changes took place, and in 1848-9 a contractor again paid the district 95l. I have shown, too, that in Shadwell the dust-contractor now receives 450l. per annum, whereas he formerly paid 240l. To prove, however, that a spirit of combination does occasionally exist among these contractors, I may cite the following minute from one of the parish books.

Extract from Minute-book, Nov. 7, 1839. Letter C, Folio 437.

“Commissioner’s Office, “30, Howland-street, “Nov. 7, 1839.

“Report of the Paving Committee to the General Board, relating to the watering the district for the past year.

“Your Committee beg leave to report that for the past three years the sums paid by contract for watering were respectively:—

“For 1836£230

„ 1837220

„ 1838200

“That in the month of February in the present year the Board advertised in the usual manner for tenders to water the district, when the following were received, viz.:—

“Mr. Darke£315

„ Gore318

„ Nicholls312

„ Starkey285

which was the lowest.

“Your Committee, anxious to prevent any increase in the watering-rate from being levied, and considering the amount required by the contractors for this service as excessive and exorbitant, and even evincing a spirit of combination, resolved to make an inroad upon this system, and after much trouble and attention adopted other measures for watering the district, the results of which they have great pleasure in presenting to the Board, by which it will be seen that a saving over the very lowest of the above tenders of 102l. 3s. has been effected; the sum of 18l. 18s. has been paid for pauper labour at the same time. Your Committee regret that, notwithstanding the efforts of themselves and their officers, the state of insubordination and insult of most of the paupers (in spite of all encouragement to industry) was such, that the Committee, on the 12th of July last, were reluctantly compelled to discontinue their services. The Committee cannot but congratulate the Board upon the result of their experiment, which will have the effect of breaking up a spirit of combination highly dangerous to the community at large, at the same time that their labours have caused a very considerable saving to the ratepayers; and they trust the work, considering all the numerous disadvantages under which they have laboured, has been performed in a satisfactory manner.

“P. Cunningham, “Surveyor, “30, Howland-street, Fitzroy-square.”

The following regulations sufficiently show the nature of the agreements made between the contractors and the authorities as to the cleansing of the more important thoroughfares especially. It will be seen that in the regulations I quote every street, court, or alley, must now be swept daily, a practice which has only been adopted within these few years in the City.

“Sewers’ Office, Guildhall, London, Rakers’ Duties,[15] Midsummer, 1851, to Midsummer, 1852.

“Cleansing.

“The whole surface of every Carriage-way, Court, and Alley shall be swept every day (Sundays excepted), and all mud, dust, filth, and rubbish, all frozen or partially frozen matter, and snow, animal and vegetable matter, and everything offensive or injurious, shall be properly pecked, scraped, swept up, and carted away therefrom; and the iron gutters laid across or along the footways, the air-grates over the sewers, the gulley-grates in the carriage-way of the streets respectively; and all public urinals are to be daily raked out, swept, and made clean and clear from all obstructions; and the Contractor or Contractors shall, in time of frost, continually keep the channels in the Streets and Places clear for water to run off: and cleanse and cart away refuse hogan or gravel (when called upon by the Inspector to do so) from all streets newly paved.

“The Mud and Dirt, &c., is to be carted away immediately that it is swept up.

“N.B. The Inspector of the District may, at any time he may think it necessary, order any Street or Place to be cleansed and swept a second time in any one day, and the Contractor or Contractors are thereupon bound to do the same.

“The Markets and their approaches are also to be thus cleansed DAILY, and the approaches thereto respectively are also to be thus cleansed at such an hour in the night of Saturday in each week as the Inspector of the District may direct.

“Every Street, Lane, Square, Yard, Court, Alley, Passage, and Place (except certain main Streets hereinafter enumerated), are to be thus cleansed within the following hours Daily: namely—

“In the months of April, May, June, July, August, and September. To be begun not earlier than 4 o’Clock in the morning, and finished not later than 1 o’Clock in the afternoon.

“In the months of October, November, December, January, February, and March. To be begun not earlier than 5 o’Clock in the morning, and finished not later than 2 o’Clock in the afternoon.

“The following main Streets are to be cleansed DAILY throughout the year (except Sundays), to be begun not earlier than 4 o’Clock in the morning, and finished not later than 9 o’Clock in the morning.

