am constrained humbly to acknowledge that perhaps this is just as
well."
* * * * *
SAM SETS UP SHOP.
"I think you might help me, Dot," cried Sam, in dismal and rather
injured tones.
It was the morning following the day of the earthquake, and of Aunt
Penelope's arrival. Sam had his back to Dot, and his face to the fire,
over which indeed he had bent for so long that he appeared to be half
roasted.
"What do you want?" asked Dot, who was working at a doll's night-dress
that had for long been partly finished, and now seemed in a fair way to
completion.
"It's the glue-pot," Sam continued. "It does take so long to boil. And
I have been stirring at the glue with a stick for ever so long to get
it to melt. It is very hot work. I wish you would take it for a bit.
It's as much for your good as for mine."
"Is it?" said Dot.
"Yes, it is, Miss," cried Sam. "You must know I've got a splendid
idea."
"Not another earthquake, I hope?" said Dot, smiling.
"Now, Dot, that's truly unkind of you. I thought it was to be
forgotten."
"So it is," said Dot, getting up. "I was only joking. What is the
idea?"
"I don't think I shall tell you till I have finished my shop. I want to
get to it now, and I wish you would take a turn at the glue-pot."
Sam was apt to want a change of occupation. Dot, on the other hand, was
equally averse from leaving what she was about till it was finished, so
they suited each other like Jack Sprat and his wife. It had been an
effort to Dot to leave the night-dress which she had hoped to finish at
a sitting; but when she was fairly set to work on the glue business she
never moved till the glue was in working order, and her face as red as
a ripe tomato.
By this time Sam had set up business in the window-seat, and was
fastening a large paper inscription over his shop. It ran thus:--
* * * * *
MR. SAM.
_Dolls' Doctor and Toymender to Her Majesty
the Queen, and all other Potentates_.
* * * * *
"Splendid!" shouted Dot, who was serving up the glue as if it had been
a kettle of soup, and who looked herself very like an over-toasted
cook.
Sam took the glue, and began to bustle about.
"Now, Dot, get me all the broken toys, and we'll see what we can do.
And here's a second splendid idea. Do you see that box? Into that we
shall put all the toys that are quite spoiled and cannot possibly be
mended. It is to be called the Hospital for Incurables. I've got a
placard for that. At least it's not written yet, but here's the paper,
and perhaps you would write it, Dot, for I am tired of writing, and I
want to begin the mending."
"For the future," he presently resumed, "when I want a doll to scalp or
behead, I shall apply to the Hospital for Incurables, and the same with
any other toy that I want to destroy. And you will see, my dear Dot,
that I shall be quite a blessing to the nursery; for I shall attend the
dolls gratis, and keep all the furniture in repair."
Sam really kept his word. He had a natural turn for mechanical work,
and, backed by Dot's more methodical genius, he prolonged the days of
the broken toys by skilful mending, and so acquired an interest in them
which was still more favourable to their preservation. When his
birthday came round, which was some months after these events, Dot
(assisted by Mamma and Aunt Penelope) had prepared for him a surprise
that was more than equal to any of his own "splendid ideas." The whole
force of the toy cupboard was assembled on the nursery table, to
present Sam with a fine box of joiner's tools as a reward for his
services, Papa kindly acting as spokesman on the occasion.
And certain gaps in the china tea-set, some scars on the dolls' faces,
and a good many new legs, both amongst the furniture and the animals,
are now the only remaining traces of Sam's earthquake.
* * * * *
THREE CHRISTMAS TREES.
This is a story of Three Christmas Trees. The first was a real one, but
the child we are to speak of did not see it. He saw the other two, but
they were not real; they only existed in his fancy. The plot of the
story is very simple; and, as it has been described so early, it is
easy for those who think it stupid to lay the book down in good time.
Probably every child who reads this has seen one Christmas tree or
more; but in the small town of a distant colony with which we have to
do, this could not at one time have been said. Christmas-trees were
then by no means so universal, even in England, as they now are, and in
this little colonial town they were unknown. Unknown, that is, till the
Governor's wife gave her great children's party. At which point we will
begin the story.
