Hence we see, that the great scurf employers of the scavagers, after all, are the guardians of the poor, compared with whom the most grasping contractor is a model of liberality.

That the minimum of remuneration paid by the parishes has tended, and is tending more and more, to the general depreciation of wages in the scavaging trade, there is no doubt. It has done so directly and indirectly. One man, who had been a last-maker, told me that he left his employment as a London scavager, for he had “come down to the parish,” and set off at the close of the summer into Kent for the harvest and hopping, for, when in the country, he had been more used to agricultural labour than to last, clog, or patten making. He considered that he had not been successful; still he returned to London a richer man by 26s. 6d. Nearly 20s. of this soon went for shoes and necessary clothing, and to pay some arrears of rent, and a chandler’s bill he owed, after which he could be trusted again where he was known. He applied to the foreman of a contractor, whom he knew, for work. “What wage?” said the foreman. “Fifteen shillings a week,” was the reply. “Why, what did you get from the parish for sweeping?” “Nine shillings.” “Well,” said the foreman, “I know you’re a decent man, and you were recommended before, and so I can give you four or five days a week at 2s. 4d. a day, and no nonsense about hours; for you know yourself I can get 50 men as have been parish workers at 1s. 9d. a day, and jump at it, and so you mustn’t be cheeky.” The man closed with the offer, knowing that the foreman spoke the truth.

A contractor told me that he could obtain “plenty of hands,” used to parish scavaging work, at 10s. 6d. to 12s. a week, whereas he paid 16s.

It is evident, then, that the system of pauper work in scavaging has created an increasing market for cheap and deteriorated labour, a market including hundreds of the unemployed at other unskilled labours; and it is hardly to be doubted that the many who have faith in the doctrine that it is the best policy to buy in the cheapest and sell in the dearest market, will avail themselves of the low-priced labour of this pauper-constituted mart.

It is but right to add, that those parishes which pay 15s. a week are as worthy of commendation as those which pay 9s., 7s. 6d. and 7s. per week, and 1s. 4d. and 1s. 1½d. a day are reprehensible; and, unfortunately, the latter have a tendency to regulate all the others.

Of the Street-Orderlies.

This constitutes the last of the four varieties of labour employed in the cleansing of the public thoroughfares of London. I have already treated of the self-supporting manual labour, the self-supporting machine labour, and the pauper labour, and now proceed to the consideration of the philanthropic labour of the streets.

In the first place, let us understand clearly what is meant by philanthropic labour, and how it is distinguished from pauper labour on the one hand, and self-supporting labour on the other. Self-supporting labour I take to be that form of work which returns not less, and generally something more, than is expended upon it. Pauper labour, on the other hand, is work to which the applicants for parish relief are “set,” not with a view to the profit to be derived from it, but partly as a test of their willingness to work, and partly as a means of employing the unemployed; while philanthropic labour is employment provided for the unemployed with the same disregard of profit as distinguishes pauper labour, but with a greater regard for the poor, and as a means of affording them relief in a less degrading manner than is done under the present Poor Law. Pauper and philanthropic labour, then, differ essentially from self-supporting labour in being non-profitable modes of employment; that is to say, they yield so bare an equivalent for the sum expended upon the labourers, that none, in the ordinary way of trade, can be found to provide the means necessary for putting them into operation: while pauper labour differs from philanthropic labour, in the fact that the funds requisite for “setting the poor on work” are provided by law as a matter of social policy, whereas, in the case of philanthropic labour, the funds, or a part of them, are supplied by voluntary contributions, out of a desire to improve the labourers’ condition. There are, then, two distinguishing features in all philanthropic labour—the one is, that it yields no profit (if it did it would become a matter of trade), and the other, that it is instituted and maintained from a wish to benefit the labourer.

The Street-Orderly system forms part of the operations on behalf of the poor adopted by a society, of which Mr. Charles Cochrane is the president, entitled the “National Philanthropic Association,” which is said to have for its object “the promotion of social and salutiferous improvements, street cleanliness, and the employment of the poor, so that able-bodied men may be prevented from burthening the parish-rate, and preserved independent of workhouse, alms, and degradation.” Here a twofold object is expressed: the Philanthropic Association seeks not only to benefit the poor by giving them employment, and “preserving them independent of workhouse, alms, and degradation,” but to benefit the public likewise, by “promoting social and salutiferous improvements and street cleanliness.” I shall deal with each of these objects separately; but first let me declare, so as to remove all suspicion of private feelings tending in any way to bias my judgment in this most important matter, that I am an utter stranger to the President and Council of the Philanthropic Association; and that, whatever I may have to say on the subject of the street-orderlies, I do simply in conformity with my duty to the public—to state truthfully all that concerns the labourers and the poor of the metropolis.

