A Bird's Eye View of Smithfield Market 1811

Bird's Eye View of Smithfield Market taken from the Bear and Ragged Staff. Coloured aquatint. General view over the cattle and sheep stalls at Smithfield market. 'Oliver Twist' by Charles Dickens has a description of Smithfield as being a very busy, crowded and noisy place: 'Countrymen, butchers, drovers, hawkers, boys, thieves, idlers, and vagabonds of every low grade, were mingled together in a mass; the whistling of drovers, the barking of dogs, the bellowing and plunging of oxen, the bleating of sheep, the grunting and squeaking of pigs, the cries of hawkers, the shouts, oaths, and quarrelling on all sides; the ringing of bells and roar of voices, that issued from every public-house; the crowding, pushing, driving, beating, whooping, and yelling; the hideous and discordant din that resounded from every corner of the market...'