The Governor had given a great many parties in his time. He had
entertained big wigs and little wigs, the passing military, and the
local grandees. Everybody who had the remotest claim to attention had
been attended to: the ladies had had their full share of balls and
pleasure parties: only one class of the population had any complaint to
prefer against his hospitality; but the class was a large one--it was
the children. However, he, was a bachelor, and knew little or nothing
about little boys and girls: let us pity rather than blame him. At last
he took to himself a wife; and among the many advantages of this
important step, was a due recognition of the claims of these young
citizens. It was towards happy Christmas-tide that "the Governor's
amiable and admired lady" (as she was styled in the local newspaper)
sent out notes for her first children's party. At the top of the
note-paper was a very red robin, who carried a blue Christmas greeting
in his mouth, and at the bottom--written with A.D.C.'s best
flourish--were the magic words, _A Christmas Tree_. In spite of the
flourishes--partly perhaps because of them--the A.D.C.'s handwriting,
though handsome, was rather illegible. But for all this, most of the
children invited contrived to read these words, and those who could not
do so were not slow to learn the news by hearsay. There was to be a
Christmas Tree! It would be like a birthday party, with this above
ordinary birthdays, that there were to be presents for every one. One
of the children invited lived in a little white house, with a spruce
fir-tree before the door. The spruce fir did this good service to the
little house, that it helped people to find their way to it; and it
was by no means easy for a stranger to find his way to any given house
in this little town, especially if the house were small and white, and
stood in one of the back streets. For most of the houses were small,
and most of them were painted white, and back streets ran parallel with
each other, and had no names, and were all so much alike that it was
very confusing. For instance, if you had asked the way to Mr.
So-and-So's, it is very probable that some friend would have directed
you as follows: "Go straight forward and take the first turning to your
left, and you will find that there are four streets, which run at right
angles to the one you are in, and parallel with each other. Each of
them has got a big pine in it--one of the old forest trees. Take the
last street but one, and the fifth white house you come to is Mr.
So-and-So's. He has green blinds and a coloured servant." You would not
always have got such clear directions as these, but with them you would
probably have found the house at last, partly by accident, partly by the
blinds and coloured servant. Some of the neighbours affirmed that the
little white house had a name; that all the houses and streets had names,
only they were traditional and not recorded anywhere; that very few
people knew them, and nobody made any use of them. The name of the little
white house was said to be Trafalgar Villa, which seemed so inappropriate
to the modest peaceful little home, that the man who lived in it tried to
find out why it had been so called. He thought that his predecessor must
have been in the navy, until he found that he had been the owner of what
is called a "dry-goods store," which seems to mean a shop where things
are sold which are not good to eat or drink--such as drapery. At last
somebody said, that as there was a public-house called the "Duke of
Wellington" at the corner of the street, there probably had been a nearer
one called "The Nelson," which had been burnt down, and that the man who
built "The Nelson" had built the house with the spruce fir before it,
and that so the name had arisen. An explanation which was just so far
probable, that public-houses and fires were of frequent occurrence in
those parts.
But this has nothing to do with the story. Only we must say, as we said
before, and as we should have said had we been living there then, the
child we speak of lived in the little white house with one spruce fir
just in front of it.
Of all the children who looked forward to the Christmas tree, he looked
forward to it the most intensely. He was an imaginative child, of a
simple, happy nature, easy to please. His father was an Englishman, and
in the long winter evenings he would tell the child tales of the old
country, to which his mother would listen also. Perhaps the parents
enjoyed these stories the most. To the boy they were new, and
consequently delightful, but to the parents they were old; and as
regards some stories, that is better still.
"What kind of a bird is this on my letter?" asked the boy on the day
which brought the Governor's lady's note of invitation. "And oh! what
is a Christmas tree?"
"The bird is an English robin," said his father. "It is quite another
bird to that which is called a robin here: it is smaller and rounder,
and has a redder breast and bright dark eyes, and lives and sings at
home through the winter. A Christmas tree is a fir-tree--just such a
one as that outside the door--brought into the house and covered with
lights and presents. Picture to yourself our fir-tree lighted up with
tapers on all the branches, with dolls, and trumpets, and bon-bons, and
drums, and toys of all kinds hanging from it like fir-cones, and on the
tip-top shoot a figure of a Christmas Angel in white, with a star upon
its head."
