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Many years ago a dust-sifter, named Mary Collins, residing in Bell Street, Lisson Grove, was robbed by a nurse, when her evidence before the police magistrate was remarkable for the extraordinary disclosures it incidentally afforded of the large profits obtained from the apparently humble vocation of dust-sifting. The articles stolen were in a pocket, and were thus described: one coral necklace, large beads; one ditto, with pearl clasp; several handsome brooches; five gold seals; some gold rings; several gold shirt-pins; a quantity of loose beads; broken bits of gold and silver, &c. Mr. Rawlinson, the magistrate, expressed his surprise at her having such a motley assortment of valuables. Complainant: Your worship, we find them amongst the dust.—Mr. Rawlinson: Indeed! what, all these articles?—Complainant: Oh, your worship, that's nothing; we find many more things than them: we find almost every small article that can be mentioned. We are employed by the dust contractor, who allows us 8d. per load for sifting, besides which we have all the spoons and other articles which we may find amongst the dust.—Mr. Rawlinson: That is dustman's law, I suppose: but pray how many silver spoons may you find in the course of the year?—Complainant: It is impossible to say: sometimes more and sometimes less.

Mr. Rawlinson declared that what she had just related was quite novel to him. The urbane manner of the worthy magistrate won upon the old lady and made her quite communicative. She had followed her occupation eight years, and what with the "perquisites" (id est, articles found), and the savings from "hard labour," she had realized sufficient money to think about house-building, and had then a house erecting which she expected would cost her at least 300l. She had deposited 100l. in the hands of her employer, in part payment, and as a proof that all was not vaunting, she produced her box, in which were thirty-nine sovereigns, two five-pound bank-notes, and several guineas and half-sovereigns.

Early in the present century, the spot of ground on which now stands Argyle Street, Liverpool Street, Manchester Street, and the corner of Gray's Inn Road, was covered with a mountain of filth and cinders, the accumulation of many years, and which afforded food for hundreds of pigs. The Russians bought the whole of the ash-heap, and shipped it to Moscow, to be used in rebuilding that city after it had been burned by the French. The Battle-bridge dustmen had a certain celebrity in their day. The ground on which the dust-heap stood was sold in 1826 to the Pandemonium Company for fifteen thousand pounds; they walled in the whole, and built a theatre, which now remains at the corner of Liverpool Street. The Company's scheme was, however, abandoned, and the ground was let on building leases. The heap is mentioned in the burlesque song, Adam Bell, the Literary Dustman:[11]

You recollect the cinder heap,

Vot stood in Gray's Inn Lane, sirs?

When the street now called the Caledonian Road was in the fields, there was at the Battle-bridge end of the road a large accumulation of horse-bones, which were stored there by some horse-slaughterers. And in 1833, Battle-bridge was described in the New Monthly Magazine as "the grand centre of dustmen, scavengers, horse and dog dealers, knackermen, brickmakers, and other low but necessary professionalists." The dust-heap is described as "that sublime, sifted wonder of cockneys, the cloud-kissing dust-heap which sold for twenty thousand pounds;" but this is doubtful.

Mr. T. C. Noble has communicated to Pinks's History of Clerkenwell the following particulars of the Dust and Cinder Heap, &c.—"The estate at Battle-bridge comprised from seventeen to twenty acres. Of this my grandfather took sixteen small dilapidated houses, and the dust and cinder heap, which, it was said, had been existing on the spot since the Great Fire of London. He gave about 500l. for the lot, although the parties wanted 800l. Bricks were then very scarce, so he very soon realized a good sum for the old buildings, while Russia, hearing in some way of this enormous dust-heap, purchased it for purposes in rebuilding Moscow. The site of the mountain of dust is now covered by the houses of Derby Street, and I may add, the names of the thoroughfares erected on this estate were derived from the popular ministers of that day. The rental derived from the property by my grandfather exceeded 1,000l. a year."

John Thomas Smith gives the following notes upon oddities of the above class:—"Within my time many men have indulged most ridiculously in their eccentricities. I have known one who had made a pretty large fortune in business get up at four o'clock in the morning and walk the streets to pick up horse-shoes which had been slipped in the course of the night, with no other motive than to see how many he could accumulate in the course of a year. I also remember a rich soap-boiler who never missed an opportunity of pocketing nails, pieces of iron hoops, and bits of leather in his daily walks; and these he would spread upon a large walnut-tree three-flapped dining-table, with a similar view to that of the horse-shoe collector. This wealthy citizen would often put on a red woollen cap and a waggoner's frock, in order to stoke his own furnace; after which he would dress, get into his coach, and, attended by tall servants in bright blue liveries, drive to his villa, where his hungry friends were waiting his arrival."