University of Virginia Library

OF A "NEGLECTED" CHILD, A STREET-SELLER.

Of this class perhaps there is less to be said than
of others. Drunken parents allow their children
to run about the streets, and often to shift for
themselves. If such parents have any sense of
shame, unextinguished by their continued be-
sottedness, they may feel relieved by not having
their children before their eyes, for the very sight
of them is a reproach, and every rag about such
helpless beings must carry its accusation to a
mind not utterly callous.

Among such children there is not, perhaps,
that extreme pressure of wretchedness or of priva-
tion that there is among the orphans, or the utterly
deserted. If a "neglected child" have to shift,
wholly or partly, for itself, it is perhaps with the
advantage of a shelter; for even the bare room of
the drunkard is in some degree a shelter or roof.
There is not the nightly need of 2d. for a bed, or
the alternative of the Adelphi arches for nothing.

I met with one little girl ten or eleven years of
age, whom some of the street-sellers described to
me as looking out for a job every now and then. She
was small-featured and dark-eyed, and seemed
intelligent. Her face and hands were brown as if
from exposure to the weather, and a lack of soap;
but her dress was not dirty. Her father she de-
described as a builder, probably a bricklayer's
labourer, but he could work, she said, at drains or
such like. "Mother's been dead a long time,"
the child continued, "and father brought another
woman home and told me to call her mother, but
she soon went away. I works about the streets,
but only when there's nothing to eat at home.
Father gets drunk sometimes, but I think not so
oft as he did, and then he lies in bed. No, sir.
not all day, but he gets up and goes out and
gets more drink, and comes back and goes to
bed again. He never uses me badly. When
he's drinking and has money, he gives me some
now and then to get bread and butter with,
or a halfpenny pudding; he never eats anything

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in the house when he's drinking, and he's a
very quiet man. Sometimes he's laid in bed
two or three days and nights at a time. I goes
to school when father has money. We lives
very well then. I've kept myself for a whole
week. I mind people's stalls, if they're away a
bit, and run for them if they're wanted; and I go
errands. I've carried home flower-pots for a lady.
I've got a halfpenny on a day, and a penny, and
some bread perhaps, and I've lived on that. I
should like very well to have a pitch of my own.
I think I should like that better than place. But
I have a sister who has a place in the country;
she's far older than I am, and perhaps I shall get
one. But father's at work now, and he says he'll
take the pledge. Five or six times I've sold
oranges, and ingans as well, and carried the money
to Mrs. — , who gave me all I took above 4d. for myself."

It could surprise no one if a child so neglected
became so habituated to a street life, that she
could not adapt herself to any other. I heard of
other children thus or similarly neglected, but
boys far more frequently than girls, who traded re-
gularly in apples, oranges, &c., on their own
account. Some have become regular street-sellers,
and even in childhood have abandoned their
homes and supported themselves.