"Fancy!" said the boy.
And fancy he did. Every day he looked at the spruce fir, and tried to
imagine it laden with presents, and brilliant with tapers, and thought
how wonderful must be that "old country"--_Home_, as it was called, even
by those who had never seen it--where the robins were so very red, and
where at Christmas the fir-trees were hung with toys instead of cones.
It was certainly a pity that, two days before the party, an original
idea on the subject of snowmen struck one of the children who used to
play together, with their sleds and snow shoes, in the back streets.
The idea was this: That instead of having a commonplace snowman, whose
legs were obliged to be mere stumps, for fear he should be top-heavy,
and who could not walk, even with them; who, in fact, could do nothing
but stand at the corner of the street, holding his impotent stick, and
staring with his pebble eyes, till he was broken to pieces or
ignominiously carried away by a thaw,--that, instead of this, they
should have a real, live snowman, who should walk on competent legs, to
the astonishment, and (happy thought!) perhaps to the alarm of the
passers-by. This delightful novelty was to be accomplished by covering
one of the boys of the party with snow till he looked as like a real
snowman as circumstances would admit. At first everybody wanted to be
the snowman, but, when it came to the point, it was found to be so much
duller to stand still and be covered up than to run about and work,
that no one was willing to act the part. At last it was undertaken by
the little boy from the Fir House. He was somewhat small, but then he
was so good-natured he would always do as he was asked. So he stood
manfully still, with his arms folded over a walking-stick upon his
breast, whilst the others heaped the snow upon him. The plan was not so
successful as they had hoped. The snow would not stick anywhere except
on his shoulders, and when it got into his neck he cried with the cold;
but they were so anxious to carry out their project, that they begged
him to bear it "just a little longer"; and the urchin who had devised
the original idea wiped the child's eyes with his handkerchief, and
(with that hopefulness which is so easy over other people's matters)
"dared say that when all the snow was on, he wouldn't feel it."
However, he did feel it, and that so severely that the children were
obliged to give up the game, and, taking the stick out of his stiff
little arms, to lead him home.
It appears that it is with snowmen as with some other men in
conspicuous positions. It is easier to find fault with them than to
fill their place.
The end of this was a feverish cold, and, when the day of the party
came, the ex-snowman was still in bed. It is due to the other children
to say that they felt the disappointment as keenly as he did, and that
it greatly damped the pleasure of the party for them to think that they
had prevented his sharing in the treat. The most penitent of all was
the deviser of the original idea. He had generously offered to stay at
home with the little patient, which was as generously refused; but the
next evening he was allowed to come and sit on his bed, and describe it
all for the amusement of his friend. He was a quaint boy, this urchin,
with a face as broad as an American Indian's, eyes as bright as a
squirrel's, and all the mischief in life lurking about him, till you
could see roguishness in the very folds of his hooded Indian winter
coat of blue and scarlet. In his hand he brought the sick child's
present: a dray with two white horses, and little barrels that took off
and on, and a driver, with wooden joints, a cloth coat, and everything,
in fact, that was suitable to the driver of a brewer's dray, except
that he had blue boots and earrings, and that his hair was painted in
braids like a lady's, which is clearly the fault of the doll
manufacturers, who will persist in making them all of the weaker sex.
"And what was the Christmas tree like?" asked the invalid.
"Exactly like the fir outside your door," was the reply. "Just about
that size, and planted in a pot covered with red cloth. It was kept in
another room till after tea, and then when the door was opened it was
like a street fire in the town at night--such a blaze of light--candles
everywhere! And on all the branches the most beautiful presents. I got
a drum and a penwiper."
"Was there an angel?" the child asked.
"Oh, yes!" the boy answered. "It was on the tip-top branch, and it was
given to me, and I brought it for you, if you would like it; for, you
know, I am so very, very sorry I thought of a snowman and made you ill,
and I do love you, and beg you to forgive me."
