Author: Various
Date: 1912-12-31T15:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Children's Stories; Christmas; Fairytales; Fantasy
Description: ~~~This collection of legends, fables, and fairytales celebrates the magic and joy of the Christmas season. Fourteen heart-warming stories with a message of sharing and compassion, to entertain and inspire readers young and old.
Publisher: MobileRead
Rights: Public Domain in countries where copyright is “Life+80” or less, and in the USA

About this Ebook



Christmas Magic

CHRISTMAS STORIES
BY VARIOUS AUTHORS

This collection of legends, fables, and fairytales celebrates the magic and joy of the Christmas season. Fourteen heart-warming stories with a message of sharing and compassion, to entertain and inspire readers young and old.

This ebook compiled and created by E.C.M. for MobileRead.com, December 2015.

This ebook may be freely distributed for non-commercial purposes.

The text of this book is in the public domain in countries where copyright is “Life+80” or less, and in the USA.

Texts were obtained from archive.org, hathitrust.org, wikisource.org, gutenberg.org. Some spelling and punctuation modernized. Story titles are cross-linked to in-line Table of Contents. Cover design by E.C.M.

Embedded fonts (all licensed for re-distribution):
“Kingthings Petrock, by Kevin C. King,
“Fontin Small Caps” by Jos Buivenga,
“Iota” by E.C.M.

Validation by Pagina Epub Checker.

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Contents

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CHRISTMAS MAGIC

About This Ebook

The Stories:

The Christmas Masquerade
Jimmy Scarecrow’s Christmas
Little Roger’s Night in the Church
The Elves and the Shoemaker
Christmasland
The Christmas Princess
The Christmas Cuckoo
Toinette and the Elves
The Visit of the Wishing Man
The Great Walled Country
The Symbol and the Saint
Little Wolff’s Wooden Shoes
Why the Chimes Rang
Little Gretchen and the Wooden Shoe

CHRISTMAS MAGIC



The Christmas Masquerade



On Christmas Eve the Mayor’s stately mansion presented a beautiful appearance. There were rows of different colored wax candles burning in every window, and beyond them one could see the chandeliers of gold and crystal blazing with light. The fiddles were squeaking merrily, and lovely little forms flew past the windows in time to the music.

There were gorgeous carpets laid from the door to the street, and carriages were constantly arriving and fresh guests tripping over them. They were all children. The Mayor was giving a Christmas Masquerade tonight to all the children in the city, the poor as well as the rich. The preparation for this ball had been making an immense sensation for the last three months. Placards had been up in the most conspicuous points in the city, and all the daily newspapers had at least a column devoted to it, headed with “THE MAYOR’S CHRISTMAS MASQUERADE,” in very large letters.

The Mayor had promised to defray the expenses of all the poor children whose parents were unable to do so, and the bills for their costumes were directed to be sent in to him.

Of course there was great excitement among the regular costumers of the city, and they all resolved to vie with one another in being the most popular, and the best patronized on this gala occasion. But the placards and the notices had not been out a week before a new Costumer appeared who cast all the others into the shade directly. He set up his shop on the corner of one of the principal streets, and hung up his beautiful costumes in the windows. He was a little fellow, not much bigger than a boy of ten. His cheeks were as red as roses, and he had on a long curling wig as white as snow. He wore a suit of crimson velvet knee-breeches, and a little swallow-tailed coat with beautiful golden buttons. Deep lace ruffles fell over his slender white hands, and he wore elegant knee buckles of glittering stones. He sat on a high stool behind his counter and served his customers himself; he kept no clerk.

It did not take the children long to discover what beautiful things he had, and how superior he was to the other costumers, and they begun to flock to his shop immediately, from the Mayor’s daughter to the poor ragpicker’s. The children were to select their own costumes; the Mayor had stipulated that. It was to be a children’s ball in every sense of the word.

So they decided to be fairies and shepherdesses, and princesses according to their own fancies; and this new Costumer had charming costumes to suit them.

It was noticeable that, for the most part, the children of the rich, who had always had everything they desired, would choose the parts of goose-girls and peasants and such like; and the poor children jumped eagerly at the chance of being princesses or fairies for a few hours in their miserable lives.

When Christmas Eve came and the children flocked into the Mayor’s mansion, whether it was owing to the Costumer’s art, or their own adaptation to the characters they had chosen, it was wonderful how lifelike their representations were. Those little fairies in their short skirts of silken gauze, in which golden sparkles appeared as they moved with their little funny gossamer wings, like butterflies, looked like real fairies. It did not seem possible, when they floated around to the music, half supported on the tips of their dainty toes, half by their filmy purple wings, their delicate bodies swaying in time, that they could be anything but fairies. It seemed absurd to imagine that they were Johnny Mullens, the washerwoman’s son, and Polly Flinders, the charwoman’s little girl, and so on.

The Mayor’s daughter, who had chosen the character of a goose-girl, looked so like a true one that one could hardly dream she ever was anything else. She was, ordinarily, a slender, dainty little lady rather tall for her age. She now looked very short and stubbed and brown, just as if she had been accustomed to tend geese in all sorts of weather. It was so with all the others – the Red Riding-hoods, the princesses, the Bo-Peeps and with every one of the characters who came to the Mayor’s ball; Red Riding-hood looked round, with big, frightened eyes, all ready to spy the wolf, and carried her little pat of butter and pot of honey gingerly in her basket; Bo-Peep’s eyes looked red with weeping for the loss of her sheep; and the princesses swept about so grandly in their splendid brocaded trains, and held their crowned heads so high that people half-believed them to be true princesses.

But there never was anything like the fun at the Mayor’s Christmas ball. The fiddlers fiddled and fiddled, and the children danced and danced on the beautiful waxed floors. The Mayor, with his family and a few grand guests, sat on a dais covered with blue velvet at one end of the dancing hall, and watched the sport. They were all delighted. The Mayor’s eldest daughter sat in front and clapped her little soft white hands. She was a tall, beautiful young maiden, and wore a white dress, and a little cap woven of blue violets on her yellow hair. Her name was Violetta.

The supper was served at midnight – and such a supper! The mountains of pink and white ices, and the cakes with sugar castles and flower gardens on the tops of them, and the charming shapes of gold and ruby-colored jellies. There were wonderful bonbons which even the Mayor’s daughter did not have every day; and all sorts of fruits, fresh and candied. They had cowslip wine in green glasses, and elderberry wine in red, and they drank each other’s health. The glasses held a thimbleful each; the Mayor’s wife thought that was all the wine they ought to have. Under each child’s plate there was a pretty present and everyone had a basket of bonbons and cake to carry home.

At four o’clock the fiddlers put up their fiddles and the children went home; fairies and shepherdesses and pages and princesses all jabbering gleefully about the splendid time they had had.

But in a short time, what consternation there was throughout the city. When the proud and fond parents attempted to unbutton their children’s dresses, in order to prepare them for bed, not a single costume would come off. The buttons buttoned again as fast as they were unbuttoned; even if they pulled out a pin, in it would slip again in a twinkling; and when a string was untied it tied itself up again into a bowknot. The parents were dreadfully frightened. But the children were so tired out they finally let them go to bed in their fancy costumes and thought perhaps they would come off better in the morning. So Red Riding-hood went to bed in her little red cloak holding fast to her basket full of dainties for her grandmother, and Bo-Peep slept with her crook in her hand.

The children all went to bed readily enough, they were so very tired, even though they had to go in this strange array. All but the fairies – they danced and pirouetted and would not be still.

“We want to swing on the blades of grass,” they kept saying, “and play hide and seek in the lily cups, and take a nap between the leaves of the roses.”

The poor charwomen and coal-heavers, whose children the fairies were for the most part, stared at them in great distress. They did not know what to do with these radiant, frisky little creatures into which their Johnnys and their Pollys and Betseys were so suddenly transformed. But the fairies went to bed quietly enough when daylight came, and were soon fast asleep.

There was no further trouble till twelve o’clock, when all the children woke up. Then a great wave of alarm spread over the city. Not one of the costumes would come off then. The buttons buttoned as fast as they were unbuttoned; the pins quilted themselves in as fast as they were pulled out; and the strings flew round like lightning and twisted themselves into bow-knots as fast as they were untied.

