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ILLUSTRATIONS OF HUMANITY.

No. XXVII. THE MILK TRADE OF
LONDON.

WISHING to be learned and profound, we turned to the " Encyclopædia of Antiquities" by the erudite Fosbroke, and under the head "MILK," find it very gravely stated, "every schoolboy knows the use of it among the classical ancients." Indeed!—that is more than we would give "every schoolboy" credit for. But to proceed. Our author says, "We find milk and water drank on fasts by the Anglo-Saxons." So! -the use of the pump boasts a venerable antiquity. Then rejoice, ye London vendors of "thin potations," for you can trace up your time-honoured practices to those remote periods, from whence all that is grand in our laws and constitution has descended. Moreover, the reverend antiquary assures us, that "with some classes of the Britons, it (i. e. milk and water) was almost the sole beverage, and continued so, in some districts, down to the reign of Elizabeth." Think of that! Teetotalism may hide its diminished head. Water has been administered to milk from an early period in our annals, and whole classes of hardy Britons drank nothing but blue milk (without taking the pledge) throughout a succession of generations. Seeing the antiquity of our subject, we need not begin to inquire when or how the people of London first began to imbibe water and milk. One sentence more from Fosbroke settles the matter. Not only was Britain famous for milk, but we are assured that "cream for custards, milk for flawns, hawking London milk-maids, milk-wives, and milk-pails, occur in the sixteenth century." Ay did they-they occurred much earlier, as we have already shown; and should any man be so unreasonable as to doubt the assertion, let him turn to Nelson's quarto on "merry Islington," and there he will find, that this famous adjunct of London has been celebrated for "the richness of its pastures," and that the Romans, "it is reasonable to conjecture," actually "derived a large portion of their needful supplies from the luxuriant herbage."

Therefore at the present day, and from time immemorial, London is divided into "Milk Walks," which are footed morning and night by the industrious retailers of "albuminous and oleaginous principles." Some reader stares, and asks, "What's that?" Why, you stupid, milk has been found to be "a compound fluid," and is said chiefly to consist of "oleaginous and albuminous principles, with different salts." These principles, however, are not administered to the people of London in their native ferocity. A compounder of stuff which he called gin was asked, if he sold the liquid fire in its original state, with all its burning powers. "Oh, no," he replied, "poor things! (the speaker was a humane man) it would scald their bowels-we comforts it for them." So the milk-folks of London are more considerate to their customers, than to supply them with over-proof doses of "albuminous and oleaginous principles, with different salts."

No! they "comforts it for them." They carry their milk to the pump, and mitigate the activity of the "principles."

Islington, though its fields and pastures have nearly all disappeared, still supplies a large portion of the "milk and water" used by the people of London. Nelson, in his "History of Islington," published in 1811, states that the number of cows kept for supplying the metropolis, was then estimated at between eight and nine thousand. "The quantity of milk yielded by each cow, has been averaged at nine quarts per day. The retail dealer agrees with the cow-keeper for the produce of a certain number of cows: for this purpose certain persons are employed in the cow-house, called milkers, who are paid by the retailer. The milk is sold pure to the retail dealers; but in delivering it to the consumer an increase takes place, the milk being mixed with water. The milk room is mostly furnished with a pump, to which the retail dealers apply in rotation, not secretly, but openly, and pump water into the milk vessels at their discretion; the pump being placed there for that purpose, and but seldom used for any other."

The milk is conveyed from the cow-house in pails, chiefly by women, though men are also engaged. The women are either Welsh or Irish-very few Scotch or even English women, being found amongst them. The "milk walks" of London are, to a considerable extent, appropriated by Welsh people, who, when they migrate to the metropolis, regard the retailing of milk to be as peculiarly their business, as Jews regard the picking up of old clothes.

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Two natives of India, who have recently published "Journal of a Residence of Two Years and a Half in Great Britain," have given an account of a visit to the most celebrated dairy near London, and we therefore extract it.

The

"We paid a visit to Thomas Flight, Esq., of Highbury terrace, who is the proprietor of Laycock's dairy, Islington, near London, and which place we visited. It is certainly one of the curiosities of London, and is a most valuable and extensive property. There are fourteen acres surrounded by a high wall, and which is nearly covered with buildings for the several purposes required. And first, there are upwards of four hundred cows, which are kept for supplying milk, twice in each day, namely, at three o'clock in the morning, and at noon, being milked by women. whole of the cows are kept in stalls, and the food is varied as much as possible. Mangel wurzel, a large species of beet root, is their chief food, and then they have turnips, cabbages, carrots, and clover; when they do not continue to give a large quantity of milk, oil cake and other things are given to fatten them for sale at Smithfield market. All the cows are fine animals, sleek as race horses, and they are curried with a comb every day. As it is quite necessary to have four hundred cows to milk each day, they are obliged to keep more than that number on the premises; and there is a hospital for the cows to have their calves in, and where any that are unwell have medical treatment.

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