And the roguish face stooped over the pillow to be kissed; and out of a
pocket in the hooded coat came forth the Christmas Angel. In the face
it bore a strong family likeness to the drayman, but its feet were
hidden in folds of snowy muslin, and on its head glittered a tinsel
star.
"How lovely!" said the child. "Father told me about this. I like it
best of all. And it is very kind of you, for it is not your fault that
I caught cold. I should have liked it if we could have done it, but I
think to enjoy being a snowman, one should be snow all through."
They had tea together, and then the invalid was tucked up for the
night. The dray was put away in the cupboard, but he took the angel to
bed with him.
And so ended the first of the Three Christmas Trees.
* * * * *
Except for a warm glow from the wood fire in the stove, the room was
dark; but about midnight it seemed to the child that a sudden blaze of
light filled the chamber. At the same moment the window curtains were
drawn aside, and he saw that the spruce fir had come close up to the
panes and was peeping in. Ah! how beautiful it looked! It had become a
Christmas tree. Lighted tapers shone from every familiar branch, toys
of the most fascinating appearance hung like fruit, and on the tip-top
shoot there stood the Christmas Angel. He tried to count the candles,
but somehow it was impossible. When he looked at them they seemed to
change places--to move--to become like the angel, and then to be
candles again, whilst the flames nodded to each other and repeated the
blue greeting of the robin, "A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!"
Then he tried to distinguish the presents, but, beautiful as the toys
looked, he could not exactly discover what any of them were, or choose
which he would like best. Only the Angel he could see clearly--so
clearly! It was more beautiful than the doll under his pillow; it had a
lovely face like his own mother's, he thought, and on its head gleamed
a star far brighter than tinsel. Its white robes waved with the flames
of the tapers, and it stretched its arms towards him with a smile.
"I am to go and choose my present," thought the child; and he called
"Mother! Mother dear! please open the window."
But his mother did not answer. So he thought he must get up himself,
and with an effort he struggled out of bed.
But when he was on his feet, everything seemed changed! Only the
firelight shone upon the walls, and the curtains were once more firmly
closed before the window. It had been a dream, but so vivid that in his
feverish state he still thought it must be true, and dragged the
curtains back to let in the glorious sight again. The firelight shone
upon a thick coating of frost upon the panes, but no further could he
see, so with all his strength he pushed the window open and leaned out
into the night.
The spruce fir stood in its old place; but it looked very beautiful in
its Christmas dress. Beneath it lay a carpet of pure white. The snow
was clustered in exquisite shapes upon its plumy branches; wrapping the
tree top with its little cross shoots, as a white robe might wrap a
figure with outstretched arms.
There were no tapers to be seen, but northern lights shot up into the
dark blue sky, and just over the fir-tree shone a bright, bright star.
"Jupiter looks well to-night," said the old Professor in the town
observatory, as he fixed his telescope; but to the child it seemed as
the star of the Christmas Angel.
His mother had really heard him call, and now came and put him back to
bed again. And so ended the second of the Three Christmas Trees.
* * * * *
It was enough to have killed him, all his friends said; but it did not.
He lived to be a man, and--what is rarer--to keep the faith, the
simplicity, the tender-heartedness, the vivid fancy of his childhood.
He lived to see many Christmas trees "at home," in that old country
where the robins are redbreasts, and sing in winter. There a heart as
good and gentle as his own became one with his; and once he brought his
young wife across the sea to visit the place where he was born. They
stood near the little white house, and he told her the story of the
Christmas trees.
"This was when I was a child," he added.
"But that you are still," said she; and she plucked a bit of the
fir-tree and kissed it, and carried it away.
He lived to tell the story to his children, and even to his
grandchildren; but he never was able to decide which of the two was
the more beautiful--the Christmas Tree of his dream, or the Spruce Fir
as it stood in the loveliness of that winter night.
This is told, not that it has anything to do with any of the Three
Christmas Trees, but to show that the story is a happy one, as is right
and proper; that the hero lived, and married, and had children, and was
as prosperous as good people, in books, should always be.
Of course he died at last. The best and happiest of men must die; and
it is only because some stories stop short in their history, that every
hero is not duly buried before we lay down the book.