And that was not the worst of it; every one of the children seemed to have become, in reality, the character which he or she had assumed.

The Mayor’s daughter declared she was going to tend her geese out in the pasture, and the shepherdesses sprang out of their little beds of down, throwing aside their silken quilts, and cried that they must go out and watch their sheep. The princesses jumped up from their straw pallets, and wanted to go to court; and all the rest of them likewise. Poor little Red Riding-hood sobbed and sobbed because she couldn’t go and carry her basket to her grandmother, and as she didn’t have any grandmother she couldn’t go, of course, and her parents were very much doubled. It was all so mysterious and dreadful. The news spread very rapidly over the city, and soon a great crowd gathered around the new Costumer’s shop for everyone thought he must be responsible for all this mischief.

The shop door was locked; but they soon battered it down with stones. When they rushed in the Costumer was not there; he had disappeared with all his wares. Then they did not know what to do. But it was evident that they must do something before long for the state of affairs was growing worse and worse.

The Mayor’s little daughter braced her back up against the tapestried wall, and planted her two feet in their thick shoes firmly. “I will go and tend my geese,” she kept crying. “I won’t eat my breakfast. I won’t go out in the park. I won’t go to school. I’m going to tend my geese – I will, I will, I will!”

And the princesses trailed their rich trains over the rough unpainted floors in their parents’ poor little huts, and held their crowned heads very high and demanded to be taken to court. The princesses were mostly geese-girls when they were their proper selves, and their geese were suffering, and their poor parents did not know what they were going to do and they wrung their hands and wept as they gazed on their gorgeously apparelled children.

Finally the Mayor called a meeting of the Aldermen, and they all assembled in the City Hall. Nearly every one of them had a son or a daughter who was a chimney-sweep, or a little watch-girl, or a shepherdess. They appointed a chairman and they took a great many votes and contrary votes but they did not agree on anything, until everyone proposed that they consult the Wise Woman. Then they all held up their hands, and voted to, unanimously.

So the whole board of Aldermen set out, walking by twos, with the Mayor at their head, to consult the Wise Woman. The Aldermen were all very fleshy, and carried gold-headed canes which they swung very high at every step. They held their heads well back, and their chins stiff, and whenever they met common people they sniffed gently. They were very imposing.

The Wise Woman lived in a little hut on the outskirts of the city. She kept a Black Cat; except for her, she was all alone. She was very old, and had brought up a great many children, and she was considered remarkably wise.

But when the Aldermen reached her hut and found her seated by the fire, holding her Black Cat, a new difficulty presented itself. She had always been quite deaf and people had been obliged to scream as loud as they could in order to make her hear; but lately she had grown much deafer, and when the Aldermen attempted to lay the case before her she could not hear a word. In fact, she was so very deaf that she could not distinguish a tone below G-sharp. The Aldermen screamed till they were quite red in the faces, but all to no purpose: none of them could get up to G-sharp of course.

So the Aldermen all went back, swinging their gold-headed canes, and they had another meeting in the City Hall. Then they decided to send the highest Soprano Singer in the church choir to the Wise Woman; she could sing up to G-sharp just as easy as not. So the high Soprano Singer set out for the Wise Woman’s in the Mayor’s coach, and the Aldermen marched behind, swinging their gold-headed canes.

The High Soprano Singer put her head down close to the Wise Woman’s ear, and sung all about the Christmas Masquerade and the dreadful dilemma everybody was in, in G-sharp – she even went higher, sometimes, and the Wise Woman heard every word.

She nodded three times, and every time she nodded she looked wiser.

“Go home, and give ’em a spoonful of castor-oil, all ’round,” she piped up; then she took a pinch of snuff, and wouldn’t say any more.

So the Aldermen went home, and everyone took a district and marched through it, with a servant carrying an immense bowl and spoon, and every child had to take a dose of castor-oil.

But it didn’t do a bit of good. The children cried and struggled when they were forced to take the castor-oil; but, two minutes afterward, the chimney-sweeps were crying for their brooms, and the princesses screaming because they couldn’t go to court, and the Mayor’s daughter, who had been given a double dose, cried louder and more sturdily: “I want to go and tend my geese. I will go and tend my geese.”

So the Aldermen took the high Soprano Singer, and they consulted the Wise Woman again. She was taking a nap this time, and the Singer had to sing up to B-flat before she could wake her. Then she was very cross and the Black Cat put up his back and spit at the Aldermen.

“Give ’em a spanking all ’round,” she snapped out, “and if that don’t work put ’em to bed without their supper.”

Then the Aldermen marched back to try that; and all the children in the city were spanked, and when that didn’t do any good they were put to bed without any supper. But the next morning when they woke up they were worse than ever.

The Mayor and Aldermen were very indignant, and considered that they had been imposed upon and insulted. So they set out for the Wise Woman again, with the high Soprano Singer.

She sang in G-sharp how the Aldermen and the Mayor considered her an impostor, and did not think she was wise at all, and they wished her to take her Black Cat and move beyond the limits of the city.

She sang it beautifully; it sounded like the very finest Italian opera music.

“Dearie me,” piped the Wise Woman, when she had finished, “how very grand these gentlemen are.” Her Black Cat put up his back and spit.

“Five times one Black Cat are five Black Cats,” said the Wise Woman. And directly there were five Black Cats spitting and miauling.

“Five times five Black Cats are twenty-five Black Cats.” And then there were twenty-five of the angry little beasts.

“Five times twenty-five Black Cats are one hundred and twenty-five Black Cats,” added the Wise Woman with a chuckle.

Then the Mayor and the Aldermen and the high Soprano Singer fled precipitately out the door and back to the city. One hundred and twenty-five Black Cats had seemed to fill the Wise Woman’s hut full, and when they all spit and miauled together it was dreadful. The visitors could not wait for her to multiply Black Cats any longer.

As winter wore on and spring came, the condition of things grew more intolerable. Physicians had been consulted, who advised that the children should be allowed to follow their own bents, for fear of injury to their constitutions. So the rich Aldermen’s daughters were actually out in the fields herding sheep, and their sons sweeping chimneys or carrying newspapers; and while the poor charwomen’s and coal-heavers, children spent their time like princesses and fairies. Such a topsy-turvy state of society was shocking. While the Mayor’s little daughter was tending geese out in the meadow like any common goose-girl, her pretty elder sister, Violetta, felt very sad about it and used often to cast about in her mind for some way of relief.

When cherries were ripe in spring, Violetta thought she would ask the Cherry-man about it. She thought the Cherry-man quite wise. He was a very pretty young fellow, and he brought cherries to sell in graceful little straw baskets lined with moss. So she stood in the kitchen door one morning and told him all about the great trouble that had come upon the city. He listened in great astonishment; he had never heard of it before. He lived several miles out in the country.

“How did the Costumer look?” he asked respectfully; he thought Violetta the most beautiful lady on earth.

Then Violetta described the Costumer, and told him of the unavailing attempts that had been made to find him. There were a great many detectives out, constantly at work.

“I know where he is!” said the Cherry-man. “He’s up in one of my cherry-trees. He’s been living there ever since cherries were ripe, and he won’t come down.”

Then Violetta ran and told her father in great excitement, and he at once called a meeting of the Aldermen, and in a few hours half the city was on the road to the Cherry-man’s.

He had a beautiful orchard of cherry-trees all laden with fruit. And, sure enough in one of the largest, way up amongst the topmost branches, sat the Costumer in his red velvet and short clothes and his diamond knee-buckles. He looked down between the green boughs. “Good-morning, friends!” he shouted.

The Aldermen shook their gold-headed canes at him, and the people danced round the tree in a rage. Then they began to climb. But they soon found that to be impossible. As fast as they touched a hand or foot to a tree, back it flew with a jerk exactly as if the tree pushed it. They tried a ladder, but the ladder fell back the moment it touched the tree, and lay sprawling upon the ground. Finally, they brought axes and thought they could chop the tree down, Costumer and all; but the wood resisted the axes as if it were iron, and only dented them, receiving no impression itself.

Meanwhile, the Costumer sat up in the tree, eating cherries and throwing the stones down. Finally he stood up on a stout branch, and, looking down, addressed the people.

“It’s of no use, your trying to accomplish anything in this way,” said he; “you’d better parley. I’m willing to come to terms with you, and make everything right on two conditions.”

