Transcriber's Note: Italic text is denoted by _underscores_
and bold text by =equal signs=.
THE COUNTRY CHRISTMAS
Works of
Frances Margaret Fox
[Illustration]
Farmer Brown and the Birds $.50
The Little Giant's Neighbours .50
Mother Nature's Little Ones .50
Betty of Old Mackinaw .50
Brother Billy .50
How Christmas Came to the Mulvaneys .50
The Country Christmas .50
Little Lady Marjorie 1.50
L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
New England Building, Boston, Mass.
[Illustration: CHOOSING THE CHRISTMAS TREE.
(_See page 99_)]
Cosy Corner Series
THE COUNTRY
CHRISTMAS
By
Frances Margaret Fox
Author of
"Farmer Brown and the Birds," "Little Lady
Marjorie," "Betty of Old Mackinaw," "How Christmas
Came to the Mulvaneys," etc.
_Illustrated by_
Etheldred B. Barry
[Illustration]
_Boston_
[Illustration]
_L. C. Page & Company_
[Illustration]
_1907_
_Copyright, 1907_
BY L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
(INCORPORATED)
_All rights reserved_
First Impression, June, 1907
_COLONIAL PRESS_
_Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co.
Boston, U. S. A._
[Illustration: CONTENTS]
CHAPTER PAGE
I. HOPE FOR THE MULVANEYS 1
II. SALLY BROWN'S NEW IDEA 11
III. HOUSE-HUNTING 18
IV. TOM MAKES A SUGGESTION 28
V. SOMETHING HAPPENED 35
VI. HOW STUBBINS WENT TO SEE MR. HODGKINS 46
VII. PIGS IN THE ATTIC 54
VIII. STUBBINS AND CHINKY LEARN THEIR NAMES 63
IX. HANNAH'S PINK DRESS 69
X. THE HOME THAT WAS LOST ON CHRISTMAS DAY 77
XI. MRS. MULVANEY'S AIR CASTLE 86
XII. WELCOME HODGKINS CHOOSES THE CHRISTMAS TREE 93
XIII. ON THE TRAIL OF SANTA CLAUS 101
XIV. THE HOME THAT WAS FOUND ON CHRISTMAS DAY 107
[Illustration: ILLVSTRATIONS]
PAGE
CHOOSING THE CHRISTMAS TREE (_See page 99_) _Frontispiece_
"'HE PUT ON ONE OF HER NEW DRESSES'" 7
"POINTING TO A DILAPIDATED WEATHER-BEATEN
STRUCTURE ALMOST HIDDEN FROM VIEW" 19
"WHEREUPON HE WAS TAKEN IN HAND" 42
"THEN BEGAN A WILD RIDE" 52
"A CLEANER IF NOT A BETTER BOY" 59
"JOINED HER FAMILY BENEATH AN APPLE-TREE" 73
"LAUGHING SOFTLY AS SHE ROCKED" 90
"THE NEXT DAY CHINKY SHARPENED HIS HATCHET" 103
"THE SEVEN STOOD IN A ROW" 107
THE COUNTRY CHRISTMAS
CHAPTER I
HOPE FOR THE MULVANEYS
Sally Brown remembered the Mulvaneys. It was no wonder the child talked
of them at first; but, when she had lived in the country two months,
her mother and brother Alfred begged her to change the subject.
"Give us a rest," was Alfred's repeated command.
"Really, Sally," her mother remonstrated one morning, "what is the
use of thinking of the Mulvaneys all the time? If it did any good I
wouldn't say a word, but you only make us uncomfortable without helping
them in the least."
"Well, mamma," was the reply, "you see I can't help hoping."
"Hoping," mocked Alfred, "hoping for what, I'd like to know?"
"If your name was Chinky Mulvaney you'd guess quick enough," was
Sally's retort. "I am hoping the Mulvaneys will get out of the city
same as we did."
"Hoping won't get them out," said Alfred.
"Maybe it won't and maybe it will," Sally remarked. "I notice that when
you hope for things hard enough, you're pretty sure to get them. That
is," she added, "if you do some squirming too. Don't you know, Alfred,
you can help things happen if you try. I've discovered there's more'n
one way of hoping."
Mrs. Brown was ready to go out. "Sally, my child," was her parting
advice, "hope all you wish, but please don't mention the Mulvaneys to
Alfred or me for one week."
"She'd never live," Alfred said, as he grabbed his cap and followed his
mother.
Sally flew to the kitchen. "I can talk to you about the Mulvaneys,
can't I, Mrs. Turner? Now I am ready to wash the dishes. Alfred's gone
to the post-office, and mamma has gone to sew for Mrs. Reuben Smith;
that's why I didn't get out here sooner; I had to see them off. Mamma
says,—what do you think?—that I mustn't say Mulvaney to her for a
week. I can talk to you, though, can't I?"
"Indeed you may," laughed Mrs. Isaac Turner. "I feel as if I had known
the Mulvaneys all my life. Talk about them, of course you may. Is Mrs.
Mulvaney a nice looking woman?"
"Dear me, no," laughed Sally, playing with the soapsuds in the dishpan.