When death came for our hero he was an old man. The beloved wife, some
of his children, and many of his friends had died before him, and of
those whom he had loved there were fewer to leave than to rejoin. He
had had a short illness, with little pain, and was now lying on his
deathbed in one of the big towns in the North of England. His youngest
son, a clergy-man, was with him, and one or two others of his children,
and by the fire sat the doctor.
The doctor had been sitting by the patient, but now that he could do no
more for him he had moved to the fire; and they had taken the ghastly,
half-emptied medicine bottles from the table by the bedside, and had
spread it with a fair linen cloth, and had set out the silver vessels
of the Supper of the Lord. The old man had been "wandering" somewhat
during the day. He had talked much of going home to the old country,
and with the wide range of dying thoughts he had seemed to mingle
memories of childhood with his hopes of Paradise. At intervals he was
clear and collected--one of those moments had been chosen for his last
sacrament--and he had fallen asleep with the blessing in his ears.
He slept so long and so peacefully that the son almost began to hope
that there might be a change, and looked towards the doctor, who still
sat by the fire with his right leg crossed over his left. The doctor's
eyes were also on the bed, but at that moment he drew out his watch and
looked at it with an air of professional conviction, which said, "It's
only a question of time." Then he crossed his left leg over his right,
and turned to the fire again. Before the right leg should be tired, all
would be over. The son saw it as clearly as if it had been spoken, and
he too turned away and sighed.
As they sat, the bells of a church in the town began to chime for
midnight service, for it was Christmas Eve, but they did not wake the
dying man. He slept on and on.
The doctor dozed. The son read in the Prayer Book on the table, and one
of his sisters read with him. Another, from grief and weariness, slept
with her head upon his shoulder. Except for a warm glow from the fire,
the room was dark. Suddenly the old man sat up in bed, and, in a strong
voice, cried with inexpressible enthusiasm,
"_How beautiful!_"
The son held back his sisters, and asked quietly,
"_What_, my dear Father?"
"The Christmas Tree!" he said in a low, eager voice. "Draw back the
curtains."
They were drawn back; but nothing could be seen, and still the old man
gazed as if in ecstasy.
"Light!" he murmured. "The Angel! the Star!"
Again there was silence; and then he stretched forth his hands, and
cried passionately,
"The Angel is beckoning to me! Mother! Mother dear! Please open the
window."
The sash was thrown open, and all eyes turned involuntarily where those
of the dying man were gazing. There was no Christmas tree--no tree at
all. But over the house-tops the morning star looked pure and pale in
the dawn of Christmas Day. For the night was past, and above the
distant hum of the streets the clear voices of some waits made the
words of an old carol heard--words dearer for their association than
their poetry:
"While shepherds watched their flocks by night,
All seated on the ground,
The Angel of the Lord came down,
And glory shone around."
When the window was opened, the soul passed; and when they looked back
to the bed the old man had lain down again, and, like a child, was
smiling in his sleep--his last sleep.
And this was the Third Christmas Tree.
* * * * *
AN IDYLL OF THE WOOD.
"Tell us a story," said the children, "a sad one, if you please, and a
little true. But, above all, let it end badly, for we are tired of
people who live happily ever after."
"I heard one lately," said the old man who lived in the wood; "it is
founded on fact, and is a sad one also; but whether it ends badly or no
I cannot pretend to say. That is a matter of taste: what is a bad
ending?"
"A story ends badly," said the children with authority, "when people
die, and nobody marries anybody else, especially if it is a prince and
princess."
"A most lucid explanation," said the old man. "I think my story will
do, for the principal character dies, and there is no wedding."
"Tell it, tell it!" cried his hearers, "and tell us also where you got
it from."
"Who knows the riches of a wood in summer?" said the old man. "In
summer, do I say? In spring, in autumn, or in winter either. Who knows
them? You, my children? Well, well. Better than some of your elders,
perchance. You know the wood where I live; the hollow tree that will
hold five children, and Queen Mab knows how many fairies. (What a
castle it makes! And if it had but another floor put into it, with a
sloping ladder--like one of the round towers of Ireland--what a house
for children to live in! With no room for lesson-books, grown-up
people, or beds!)