able if they didn't get what they
considered enough money, and refused to go out of the house until a
policeman was fetched. So it is as well perhaps that now this means of
extorting money is impossible, for no man could run fast enough to keep
up with a taxi-cab.

The barrel-organ man we have already mentioned. He is frequently an
Italian, and has a dark-haired woman with him, and she wears a red
handkerchief over her hair to make her look more foreign; and they go
from house to house grinding out their awful tunes, and they get very
well paid, for the people in the poorer shops and in the foreign parts
of London like the noise, and give them pennies. Sometimes the man has a
monkey, which always attracts the children. Other men walk about with
barrows selling ice-cream; this is sold at a half-penny a time, and the
children lick it out of little glasses and have no spoons: one wonders
how often the glasses are washed. But that does not trouble the little
street children at all; they follow the ice-cream man in throngs like
flies in summer whenever it is hot. Poor little bairns! they have no
milk to drink or nice cool rooms to go to, only the hot, dusty street,
and they must often be thirsty. Well, all these things you can see in
the streets daily, and a great many more. I have not spoken of the
'sandwich' man; that is a funny name, and it means the man is sandwiched
between two great boards, which he carries on his front and back. On
these are written in large letters the name of a new play, or a
restaurant, or anything else to which someone wants to attract
attention. These men are paid a very little each day; they are hired a
large number together, and walk along by the side of the pavement with
their great boards one after another, so the people passing in the
street read the boards, and perhaps go to see the play or to dine at
the restaurant. The men are bound to keep on walking always together all
day, and they very often are ashamed of their work; for they may have
been something better than this, for to be a sandwich man is about the
lowest work a man can do, but, at any rate, it is earning money
honestly, without begging or stealing.

BOOK II

HISTORICAL STORIES

CHAPTER XI

KING EDWARD V

I think I heard someone ask for stories, and there are many stories
connected with London, though they are generally rather sad ones. There
was once a boy who became Edward V., King of England, who had a