"She's about as unpretty as any one you ever saw. She's cross as a
bear, too, but who wouldn't be? Just 'magine, Mrs. Turner, if you lived
in a horrid little pig-pen house, and you had seven acting children
and your Mr. Mulvaney was dead, and you had to take in washing? I do
wish they could come out in the country. I wish they could live in this
very village. Why, Mrs. Turner, they are the most discouraging children
you ever saw. There's Hannah and Chinky and Nora and Dora and Mike and
Johnnie and Stubbins, and they all look worse'n they act."
"Yes," agreed Mrs. Turner, "I know them every one, Sally, just as well
as if I had seen their photographs. Hannah is tall and thin; Chinky is
red-headed and freckled; Mike is full of mischief; and Johnnie's always
getting into trouble; and Stubbins is a terror. Now why do you want
such a family turned loose in our pretty village?"
"Don't laugh, Mrs. Turner, because it is dreadful for children not
to have better things. They live down by the railroad tracks and the
river, in mud and dirt. I think it is worse for them because they have
always lived there, and they don't know anything different. They are
not so very bad yet, but you just wait and see what'll happen if they
stay there."
"How is it, Sally, that you like such children?"
"Because," was the instant response, "I got acquainted with them. I've
discovered that you're pretty sure to like every one if you only get
well enough acquainted. I never knew how good Mrs. Mulvaney was until
mamma was taken to the hospital, and Mrs. Mulvaney took me and Alfred
in. Of course she was cross and everything, but I'll never forget
how good she was to us, nor how she cried for joy,—that's what mamma
said,—because they had a gay Christmas for once in their lives. She
was glad mamma and Alfred and I could come here to live, too; and now
I'll tell you something, Mrs. Turner. I'm not the only one that's
hoping. This is exactly what Mrs. Mulvaney said when we talked it over.
'We'll put for the country, too, Sally, if we ever get a chance!' So
you see, she wants to come."
Nothing more was said about the Mulvaneys for a week, which doesn't
mean that Sally forgot them. It happened this way: Alfred brought a
letter from the post-office that Saturday morning addressed to Mrs.
Elizabeth Brown, and as Mrs. Elizabeth Brown was away all day, the
children passed their spare time wondering about its contents. At night
their curiosity was satisfied. A farmer's daughter needed the help of a
dressmaker for two weeks. Better than that she wrote, "Come as soon as
possible, and bring both your children. They can walk to school every
day with my brother."
"That lets me out," declared Alfred; "but you may go, Sally, just the
same." To show how little he cared, Alfred whistled "Yankee Doodle."
"Perhaps Mr. Turner would give you a vacation," suggested Sally.
"Wouldn't ask him," was the reply. "When they take a feller to work
for his board in a grocery store after school hours, and to do chores
around the house, he's got to tend to business or lose his job."
Alfred sometimes put on airs. Sally always felt humiliated when her
brother talked about working for his board, and how fortunate it was
that one of his mother's children happened to be a boy. "What if we'd
both been girls?" he used to ask in tones of scorn. Instead of feeling
sorry for Alfred, when she and her mother were driven to the Randall
farm, Sally envied him because of his importance at home.
"How do you like it out there?" asked the boy at recess a few days
later.
[Illustration: "'HE PUT ON ONE OF HER NEW DRESSES'"]
"The only thing I don't like," was the reply, "is coming to school with
Tom Randall. I am glad he isn't my brother. He's the worst tease I
ever saw. Why Alfred, you are a perfect angel beside of him. He made
Cornelia Mary cry last night, and she's sixteen."
"Who's Cornelia Mary?"
"She's his sister. He put on one of her new dresses mamma is making,
and said he was going to wear it out to milk the cows."
"Did he do it?" inquired Alfred.
"No, his mother made him take it off. He's fourteen and he thinks he
knows it all."
"The boys all like him, Sally. If girls weren't so silly they wouldn't
have so much trouble."
"You needn't think that bothers me," laughed Sally, "because I want to
tell you about the Randalls. They're the nicest people ever, all but
Tom. They live in a great big white house with green blinds and wide
verandas. It must be lovely in the summer. You ought to see their cows
and their horses and their chickens, and when I say chickens I mean
everything with feathers; pigeons, ducks, and geese, turkeys, and even
guinea hens. Oh, but it's nice. I can't begin to tell you. Cornelia
Randall is the sweetest girl you ever saw, too. She told me to call
her Cornelia Mary except when I go visiting her school next summer,
then I must say 'Miss Randall,' to set the country children a good
example."
"Is she going to be a school teacher?"
"Yes, Alfred, and she says she can hardly wait for summer. She's passed
her examination and got her certificate, and she's going to teach over
in the Hodgkins district. Tom declares he'll visit her school and make
speeches to the children. It would be just like him, and she couldn't
put him out either, if she tried. Cornelia Mary says sometimes she
wishes she was an only child."
"Nice and selfish," suggested Alfred.
"You never lived with Tom Randall," observed Sally. "There he comes
now, and don't you dare tell what I told you."
"Won't I though?"
"Oh, no, you won't, Alfred. Wait a minute," she called, "I want to tell
you something. I'm still hoping about the Mulvaneys; they would have
such a good time in the country!"