Lives of Famous London Beggars: With Forty Portraits of the Most Remarkable. — John Shaqi
Lives of Famous London Beggars: With Forty Portraits of the Most Remarkable.Smith, John Thomas
History
Lives of Famous London Beggars: With Forty Portraits of the Most Remarkable.
Smith, John Thomas
Beggars -- England -- London
Thomas King, a most excellent painter of conversation-scenes, who lived
at the time of Hogarth, and assisted him in his large pictures of Paul
before Felix in Lincoln's Inn Hall, and the Good Samaritan in
Bartholomew's Hospital, has left portraits of several of these singular
beings,--such as Maddox, the balancer of a straw; but particularly that
of Matthew Skeggs, who played a concerto upon a broomstick, in the
character of Signor Bumbasto, at the little theatre in the Haymarket.
These portraits have been engraved by Houston. That of Skeggs was
published by himself, at the sign of the Hoop and Bunch of Grapes, in St
Alban's Street, now a part of Waterloo Place. Since their time, Mr
Meadows, the comedian, has been particularly famous for his imitations
of birds; and some of the lowest description of street vagabonds have
produced tones by playing upon their chins with their knuckles. Another
hero of the knuckle, was the famous Buckhorse, the friend of Ned Shuter,
and who formerly sold sticks in Covent Garden. This fellow grew so
callous to the blow of the knuckle, as to place his head firmly against
a wall, and suffer, for a shilling, any wretch to strike him with his
doubled fist, with all his strength, in his face, which became at last
more like a Good-Friday bun than any thing human. Of this man there are
many portraits.
Of Scottish, Welsh, and Irish mendicants there are now very few in
London; perhaps their full number does not exceed fifty, unless by
including that lower order of street-musicians who so frequently
distract the harmonious ear with their droning bag-pipes, screaming
clarionets, and crazy harps. These people, with match, tooth-pick, and
cotton-ball venders, may be considered but as one remove from beggary.
The lowest class of the Scotch are bakers' men; the women are
laundresses. The Welshmen, of whom London never had many, are
principally employed by the potters of Lambeth, at which place they have
an old established house of worship. It is a cheerful sight to behold
their women, who are remarkable for their cleanliness, and, like the
Scotch, are generally pictures of vigorous health. These will go in
trains of twenty or thirty persons, from Hammersmith to Covent Garden
Market, joining in one national melody, and perfuming the air with their
baskets of ripe strawberries.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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