Fleet Street

Ludgate Hill and Street

St. Paul’s Church Yard

Cheapside

Newgate Street

Poultry

Watling Street, Budge Row, and Cannon St.

Mansion House Street

Cornhill

Leadenhall Street

Aldgate Street and Aldgate

King William Street and London Bridge

Fenchurch Street

Holborn

Holborn Bridge

Skinner Street

Old Bailey

Lombard Street

New Bridge Street

Farringdon Street

Aldersgate Street

St. Martin-le-grand

Prince’s Street

Moorgate Street

The Street called ‘The Pavement’

Finsbury Place, South

Gracechurch Street

Bishopsgate St., within and without

The Minories

Wood Street

Gresham Street

Coleman Street.

“N.B. In times of frost and snow these hours of executing the work may be extended at the discretion of the Local Commissioners.”

The other conditions relate to the removal of the dust from the houses (a subject I have already treated), and specify the fines, varying from 1l. to 5l., to be paid by the contractors, for the violation or neglect of any of the provisions of the contract. It is further required that “Each Foreman, Sweeper, and Dustman, in the employ of either of the Contractors,” (of whom there are four, Messrs. Sinnott, Rooke, Reddin, and Gould), “will be required to wear a Badge on the arm with these words thereon,—

“‘London Sewers, N^o. — Guildhall,’

by which means any one having cause of complaint against any of the men in the performance of their several duties, may, by taking down the number of the man and applying at the Sewers’ Office, Guildhall, have reference to his name and employer.

“Any man working without his Badge, for each day he offends, the Contractor is liable to the penalty of Five Shillings.

“All the sweepings of the Streets, and all the dust and ashes from the Houses, are to be entirely carted away from the City of London, on a Penalty of Ten Pounds for each cart-load.”

These terms sufficiently show the general nature of the contracts in question; the principal difference being that in some parts, the contractor is not required to sweep the streets more than once, twice, or thrice a week in ordinary weather.

The number of individuals in London styling themselves Master Scavengers is 34. Of these, 10 are at present without a contract either for dust or scavenging, and 5 have a contract for removing the dust only; so that, deducting these two numbers, the gross number 34 is reduced to 19 scavenging contractors. Of the latter number 16 are in a large way of business, having large yards, possessing several carts and some waggons, and employing a vast number of men daily in sweeping the streets, carting rubbish, &c. The other 3 masters, however, are only in a small way of business, being persons of more limited means. A large master scavenger employs from 3 to 18 carts, and from 18 to upwards of 40 men at scavengery alone, while a small master employs only from 1 to 3 carts and from 3 to 6 men. By the table I have given, p. 186, vol. ii., it is shown that there are 52 contracts between the several district authorities and master scavengers, and nineteen contractors, without counting members of the same family, as distinct individuals; this gives an average of nearly three distinct contracts per individual. The contracts are usually for a twelvemonth.

Although the table above referred to shows but 19 contractors for public scavenging, there are, as I have said, more, or about 24, in London, most of them in a “large way,” and next year some of those who have no contracts at present may enter into agreements with the parishes. The smallness of this number, when we consider the vast extent of the metropolis, confirms the notion of the sort of monopoly and combination to which I have alluded. In the Post-Office Directory for 1851 there are no names under the heads of Scavengers or Dustmen, but under the head of “Rubbish Carters,” 28 are given, 9 names being marked as “Dust Contractors” and 10 as “Nightmen.”

Of large contractors, however, there are, as I have said, about 24, but they may not all obtain contracts every year, and in this number are included different members of the same family or firm, who may undertake specific contracts, although in the trade it is looked upon as “one concern.” The smaller contractors were represented to me as rather more numerous than the others, and perhaps numbered 40, but it is not easy to define what is to be accounted a contractor. In the table given in pp. 213, 214, I cite only 7 as being the better known. The others may be considered as small rubbish-carters and flying-dustmen.

There are yet other transactions in which the contractors are engaged with the parishes, independently of their undertaking the whole labour of street and house cleansing. In the parishes where pauper, or “poor” labour is resorted to—for it is not always that the men employed by the parishes are positive “paupers,” but rather the unemployed poor of the parish—in such parishes, I say, an agreement is entered into with a contractor for the deposit of the collected street dirt at his yard or wharf. For such deposit the contractor must of course be paid, as it is really an occupation and renting of a portion of his premises for a specific purpose. The street dirt, however, is usually left to the disposal of the contractor, for his own profit, and where he once paid 50l. for the possession of the street-collected dirt of a parish, collected by labour which was no cost to him, he may now receive half of such 50l., or whatever the terms of the agreement may be. I heard of one contractor who lately received 25l. where he once paid 50l.

