brawl, the busy mill,
Where tiny urchins vied in fistic skill.
(Two phrases only have that dusky race
Caught from the learned influence of the place;
Phrases in their simplicity sublime,
"Scramble a copper!" "Please, sir, what's the time?")
These round thy walks their cheerful influence shed;
These were thy charms--but all these charms are fled,
Amidst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen,
And rude pavilions sadden all thy green;
One selfish pastime grasps the whole domain,
And half a faction swallows up the plain;
Adown thy glades, all sacrificed to cricket,
The hollow-sounding bat now guards the wicket;
Sunk are thy mounds in shapeless level all,
Lest aught impede the swiftly rolling ball;
And trembling, shrinking from the fatal blow,
Far, far away thy hapless children go.
Ill fares the place, to luxury a prey,
Where wealth accumulates, and minds decay:
Athletic sports may flourish or may fade,
Fashion may make them, even as it has made;
But the broad Parks, the city's joy and pride,
When once destroyed can never be supplied!

Readers of "Sylvie and Bruno" will remember the way in which the
invisible fairy-children save the drunkard from his evil life, and I
have always felt that Mr. Dodgson meant Sylvie to be something more
than a fairy--a sort of guardian angel. That such an idea would not
have been inconsistent with his way of looking at things is shown by
the following letter:

Ch. Ch., _July_, 1879.

My dear Ethel,--I have been long intending to answer your
letter of April 11th, chiefly as to your question in
reference to Mrs. N--'s letter about the little S--s [whose
mother had recently died]. You say you don't see "how they
can be guided aright by their dead mother, or how light can
come from her." Many people believe that our friends in the
other world can and do influence us in some way, and perhaps
even "guide" us and give us light to show us our duty. My
own feeling is, it _may_ be so: but nothing has been
revealed about it. That the angels do so _is_ revealed,
and we may feel sure of _that_; and there is a
beautiful fancy (for I don't think one can call it more)
that "a mother who has died leaving a child behind her in
this world, is allowed to be a sort