The London Guide and Stranger's Safeguard/Introduction
INTRODUCTION.
When a stranger first arrives in this overgrown city, and finds, upon alighting at the inn, that he has still some miles perhaps to go before he can see his friends, he is naturally anxious for advice how to reach them in safety, with his luggage. But, if this be the case with those who have got friends, what is the dread of such as have a home to seek, business to look after, or a place of service to obtain, without a friend to guide their steps, or a candid person to warn them of their danger; to tell them of the precipices, pit falls, and moral turpitude, of a large proportion of the population of this great metropolis?
To supply the place of a living friend, and in some cases to perform the necessary part of one, by directing the stranger in the choice of companions, and what characters he should avoid, I have compiled these sheets; in which will be found "all I know about the matter," and all I could "learn out" by "fine-drawing" of others. In this work I have obtained the assistance of an author by profession, who will new-write it mostly all over. The gentleman will put all of it in order, fit to be read, and add a word or two, or a line or two, here and there, when I am out. This is but fair and proper, considering as I am not much used to the pen, I might make "a pretty kettle of fish of it;" so, "I cares not, not I," says I to the gentleman as employs us both, "its all one to me, though he should strike out every word; for, as for me, as I mean to out with it all, he may put it dowm in what lingo he likes." This is all I shall say "of my own accord," seeing I am willing to make amends for my past life, by disclosing such secrets as never were made public before, not upon paper; and I thought I would have a few words of my own put down in genuine, at the beginning, without any of his "making or meddling." So, as I have promised and mean to leave off the calling, and "live comfortable" upon the profits of this here book, I have just put an end to it by grabbing three or four books[1] from the gentleman, my employer, which I have now got under my great coat, as I mean to borrow a word or two, and a few hints as I go on, as is usual in book-making.
Although one of them authors pretends to be up to
a great deal, yet he does not know more about the matter than one of us, nor half so much as myself of some things. He had his information from an interested, and therefore a polluted, source,—the officers. When he says, "there are twenty thousand persons of both sexes, who get up in the morning without knowing whereabout they shall sleep at night," he makes a decent good round numbered guess, as applied to one part of the year, but not so as to another, which shows want of discrimination. But what of the fact? Does he propose a remedy? If he had pointed out the means of sheltering them at night, he would have been more beneficially employed; as the statement now stands his readers are left to conclude, "that those twenty thousand houseless wretches are upon the look out for what they can appropriate to themselves." Agreed, as to this inference; and I can tell him, there are an equal number (more) who live in comparative affluence, who are equally upon the alert in actual robbery, to say nothing of mere cheats, mace-coves, and such like."
How to steer clear of and to detect these, and a multitude of others, who are always keeping a sharp look out to entrap the property of the honest part of the community, to take in and cheat the unwary,—to rob and perhaps murder the unprotected, and to make a prey of the unsuspecting,—are the motives for this publication. As the information it contains is faithful and genuine, it cannot fail to be highly useful to the perambulator and resident Inhabitant, valuable as a guide to the occasional visitant, and entertaining to all descriptions of readers.
As will be seen in the title page, more persons than one have been employed in putting these sheets into their present form; which will account for, and be the apology of a certain discrepancy of style observable in most of the pages; for it was thought better to incur this charge, than to fritter away the pithy sense of the author by grinding it down to the forms and rules of a stubborn rhetoric.
The terms of art are explained in the vocabulary; to which the reader may have recourse whenever he is under any difficulty. Among them will be found, also, the English rendering of foreign phrases, which have been retained in the body of the work only because they make part of the flash as used by such topping ones as Tom Furby, the young ruffian, Bob Holloway, and such like old ones who knew well how to astonish the natives with scraps of Latin, &c. and who are imitated or copied by great numbers of lads upon every kind of lay. Women street walkers of the better sort affect to talk French upon all occasions, as a means of showing their breeding. Tom's Liverpool widow is supposed to have introduced this species of flummery, and no doubt she had it from him.
In avowing the sources whence we have derived our information, we disclaim any intention of 'peaching those we have fine-drawn, as well as of having used illegal means of coming at the secrets here disclosed . Were it not for such imputation, we could adduce positive proofs of our accuracy and intimate knowledge of the subjects treated as would convince the most incredulous reader; and as for materials we have such a superabundance as would fill another volume,—intelligence flowing from a hundred quarters, but which is postponed for the present.[2] Suffice it to say, that some of us have had communications, more or less, with Conkey Beau, Tit Shiels, Bill Soames, Kelting Bight, Hoppy Cole, Mr. Pullen,—little Roberts, Old Smith, Mr. B. Jack Pettit, Bill Colebrook, and almost every living soul mentioned in these pages, at one time or other, or under one garb or another.
N.B. The judicious reader will see, that by our exposing thus accurately the modes of perpetrating crime, those of prevention must become apparent.
In revising these pages as they went to press, we passed over several smaller errors, which fastidious people may say ought to have been amended, from the sentiment that "one may as well be right as wrong." This, however, is not our feeling: we discover our greatest errors to have been these, 1. Spelling a man's name amiss; 2. Attributing the adventure of one man
to another; and 3. Mistaking the strength and quality of some liquor, which we never tasted. If nothing more important than these occur, we shall congratulate ourselves upon having attained a degree of perfection we by no means hoped for in the earlier stages of our labours: should such have crept in, however, we beg the favour of candid readers to point them out upon paper, directed to W. Perry, left at No. 6, Holborn Barrs.
Erratum: Page 115, line 6, for dark read dank.
- ↑ 1. Report of the house of commons on the police; 2. A treatise on the police of the metropolis; 3. King's Frauds of London; 4. Sir John Fielding's tracts; 5. New Monthly Magazine, 1st June, 1817, and Oct. Nov. Dec. and Jan. following.
- ↑ Shortly will be published, of the same size as this volume, A Companion to the Guide; or the Complete London Tradesman; showing what are the means made use of by honourable men, in conducting their business, trade, or commerce: and also what are the knaveries practised upon upright tradesmen, by the over-keen and disreputable among themselves. By the Editor of "the Guide."