In another way, too, contractors are employed by parishes. Where pauper or poor labour in street cleansing is the practice, a contractor’s horses, carts, and cart-drivers are hired for the conveyance of the dirt from the streets. This of course is for a specific payment, and is in reality the work of the tradesmen who in the Post Office Directory are described as “Rubbish Carters,” and of whom I shall have to speak afterwards. Some parishes or paving boards have, however, their own horses and vehicles, but in the other respects they have dealings with the contractors.

To come to as correct a conclusion as possible in this complicated and involved matter, I have obtained the aid of some gentlemen long familiar with such procedures. One of them said that to procure the accounts of such transactions for a series of years, with all their chops and changes, or to obtain a perfectly precise return, for any three years, affecting the whole metropolis, would be the work of a parliamentary commission with full powers “to send for papers,” &c., &c., and that even then the result might not be satisfactory as a clear exposition. However, with the aid of the gentlemen alluded to, I venture upon the following approximation.

As my present inquiry relates only to the Scavenging Contractors in the metropolis, I will take the number of districts, markets, &c., which are specified in the table, p. 186, vol. ii. These are 83 in number, of which 29 are shown to be scavenged by the “parish.” I will not involve in this computation any of the more rural places which may happen to be in the outskirts of the metropolitan area, but I will take the contracts as 54, where the contractors do the entire work, and as 29 where they are but the rubbish-carters and dirt receivers of the parishes.

I am assured that it is a fair calculation that the scavengery of the streets, apart from the removal of the dust from the houses, costs in payments to the contractors, 150l. as an average, to each of the several 54 districts; and that in the 29 localities in which the streets are cleansed by parish labour, the sum paid is at the rate of 50l. per locality, some of them, as the five districts of Marylebone for instance, being very large. This is calculated regardless of the cases where parishes may have their own horses and vehicles, for the cost to the rate-payers may not be very materially different, between paying for the hire of carts and horses, and investing capital in their purchase and incurring the expense of wear and tear. The account then stands thus:—

Parish payment on 54 contracts, 150l. each£8100

Parish payment on 29 contracts, 50l. each1450

Yearly total sum paid for Scavenging of the Metropolis£9550

or, apportioned among 19 contractors, upwards of 500l. each; and among 83 contracts, about 115l. per contract. Even if other contractors are employed where parish labour is pursued, the cost to the rate-payers is the same. This calculation is made, as far as possible, as regards scavengery alone; and is independent of the value of the refuse collected. It is about the scavengery that the grand fight takes place between the parishes and contractors; the house dust, being uninjured by rain or street surface-water, is more available for trade purposes.

From this it would appear that the cost of cleansing the streets of London may be estimated in round numbers at 10,000l. per annum.

The next point in the inquiry is, What is the value of the street dirt annually collected?

The price I have adduced for the dirt gained from the streets is 3s. per load, which is a very reasonable average. If the load be dung, or even chiefly dung, it is worth 5s. or 6s. With the proportion of dung and street refuse to be found in such a thoroughfare as the Haymarket, in dry, or comparatively dry weather, a load, weighing about a ton, is worth about 3s. in the purchaser’s own cart. On the other hand, as I have shown that quantities of mixed or slop “mac” have to be wasted, that some is sold at a nominal price, and a good deal at 1s. the load, 3s. is certainly a fair average.

A TABLE SHOWING THE NUMBER OF MEN AND CARTS EMPLOYED IN COLLECTING DUST, IN SCAVENGERY, AND AT RUBBISH CARTING, AS WELL AS THE NUMBER OF MEN, WOMEN, AND BOYS WORKING IN THE DUST-YARDS OF THE SEVERAL METROPOLITAN CONTRACTORS.

Contractors (Large).Dust.Scavengery.Rubbish Carting.Working in the Yard.

Number of Men employed.Number of Carts used.Number of Men employed.Number of Carts, Waggons, or Machines used.Number of Men employed.Number of Carts used.Number of Men employed.Number of Women employed.Number of Boys working.