Viewed economically, philanthropic and pauper work may be said to be the regulators of the minimum rate of wages—establishing the lowest point to which competition can possibly drive down the remuneration for labour; for it is evident, that if the self-supporting labourer cannot obtain greater comforts by the independent exercise of his industry than the parish rates or private charity will afford him, he will at once give over working for the trading employer, and declare on the funds raised by assessment or voluntary subscription for his support. Hence, those who wish well to the labourer, and who believe that cheapness of commodities is desirable “only,” as Mr. Stewart Mill says (p. 502, vol. ii.), “when the cause of it is, that their production costs little labour, and not when occasioned by that labour’s being ill-remunerated;” and who believe, moreover, that the labourer is to be benefited solely by the cultivation of a high standard of comfort among the people—to such, I say, it is evident, that a poor law which reduces the relief to able-bodied labourers to the smallest modicum of food consistent with the continuation of life must be about the greatest curse that can possibly come upon an over-populated country, admitting, as it does, of the reduction of wages to so low a point of mere brutal existence as to induce that recklessness and improvidence among the poor which is known to give so strong an impetus to the increase of the people. A minimized rate of parish relief is necessarily a minimized rate of wages, and admits of the labourers’ pay being reduced, by pauper competition, to little short of starvation; and such, doubtlessly, would have been the case long ago in the scavaging trade by the employment of parish labour, had not the Philanthropic Association instituted the system of street-orderlies, and by the payment of a higher rate of wages than the more grinding parishes afforded—by giving the men 12s. instead of 9s. or even 7s. a week—prevented the remuneration of the regular hands being dragged down to an approximation to the parish level. Hence, rightly viewed, philanthropic labour—and, indeed, pauper labour too—comes under the head of a remedy for low wages, as preventing, if properly regulated, the undue depreciation of industry from excessive competition, and it is in this light that I shall now proceed to consider it.

The several plans that have been propounded from time to time, as remedies for an insufficient rate of remuneration for work, are as multifarious as the circumstances influencing the three requisites for production—labour, capital, and land. I will here run over as briefly as possible—abstaining from the expression of all opinion on the subject—the various schemes which have been proposed with this object, so that the reader may come as prepared as possible to the consideration of the matter.

The remedies for low wages may be arranged into two distinct groups, viz., those which seek to increase the labourer’s rate of pay directly, and those which seek to do so indirectly.

The direct remedies for low wages that have been propounded are:—

Such are the direct modes of remedying low wages, viz., either by preventing the price of labour itself falling below a certain standard; prohibiting all stoppages from the pay of the labourer; instituting certain aids or additions to such pay; or increasing the money value of the ordinary wages by reducing the price of provisions.

The indirect modes of remedying low wages are of a far more complex character. They consist of, first, the remedies propounded by political economists, which are—

The above constitute what, with a few exceptions, may be termed, more particularly, the “economist” remedies for low wages.

The two latter proposals, and that of the extension of the markets, may be said to seek to remedy low wages by expanding or circumscribing the foreign trade of the country.

These remedies may, with a few exceptions (such as the tribute system of wages, and the abolition of middlemen), be said to constitute the socialist and communist schemes for the prevention of distress.

The above I believe to be a full and fair statement of the several plans that have been proposed, from time to time, for alleviating the distress of the people. This enumeration is as comprehensive as my knowledge will enable me to make it; and I have abstained from all comment on the several schemes, so that the reader may have an opportunity of impartially weighing the merits of each, and adopting that, which in his own mind, seems best calculated to effect what, after all, we every one desire—whether protectionist, economist, free-trader, philanthropist, socialist, communist, or chartist—the good of the country in which we live, and the people by whom we are surrounded.

Now we have to deal here with that particular remedy for low wages or distress which consists in creating additional employment for the poor, and of which the street-orderly system is an example.

