"When my mother died, I was very young, And my father sold me while yet my tongue could scarcely cry weep! Weep! Weep! So your chimneys i sweep and in slot i sleep."
These lines give up a realistic picture of a society where children were sold for two or three guineas. In fact, it is true to every society where child labour is practised.
Child labour is a henious crime, a punishable offence and yet it is a sad fact that it is an age old phenomenon. William wordsworth said "Heaven lies about us in our infancy."
Survival is the sole priority so children take upon them the onerous task of contributing to family income.
Children are God's gift, born to live and blossom. Though their imagination becomes blackened by soot of inhumanity, their dreams stolen, innocence lost, their heavenly abode must be restored. Because-
"WHAT IS DONE TO CHILDREN, THEY WILL DO TO SOCIETY."