Mr. Dodd2010261320209124

„ Gould2010281111115154

„ Redding3216411822225124

„ Gore3216187none.none.4206

„ Rooke1681661616263

„ Stapleton & Holdsworth1051181010482

„ Tame2010511212482

„ Starkey105228none.none.4123

„ Newman84231088482

„ Pratt and Sewell105422020262

„ W. Sinnott, Sen.281452none.none.5155

„ J. Sinnott84166ditto.ditto.none.none.none.

„ Westley105189ditto.ditto.392

„ Parsons105183ditto.ditto.261

„ Hearne189722020393

„ Humphries20104166393

„ Calvert63none.none.77262

2781392621071521526116148

Contractors (Small).

Mr. North422144121

„ Milton63none.none.none.none.362

„ Jenkins2151ditto.ditto.121

„ Stroud105none.none.ditto.ditto.493

„ Martin2163ditto.ditto.121

„ Clutterbuck42none.none.55131

„ W. Sinnott, Jun.42ditto.ditto.66121

32161351515122610

Contractors, but not having any contract at present, only carting rubbish, &c.

Mr. Darke............3636

„ Tomkins............66

„ J. Cooper............88

„ T. Cooper, Sen.............1212

„ Athill............66

„ Barnett (lately sold off)

„ Brown............44

„ Ellis............66

„ Limpus............1010

„ Emmerson............66

9494

Contractors (Large).Dust.Scavengery.Rubbish Carting.

Number of Men employed.Number of Carts used.Number of Men employed.Number of Carts, Waggons, or Machines used.Number of Men employed.Number of Carts used.

Mr. Dodd201026132020

„ Gould201028111111

„ Redding321641182222

„ Gore3216187none.none.

„ Rooke1681661616

„ Stapleton & Holdsworth1051181010

„ Tame2010511212

„ Starkey105228none.none.

„ Newman84231088

„ Pratt and Sewell105422020

„ W. Sinnott, Sen.281452none.none.

„ J. Sinnott84166ditto.ditto.

„ Westley105189ditto.ditto.

„ Parsons105183ditto.ditto.

„ Hearne189722020

„ Humphries20104166

„ Calvert63none.none.77

278139262107152152

Contractors (Small).

Mr. North422144

„ Milton63none.none.none.none.

„ Jenkins2151ditto.ditto.

„ Stroud105none.none.ditto.ditto.

„ Martin2163ditto.ditto.

„ Clutterbuck42none.none.55

„ W. Sinnott, Jun.42ditto.ditto.66

32161351515

Contractors (Large).Working in the Yard.

Number of Men employed.Number of Women employed.Number of Boys working.

Mr. Dodd9124

„ Gould5154

„ Redding5124

„ Gore4206

„ Rooke263

„ Stapleton & Holdsworth482

„ Tame482

„ Starkey4123

„ Newman482

„ Pratt and Sewell262

„ W. Sinnott, Sen.5155

„ J. Sinnottnone.none.none.

„ Westley392

„ Parsons261

„ Hearne393

„ Humphries393

„ Calvert262

6116148

Contractors (Small).

Mr. North121

„ Milton362

„ Jenkins121

„ Stroud493

„ Martin121

„ Clutterbuck131

„ W. Sinnott, Jun.121

122610

Contractors, but not having any contract at present, only carting rubbish, &c.

Mr. Darke............3636

„ Tomkins............66

„ J. Cooper............88

„ T. Cooper, Sen.............1212

„ Athill............66

„ Barnett (lately sold off)

„ Brown............44

„ Ellis............66

„ Limpus............1010

„ Emmerson............66

9494

Machines.Dust.Scavengers.Rubbish.Employed in Yard.

Men.Carts.Men.Carts.Men.Carts.Men.Women.Children.

Woods and Forestsnone.none.42machines.none.none.none.none.none.

Regent-street and Pall-mallditto.ditto.122„ditto.ditto.ditto.ditto.ditto.

St. Martin’sditto.ditto.94„ditto.ditto.ditto.ditto.ditto.

258„

Parishes.

Kensington[16]......52

Chelsea[16]......52

St. George’s, Hanover-sq.[16]......51

St. Margaret’s, Westminster[16]......73

Piccadilly[16]......282

St. Ann’s, Soho[16]......42

Paddington[16]......62

St. Marylebone[16] (5 Districts)......354

St. James’s, Westminster......21

HampsteadNo parochial removal of dust.41

Highgateditto.41

Islington[16]......81

Hackney8471......262

St. Clement Danes[16]......73waggons.

