Street vendors of pills, potions, and quack nostrums are not quite so numerous as they were in former days.
The increasingly large number of free hospitals, where the poor may consult qualified physicians, the aid received at a trifling cost from clubs and friendly societies, and the spread of education, have all tended to sweep this class of street-folks from the thoroughfares of London.
Although of late years much has been done by private charities to supplement the system of parochial relief, there is still a vast field open for the extension of medical missions among the lower orders of the community.

From 'Street Life in London', 1877, by John Thomson and Adolphe Smith