DICKENS "GOLDEN DUSTMAN."

Press, Volume XLIII, Issue 6627, 18 December 1886, Page 1 (Supplement)

DICKENS "GOLDEN DUSTMAN."

Mr John Braye, a member of the Ken- J aungtott isatis, oomnittniontes the following interesting particulars of the dustman's calling to the Jf*efropelima :— The scavengering business is the most healthy of all tha occupations of the people. I lately applied to the EegistrarOeseral for a return of the death rate among this class of the oommtmity, but, by some oversight, .there is no tabulated information on the subject, although in London there are over 30,000 men and women engaged in the business. As there ia no published statement I wrote to the registrar of a town with 172,000 population for their return for 1885 of deaths of scavengers and dustmen. He officially replied that, to his surprise, there JTnot a single death tost year, hut this ye« one had ©omnutted sniade. Out of the number of men employed m the town there ought to hare been six deaths maxgdmg to the average; thu seems atrawreTas many of the men are old when down to this kind of empteymX. A? to the healthiness of the calW, i 1 have the authority of a gentleman descended from a long toof dust, con- , tractors, and a near 0 ? i Friend-a.the w G o !***^?"*^^,?!

doctors who prescribe charcoal hare only stumbled on a small portion of which it is oapable of doing. This gentleman, who is still slightly connected with the dust business, I will call Boffin, junior; he was well acquainted wi v h the great novelist, made a large fortune in the family business, devotes hia time, and, I should think, a considerable sum of money, to the study of natural history (his place is a sort of zoological and botanic garden combined; and he is ss conversant with Darwin and the'great man of science as he is with the best means of money out of dustbin refuse. So, such ia the force of habit, that he has set aside a corner of his park for the neighbouring townfolks to shoot their dust. He says he likes the smell; it reminds him of old times; and he looks on it as a sort of

"family tree ;" the only objectors are his sons, whan they run down with their college friends to s?e him. The story told by Dickens is substantially correct. Mr Boffin had one daughter; she was sought in marriage by a gentleman of aristocratic connections. On the wedding morn the " golden dustman,'' instead of coming down with a big cheque, to the dismay of the gentleman, said the only present he could make the bride would be one of his dustheaps. The bridegroom accepted, as he l thought, a bad bargain; bnt he sold it to the brickmakers for £10,000.