The people grew quiet then, and the Mayor stepped forward as spokesman, “Name your two conditions,” said he rather testily. “You own, tacitly, that you are the cause of all this trouble.”

“Well” said the Costumer, reaching out for a handful of cherries, “this Christmas Masquerade of yours was a beautiful idea; but you wouldn’t do it every year, and your successors might not do it at all. I want those poor children to have a Christmas every year. My first condition is that every poor child in the city hangs its stocking for gifts in the City Hall on every Christmas Eve, and gets it filled, too. I want the resolution filed and put away in the city archives.”

“We agree to the first condition!” cried the people with one voice, without waiting for the Mayor and Aldermen.

“The second condition,” said the Costumer, “is that this good young Cherry-man here has the Mayor’s daughter, Violetta, for his wife. He has been kind to me, letting me live in his cherry-tree and eat his cherries and I want to reward him.”

“We consent,” cried all the people; but the Mayor, though he was so generous, was a proud man. “I will not consent to the second condition,” he cried angrily.

“Very well,” replied the Costumer, picking some more cherries, “then your youngest daughter tends geese the rest of her life, that’s all.”

The Mayor was in great distress; but the thought of his youngest daughter being a goose-girl all her life was too much for him. He gave in at last.

“Now go home and take the costumes off your children,” said the Costumer, “and leave me in peace to eat cherries.”

Then the people hastened back to the city, and found, to their great delight, that the costumes would come off. The pins stayed out, the buttons stayed unbuttoned, and the strings stayed untied. The children were dressed in their own proper clothes and were their own proper selves once more. The shepherdesses and the chimney-sweeps came home, and were washed and dressed in silks and velvets, and went to embroidering and playing lawn-tennis. And the princesses and the fairies put on their own suitable dresses, and went about their useful employments. There was great rejoicing in every home. Violetta thought she had never been so happy, now that her dear little sister was no longer a goose-girl, but her own dainty little lady-self.

The resolution to provide every poor child in the city with a stocking full of gifts on Christmas was solemnly filed, and deposited in the city archives, and was never broken.

Violetta was married to the Cherry-man, and all the children came to the wedding, and strewed flowers in her path till her feet were quite hidden in them. The Costumer had mysteriously disappeared from the cherry-tree the night before, but he left at the foot some beautiful wedding presents for the bride – a silver service with a pattern of cherries engraved on it, and a set of china with cherries on it, in hand painting, and a white satin robe, embroidered with cherries down the front.

—Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
(1852–1930)

Jimmy Scarecrow’s
Christmas

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Jimmy Scarecrow led a sad life in the winter. Jimmy’s greatest grief was his lack of occupation. He liked to be useful, and in winter he was absolutely of no use at all.

He wondered how many such miserable winters he would have to endure. He was a young Scarecrow, and this was his first one. He was strongly made, and although his wooden joints creaked a little when the wind blew he did not grow in the least rickety. Every morning, when the wintry sun peered like a hard yellow eye across the dry corn-stubble, Jimmy felt sad, but at Christmas time his heart nearly broke.

On Christmas Eve Santa Claus came in his sledge heaped high with presents, urging his team of reindeer across the field. He was on his way to the farmhouse where Betsey lived with her Aunt Hannah.

Betsey was a very good little girl with very smooth yellow curls, and she had a great many presents. Santa Claus had a large wax doll-baby for her on his arm, tucked up against the fur collar of his coat. He was afraid to trust it in the pack, lest it get broken.

When poor Jimmy Scarecrow saw Santa Claus his heart gave a great leap. “Santa Claus! Here I am!” he cried out, but Santa Claus did not hear him.

“Santa Claus, please give me a little present. I was good all summer and kept the crows out of the corn,” pleaded the poor Scarecrow in his choking voice, but Santa Claus passed by with a merry halloo and a great clamor of bells.

Then Jimmy Scarecrow stood in the corn-stubble and shook with sobs until his joints creaked. “I am of no use in the world, and everybody has forgotten me,” he moaned. But he was mistaken.

The next morning Betsey sat at the window holding her Christmas doll-baby, and she looked out at Jimmy Scarecrow standing alone in the field amidst the corn-stubble.

“Aunt Hannah?” said she. Aunt Hannah was making a crazy patchwork quilt, and she frowned hard at a triangular piece of red silk and circular piece of pink, wondering how to fit them together. “Well?” said she.

“Did Santa Claus bring the Scarecrow any Christmas present?”

“No, of course he didn’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because he’s a Scarecrow. Don’t ask silly questions.”

“I wouldn’t like to be treated so, if I was a Scarecrow,” said Betsey, but her Aunt Hannah did not hear her. She was busy cutting a triangular snip out of the round piece of pink silk so the piece of red silk could be feather-stitched into it.

It was snowing hard out of doors, and the north wind blew. The Scarecrow’s poor old coat got whiter and whiter with snow. Sometimes he almost vanished in the thick white storm. Aunt Hannah worked until the middle of the afternoon on her crazy quilt. Then she got up and spread it out over the sofa with an air of pride.

“There,” said she, “that’s done, and that makes the eighth. I’ve got one for every bed in the house, and I’ve given four away. I’d give this away if I knew of anybody that wanted it.”

Aunt Hannah put on her hood and shawl, and drew some blue yarn stockings on over her shoes, and set out through the snow to carry a slice of plum-pudding to her sister Susan, who lived down the road. Half an hour after Aunt Hannah had gone Betsey put her little red plaid shawl over her head, and ran across the field to Jimmy Scarecrow. She carried her new doll-baby smuggled up under her shawl.

“Wish you Merry Christmas!” she said to Jimmy Scarecrow.

“Wish you the same,” said Jimmy, but his voice was choked with sobs, and was also muffled, for his old hat had slipped down to his chin. Betsey looked pitifully at the old hat fringed with icicles, like frozen tears, and the old snow-laden coat. “I’ve brought you a Christmas present,” said she, and with that she tucked her doll-baby inside Jimmy Scarecrow’s coat, sticking its tiny feet into a pocket.

“Thank you,” said Jimmy Scarecrow faintly.

“You’re welcome,” said she. “Keep her under your overcoat, so the snow won’t wet her, and she won’t catch cold, she’s delicate.”

“Yes, I will,” said Jimmy Scarecrow, and he tried hard to bring one of his stiff, outstretched arms around to clasp the doll-baby.

“Don’t you feel cold in that old summer coat?” asked Betsey.

“If I bad a little exercise, I should be warm,” he replied. But he shivered, and the wind whistled through his rags.

“You wait a minute,” said Betsey, and was off across the field.

Jimmy Scarecrow stood in the corn-stubble, with the doll-baby under his coat and waited, and soon Betsey was back again with Aunt Hannah’s crazy quilt trailing in the snow behind her.

“Here,” said she, “here is something to keep you warm,” and she folded the crazy quilt around the Scarecrow and pinned it.

“Aunt Hannah wants to give it away if anybody wants it,” she explained. “She’s got so many crazy quilts in the house now she doesn’t know what to do with them. Good-bye – be sure you keep the doll-baby covered up.” And with that she ran cross the field, and left Jimmy Scarecrow alone with the crazy quilt and the doll-baby.

The bright flash of colors under Jimmy’s hat-brim dazzled his eyes, and he felt a little alarmed. “I hope this quilt is harmless if it is crazy,” he said. But the quilt was warm, and he dismissed his fears. Soon the doll-baby whimpered, but he creaked his joints a little, and that amused it, and he heard it cooing inside his coat.

Jimmy Scarecrow had never felt so happy in his life as he did for an hour or so. But after that the snow began to turn to rain, and the crazy quilt was soaked through and through: and not only that, but his coat and the poor doll-baby. It cried pitifully for a while, and then it was still, and he was afraid it was dead.

It grew very dark, and the rain fell in sheets, the snow melted, and Jimmy Scarecrow stood halfway up his old boots in water. He was saying to himself that the saddest hour of his life had come, when suddenly he again heard Santa Claus’ sleigh-bells and his merry voice talking to his reindeer. It was after midnight, Christmas was over, and Santa was hastening home to the North Pole.

