NOISES IN STREETS

Waikato Times, Volume 119, Issue 19894, 25 May 1936, Page 15

NOISES IN STREETS

mam DICKENS’ INTEREST. TIHTSE “DISCORDANT HOSTS." Charles Dickens' interest in the suppression of street noises was referred to by Lord Herder, chairman of the Anti-Noise League, at a luncheon of the league at London recently, says the Daily Telegraph. Lord Harder read from a letter written in 1863 by Dickens to an M.P. ,who had introduced to the House of. Commons 3 Bill for the Suppression of Street Music, Co-signatories included Alked Tennyson, John Everett Millals, W. HOl- - Hunt. Wilkie Collins and Thomas Carlyle. Dickens wrote that all the slmtories were "professors and practitioners of one or other of the arts or sciences.” He added:— “In their devotion to their pursuits—tendinz to the peace and comfort of mankind—they are daily interrupted, harassed, worried, wearied. driven nearly mad, by street musicians. “They are even made especial objects of persecution b; brazen performers on brazen instruments, heaters of drums, grinders of organs. bangers o! banjos. clashers of cymbals, worriers of fiddles and bellowers of ballads. “No sooner does it become known to those producers of horrible sounds than any of your correspondents have partlculal need of quiet in their own houses, than the said houses are beleaguered by discordant hosts seeking to be bought off. "Your grateful correspondents take the liberty to suggest to you that, although a Parliamentary debate undoubtedly requires great delicacy Lr the handling, their avocations require at least as much, and that it would highly conduce towards the succes of your proposed enactment if you prevail on its opponents to state their objections to it. asailed on all sides by the frightful noises, in despite of which your correspondents have to gain their bread.” Lord Harder denied that the league was attempting to make life less endurable. “We believe," he said, “that to eliminate needless noise and to lessen noise which must exist is merely one of the means of making life better worth living," Mr. Clough Williams-Ellis. the archiI tect, said: ‘Of all the useless, senseless, _ hateful, damn-fool noise: in this crazy world commend me to that of machineguns, bombs and heavy artillery. I had some years of tlzat pandemonium—l am still a bit deaf from it all—and none of us wants any more of it ever again."