EFLECTIVE reader, you may go

From Chelsea unto outer Bow,

And back again to Chelsea,

Nor grudge the labour if you meet—

In lane or alley, square or street—

The child whom all the children greet

As Elsie—little Elsie.

A pretty name, a pretty face,

And pretty ways that give a grace

To all she does or utters,

Did Fortune at her birth bestow',

When little Elsie's lot below—

About a dozen years ago—

Got cast among the gutters.

The Fates, you see, have will'd it so

That even folks in Rotten Row

Are not without their trials;

Whilst only those that know the ways

Of stony London's waifs and strays

Can fancy how the seven days

Pass o'er the Seven Dials.

Suppose an able artizan,

(A model of the "working man"

So written at and lectur'd,)

Amongst the fevers that infest

His temporary fever-nest

Should catch a deadly one—the rest

Is easily conjectur'd.

'Twas hard, on father's death, I think,

That Elsie's mother took to drink;

('Twas harder yet on baby.)

The reason, reader, you may guess,

(I cannot find it, I confess)—

Perhaps it was her loneliness;

Or love of gin, it may be.

So there was Elsie, all astray,

And growing bigger day by day,

But growing none the better.

No other girl (in all the set

That looks on Elsie as a pet)

But knows at least the alphabet,

And Elsie—not a letter.

Well, reader, I had best be dumb

About the future that may come

To this forlorn she-urchin.

Her days are brighter ones pro tem.,

So let her make the most of them,

Amidst the labyrinths that hem

Saint Giles's ugly Church in.