The increase of employment for the poor was the main object of the 43 Eliz., for which purpose, as we have seen, the overseers of the several parishes were empowered to raise a fund by assessments upon the property of the rich, for providing “a sufficient stock of flax, hemp, wool, and other ware or stuff, to set the poor on work.” But though economists, to this day, tell us that “while, on the one hand, industry is limited by capital, so, on the other, every increase of capital gives, or is capable of giving, additional employment to industry, and this without assignable limit,”[26] nevertheless the great difficulty of carrying out the provisions of the original poor-law has consisted in finding a market for the products of pauper labour, for the frequent gluts in our manufactures are sufficient to teach us that it is one thing to produce and another to dispose of the products; so that to create additional employment for the poor something besides capital is requisite: it is necessary either that they shall be engaged in producing that which they themselves immediately consume, or that for which the market admits of being extended.

The two plans proposed for the employment of the poor, it will be seen, consist (1) in the cultivation of waste lands; (2) in promoting public cleanliness, and so increasing the sanitary condition of the country. The first, it is evident, removes the objection of a market being needed for the products of the labour of the poor, since it proposes that their energies should be devoted to the production of the food which they themselves consume; while the second seeks to create additional employment in effecting that increased cleanliness which more enlightened physiological views have not only made more desirable, but taught us to be absolutely necessary to the health and enjoyment of the community.

The great impediment, however, to the profitable employment of the poor, has generally been the unproductive or unavailing character of pauper labour. This has been mainly owing to the fact that the able-bodied who are deprived of employment are necessarily the lowest grade of operatives; for, in the displacement of workmen, those are the first discarded whose labour is found to be the least efficient, either from a deficiency of skill, industry, or sobriety, so that pauper labour is necessarily of the least productive character.

Another great difficulty with the employment of the poor is, that the idle, or those to whom work is more than usually irksome, require a stronger inducement than ordinary to make them labour, and the remuneration for parish work being necessarily less than for any other, those who are pauperized through idleness (the most benevolent among us must allow there are such) are naturally less than ever disposed to labour when they become paupers. All pauper work, therefore, is generally unproductive or unavailing, because it is either inexpert or unwilling work. The labour of the in-door paupers, who receive only their food for their pains, is necessarily of the same compulsory character as slavery; while that of the out-door paupers, with the remuneration often cut down to the lowest subsisting point, is scarcely of a more willing or more availing kind.

Owing to this general unproductiveness, (as well as the difficulty of finding a field for the profitable employment of the unemployed poor,) the labour of paupers has been for a long time past directed mainly to the cleansing of the public thoroughfares. Still, from the degrading nature of the occupation, and the small remuneration for the toil, pauper labourers have been found to be such unwilling workers that many parishes have long since given over employing their poor even in this capacity, preferring to entrust the work to a contractor, with his paid self-supporting operatives, instead.

The founder of the Philanthropic Association appears to have been fully aware of the two great difficulties besetting the profitable employment of the poor, viz., (1) finding a field for the exercise of their labours where they might be “set on work” with benefit to the community, and without injury to the independent operatives already engaged in the same occupation; and (2) overcoming the unwillingness, and consequently the unavailingness, of pauper labour.

The first difficulty Mr. Cochrane has endeavoured to obviate by taking advantage of that growing desire for greater public cleanliness which has arisen from the increased knowledge of the principles governing the health of towns; and the second, by giving the men 12s. instead of 9s. or 7s. a week, or worse than all, 1s. 1½d. and a quartern loaf a day for three days in the week, and so not only augmenting the stimulus to work (for it should be remembered that wages are to the human machine what the fire is to the steam-engine), but preventing the undue depreciation of the labour of the independent workman. He who discovers the means of increasing the rewards of labour, is as great a friend to his race as he who strives to depreciate them is the public enemy; and I do not hesitate to confess, that I look upon Mr. Charles Cochrane as one of the illustrious few who, in these days of unremunerated toil, and their necessary concomitants—beggars and thieves, has come forward to help the labourers of this country from their daily-increasing degradation. His benevolence is of that enlightened order which seeks to extend rather than destroy the self-trust of the poor, not only by creating additional employment for them, but by rendering that employment less repulsive.

The means by which Mr. Cochrane has endeavoured to gain these ends constitutes the system called Street-Orderlyism, which therefore admits of being viewed in two distinct aspects—first, as a new mode of improving “the health of towns,” and, secondly, as an improved method of employing the poor.

Concerning the first, I must confess that the system of scavaging or cleansing the public thoroughfares pursued by the street-orderlies assumes, when contemplated in a sanitary point of view, all the importance and simplicity of a great discovery. It has been before pointed out that this system consists not only in cleansing the streets, but in keeping them clean. By the street-orderly method of scavaging, the thoroughfares are continually being cleansed, and so never allowed to become dirty; whereas, by the ordinary method, they are not cleansed until they are dirty. Hence the two modes of scavaging are diametrically opposed; under the one the streets are cleansed as fast as dirtied, while under the other they are dirtied as fast as cleansed; so that by the new system of scavaging the public thoroughfares are maintained in a perpetual state of cleanliness, whereas by the old they may be said to be kept in a continual state of dirt.