“Santa Claus! dear Santa Claus!” cried Jimmy Scarecrow with a great sob, and that time Santa Claus heard him and drew rein.

“Who’s there?” he shouted out of the darkness.

“It’s only me,” replied the Scarecrow.

“Who’s me?” shouted Santa Claus.

“Jimmy Scarecrow!”

Santa got out of his sledge and waded up. “Have you been standing here ever since corn was ripe?” he asked pityingly, and Jimmy replied that he had.

“What’s that over your shoulders?” Santa Claus continued, holding up his lantern.

“It’s a crazy quilt.”

“And what are you holding under your coat?”

“The doll-baby that Betsey gave me, and I’m afraid it’s dead,” poor Jimmy Scarecrow sobbed.

“Nonsense!” cried Santa Claus. “Let me see it!” And with that he pulled the doll-baby out from under the Scarecrow’s coat, and patted its back, and shook it a little, and it began to cry, and then to crow. “It’s all right,” said Santa Claus. “This is the doll-baby I gave Betsey, and it is not at all delicate. It went through the measles, and the chicken-pox, and the mumps, and the whooping-cough, before it left the North Pole. Now get into the sledge, Jimmy Scarecrow, and bring the doll-baby and the crazy quilt. I have never had any quilts that weren’t in their right minds at the North Pole, but maybe I can cure this one. Get in!” Santa chirruped to his reindeer, and they drew the sledge up close in a beautiful curve.

“Get in, Jimmy Scarecrow, and come with me to the North Pole!” he cried.

“Please, how long shall I stay?” asked Jimmy Scarecrow.

“Why, you are going to live with me,” replied Santa Claus. “I’ve been looking for a person like you for a long time.”

“Are there any crows to scare away at the North Pole? I want to be useful,” Jimmy Scarecrow said, anxiously.

“No,” answered Santa Claus, “but I don’t want you to scare away crows. I want you to scare away Arctic Explorers. I can keep you in work for a thousand years, and scaring away Arctic Explorers from the North Pole is much more important than scaring away crows from corn. Why, if they found the Pole, there wouldn’t be a piece an inch long left in a week’s time, and the earth would cave in like an apple without a core! They would whittle it all to pieces, and carry it away in their pockets for souvenirs. Come along; I am in a hurry.”

“I will go on two conditions,” said Jimmy. “First, I want to make a present to Aunt Hannah and Betsey, next Christmas.”

“You shall make them any present you choose. What else?”

“I want some way provided to scare the crows out of the corn next summer, while I am away,” said Jimmy.

“That is easily managed,” said Santa Claus. “Just wait a minute.”

Santa took his stylographic pen out of his pocket, went with his lantern close to one of the fence-posts, and wrote these words upon it:

NOTICE TO CROWS

Whichever crow shall hereafter hop, fly, or flop into this field during the absence of Jimmy Scarecrow, and therefrom purloin, steal, or abstract corn, shall be instantly, in a twinkling and a trice, turned snow-white, and be ever after a disgrace, a byword and a reproach to his whole race.

Per order of Santa Claus.

“The corn will be safe now,” said Santa Claus, “get in.” Jimmy got into the sledge and they flew away over the fields, out of sight, with merry halloos and a great clamor of bells.

The next morning there was much surprise at the farmhouse, when Aunt Hannah and Betsey looked out of the window and the Scarecrow was not in the field holding out his stiff arms over the corn stubble. Betsey had told Aunt Hannah she had given away the crazy quilt and the doll-baby, but had been scolded very little.

“You must not give away anything of yours again without asking permission,” said Aunt Hannah. “And you have no right to give anything of mine, even if you know I don’t want it. Now both my pretty quilt and your beautiful doll-baby are spoiled.”

That was all Aunt Hannah had said. She thought she would send John after the quilt and the doll-baby next morning as soon as it was light.

But Jimmy Scarecrow was gone, and the crazy quilt and the doll-baby with him. John, the servant-man, searched everywhere, but not a trace of them could he find. “They must have all blown away, mum,” he said to Aunt Hannah.

“We shall have to have another scarecrow next summer,” said she.

But the next summer there was no need of a scarecrow, for not a crow came past the fence-post on which Santa Claus had written his notice to crows. The cornfield was never so beautiful, and not a single grain was stolen by a crow, and everybody wondered at it, for they could not read the crow-language in which Santa had written.

“It is a great mystery to me why the crows don’t come into our cornfield, when there is no scarecrow,” said Aunt Hannah.

But she had a still greater mystery to solve when Christmas came round again. Then she and Betsey had each a strange present. They found them in the sitting-room on Christmas morning. Aunt Hannah’s present was her old crazy quilt, remodelled, with every piece cut square and true, and matched exactly to its neighbor.

“Why, it’s my old crazy quilt, but it isn’t crazy now!” cried Aunt Hannah, and her very spectacles seemed to glisten with amazement.

Betsey’s present was her doll-baby of the Christmas before; but the doll was a year older. She had grown an inch, and could walk and say, “mamma,” and “how do?” She was changed a good deal, but Betsey knew her at once. “It’s my doll-baby!” she cried, and snatched her up and kissed her.

But neither Aunt Hannah nor Betsey ever knew that the quilt and the doll were Jimmy Scarecrow’s Christmas presents to them.

—Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
(1852–1930)

Little Roger’s Night
in the Church



The boys and girls had fastened the last sprig of holly upon the walls, and then gone to their homes, leaving the old church silent and deserted. The sun had set in a sky clear and yellow as topaz. Christmas eve had fairly come, and now the moon was rising, a full moon, and all the world looked white in the silver light. Every bough of every tree sparkled with a delicate coating of frost, the pines and cedars were great shapes of dazzling snow, even the ivy on the gothic tower hung a glittering arabesque on the gray wall. Never was there a lovelier night.

That light that you see yonder comes from the window of old Andrew, the sexton, and inside sits his grandson, little Roger, eating his supper of porridge. The kitchen is in apple-pie order, chairs and tables have been scrubbed as white as snow, the tins on the dresser shine like silver, the hearth is swept clean, and Grandfather’s chair is drawn into the warmest comer. Grandfather is not sitting in it though; he has gone to the church to put the fire in order for the night, lock up the doors, and make all safe.

Grandmother, in her clean stuff gown and apron, is mounted upon a chair to stick a twig of holly on the tall clock in the corner. And now, as she turns round, what a pleasant face she shows us, does she not? Old and wrinkled, to be sure, but so good-natured and gentle that she is prettier than many a young girl even now. Is it any wonder that little Roger there is so fond of her?

Now another bit of holly is wanted on the chimney-piece; and it is while putting this up that the dear old dame gives sign that something has gone wrong. “Ts, ts, ts – dearie me!”

“What’s the matter. Granny?” said Roger.

“Why, Roger,” replied Granny, carefully dismounting from her chair, “look here. Grandfather has gone off and forgot his keys. He took ’em from the door this morning, because last year some of the young folks let ’em drop in the snow, and had a sad time hunting for them. He knew they would be in and out all day, so he just opened the door and brought the keys home. Dearie me! it’s a cold night for old bones to be out of doors. Would’st be a-feared, little ’un, to run up with them?”

“Not a bit,” said Roger, stoutly, as he crammed the last spoonful of porridge in his mouth, and seized hat and mittens from the table. “I’ll take ’em down in a minute. Granny, and then run home. Mother’ll want me in the morning, likely.”

For Roger’s parents lived in a cottage near the old people, and the boy often said that he had two homes, and belonged half in one and half in the other, and the small press-bed in Granny’s loft seemed as much his own as the cot in the comer of his mother’s sleeping-room, and was occupied almost as often. So, after a good-night hug from Granny, off he ran. The church was near, and the moon light as day, so he never thought of being afraid, not even when, as he brushed by the dark tower, something stirred overhead, and a long, melancholy cry came shuddering from the ivy. Roger knew the owls in the belfry well, and now he called out to them cheerily: “To-whit-whit-whoo!”

“Whoo-whoo-whit!” answered the owls, startled by the cry. Roger could hear them fluttering in the nest.

The church-door stood ajar, and he peeped in. The glow from the open door of the stove showed Grandfather’s figure, red and warm, stooping to cover the fire with ashes for the night. He was so busy he never knew the boy was there till he got close to him and jingled the keys in his ear; but after one start he laughed, well pleased.

