We should expect, further, to find no sailors' or working men's
quarters. The former because there were no ships; the latter because
there were no markets. Lastly, we should not be surprised to find the
place very early occupied by inns and places of accommodation for those
who resorted to London.
All this was, in fact, what did take place. The Roman remains are
numerous; they are all found along the causeways; the existence of a
Roman cemetery shows that it was a place of some importance. I say
_some_, because its very limited extent proves that it was never a large
place. I will return immediately to the Roman remains.
There was, however, one trade, one class of working men which took up
its abode along the embankment of Southwark: it was that of the
fishermen, driven across the river by the growth of London. There was no
room for the fishermen with their coracles and nets along the line of
quays on the north side; they wanted a place to haul up their boats, and
a place to spread their nets,--they could not find either in the north;
nor would the fish be caught in waters troubled perpetually by oars and
keels. The fisherfolk, therefore, put up their huts along the
embankment; for long centuries afterwards the fisherfolk continued to
live in South London. The last remnant of Thames fishermen occupied,
well into the present century, a single court in Lambeth; it is
described as unpaved, unglazed, unlighted, dirty, and insanitary. But
the last salmon had been caught in the river; the Thames fishermen were
by that time almost starved out of existence. I am sure that the south
was always their place of residence; the foreshore offered them what
they could not find on the north bank. To him, however, who considers
the fisheries of the Thames, there are many points on which, for want of
exact information, he may speculate and theorise as much as he pleases.
For instance, later on, there were fishermen living at Limehouse. Some
of the Thames watermen lived here also--the legend of Awdry the ferryman
assigns to him a residence on the south; their favourite place of
residence, however, was St. Katherine's first, and Wapping afterwards.
[Illustration: RELICS OF THE STONE AGE]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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