Friends of the poor, the young, the weak. J. Montgomery. Poor Children's Plea.] This hymn is intended to be sung by children in Orphan Homes and Institutions of a like kind, at their yearly and other gatherings. It is a plea for sympathy and material help. It appeared in Montgomery's Christian Psalmist, 1825, No. 424, and in his Original Hymns, 1853, No. 312, in 6 stanzas of 4 lines.
--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)