“I but just missed them,” he said. “Thou’rt a good boy to fetch them up. Art going home with me tonight?”

“No, I’m to sleep at my mother’s,” said Roger, “but I’ll wait and walk with you. Grandfather.” So he slipped into a pew, and sat down till the work should be finished, and they ready to go; and as he looked up he saw all at once how beautiful the old church was looking.

The moon outside was streaming in so brightly, that you hardly missed the sun. Roger could see distinctly way up to the carved beams of the roof, and trace the figures on the great arched windows over the altar, whose colors had so often dazzled him on Sundays. The colors were soft and dim now, but the figures were there. Roger could see them plainly – the sitting figure of the Lord Christ, with St. Matthew and two other apostles, and the fisher-lad with his basket of fish. He had often asked Granny to read him the story.

That gleam at the further end of the nave came from the organ-loft, where the moonbeams had found out the great brass pipes, and were playing all manner of tricks with them. Almost the red of the holly-berries could be seen, and every pointed ivy-leaf and spike of evergreen in the wreathings of the windows stood out in bold relief against the shining panes. With this beautiful whiteness the red glow of the fire blended, and flooded the chancel with a lovely pink light, in which shone the gilded letters on the commandment-tables, and the brasses of the tablets on the walls. It was a wonderful thing to see.

To study the roof better, Roger thought he would lie flat on the cushion awhile, and look straight up. So he arranged himself comfortably, and somehow – it will happen, even when we are full of enjoyment and pleasure – his eyes shut, and the first thing he knew he was rubbing them open again, only a minute afterward, as it seemed; but Grandfather was gone. There was the stove closed for the night, and the great door at the end of the aisle was shut. He jumped up in a fright, as you can imagine, and ran to see, and shook it hard. No: it was locked, and poor Roger was fastened in for the night.

He understood it all in a moment. The tall pew had hidden him from sight. Grandfather had thought him gone home; his mother would never doubt that he was safe at the other cottage; no one would miss him, and there was no chance of being let out before morning.

He was only six years old, so no wonder that at first he felt choked and frightened, and inclined to cry. But he was a brave lad, and that idea soon left him. He began to think that he was not badly off, after all – the church was warm, the pew-cushion as soft as his bed. No one could get in to harm him. In fact, after the first moment, there was something so exciting and adventurous in the idea of spending the night in such a place, that he was almost glad the accident had happened. So he went back to the pew, and tried to go to sleep again.

That was not so easy. Did you ever get thoroughly waked up in the night by a sudden fright? Do you remember how your eyes wouldn’t stay shut afterward, even when you closed them tight, but jerked open almost against your will, as if a string was fastened to them and someone was twitching it? Just so poor Roger felt. He lay still and kept himself quiet for a moment, and then some little noise would come, and his heart beat and his eyes be wide open in a minute. It was a coal dropping from the fire, or a slight crack on the frosty panes: once a little mouse crept out from the chancel, glaring shyly about with his bright eyes, nibbled a moment at a leaf on the carpet and then crept back again. No other living thing disturbed the quiet.

He had heard the clock strike eleven a long time since, and was lying with eyes half shut, gazing at the red fire-grate, and feeling at last a little drowsy, when all at once a strange rush and thrill seemed to come to him in the air, like a cool clear wind blowing through the church, and in one minute he was wide awake and sitting upright, with ears strained to catch some sound afar off. It was too distant and faint for ordinary sense, but a new and sharper power of hearing seemed given him. Little voices were speaking high in the air, outside the church – very odd ones, like birds’ notes, and yet the words were plain. He listened and listened, and made out at last that it was the owls in the tower talking together.

“Hoo, hoo, why don’t you lie still there?” said one.

“Whit-whoo-whit,” said the other, “I can’t. I know what is coming too well for that.”

“What is coming – what, what?” said two voices together.

“Ah! you’ll see soon,” replied the first. “The elves are coming, the hateful Christmas elves. You’ll not get a wink of sleep tonight.”

“Why not? What will they do to us?” chirped the young ones.

“You’ll see,” hooted the old owl. “You’ll see! They’ll pull your tails, and tickle your feathers, and prick you with thorns. I know them, the tricksy, troublesome things! I’ve been here many a long year. You were only hatched last summer. To-whoo, to-whoo!”

Just at this moment the church-clock began to strike twelve. At the first clang the owls ceased to hoot, and Roger listened to the deep notes, almost awe-struck, as they sounded one by one. He knew the voice of the clock well, but it never before sounded so loud or so solemn: five – six – seven – eight – nine – ten – eleven – twelve. It was Christmas Day.

As the last echo died away, a new sound took its place. From afar off came the babble of tiny voices drawing nearer. Anything so gay and charming was never dreamed of before – half a laugh, half a song, the tones blended into an enchanting peal, like bells on a frolic. Above the old tower the sounds clustered and increased – then a long, distressed cry came from the owl, and a bubbling laugh floated in on the wind. Roger could not stand it. Wild to see, he flew to the window, and tried to stretch his neck in such a way as to catch what was going on above; but it was a vain attempt, and just then the church-bells began to ring all together, a chime, a Christmas chime, only the sounds were infinitely small, as if baby hands had laid hold on the ropes. But his sharpened senses brought every note and change to Roger’s ears, and they were so merry and so lovely that he felt he must get nearer or die; and almost before he knew it he was climbing the dark belfry-stairs as fast as his feet could carry him, never thinking of fear or darkness, only of the elfin bells which were pealing overhead.

Up, up, through the long slits in the tower the moon could be seen sailing in the cold. clear blue. Higher, higher – at last he gained the belfry. There hung the four great bells, but nobody was pulling at their heavy ropes. On each iron tongue was perched a fay; on the chains which suspended them clustered others, all keeping time by the swaying of their bodies as they swung to and fro, just grazing either side, and bringing forth a clear, delicate stroke, sweet as laughter – just loud enough for fairy ears.

Through the windows the crowd of floating fays could be seen whirling about in the moonlight like glittering gossamer. They floated in and out of the tower, they mounted the great bells and sat atop in swarms, they chased and pushed each other, playing all sorts of pranks. Below, others were attacking the owl’s nest Roger could hear their hoots and grunts and the gleeful laughter of the elves. The moon made the tower light as noon; all the time the elves sang or talked – which, he could not tell; there were words, but all so blent with laughs and mirthful trills that it was nothing less than music.

To and fro, to and fro, keeping time to a fairy rhythm, they swayed in unison with the tiny peal they rang. Little quarrels arose. Once Roger watched an elf trying to mount the clapper, and whenever he neared the top a mischievous comrade pushed him off again. Then the elf pouted, and, flying away, he returned with a holly-leaf. Small as it was, it curled over his head like a huge umbrella. With the spiky point he slyly pricked the elf above; and he, taken by surprise, lost his hold, and came tumbling down, while the other danced for glee and clapped his hands mockingly. Pretty soon, however, all was made up again – they kissed and were friends – and Roger saw them perched opposite each other, and moving to and fro like children in a swing.

How long the pretty sight lasted he could not tell. So fearful was he of marring the sport that he never stirred a finger; but all at once there came a strain of music in the air, solemn, and sweeter than ever mortal heard before. In a moment the elves left their sports; they clustered like bees together in the window, and then flew from the tower in one sparkling drift, and were gone, leaving Roger alone, and the owls hooting below in the ivy.

And then he felt afraid – which he had not been as long as the fays were there – and down he ran in a fright over the stone steps of the stairs, and entered the church again. The red glow of the fire was grateful to him, for he was shivering with cold and excitement; but hardly had he regained his old seat, when, lo! a great marvel came to pass.

The wide window over the altar swung open, and a train of angels slowly floated through. How he knew them to be angels, Roger could not have told; but that they were, he was sure – Christmas angels, with faces of calm, glorious beauty, and robes as white as snow. Over the altar they hovered, and a wonderful song rose and filled the church – no bird’s strain was ever half so sweet. The words were few, but again and again and again they came: “Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, good-will to men!”

Roger knew the oft-repeated words – they were those of the great evergreen motto which overarched the chancel; but I think he never forgot the beautiful meaning they seemed to bear as the angels sang them over and over. It was so wondrous sweet that he could not feel afraid – he could only gaze and gaze, and hold his breath lest he should lose a note.

