The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1889-02-15
0TEER VENDORS OF FOOD
.>5n vENDORs OF QUEER FOOD
AS WE'LL

!
From the NeB York Times.
Tbare are about 5000 parsons in New
x-orl-not quite half of them licensed
,rbo make living and sometimes amass
o,,,netences out of ''hawking" second class
oo,,modlties of life about the streets. Some
- them fill a real want in the poorer Sec
.i,,,s Of the city, but not few depend
mainly for their success upon the ire
sistible temptation that, to some minds, ex-
let's in the prospect of getting things for
80 than their value. The magic of that
aosira makes easy victims of those who
cherish it. and the popular faith in hunters
vending their own game seems to be I'M
shaken
Through the winter our commission mer.
obants are constantly in receipt of large
(onsionments of game from Maryland,
IUinGis Michigan, Kansas, Miss 1uri and
aieavhere. If the weather is at ali warm
and humid, ducks and other game birds
must be handled very promptly. Experts
GOVT them over when received, tossing out
all that have turned Soft or show
tendency to do so. The others
are hung up by the heads, in
which position they will keep best,
and are sold at good prices. But the
0softn ones are made up in strings and
bnncbes to be sold at whatever prices they
will bring in downtown stores and offices
or at uptown dwellings. TIE fellows who
..hawk" them about are carefully gotten
nm in the guise Of hunters, with long boots,
shooting coats. and sometimes guns, if the
birds are particularly queer" T ey al
ways pretend to be from the country,
and. swearing that they shot" EN-
Yesterday are ready to tell, with
nice circumstantiality of detail Just
where on Long Island or in New
Jersey,they had such good luck. An unso-
rhisticated man who believes them Will
amazed at learning how much good DOT
ing there is close to the city. He will know
moro " hen he starts out to shoot his own
game. The reasons that the fellows give for
selling their birds away below market prices
are that they want to get back home"
that birds are so plenty man can make
plenty of money shootin' them without
tein' hog" and that they don't know
what they rightly are worth"
There is less cunning about the itinerant
fish vendors. In fact, SO long as they deal
only il the common and CT cap kinds of fish
--porgIes, founders, fresh herring and cod
there is every probability that those who
luv from them are as well served as those
who go to the markets and fish stores, but
when their wagons, or barrowS, contain
halibut, salmon, and other igh-priced fish,
there need be no question about cir stock
being back numbers, y often of the rankest
description. Then they give free rein Go that
untrammeled inagination-often cruelty
branded as carbohydrates seems naturally
to "go with fish. The market is glutted
with choice fish they aver, or a fisherman,
VINO is friend, has stocked them up far be-
low market rates. The dull eyes and Shiny
gills of the fish have been carefully removed,
but the frying pan will develop the truth.
No matter. The vendor will be far away
by that time And really, to most persons
who buy their supplies from the hawkers,
the extra strength of odor is likely to pass
for just what is to be expected from those
rare fishes ordinarily beyond their means.
Nothing that comes out of the water is
nowadays sold in New York so temptiugly
Is clans used to be IN the old times. Long
ego. when old-fashioned customs prevailed
in the Seventh ward, ere East Broadway
had become a sort of New Jerusalem CLAIMS
were as much OF a necessity for the Sunday
morning breakfast as brown bread and
beans are still supposed TO be in Boston
TEen the clam vendors wore darkieS, wear
ing long, snowy-white aprons, and, by a
wooden yoke across the shoulders, each car
ried two big polished tin pals, with SHINY
brass balls The pals were full when the
vendor started out with fresh clans, and as
H'yah's yo' hly-white clans
Dey am good to roast an dey's good to fry,
An deys good TO make hot clam pie.
Hyah's yO' hlywhite clans.
That sweet old song is heard no more.
Now, the clam vendor is, as a rule, a filthy
looking young tough, who, with a voice
like a devils fiddle,n wells "ClamsP and
sells them in the shell out of a rickety
wagon drawn by gothic horse.
Conspicuous hawkers are those who vend
cooked sea products from baskets generally
finding their patrons in liquid refreshment
stores after nightfal. One Of these, a note
worthy figure about the city during at least
twenty years past, is said to be the owner
Of three down town tenement" houses, the
results mainly of his traffic in fried soft
shell crabs, but is still as industrious as
ever, seemingly at work all night long,
liable to be met in any saloon between the
battery and Harlem, and always rosy, fat,
merry, and personally acquainted with at
least half the people he meets wherever he
may be.
Soft-shell crabs are risky goods. A thun-
der storm will kill them when they are out
Of water as surely as pounding them with a
club, and once dead, If they are not inme-
dlately cooked, they will spoil so rapidly as
to be offensive in two or three hours. Con-
ssquently thousands of them in the crab
season are sometimes suddenly thrown on
Tie market for anything that will be given
Tor them. The purveyors OF free lunches
Ior oarrooms generally seize all these killed
CRABS, after paying for them only ten or
nlteen cents a dozen, when live ones are
worth seven to ten times as much, and if
they have been kept little too long con-
vert them into 'deviledn crabs, in which
style seasoning conceals their over-ripeness.
Crab john" the tenement owner men
uoned, swears that he only buys live crabs,
and his many customers find it pleasantest
to believe him.
The "huckster" wagons are the channel
by which the stupendous quantities of poor
aAo damaged fruit that reached New York
ID TIE fruit seasons are worked off among
those who cannot afford the best Bruised
apples, nodded and shriveed grapes, green
suu black bananas, damaged oranges, and
Lal-rotten pineapples, even such as are be-
yohd utilization In a canning factory, find
ready sale on the streets. OF course the
nealtn officers now and then interfere with
the vending Of the very worst stuff, but far
oey0nd where they draw the line it is still
ID eager demand, If its price is only low
enough, IN those parts Of the least side
.uat are thickly populated with Bohemian
ahu fohsh Jews, who seem absolutely reck
ieSs and indifferent as to what they devour
~ II Is only cheap Thus late in the season
.9e howls of caps" "Gerrapes,n and
.oqulnches," have given way generally to
'aters, and ''cabges," and m any families
ava even small restaurants depend wholly
i2r their supplies OF those vegetables upon
'ue street vendors, whose profits in such