Wikipedia
A rag-and-bone man collects unwanted household items and sells them to merchants. Traditionally this was a task performed on foot, with the scavenged materials (which included rags, bones and various metals) kept in a small bag slung over the shoulder. Some wealthier rag-and-bone men used a cart, sometimes pulled by horse or pony.
Nineteenth-century rag-and-bone men typically lived in penury, surviving on the proceeds of what they collected each day. Conditions improved following the Second World War, but the trade declined during the latter half of the 20th century. Lately, however, due in part to the soaring price of scrap metal, rag-and-bone men can once again be seen at work.
Usage examples of "rag-and-bone man".
The rag-and-bone man would not question his good luck when he found those items.
At the back of the house in Engadine was a large yard where the rag-and-bone man kept his scrap metal and where he stabled his horse.
I replaced the book in disgust and took up another, then another, both of which were likewise of use to no one but the rag-and-bone man.
It took days, and I had to get my friend the rag-and-bone man to help me, and bit by bit, he loaded all the old rubbish into his little cart and drove it away.
She had osmoted some with this limp fatso, his mind in freefall and turnaround, a rag-and-bone man, hollow, stuffed, made out of junk, junk.
Gar closed his eyes, and the image of the rag-and-bone man rose unbidden behind his eyelids.
Her shoes should have been cast off on the rag-and-bone man long ago.
Somewhere, Pinch guessed, there was a rag-and-bone man trying to find his wagon.