Commercial-road, East[16]......63carts.

Poplar4241......241

Bermondsey6363......362

Newington8462......262

Lambeth[16]......163

Ditto (Christchurch)42203......141

Wandsworth4241......141

Camberwell and Walworth8462......253

Rotherhithe6352......152

Greenwich4252......131

Deptford4242......131

Woolwichnone.none.52

Lewishamditto.ditto.41

Total for Parishes562821850carts.164616

3waggons.

Total for large contractors2781392621071521526116148

Total for small contractors32161351515122610

Total for machines......258machines.

Total for street orderlies......609

Gross total366183578179carts.1671678923374

3waggons.

Men.Carts.

Total employed at dust366183

„ „ scavenging578179

„ „ rubbish carting167167

„ (men, women, and children), in yard396

Total employed in the removal of house and street refuse1507529

Thus the annual sum of the street-dirt, as regards the quantity collected by the contracting scavengers (as shown in the table given at page 186), is, in round numbers, 89,000 cart-loads; that collected by parish labour, with or without the aid of the street-sweeping machines, at 52,000 cart-loads, or a total (I do not include what is collected by the orderlies) of 141,000 loads.

This result shows, then, that the contractors yearly collect by scavenging the streets with their own paid labourers, and receive as the produce of pauper labour, as follows:—

Loads of Street Dirt.Per Load.Total.

By Contractors89,0003s.£13,350

By Parishes52,0003s.7,800

Total141,000£21,150

or a value of rather more than 1113l. as the return to each individual contractor in the table, or about 255l. as the average on each contract. As, however, the whole of the parish-collected manure does not come into the hands of the contractors, it will be fair, I am assured, to compute the total at 19,000l., a sum of 1000l. to each contractor, or nearly 229l. on each contract.

It would appear, then, that the total receipts of the contractors for the scavenging of London amount to very nearly 30,000l.; that is to say, 10,000l. as remuneration for the office, and 20,000l. as the value of the dirt collected. But against this sum as received, we have to set the gross expense of wages paid to men, wear and tear of carts and appliances, rent of wharfs, interest for money, &c.

Concerning the amount paid in wages, it appears by the table at pp. 186, 187, that the men employed by the scavenging contractors in wet weather, are 260 daily (being nearly half of the whole force of 531 men, the orderlies excepted). In dry weather, however, there are only 194 men employed. I will therefore calculate upon 194 men employed daily, and 66 employed half the year, making the total of 260. By the table here given, it will be seen that the total number of scavengers employed by the large and small contractors, is 275.

Number of Men.Weekly Wage.Yearly.

194 (for 12 months)16s.[17]£80708s.

66 (for 6 months)16s.137216s.

Total£94434s.

There remains now to show the amount of capital which a large contractor must embark in his business: I include the amount of rent, and the expenditure on what must be provided for business purposes, and which is subject to wear and tear, to decay, and loss.

There are not now, I am told, more than twelve scavengers’ wharfs and 20 yards (the wharf being also a yard) in the possession of the contractors in regular work. These are the larger contractors, and their capital, I am assured, may be thus estimated:—

Capital of the Master Scavengers.

£s.d.

179Carts, 21l. each3,75900

3Waggons, 32l. each9600

230Horses, 25l. each5,75000

230Sets of harness, 2l. each46000

600Brooms, 9d. each22100

300Shovels, 1s. each1500

100Barges, 50l. each5,00000

Total15,102100

I have estimated according to what may be the present value, not the original cost, of the implements, vehicles, &c. A broom, when new, costs 1s. 2d., and is worn out in two or three weeks. A shovel, when new, costs 2s.

The following appears to be the

Yearly Expenditure of the Master Scavengers.

£s.d.

Wages to working scavengers (as before shown)9,44300

Wages to 48 bargemen, engaged in unloading the vessels with street-dirt, 4 men to each of 12 wharfs, at 16s. weekly wage1,99600

Keep of 300 horses (26l. each)7,80000

Wear and tear (say 15 per cent. on capital)2,25000

Rent of 20 wharfs and yards (average 100l. each)2,00000

Interest on 15,000l. capital, at 10 per cent.1,50000

£24,98900

I have endeavoured in this estimate to confine myself, as much as possible, to the separate subject of scavengery, but it must be borne in mind that as the large contractors are dustmen as well as scavengers, the great charges for rent and barges cannot be considered as incurred solely on account of the street-dirt trade. Including, then, the payments from parishes, the account will stand thus:—

Yearly Receipts of Master Scavengers.

