Two features of London street life, familiar to Londoners for decades, are gradually disappearing—the barrel organ and the shoeblack.
Once known as "the poor man's orchestra" and always sure of an eager and appreciative audience in the humbler streets, the barrel organ is still to be seen, but its day is nearly over. No new instruments have been made since before the war and it is doubtful if more than 100 are now in use.
It cost but two shillings to hire a barrel organ for a day, but street musicians (of whom there is no lack) prefer other and less cumbersome methods of touching the hearts and pockets qf the public. The London traffic is one reason why these once-popular instruments are less in demand among entertainers; organ-grinders are barred from main roads, And with radio on tap in almost every home the children and adults who once danced freely and gladly to the strains of a barrel organ are no longer thrilled by its arrival in their locality.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.