Tales from Victorian London

Tales from Victorian London brings together accounts of 19th century London from two Victorian writers, Henry Mayhew and James Greenwood. Both Mayhew and Greenwood were concerned with daily life in London, and both had an ability to find bizarre, interesting and surprising stories. Tales from Victorian London covers different subjects, ranging from supposedly immoral behaviour in London’s lodging houses and the tricks practised by London’s street sellers, to tales from the poor and the sights and sounds of Victorian street life. SLUM LIFETiny rooms with broken floors and blackened wallsLodging dens which no decent man dare enterBuff ball in Golden Lane– naked dancing with a fiddle and tin whistleThe filth, dishonesty and immorality of low lodging housesDODGES AND DECEITSCostermonger tricksDrunken Dave the fish sellerThe night cabmanOn the petty thieving by London’s omnibus conductorsFOOD AND DRINK“I’ve seen better days”: selling sheep’s trotters in pubsMilk from the cow in St James’s ParkHot eels and pea soupStreet oystersLondon’s whelk eatersGinger beer fountainsPUBS AND DAYS OUTBlack-eyed “as course as a coal whipper”Mr. Popshort’s “Sly House”, or how to get a drink in London on a SundayA Londoner’s Sunday outingA Cockney holidayOTHER TALESThe Smithfield RacesStreet urchins and ragamuffins at the Angel IslingtonStreet patterersJack sailors in the Port of London