And the song rang on, clear and triumphant, even as the white-robed choir parted and floated like soft summer clouds to and fro in the church, pausing ever and anon as in blessing. They touched the leaves of the Christmas green as they passed; they hung over the organ and brushed the keys with their wings; a long time they clustered above the benches of the poor, as if to leave a fragrance in the air; and then they rested before a tablet which had been put up but a few months before, and which bore the name of the rector’s eldest son, and the dates of his birth and death. Roger had been told of this brave lad, and how he had lost his life in plunging from his ship to save the drowning child of an emigrant; and now the angel-song seemed sweeter than ever, as over and again they chanted, “Good-will to men – good-will to men.”

At last one of the white-winged ones left the others, and hovered awhile above the Squire’s pew, near which our little boy was hidden. A prayer-book lay open on the rail, and over this the fair angel bent as in benediction. A girl had sat there once – the Squire’s only daughter. Roger remembered her well, and the mourning of the whole parish when, only a twelvemonth ago, the lovely child had been buried from their sight; and now, as he timidly glanced into the glorious face above him, it seemed to him to have the same look, only so ineffably beautiful that he closed his dazzled eyes to shut out the vision and the light that shone from the white wings – only for a moment, then he opened them again, as a gentle rustling filled the air, and he saw the bending figure stoop, leave a kiss or a blessing on the pages of the open book, and then glide away with the others. Again the group hovered above the altar – louder and clearer rose the triumphant strain, and, noiseless as a cloud, the snowy train floated to the window. For one moment their figures could be seen against the sky, then the song died away – they were gone, and Roger saw them no more.

And now the light of dawn began to creep into the windows, twittering sounds showed the birds awakening outside, and a pink streak appeared in the sky. Too much rapt by his vision to feel impatience, the boy sat and waited; and by and by a jingling in the lock showed Grandfather at hand – the door opened, and he came in.

You can guess his surprise when his little grandson flew to meet him with his wonderful story. As for the story, he pooh-poohed that, – sleeping in such a strange place might well bring about a queer dream, he said; but he took the boy home to the cottage, and Granny, full of wonderment and sympathy, speedily prepared a breakfast for her darling after his adventure. But, even with his mouth full of scalding bread and milk, Roger would go on telling of angels and fairies, and the owls’ talk in their nest, till both grandparents began to think him bewitched.

Perhaps he was, for to this day he persists in the story. And though the villagers that morning exclaimed that at no time had their old church, in its Christmas dress, looked so beautiful before, and though the organ sent forth a rarer, sweeter music than fingers had ever drawn from it, still nobody believed a word of it. And though the poor mother, kneeling in her lonely pew, and missing her darling from beside her, felt a strange peace and patience enter her heart, and came away calmed and blessed, still no one listened to the story. “Roger had dreamed it all,” they said; and perhaps he had – only the owls knew.

—Susan Coolidge
[Sarah Chauncey Woolsey]
(1835–1905)

The Elves
and the Shoemaker



A shoemaker, by no fault of his own, had become so poor that at last he had nothing left but leather for one pair of shoes. So in the evening, he cut out the shoes which he wished to begin to make the next morning. Having a clear conscience, he went to bed peacefully, commended himself to God, and fell asleep.

In the morning, after he had said his prayers, and was just going to sit down to work, the two shoes stood quite finished on his table. He was astounded, and knew not what to say to it. He took the shoes in his hands to observe them closer, and they were so neatly made that there was not one bad stitch in them; all was so neat and true, that it was quite a masterpiece.

Soon after, a buyer came in, and as the shoes pleased him so well, he paid more for them than was customary, and, with the money, the shoemaker was able to purchase leather for two pairs of shoes.

He cut them out that night, intending to continue his work the next morning with good cheer. But he had no need to do so, for, when he got up, they were already made. Soon in came buyers who wanted the shoes, and the shoemaker soon had enough to buy leather for four pairs of shoes.

He cut out the work again that night, and the following morning, too, he found the four pairs were made. And so it continued — what he cut out in the evening was finished by the morning, so that he soon had his honest independence again, and at last became a wealthy man.

Now one evening not long before Christmas, when the man had been cutting out, he said to his wife, before going to bed, “What think you if we were to stay up to-night to see who it is that lends us this helping hand?”

The wife liked the idea, and lighted a candle, and then they hid themselves in a corner of the room, behind some clothes which were hanging up there, and watched.

When it was midnight, two little naked elves came, sat down by the shoemaker’s table, took all the work which was cut out before them and began to stitch, and sew, and hammer so skilfully and so quickly with their little fingers that the shoemaker could not turn away his eyes for astonishment. They did not stop until all was done and stood finished on the table; and then they ran quickly away.

Next morning the wife said, “These little men have made us rich, and we really must show that we are grateful for it. They run about so, and have nothing on, and must be cold. I’ll tell you what: I will make them little shirts, and coats, and vests, and trousers, and knit both of them a pair of stockings; and you should make a pair of shoes for each of them.”

The thought pleased the good cobbler very much; and one night, when everything was ready, they laid their presents all together on the table instead of the unfinished work. Then they hid themselves to see what the little men would do.

At midnight they came bounding in, and wanted to get to work at once, but as they did not find any leather cut out, but only the pretty little articles of clothing, they were at first astonished, and then they showed intense delight. They dressed themselves with the greatest rapidity, putting the pretty clothes on, and singing,

“Now we are boys so fine to see,

Why should we longer cobblers be?”

Then they danced and skipped and leapt over chairs and benches. At last they danced out the door and away over the green.

From that time forth they came no more, but as long as the shoemaker lived all went well with him, and all his undertakings prospered.

—Jakob Ludwig Karl Grimm
(1785–1863)
—Wilhelm Karl Grimm
(1786–1859)

Christmasland



I.
WERNER AND ANNA

In the last house of the village, just where the big forest begins, lived a poor widow with her two children, Werner and Anna. The little that grew in her garden and on her single acre of ground, the milk of the one goat she owned, and the small sum of money she was able to earn, were just enough to support the small family.

Nor were the children allowed to be idle, but were obliged to help in every way possible. This they were glad to do, enjoying their work, which led them in all directions through the glorious forest. In early spring they gathered the yellow cowslips and the blue anemones to sell in the city, and later the fragrant lilies of the valley that grew in the beech wood. Then came the strawberries glistening red under the leaves, the blueberries and the coral-tinted bilberries growing in the moor, and beautiful mosses and lichens – all these the children cheerily gathered and sent to the city.

With the coming of the fall came new labor. Day after day the children went to the woods, picking up dry wood thrown down by the wind. This they carried home and stacked by the side of the hut. Nuts, too, were gathered, put in a bag, and hung in the chimney against Christmas time.

Ah, Christmas! That was a magic word, and at its sound the eyes of the children sparkled. And yet the great day brought them very little. A wee little tree with a few candles, some apples and nuts, and two ginger-bread men; under the tree for each one a warm article of clothing for the winter, and if times were very good, a cheap toy or a new slate – that was all. And yet from those little candles and the golden star at the top of the tree there came a glorious light that shed its rays throughout the year, a light that shone in the eyes of the children whenever the word Christmas was spoken.

Winter had now come, and one evening as they sat cozily about the stove, their mother told them a beautiful Christmas story. When she had finished, Werner, who had been looking very thoughtful, suddenly asked : “Mother, where does the Christmasman live?”

The mother answered, letting the fine thread slip through her fingers while her spinning wheel hummed a merry tune: “The Christmasman? Behind the forest in the mountains. But no one can find him. Who seeks him wanders about in vain, and the little birds in the trees hop from branch to branch and laugh at him. In the mountains the Christmasman has his gardens, his shops, and his mines. There his busy workmen labor day and night, making lovely Christmas things. In the gardens grow the silver and gold apples and nuts, and the most delicious fruits of marzipan, and in the shops are heaped up thousands and thousands of the most wonderful toys in the world. There are halls filled with beautiful dolls, clad in calico, in wool, in silk, and in velvet” – “Ah!” said little Anna, and her eyes shone – “and others again are filled with drums and swords and guns, cannon and toy soldiers” – “Oh!” cried little Werner, and his eyes sparkled.

