“When I was a little girl about four years old, I remember my mother sending me for some milk to a house near to the old General Baptist Chapel, Church Street, Deptford, { 215} and while I was going down the street some dark ragged women—the same you saw me with—asked me to go down to the bottom of the street to look at some fine things, and on the way they gave me a penny and some apples and a little doll. After walking a long way we did not get to the bottom of the street, but we got among a lot of children living under a cart cover by the side of the hedge. They asked me to sit by the fire that was on the ground. I said I wanted to go to my mother. It was getting dark, and I began to cry. They kept saying that they would take me to my mother, and at night they all got into a cart, and said they were taking me home to see my mother, father, brothers, and sisters. We went a long way, and the way they took me was not like Deptford, and I have not seen my mother and father since.” The girl began to cry, and said, “I should like to see father, mother, Polly, and Jim. It is a long time since I saw them. We used to go to school together, Jimmy, Polly, and myself. My father used to take me by the hand to school and chapel on Sundays, and they did sing such nice hymns. I have seen father and mother cry lots of times. Father used to say his prayers every night and morning. They don’t say prayers where I live now. Will you take me to my father and mother? When will you take me? Take me now, and I will give you everything I have in the world. Please don’t go and leave me, and I will give you twenty, thirty, forty, and fifty kisses. I will give you hundreds if you will take me to my mother and father. I hope they are not dead. I hope Polly and Jim are alive. Will you take me, please, sir?”
I told the poor little creature that I could not take her, but that I would send three or four gentlemen for her shortly. At this she began to sob out loudly, “Take me! take me! don’t leave me here!” I directed her to pray to God for deliverance, for there seemed to be none from earth; and with her eyes turned up to heaven she said with Sir John Davis:
“Lord! hear my prayer and listen to my cries, Let not Thy gracious eye my tears despise.”