The street-orderly system of scavaging, however, is not only worthy of high commendation as a more efficient means of gaining a particular end—a simplification of a certain process—but it calls for our highest praise as well for the end gained as for the means of gaining it. If it be really a sound physiological principle, that the Creator has made dirt offensive to every rightly-constituted mind, because it is injurious to us, and so established in us an instinct, before we could discover a reason, for removing all refuse from our presence, it becomes, now that we have detected the cause of the feeling in us, at once disgusting and irrational to allow the filth to accumulate in our streets in front of our houses. If typhus, cholera, and other pestilences are but divine punishments inflicted on us for the infraction of that most kindly law by which the health of a people has been made to depend on that which is naturally agreeable—cleanliness, then our instinct for self-preservation should force us, even if our sense of enjoyment would not lead us, to remove as fast as it is formed what is at once as dangerous as it should be repulsive to our natures. Sanitarily regarded, the cleansing of a town is one of the most important objects that can engage the attention of its governors; the removal of its refuse being quite as necessary for the continuance of the existence of a people as the supply of their food. In the economy of Nature there is no loss: this the great doctrine of waste and supply has taught us; the detritus of one rock is the conglomerate of another; the evaporation of the ocean is the source of the river; the poisonous exhalations of animals the vital air of plants; and the refuse of man and beasts the food of their food. The dust and cinders from our fires, the “slops” from the washing of our houses, the excretions of our bodies, the detritus and “surface-water” of our streets, have all their offices to perform in the great scheme of creation; and if left to rot and fust about us not only injure our health, but diminish the supplies of our food. The filth of the thoroughfares of the metropolis forms, it would appear, the staple manure of the market-gardens in the suburbs; out of the London mud come the London cabbages: so that an improvement in the scavaging of the metropolis tends not only to give the people improved health, but improved vegetables; for that which is nothing but a pestiferous muck-heap in the town becomes a vivifying garden translated to the country.

Dirt, however, is not only as prejudicial to our health and offensive to our senses, when allowed to accumulate in our streets, as it is beneficial to us when removed to our gardens,—but it is a most expensive commodity to keep in front of our houses. It has been shown, that the cost to the people of London, in the matter of extra washing induced by defective scavaging, is at the least 1,000,000l. sterling per annum (the Board of Health estimate it at 2,500,000l.); and the loss from extra wear and tear of clothes from brushing and scrubbing, arising from the like cause, is about the same prodigious sum; while the injury done to the furniture of private houses, and the goods exposed for sale in shops, though impossible to be estimated—appears to be something enormous: so that the loss from the defective scavaging of the metropolis seems, at the lowest calculation, to amount to several millions per annum; and hence it becomes of the highest possible importance, economically as well as physiologically, that the streets should be cleansed in the most effective manner.

Now, that the street-orderly system is the only rational and efficacious mode of street cleansing both theory and practice assure us. To allow the filth to accumulate in the streets before any steps are taken to remove it, is the same as if we were never to wash our bodies until they were dirty—it is to be perpetually striving to cure the disease, when with scarcely any more trouble we might prevent it entirely. There is, indeed, the same difference between the new and the old system of scavaging, as there is between a bad and a good housewife: the one never cleaning her house until it is dirty, and the other continually cleaning it, so as to prevent it being ever dirty.

