"The Cry of the Children" is a poem by English writer Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
[1] This was shortly following the report into child labour by the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Children's Employment.
She uses lambs bleating in the meadows to represent the young children crying from whatever pains they must endure at the moment.
Browning involves young animals to symbolize innocence and being put through both mental and physical pain for the satisfaction of an owner (1842).
Although The Cry of the Children is a 13 stanza poem it does not use the popular terza rima rhyme scheme (ABA BCB CDC DED) but rather an ABAB CDCD EFEF format.