248
The over-all politics of the costermongers was simple and
it consisted simply in a hatred of the police; in fact, said
nHlVl""
the police
were
their politics. They were interested in Chartism,
they were mostly all Chartists, although they knew nothing of
six points and they could not understand why the Chartist
exhorted them to peace and quietness when they could just as
fight it out with the police at once. "I am assured," said
"that in case of a political riot, every 'coster' would seize his
man." And among themselves they did carry on a continuous
war with the "Peelers." To "serve out" a policeman was the
act and the highest office to which a coster could aspire. They
implacable in this pursuit, motivated as they were by a simple
venge code, and would patiently shadow a policeman for
until, catching him at a disadvantage, they would "do him in."
ensuing jail sentence was regarded as a mere bagatelle, and
worth the status of a hero among the costers that also followed.
If
the costers had no concept of nationality or law or
they were likewise devoid of any religious sentiment or
uu....
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ing. Only among the most miserable of the street people-the
the halt, the blind-could Mayhew find any religious notions.
blind musicians were "a far more deserving class than is
supposed-this affliction seems to have chastened them and to
given a peculia,r religious cast to their thoughts." But among the
body of costers only three in a hundred had even been inside a
or knew what was meant by Christianity. Occasionally a
sort
Hardyesque feeling about the Deity emerged, as with an old
who told Mayhew that while there may have "once" been a
He was either dead or grown old and diseased, for He obviously
not "fash" [trouble] himself with his creatures at all. But the
of the costers lived in cheerful ignorance of the facts of '\..
HJlU:)U(1jlllLJr-~
"I don't know what the Pope is. Is he in any trade?"; "0, yes,
heard of God; he made hea.ven and earth; I never heard of
hi
making the sea; that's another thing, and you can best learn
that at Billingsgate"-and, moreover, out of the churches th(:m!;eIvi5
they saw issuing forth only fashionable and well-dressed people.
though they hated the Irish, they respected the Catholic Church
cause they actually saw the Sisters of Charity caring for the
Protestantism meant mostly tracts and sermons and although