Hence it would appear, that the street-orderly system of scavaging would be a great public benefit, even were there no other object connected with it than the increased cleanliness of our streets; but in a country like Great Britain, afflicted as it is with a surplus population (no matter from what cause), that each day finds the difficulty of obtaining work growing greater, the opening up of new fields of employment for the poor is perhaps the greatest benefit that can be conferred upon the nation. Without the discovery of such new fields, “the setting the poor on work” is merely, as I have said, to throw out of employment those who are already employed; it is not to decrease, but really to increase, the evil of the times—to add to, rather than diminish, the number of our paupers or our thieves. The increase of employment in a nation, however, requires, not only a corresponding increase of capital, but a like increase in the demand or desire, as well as in the pecuniary means, of the people to avail themselves of the work on which the poor are set (that is to say, in the extension of the home market); it requires, also, some mode of stimulating the energies of the workers, so as to make them labour more willingly, and consequently more availingly, than usual. These conditions appear to have been fulfilled by Mr. Cochrane, in the establishment of the street-orderlies. He has introduced, in connection with this body, a system of scavaging which, while it employs a greater number of hands, produces such additional benefits as cannot but be considered an equivalent for the increased expenditure; though it is even doubtful whether, by the collection of the street manure unmixed with the mud, the extra value of that article alone will not go far to compensate for the additional expense; if, however, there be added to this the saving to the metropolitan parishes in the cost of watering the streets—for under the street-orderly system this is not required, the dust never being allowed to accumulate, and consequently never requiring to be “laid”—as well as the greater saving of converting the paupers into self-supporting labourers; together with the diminished expense of washing and doctors’ bills, consequent on the increased cleanliness of the streets—there cannot be the least doubt that the employment of the poor as street-orderlies is no longer a matter of philanthropy, but of mere commercial prudence.

Such appear to me to be the principal objects of Mr. Cochrane’s street-orderly system of scavaging; and it is a subject upon which I have spoken the more freely, because, being unacquainted with that gentleman, none can suspect me of being prejudiced in his favour, and because I have felt that the good which he has done and is likely to do to the poor, has been comparatively unacknowledged by the public, and that society and the people owe him a heavy debt of gratitude[27].

I shall now proceed to set forth the character of the labour, and the condition and remuneration of the labourers in connection with the street-orderly system of scavaging the metropolitan thoroughfares.

The first appearance of the street-orderlies in the metropolis was in 1843. Mr. Charles Cochrane, who had previously formed the National Philanthropic Association, with its eleemosynary soup-kitchens, &c., then introduced the system of street-orderlies, as one enabling many destitute men to support themselves by their labour; as well as, in his estimation, a better, and eventually a more economical, mode of street-cleansing, and partaking also somewhat of the character of a street police.

The first “demonstration,” or display of the street-orderly system, took place in Regent-street, between the Quadrant and the Regent-circus, and in Oxford-street, between Vere-street and Charles-street. The streets were thoroughly swept in the morning, and then each man or boy, provided with a hand-broom and dust-pan, removed any dirt as soon as it was deposited. The demonstration was pronounced highly successful and the system effective, in the opinion of eighteen influential inhabitants of the locality who acted as a committee, and who publicly, and with the authority of their names, testified their conviction that “the most efficient means of keeping streets clean, and more especially great thoroughfares, was to prevent the accumulation of dirt, by removing the manure within a few minutes after it has been deposited by the passing cattle; the same having, hitherto, remained during several days.”

The cost of this demonstration amounted to about 400l., of which, the Report states, “200l. still remains due from the shop-keepers to the Association; which,” it is delicately added, “from late commercial difficulties they have not yet repaid” (in 1850).

Whilst the street-orderlies were engaged in cleansing Regent-street, &c., the City Commissioners of the sewers of London were invited to depute some person to observe and report to them concerning the method pursued; but with that instinctive sort of repugnance which seems to animate the great bulk of city officials against improvement of any kind, the reply was, that they “did not consider the same worthy their attention.” The matter, however, was not allowed to drop, and by the persevering efforts of Mr. Cochrane, the president, and of the body of gentlemen who form the Council of the Association, Cheapside, Cornhill, and the most important parts of the very heart of the city were at length cleansed according to the new method. The ratepayers then showed that they, at least, did consider “the same worthy of attention,” for 8000 out of 12,000 within a few days signed memorials recommending the adoption of what they pronounced an improvement, and a public meeting was held in Guildhall (May 4, 1846), at which resolutions in favour of the street-orderly method were passed. The authorities did not adopt these recommendations, but they ventured so far to depart from their venerable routine as to order the streets to be “swept every day!” This employed upwards of 300 men, whereas at the period when the sages of the city sewers did not consider any proposed improvement in scavagery worthy their attention, the number of men employed by them in cleansing the streets did not exceed 30.

The street-orderly system was afterwards tried in the parishes of St. Paul, Covent-garden, St. James (Westminster), St. Martin-in-the-Fields, St. Anne, Soho, and others—sometimes calling forth opposition, of course from the authorities connected with the established modes of paving, scavaging, &c.

It is not my intention to write a complete history of the street-orderlies, but merely to sketch their progress, as well as describe their peculiar characteristics.

Within these few months public meetings have been held in almost every one of the 26 wards of the City, at which approving resolutions were either passed unanimously or carried by large majorities; and the street-orderly system is now about to be introduced into St. Martin’s parish instead of the street-sweeping machine.

