View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What were the two usual reasons customers bought from patterers?
(a) The patterers were almost always pretty, young women.
(b) They felt God wanted them to buy.
(c) To make fun of the patterers.
(d) For the entertainment and because they believed the spiel.

2. What percentage of costermongers did not own their stock?
(a) Seventy-five percent.
(b) Ninety percent.
(c) Fifty percent.
(d) Thirty percent.

3. How did Mike manage to live?
(a) By pilfering from the marketplace.
(b) By selling bits and pieces he'd find on the street.
(c) His master with whom he apprenticed gave him room and board.
(d) By joining a crossing sweep gang.

4. What happened to many coster children if their parents thought they did not bring enough money home at night?
(a) They were killed.
(b) They were sold into slavery.
(c) They were thrown out.
(d) They were beaten.

5. What kind of selling required the most capital and equipment?
(a) Weapons.
(b) Medicines.
(c) Clothing.
(d) Food and beverage.

Short Answer Questions

1. What did the most intelligent and well-to-do costers sell?

2. To what was street vending an alternative?

3. What happened if a coster child didn't have the money to pay for lodging?

4. Into what kind of fund did residents of better lodging houses pay?

5. What did a lodging manager do when a child brought in a stolen item for rent?

Short Essay Questions

1. What did the patterers do who could be classified as entertainers?

2. What were the largest group of London street people and what did they do for a living?

3. How did some crossing sweep get permanent jobs and why were they given the jobs?

4. How did crossing sweeps earn a living?

5. What was the story Mayhew wrote about a Cheap Jack?

6. What modern institutions did Costermongers fill in the 1800's London and what are some of the merchandise they sold? What did the more intelligent costers do?

7. Who hired dustmen and how did they do their work?

8. What are the six categories the author separated the London street people into and how did these street people generally earn their living?

9. What was the story Mayhew told about a crossing sweep from Dublin?

10. How did dustmen and mudlarks help each other?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,066 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample