Charles Dickens and Music

wilderness of shrubs, in the centre of the square....
Sounds of gruff voices practising vocal music invade
the evening's silence, and the fumes of choice tobacco
scent the air. There, snuff and cigars and German
pipes and flutes, and violins and violoncellos, divide
the supremacy between them. It is the region of song
and smoke. Street bands are on their mettle in Golden
Square, and itinerant glee singers quaver involuntarily
as they raise their voices within its boundaries.

We have another picture in the description of Dombey's house, where--

the summer sun was never on the street but in the
morning, about breakfast-time.... It was soon gone
again, to return no more that day, and the bands of
music and the straggling Punch's shows going after
it left it a prey to the most dismal of organs and
white mice.

As a Singer

Most of the writers about Dickens, and especially his