As far as the street-orderly system has been tried, and judging only by the testimony of public examination and public record of opinion, the trial has certainly been a success. A memorial to the Court of Sewers, from the ward of Broad-street, supported by the leading merchants of that locality, in recommendation of the employment of street-orderlies, seems to bear more closely on the subject than any I have yet seen.

“Your memorialists,” they state, “have observed that those public thoroughfares within the city of London which are now cleansed by street-orderlies, are so remarkably clean as to be almost free from mud in wet, and dust in dry weather—that such extreme cleanliness is of great comfort to the public, and tends to improve the sanitary condition of the ward.”

But it is not only in the metropolis that the street-orderlies seem likely to become the established scavagers. The streets of Windsor, I am informed, are now in the course of being cleansed upon the orderly plan. In Amsterdam, there are at present 16 orderlies regularly employed upon scavaging a portion of the city, and in Paris and Belgium, I am assured, arrangements are being made for the introduction of the system into both those cities. Were the street-orderly mode of scavaging to become general throughout this country, it is estimated that employment would be given to 100,000 labourers, so that, with the families of these men, not less than half a million of people would be supported in a state of independence by it. The total number of adult able-bodied paupers relieved—in-door and out-door—throughout England and Wales, on January 1, 1850, was 154,525.

The following table shows the route of the street-orderly operations in the metropolis. A further column, in the Report from which the table has been extracted, contained the names of thirteen clergymen who have “weekly read prayers and delivered discourses to the street-orderlies at their respective stations, and recorded flattering testimonials of their conduct and demeanour.”

EMPLOYMENT OF STREET-ORDERLIES.

The period of nine years comprised in the above statement (1843 and 1851 being both included) gives a yearly average, as to the number of the poor employed, exceeding 60, with a similar average of 210 wives and children, and a yearly average outlay of 420l. The number of orderlies now employed by the Association is from 80 to 90.

Such, then, is a brief account of the rise and progress of this new mode of street-sweeping, and we now come to a description of the work itself.

“The orderlies,” says the Report of the Association, “keep the streets free from mud in winter, and dust in summer; and that with the least possible personal drudgery:—adhering to the principle of operation laid down, viz., that of ‘Cleansing and keeping Clean,’ they have merely, after each morning’s sweeping and removal of dirt, to keep a vigilant look-out over the surface of street allotted to them; and to remove with the hand-brush and dust-pan, from any particular spot, whatever dirt or rubbish may fall upon it, at the moment of its deposit. Thus are the streets under their care kept constantly clean.

“But sweeping and removing dirt,” continues the Report, “is not the only occupation of the street-orderly, whilst keeping up a careful inspection of the ground allotted to him. He is also the watchman of house-property and shop-goods; the guardian of reticules, pocket-books, purses, and watch-pockets;—the experienced observer and detector of pickpockets; the ever ready, though unpaid, auxiliary to the police constable. Nay, more;—he is always at hand, to render assistance to both equestrian and pedestrian: if a horse slip, stumble, or fall,—if a carriage break down, or vehicles come into collision,—the street-orderly darts forward to raise and rectify them: if foot-passengers be run over, or knocked down, or incautiously loiter on a crossing, the street-orderly rescues them from peril or death; or warns them of the approaching danger of carriages driving in opposite directions: if other accidents befall pedestrians,—if they fall on the pavement, from sudden illness, faintness, or apoplexy, the street-orderly is at hand to render assistance, or convey them to the nearest surgery or hospital. If strangers are at fault as to the localities of London, or the place of their destination, the orderly, in a civil and respectful manner, directs them on their way. If habitual or professional mendicants are importunate or troublesome, the street-orderly warns them off; or hands them to the care of the policeman. And if a really poor or starving fellow-creature wanders in search of food or alms, he leads him to a workhouse or soup-kitchen[28].

“Should the system become general (of which there is now every good prospect), it will be the means of rescuing no less than TEN THOUSAND PERSONS and their families from destitution and distress (in London alone);—from the forlorn and wretched condition which tempts to criminality and outrage, to that of comfort, independence, and happiness—produced by their own industry, aided by the kind consideration of those who are more the favourites of fortune than themselves.

