And I Must Not Forget The Numbers Of Poor
Creatures Who Live And Maintain Their Families By Buying Provisions
In
One part of the town, and retailing them in another, whose stock
perhaps does not amount to more than forty
Or fifty shillings, and
part of this they take up (many of them) on their clothes at a
pawnbroker's on a Monday morning, which they make shift to redeem on
a Saturday night, that they may appear in a proper habit at their
parish-churches on a Sunday. These are the people that cry fish,
fruit, herbs, roots, news, &c, about town.
As to hackney-coachmen, carmen, porters, chairmen, and watermen,
though they work hard, they generally eat and drink well, and are
decently clothed on holidays; for the wife, if she be industrious,
either by her needle, washing, or other business proper to her sex,
makes no small addition to their gains; and by their united labours
they maintain their families handsomely if they have their healths.
As to the common menial servants, they have great wages, are well
kept and clothed, but are, notwithstanding the plague, of almost
every house in town. They form themselves into societies, or rather
confederacies, contributing to the maintenance of each other when
out of place; and if any of them cannot manage the family where they
are entertained as they please, immediately they give notice they
will be gone. There is no speaking to them; they are above
correction; and if a master should attempt it, he may expect to be
handsomely drubbed by the creature he feeds and harbours, or perhaps
an action brought against him for it.
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