This story impressed him greatly; he could not forget it, and he thought how happy he would be could he but find the way to this wonderland. Once he got as far as the mountains, and wandered about there a long time, but could see nothing but valleys and hills and trees. The brooks that ran by him murmured and babbled as brooks always do, but did not betray their secret; the woodpeckers hammered and pecked just as they did elsewhere in the woods and then flew away, and the squirrels that climbed nimbly up the trees were just like other squirrels that he had seen.

He longed for a glimpse of the wonderful Christmasland – if some one would only tell him how to find it, he would surely go. The people of whom he inquired the way laughed at him, and when he told his mother she too laughed, and bade him think no more about it; the story she had told him had been only a fairy tale.

But little Werner could not forget the story, though he did not speak of it again. Only to his little sister Anna did he at times confide his thoughts, and together they dreamed dreams and saw visions of that wondrous country Christmasland.

II.
THE LITTLE BIRD

One morning shortly before Christmas, Werner, with his ax on his shoulder, went alone into the forest, for the forester, who liked the well-behaved boy, had this year again permitted him to cut down a little pine tree for their Christmas Eve. The pretty, graceful little tree which the children had already selected, stood in rather a lonely spot, far out in the woods, sheltered by a kindly old beech. It was a beautiful mild winter day, and when Werner at last reached the spot he sat down on a tree-stump to rest.

Round about him all was still as in a lonely church; only a brooklet murmured softly, and from afar came the shrill cry of a jay. Again he dreamed of the wonderful Christmasland, and the longing to see its glories grew so strong that he cried aloud: “Oh, if only some one could show me the way to Christmasland!”

Then from the waves of the brook came clear sounds like rippling laughter, a wood mouse peeped from her house and laughed a wee little laugh, and from the top of the old beech tree came a stirring and a waving, as though she were shaking her head at such folly. But from the little pine tree which stood directly before him he suddenly heard a sweet, clear chirping; it was a blue titmouse, hopping gaily from branch to branch, incessantly crying: “I know! I know!”

“What do you know?” asked Werner.

The little bird threw herself backward from a branch, turning over in the air in the drollest way, then alighting again, cried: “I know the way! I know the way!”

“Then show me the way!” said Werner quickly.

Again the little bird began to chirp softly, but the boy understood everything. “You were good to me!” said she. “You protected my little children, my ten little children! I know the way! I’ll show you the way! Quick! Quick!”

And the little thing flew to the nearest bush, then farther, and Werner followed. At first he had comprehended but half of what the bird had said, but at last he remembered that it was a titmouse whose frightened cries had drawn him to the old beech tree last spring. There he saw a jay sitting before the hollow of the tree where the little bird had built her nest, about to seize the naked babies and devour them. The poor little mother was hovering about, trying to defend them, crying piteously. He picked up a stone and threw it so happily that the jay fell to the ground dead.

So now the little titmouse wished to show her gratitude. She kept flying before him from bush to bush toward the source of the brook, which came from the mountains. Soon the ground began to rise, and the brook at Werner’s feet babbled louder; then he came to an ascending valley which grew narrower and narrower, while the walls on both sides grew steeper.

At last, the brook suddenly disappeared behind a projecting rock, and Werner saw before him a smooth wall of stone, towering high and crowned with mighty pine trees. The little bird suddenly vanished, but away up in the distance her voice could be faintly heard, crying: “Soon! Soon!”

Werner sat down on a rock and examined the stone wall. It was smooth, had no crevices, and was covered with mosses and gay lichens; he could see nothing more. So he sat and waited. At last he heard a gentle fluttering above him and a hazel nut fell at his feet. “Take! Take!” cried the little bird. “Crack! Crack!”

Werner took the nut and looked at it. He could discover nothing peculiar about it, but when he shook it, it rattled as though something hard were inside. He cracked it and found a dainty golden key.

In the meantime the little bird had flown to the stone wall. Clinging to it with both delicate little feet, she began pecking away so busily among the lichens, that the pieces fairly flew. At last she cried: “Here! Here!”

Werner came near, and saw a small, silver-bound keyhole. The golden key fitted exactly into it, and when Werner turned it, a strange, fine, ringing sound came from the Stone wall, and a heavy door, that fitted as exactly into its frame as though it had been cut into the rock, swung slowly open. A warm bluish air came from the opening, and an odor of burning pine needles and of wax candles just blown out, was wafted toward him.

“Oh, how this smells of Christmas!” said little Werner.

The little bird cried: “Go in! Go in! Quick! Quick!”

Scarcely had Werner, who was just a little frightened, taken a few steps into the gloomy passage, when he felt a draft behind him, and suddenly it grew quite dark, for the door had again silently closed. Now indeed he began to lose courage, for to return was impossible, yet he saw that a faint heart would avail him little – so on he went, groping his way resolutely along the black passage.

III.
CHRISTMASLAND

Soon his path grew brighter and he stepped out into the strangest country he had ever seen. The air was warm, but not with the warmth of summer, but as it is in heated rooms, and fragrant with many sweet odors. No sun shone in the sky, yet everywhere was an even-tempered brightness. Of the country itself he saw but little, for behind him was the huge wall of rock through which he had entered, and round about him tall bushes bearing the queerest fruits obstructed the view.

As he walked along, lost in wonder, he came to a broad avenue that led to a distant building. Bordering this avenue on both sides were great apple trees, on which grew golden and silver apples. Old men who looked like gnomes, with their long gray beards, and pretty little children were busily engaged picking these apples and heaping them up in large baskets, many of which stood already filled to the brim with their glittering load.

No one paid any attention to little Werner, who, with growing astonishment, directed his steps toward the building in the background, a large castle, with towering steeples and gilded domes and roofs. On either side of the avenue lay large fields on which grew low plants. Here, too, every one was busy gathering and harvesting, and in the different fields, distinguished by different colors according to the plants they bore, he could see gay, dainty figures diligently loading little two-wheeled carts, drawn by gold-colored shaggy ponies.

As Werner approached the castle he noticed a fragrant odor of honey cake, growing stronger and stronger, and on looking more closely, he perceived that the entire castle was made of this delectable stuff. The foundation consisted of large blocks, the walls of smooth cakes, ornamented in the most enticing way with citron and almonds. Everywhere were exquisite reliefs of marzipan, the balustrades and galleries and balconies of sugar, the beautiful statues of chocolate standing in gilded niches, and the glittering, gay windows made of transparent bonbons – indeed, here was a castle good enough to eat! At the artistic entrance, the handle of the doorbell was of transparent sugar.

Werner took heart, and pulled with all his might. No bell rang, however, but a voice from within cried, “Kikeriki!” so loud and shrill that the frightened boy stepped hastily back. The cry was repeated again and again, like an echo growing fainter and fainter, losing itself in the interior of the building. Then there was silence. The door now opened softly and before him stood so strange a creature that had it not lived and moved, Werner would undoubtedly have taken it for a large jumping-jack.

“By leaf gold and honey cake!” said this merry person. “A visitor? Why, that is a most remarkable event!” And then, whether from pleasure or astonishment, he threw his limbs repeatedly up over his head, so that it was almost dreadful to see. Swinging his arms and legs back and forth, he asked: “Well, my boy, and what do you want?”

“Does the Christmasman live here?” asked little Werner.

“Certainly,” said the jumping-jack, “and his Honor is at home, but very busy, very busy.”

Then he asked the little fellow to follow him, moving along in a queer, sidelong manner, swinging his arms and legs incessantly. He led the way through an entrance hall whose walls were made of marzipan and whose ceiling was supported by pillars of polished chocolate, to a door, before which two gigantic nutcrackers in full uniform stood guard; told him to wait here, and disappeared.

The nutcrackers stared at Werner with their big eyes, then grinned at each other with an indescribable wooden grin, at which there was a funny sound as though they were laughing with their stomachs. Presently the jumping-jack returned, made a most beautiful sidelong bow, and said: “My gracious master begs you to enter.” Then the nutcrackers, drawing close together, suddenly presented their swords, and with their teeth beat a roll that was most extraordinary.