“In conclusion it may be stated, that the street-orderly system will keep the streets and pavements of London and Westminster as clean as the court-yard and hall of any gentleman’s private dwelling: it will not only secure the general comfort and health of upwards of two millions of people, but save a vast annual amount to shopkeepers, housekeepers, and others, with regard to the spoiling of their goods by dust and dirt; in the wear and tear of clothes and furniture, by an eternal round of brushing, dusting, scouring, and scrubbing.”

The foregoing extract fully indicates the system pursued and results of street-orderlyism. I will now deal with what may be considered the labour or trade part of the question.

By the street-orderly plan a district is duly apportioned. To one man is assigned the care of a series of courts, a street, or 500, 1000, 1200, 1500, or 2000 yards of a public way, according to its traffic, after the whole surface has been swept “the first thing in the morning.” In Oxford-street, for instance, it has been estimated that 500 yards can be kept clear of the dirt continually being deposited by one man; in the squares, where there is no great traffic, 2000 yards; while in so busy a part as Cheapside, some nine men will be required to be hourly on the look-out. These street-orderlies are confined to their beats as strictly as are policeman, and as they soon become known to the inhabitants, it is a means of checking any disposition to loiter, or to shirk the work; to say nothing of the corps of inspectors and superintendents.

The division of labour among the street-orderlies is as follows:—

1. The foreman, whose duty is to “look over the men” (one such over-looker being employed to about every 20 men), and who receives 15s. per week.

2. The barrow-men, or sweepers, consisting of men and boys; the former receiving 12s. and the latter generally 7s. per week.

The tools and implements used, and their cost, are as follows:—wooden scoops, to throw up the slop, 1s. 2d. each (they used to be made of iron, weighing 8 lbs. each, but the men then complained that the weight “broke their arms”); shovel, 2s. 3d.; hoe and scraper, 1s. 3d.; hand-broom, 8d.; scavager’s broom, 1s. 2d.; barrow, 12s.; covered barrow, 24s.

In the amount of his receipts, the street-orderly appears to a disadvantage, as many of the “regular hands” of the contractors receive 16s. weekly, and he but 12s. The reason for this circumscribed payment I have already alluded to—the deficiency of funds to carry out the full purposes of the Association. Contrasted with the remuneration of the great majority of the pauper scavagers, the street-orderly is in a state of comparative comfort, for he receives nearly double as much as the Guardians of the Poor of Chelsea and the Liberty of the Rolls pay their labourers, and full 25 per cent. more than is paid by Bermondsey, Deptford, Marylebone, St. James’s, Westminster, St. George’s, Hanover-square, and St. Andrew’s, Holborn; and, I am assured, it is the intention of the Council to pay the full rate of wages given by the more respectable scavagers, viz., 16s. a week each man. If traders can do this, philanthropists, who require no profit, at least should be equally liberal. The labourer never can be benefited by depreciating the ordinary wages of his trade; and I must in justice confess, that there are scattered throughout the Report repeated regrets that the funds of the Association will not admit of a higher rate of wages being paid.

The street-orderly is not subjected to any fines or drawbacks, and is paid always in money, every Saturday evening at the office of the Association. In this respect, however, he does not differ from other bodies of scavagers.

The usual mode of obtaining employment among the street-orderlies is by personal application at the office of the Association in Leicester-square; but sometimes letters, well-penned and well-worded, are addressed to the president.

The daily number of applicants for employment is far from demonstrative of that unbroken prosperity of the country, of which we hear so much. On my inquiring into the number, I ascertained towards the end of August, that, for the previous fortnight, during fine summer weather, London being still full of the visitors to the Exhibition, on an average 30 men, of nearly all conditions of life, applied personally each day for work at street-sweeping, at 12s. a week. Certainly this labour is not connected with the feeling of pauper degradation, but it does not look well for the country that in twelve days 360 men should apply for such work. On the year’s average, I am assured, there are 30 applications daily, but only ten new applicants, as men call to solicit an engagement again and again. Thus in the year there are nine thousand, three hundred, and ninety applications, and 3130 individual applicants. In the course of one month last winter, there were applications from 300 boys in Spitalfields alone, to be set to work; and I am told, that had they been successful, 3000 lads would have applied the next month.

When an application is made by any one recommended by subscribers, &c., to the Association, or where the case seems worthy of attention, the names and addresses are entered in a book, with a slight sketch of the circumstances of the person wishing to become a street-orderly, so that inquiries may be made. I give a few of the more recent of these entries and descriptions, which are really “histories in little”:—

“Thomas M’G——, aged 50, W— L— street, Chelsea Hospital, single man. Taught a French and English school in Lyons, France. Driven out of France at the Revolution of 1848. Penniless.