From Parishes£9,450

From Manure, &c.19,000

Total Income£28,450

Deduct yearly Expenditure25,000

Profit£3,450

This gives a profit of nearly 182l. to each contractor, if equally apportioned, or a little more than 41l. on each contract for street-scavenging alone, and a profit no doubt affected by circumstances which cannot very well be reduced to figures. The profit may appear small, but it should be remembered that it is independent of the profits on the dust.

Of the Contractors’ (or Employers’) Premises, &c.

At page 171 of the present volume I have described one of the yards devoted to the trade in house-dust, and I have little to say in addition regarding the premises of the contracting or employing scavengers. They are the same places, and the industrious pursuits carried on there, and the division and subdivision of labour, relate far more to the dustmen’s department than to the scavengers’. When the produce of the sweeping of the streets has been thrown into the cart, it is so far ready for use that it has not to be sifted or prepared, as has the house-dust, for the formation of brieze, &c., the “mac” being sifted by the purchaser.

These yards or wharfs are far less numerous and better conducted now than they were ten years ago. They are at present fast disappearing from the banks of the Thames (there is, however, one still at Whitefriars and one at Milbank). They are chiefly to be found on the banks of the canals. Some of the principal wharfs near Maiden-lane, St. Pancras, are to be found among unpaven, or ill-paved, or imperfectly macadamized roads, along which run rows of what were once evidently pleasant suburban cottages, with their green porches and their trained woodbine, clematis, jasmine, or monthly roses; these tenements, however, are now occupied chiefly by the labourers at the adjacent stone, coal, lime, timber, dust, and general wharfs. Some of the cottages still presented, on my visits, a blooming display of dahlias and other autumnal flowers; and in one corner of a very large and very black-looking dust-yard, in which rose a huge mound of dirt, was the cottage residence of the man who remained in charge of the wharf all night, and whose comfortable-looking abode was embedded in flowers, blooming luxuriantly. The gay-tinted holly-hocks and dahlias are in striking contrast with the dinginess of the dust-yards, while the canal flows along, dark, sluggish, and muddy, as if to be in keeping with the wharf it washes.

The dust-yards must not be confounded with the “night-yards,” or the places where the contents of the cess-pools are deposited, places which, since the passing of the Sanatory Act, are rapidly disappearing.

Upon entering a dust-yard there is generally found a heavy oppressive sort of atmosphere, more especially in wet or damp weather. This is owing to the tendency of charcoal to absorb gases, and to part with them on being saturated with moisture. The cinder-heaps of the several dust-yards, with their million pores, are so many huge gasometers retaining all the offensive gases arising from the putrefying organic matters which usually accompany them, and parting with such gases immediately on a fall of rain. It would be a curious calculation to estimate the quantity of deleterious gas thus poured into the atmosphere after a slight shower.

The question has been raised as to the propriety of devoting some special locality to the purposes of dust-yards, and it is certainly a question deserving public attention.

The chief disposal of the street manure is from barges, sent by the Thames or along the canals, and sold to farmers and gardeners. In the larger wharfs, and in those considered removed from the imputation of “scurfdom,” six men, and often but four, are employed to load a barge which contains from 30 to 40 tons. In such cases the dust-yard and the wharf are one and the same place. The contents of these barges are mixed, about one-fourth being “mac,” the rest street-mud and dung. This admixture, on board the vessel, is called by the bargemen and the contractors’ servants at the wharfs Leicester (properly Læsta, a load). We have the same term at the end of our word bal-last.

I am assured by a wharfinger, who has every means of forming a correct judgment, it may be estimated that there are dispatched from the contractors’ wharfs twelve barges daily, freighted with street-manure. This is independent of the house-dust barged to the country brick-fields. The weight of the cargo of a barge of manure is about 40 tons; 36 tons being a low average. This gives 3744 barge-loads, or 132,784 tons, or loads, yearly; for it must be recollected that the dirt gathered by pauper labour is dispatched from the contractors’ yards or wharfs, as well as that collected by the immediate servants of the contractors. The price per barge-load at the canal, basin, or wharf, in the country parts where agriculture flourishes, is from 5l. to 6l., making a total of 20,594l. The difference of that sum, and the total given in the table (21,147l.) may be accounted for on the supposition that the remainder is sold in the yards and carted away thence. The slop and valueless dirt is not included in this calculation.

Of the Working Scavengers under the Contractors.

I have now to deal with what throughout the whole course of my inquiry into the state of London Labour and the London Poor I have considered the great object of investigation—the condition and characteristics of the working men; and what is more immediately the “labour question,” the relation of the labourer to his employer, as to rates of payment, modes of payment, hiring of labourers, constancy or inconstancy of work, supply of hands, the many points concerning wages, perquisites, family work, and parochial or club relief.

First, I shall give an account of the class employment, together with the labour season and earnings of the labourers, or “economical” part of the subject. I shall then pass to the social points, concerning their homes, general expenditure, &c., and then to the more moral and intellectual questions of education, literature, politics, religion, marriage, and concubinage of the men and of their families. All this will refer, it should be remembered, only to the working scavagers in the honourable or better-paid trade; the cheaper labourers I shall treat separately as a distinct class; the details in both cases I shall illustrate with the statement of men of the class described.

The first part of this multifarious subject appertains to the division of labour. This in the scavaging trade consists rather of that kind of “gang-work” which Mr. Wakefield styles “simple co-operation,” or the working together of a number of people at the same thing, as opposed to “complex co-operation,” or the working together of a number at different branches of the same thing. Simple co-operation is of course the ruder kind; but even this, rude as it appears, is far from being barbaric. “The savages of New Holland,” we are told, “never help each other even in the most simple operations; and their condition is hardly superior—in some respects it is inferior—to that of the wild animals which they now and then catch.”

As an instance of the advantages of “simple co-operation,” Mr. Wakefield tells us that “in a vast number of simple operations performed by human exertion, it is quite obvious that two men working together will do more than four, or four times four men, each of whom should work alone. In the lifting of heavy weights, for example, in the felling of trees, in the gathering of much hay and corn during a short period of fine weather, in draining a large extent of land during the short season when such a work may be properly conducted, in the pulling of ropes on board ship, in the rowing of large boats, in some mining operations, in the erection of a scaffolding for a building, and in the breaking of stones for the repair of a road, so that the whole road shall always be kept in good repair—in all these simple operations, and thousands more, it is absolutely necessary that many persons should work together at the same time, in the same place, and in the same way.”

To the above instances of simple co-operation, or gang-working, as it may be briefly styled in Saxon English, Mr. Wakefield might have added dock labour and scavaging.

The principle of complex co-operation, however, is not entirely unknown in the public cleansing trade. This business consists of as many branches as there are distinct kinds of refuse, and these appear to be four. There are (1) the wet and (2) the dry house-refuse (or dust and night-soil), and (3) the wet and (4) the dry street-refuse (or mud and rubbish); and in these four different branches of the one general trade the principle of complex co-operation is found commonly, though not invariably, to prevail.

The difference as to the class employments of the general body of public cleansers—the dustmen, street-sweepers, nightmen, and rubbish-carters—seems to be this:—any nightman will work as a dustman or scavager; but it is not all the dustmen and scavagers who will work as nightmen. The reason is almost obvious. The avocations of the dustman and the nightman are in some degree hereditary. A rude man provides for the future maintenance of his sons in the way which is most patent to his notice; he makes the boy share in his own labour, and grow up unfit for anything else.

The regular working scavagers are then generally a distinct class from the working dustmen, and are all paid by the week, while the dustmen are paid by the load. In very wet weather, when there is a great quantity of “slop” in the streets, a dustman is often called upon to lend a helping hand, and sometimes when a working scavager is out of employ, in order to keep himself from want, he goes to a “job of dust work,” but seldom from any other cause.

In a parish where there is a crowded population, the dustman’s labours consume, on an average, from six to eight hours a day. In scavagery, the average hours of daily work are twelve (Sundays of course excepted), but they sometimes extended to fifteen, and even sixteen hours, in places of great business traffic; while in very fine dry weather, the twelve hours may be abridged by two, three, four, or even more. Thus it is manifest that the consumption of time alone prevents the same working men being simultaneously dustmen and scavagers. In the more remote and quiet parishes, however, and under the management of the smaller contractors, the opposite arrangement frequently exists; the operative is a scavager one day, and a dustman the next. This is not the case in the busier districts, and with the large contractors, unless exceptionally, or on an emergency.