“Rich. M——, 13, C—— street, H—— garden, 42 years. Married. Can read and write. Has been a seaman in the royal service ten years. Chairmaker by trade. Has jobbed as a porter in Rochester, Kent.

“Phil. S——, 1, R— L— street, High Holborn. From Killarney, co. Kerry. Bred a gardener. Fifteen years in constabulary force, for which he has a character from Col. Macgregor, and received the compensation of 50l., which he bestowed on his father and mother to keep them at home. Nine months in England, viz., in Bristol, Bath, and London. Aged 35. Can read and write.

“Edw. C——, 79, M—— street, Hackney. Aged 27. Married. Army-pensioner, 6d. a day. Can read and write. Recommended by Rev. T. Gibson, rector of Hackney.

“Chas. J——, 11, D—— street, Chelsea. Aged 38. Gentleman’s servant.”

In my account of the “regular hands” employed by the contracting scavagers, I have stated that the street-orderlies were a more miscellaneous body, as they had not been reared in the same proportion to street work. They are also, I may add, a better-conducted and better-informed class than the general run of unskilled labourers, as they know, before applying for street-orderly work, that inquiries are made concerning them, and that men of reprobate character will not be employed.

Many of those employed as orderlies have since returned to their original employments; others have procured, and been recommended to, superior situations in life to that of street-orderlies, by the Council of the Association, but no instance has occurred of any street-orderly having returned back to his parish workhouse or stoneyard. This certainly looks well.

One street-orderly, I may add, is now a reputable school-master, and has been so for some time; another is a clerk under similar circumstances. Another is a good theoretical and practical musician, having officiated as organist in churches and at concerts; he is also a neat music copyist. Another tells of his correspondence with a bishop on theological topics. Another, with a long and well-cultured beard, has been a model for artists. One had 150l. left to him not long ago, which was soon spent; his wife spent it, he said, and then he quietly applied to be permitted to be again a street-orderly. Several have got engagements as seamen, their original calling—indeed, I am assured, that a few months of street-orderly labour is looked upon as an excellent ordeal of character, after which the Association affirms good behaviour on the part of the employed.

The subscribers to the funds not unfrequently recommend destitute persons to the good offices of the Association, apart from their employment as street-orderlies. Thus, it is only a few weeks ago, that twelve Spanish refugees, none of them speaking English, were recommended to the Association; one of them it was ultimately enabled to establish as a waiter in an hotel resorted to by foreigners, another as an interpreter, another as a gentleman’s servant, and another (with a little boy, his son) in shoe-blacking in Leicester-square.

Thus among street-orderlies are to be found a great diversity of career in life, and what may be called adventures.

One great advantage, however, which the orderly possesses over his better paid brethren is in the greater probability of his “rising out of the street.” This is very rarely the case with an ordinary scavager.

I now give the following account from one of the street-orderlies, a tall, soldierly-looking man:—

“I’m 42 now,” he said, “and when I was a boy and a young man I was employed in the Times machine office, but got into a bit of a row—a bit of a street quarrel and frolic, and was called on to pay 3l., something about a street-lamp: that was out of the question; and as I was taking a walk in the park, not just knowing what I’d best do, I met a recruiting sergeant, and enlisted on a sudden—all on a sudden—in the 16th Lancers. When I came to the standard, though, I was found a little bit too short. Well, I was rather frolicsome in those days, I confess, and perhaps had rather a turn for a roving life, so when the sergeant said he’d take me to the East India Company’s recruiting sergeant, I consented, and was accepted at once. I was taken to Calcutta, and served under General Nott all through the Affghan war. I was in the East India Company’s artillery, 4th company and 2nd battalion. Why, yes, sir, I saw a little of what you may call ‘service.’ I was at the fighting at Candahar, Bowlinglen, Bowling-pass, Clatigillsy, Ghuznee, and Caboul. The first real warm work I was in was at Candahar. I’ve heard young soldiers say that they’ve gone into action the first time as merry as they would go to a play. Don’t believe them, sir. Old soldiers will tell you quite different. You must feel queer and serious the first time you’re in action: it’s not fear—it’s nervousness. The crack of the muskets at the first fire you hear in real hard earnest is uncommon startling; you see the flash of the fire from the enemy’s line, but very little else. Indeed, oft enough you see nothing but smoke, and hear nothing but balls whistling every side of you. And then you get excited, just as if you were at a hunt; but after a little service—I can speak for myself, at any rate—you go into action as you go to your dinner.