If the scavagers or dustmen have completed their street and house labours in a shorter time than usual, there is generally some sort of employment for them in the yards or wharfs of the contractors, or they may sometimes avail themselves of their leisure to enjoy themselves in their own way. In many parts, indeed, as I have shown, the street-sweeping must be finished by noon, or earlier.

Concerning the division of labour, it may be said, that the principle of complex co-operation in the scavaging trade exists only in its rudest form, for the characteristics distinguishing the labour of the working scavagers are far from being of that complicated nature common to many other callings.

As regards the act of sweeping or scraping the streets, the labour is performed by the gangsman and his gang. The gangsman usually loads the cart, and occasionally, when a number are employed in a district, acts as a foreman by superintending them, and giving directions; he is a working scavager, but has the office of overlooker confided to him, and receives a higher amount of wage than the others.

For the completion of the street-work there are the one-horse carmen and the two-horse carmen, who are also working scavagers, and so called from their having to load the carts drawn by one or two horses. These are the men who shovel into the cart the dirt swept or scraped to one side of the public way by the gang (some of it mere slop), and then drive the cart to its destination, which is generally their master’s yard. Thus far only does the street-labour extend. The carmen have the care of the vehicles in cleaning them, greasing the wheels, and such like, but the horses are usually groomed by stablemen, who are not employed in the streets.

The division of labour, then, among the working scavagers, may be said to be as follows:—

1st. The ganger, whose office it is to superintend the gang, and shovel the dirt into the cart.

2nd. The gang, which consists of from three to ten or twelve men, who sweep in a row and collect the dirt in heaps ready for the ganger to shovel into the cart.

3rd. The carman (one-horse or two-horse, as the case may be), who attends to the horse and cart, brushes the dirt into the ganger’s shovel, and assists the ganger in wet sloppy weather in carting the dirt, and then takes the mud to the place where it is deposited.

There is only one mode of payment for the above labours pursued among the master scavagers, and that is by the week.

1st. The ganger receives a weekly salary of 18s. when working for an “honourable” master; with a “scurf,” however, the ganger’s pay is but 16s. a week.

2nd. The gang receive in a large establishment each 16s. per week, but in a small one they usually get from 14s. to 15s. a week. When working for a small master they have often, by working over hours, to “make eight days to the week instead of six.”

3rd. The one-horse carman receives 16s. a week in a large, and 15s. in a small establishment.

4th. The two-horse carman receives 18s. weekly, but is employed only by the larger masters.

On the opposite page I give a table on this point.

Some of these men are paid by the day, some by the week, and some on Wednesdays and Saturdays, perhaps in about equal proportions, the “casuals” being mostly paid by the day, and the regular hands (with some exceptions among the scurfs) once or twice a week. The chance hands are sometimes engaged for a half day, and, as I was told, “jump at a bob and a joey (1s. 4d.), or at a bob.” I heard of one contractor who not unfrequently said to any foreman or gangsman who mentioned to him the applications for work, “O, give the poor devils a turn, if it’s only for a day now and then.”

Piece-work, or, as the scavagers call it, “by the load,” did at one time prevail, but not to any great extent. The prices varied, according to the nature and the state of the road, from 2s. to 2s. 6d. the load. The system of piece-work was never liked by the men; it seems to have been resorted to less as a system, or mode of labour, than to insure assiduity on the part of the working scavagers, when a rapid street-cleansing was desirable. It was rather in the favour of the working man’s individual emoluments than otherwise, as may be shown in the following way. In Battle-bridge, four men collect five loads in dry, and six men seven loads in wet weather. If the average piece hire be 2s. 3d. a load, it is 2s. 9¾d. for each of the five men’s day’s work; if 2s. 2d. a load, it is 2s. 8½d. (the regular wage, and an extra halfpenny); if 2s., it is 2s. 6d.; and if less (which has been paid), the day’s wage is not lower than 2s. At the lowest rates, however, the men, I was informed, could not be induced to take the necessary pains, as they would struggle to “make up half-a-crown;” while, if the streets were scavaged in a slovenly manner, the contractor was sure to hear from his friends of the parish that he was not acting up to his contract. I could not hear of any men now set to piece-work within the precincts of the places specified in the table. This extra work and scamping work are the two great evils of the piece system.