When little Werner stepped into the room he was greatly astonished, for the Christmasman did not look at all as he had imagined him, nor did he resemble the pictures he had seen of him. True, he had a beautiful long white beard, as was proper, but on his head was a blue, gold-embroidered skullcap, and he wore a dressing gown of yellow silk, and sat before a large book and wrote. But this dressing gown was covered with such wonderful embroidery that it was like a picture book. On it you could see soldiers and dolls and clowns, and all the animals of Noah’s ark, drums and fifes, violins, trumpets, swords and guns, flowers and cakes, and sun and moon and stars.

The Christmasman laid down his pen and said: “How did you get here, my boy?”

Werner answered: “The little bird showed me the way.”

“’Tis a hundred years since anyone has been here,” replied the Christmasman, “and now this little fellow succeeds in coming. Well, your reward shall be that you may see everything. I myself am too busy just now, but my daughter shall be your guide. Come, little Goldflame,” he cried, “we have a guest!”

Then in the next room there was a fluttering and a rustling, and in ran a beautiful little girl. She wore a dress of leaf-gold and she glittered and sparkled all over. On her head was a little crown of gold, and on its topmost tip was a gleaming flamelet.

“Why, how nice!” she said, and took little Werner by the hand, crying, “Come along, strange boy!” and ran with him from the room.

IV.
THE CHRISTMAS WAREHOUSE

They came to a large corridor where long rows of wooden horses stood tied – there were gray horses and brown horses, chestnut horses and black horses.

“You may choose one,” said little Goldflame.

Werner selected a beautiful shiny dapple-gray, and Goldflame mounted a coal-black steed. “Hoy!” she cried, and with a whir away rolled the little horses so fast that Werner’s hair flew, and the flame on the girl’s crown was wafted like a streamer in the air.

When they came to the door at the end of the corridor, she cried, “Holla!” It opened, and they rushed through into a big hall in the middle of which they halted. They dismounted, and little Goldflame said: “This is the hall of lead.”

Lining the walls to the ceiling were open cupboards filled with shelves on which stood, packed in boxes, countless armies of soldiers, hunters. shepherds, sleighing parties, menageries, and everything possible that could be made of lead. Little black-bearded dwarfs climbed busily up and down ladders, placing the boxes into carts which they rolled outside, where larger wagons waited to be loaded with the toys.

As soon as the dwarfs saw Werner and Goldflame they brought them two gold-brocaded easy-chairs, and Goldflame said: “The big parade is coming very soon.”

They sat down, and had barely waited half a minute, when from under one of the cupboards came a strange ringing music and the Prussian guard marched out, and filed by with martial strains. Here indeed were toy soldiers that delighted one’s heart! How the little fellows strutted and the dapper lieutenants saluted with their swords! Then came the white cuirassiers with their glittering armor, the red hussars of Potsdam, the lancers with their gleaming flags, the blue dragoons, and last of all the cannon. When these had passed, “Trari, trara!” sounded from under the cupboard; and deer, rabbits, and foxes burst forth, the yelping pack behind, and the hunters on horseback with huzza, crack of whip, and sounding of horns.

Then all at once something glistened in the air and fine snow began to fall. When the ground was white, a sleighing party with merry bells ringing came out and rushed by. The fronts of the sleighs were in the form of swans, lions, tigers, and dragons, and in the sleighs sat ladies and gentlemen in beautiful furs. In passing, they threw snowballs at Werner and at little Goldflame. But if you looked closely at one of these snowballs, you found a tiny bonbon wrapped in tissue paper.

The snow disappeared, and now with sweet bells ringing came shepherds and shepherdesses with their flocks, then pretty peasants with fruits and flowers, then gypsies, musicians, tinkers, rope walkers, horseback riders, and such vagrant folk. Last came Mr. Hagenbeck of Hamburg with his African menagerie of giraffes, elephants, rhinoceroses, hippopotamuses, zebras, and antelopes. The lions and panthers followed in cages on little wagons, and roared mightily, as though insulted at the indignities put upon them.

At the close of this jolly parade, both children again mounted their horses and rode on. What marvels were unfolded before little Werner’s eyes! The large hall filled with dolls, for which he did not particularly care and which he only wished Anna might see; the theater magazine where, at Goldflame’s request, a thousand theaters opened at the same time with a thousand different plays, making a terrible din; the tool-chest warehouse, the storeroom for the musical instruments; the wooden-animal magazine; the picture department; the paint-box warehouse; the hall of the wax candles; and so on.

He was quite tired out when at last they reached the great candy department. “Now let us eat,” said little Goldflame.

Immediately six little confectioner’s apprentices brought a table, set it, and served them with the most delicious dishes. Werner had never tasted such good things! There were Leipzig larks of marzipan filled with nut cream, sausages of quinces, ham made of rosy creamy sugar, pastry filled with strawberry jam, and all sorts of candied fruits. They had pineapple lemonade with vanilla cream to drink, and behind them stood the six little waiters, eager to serve, running to fill every order. For dessert they were to have, as Goldflame remarked, something quite superlatively fine – dry black bread and cheese. Such ordinary dishes were so rare in this country, and so difficult to obtain, that they were considered the greatest delicacies.

When they had finished eating, the wooden horses were again brought out, and Goldflame said, “Now we will visit the mines.” So mounting their excellent steeds, away they rode.

V.
THE MINES

They rode over fields on which grew the most exquisite fruits and vegetables, all of sugar or chocolate filled with cream; they galloped along stately avenues bordered with fruit trees, toward the mountains which lay before them. Some of these gleamed white as chalk; others looked dull and dark, almost black. But the tops of even the black mountains were as white as though snow-capped.

“Perhaps you think you see snow,” said little Goldflame. “But when it snows here, it only snows powdered sugar.”

Werner now saw before him a high, shining white rock on which hundreds of men were working. They rode quite close and dismounted. “This is the great sugar quarry,” said Goldflame. “This entire rock consists of the finest white colonial sugar.”

Quite near them they observed an entrance to a cave, and as they approached it several miners hurried toward them with torches and led the way. They penetrated deep into the mountain, whose walls shimmered and shone in the reflected torchlight. Presently they stepped into a magnificent chamber whose walls, covered with huge crystals of transparent rock candy, glittered and sparkled in the light of the torches.

“This is the large rock-candy cavern,” said little Goldflame. They went on and came to a place where the miners were knocking and hammering, and working new passages into the mountains.

“These men are looking for melted sugar, and when they find it, they scoop it out with huge spoons,” she said.

Suddenly, as they proceeded, they beheld mountains, no longer white and shining, but dull, dark brown, and smelling of vanilla. “We are now approaching the chocolate mines,” explained little Goldflame.

Here many people were at work tunneling into the mountains, for it was only in the interior that the best vanilla chocolate was found. They passed through great chambers supported here and there by single pillars left standing. When at last they again stepped into the open air, Werner noticed a roaring brook that came from a ravine in the mountains and rushed toward the valley, where it turned the mills that sawed the chocolate blocks into cakes.

“Would you like to have a drink?” said little Goldflame. “It tastes good; it is pure liqueur.”

Little Werner was so very thirsty after all the sweets he had eaten and seen, and from the brook came so fresh and enticing an odor, that he seized the cup eagerly which an obliging miner handed him, and emptied it at a single draft. But scarcely had he finished when the world began to turn about him in the queerest way – he saw two Goldflames, four Goldflames, a hundred Goldflames, glittering and gleaming before him, then flowing together into a shining sea of light, carrying away his senses – and he knew nothing more.

VI.
CONCLUSION

The first sound that Werner heard on awakening was the chirping of a titmouse. He was astonished to find himself sitting on a stump under the old beech tree with the little pine tree in front of him. The titmouse hopped from branch to branch and chirped, but Werner no longer understood what she said.

It suddenly occurred to him that it must be very late, that his mother had surely been anxiously waiting for him. But looking up at the sun he was astonished to find that scarcely a quarter of an hour had passed since he had left this spot.

He could not account for this mystery, but eager to relate his wonderful experiences to his mother and little Anna, he cut down the pine tree and hurried home with his burden as fast as he could.

When with shining eyes and breathless haste he had told them his story, his mother grew quite angry and told him not to dare fall asleep again in the woods in winter had the weather been colder it might have been his death. But afterwards she shook her head, saying to herself, “Where does the boy get all his strange fancies?”

Little Werner wept because his mother did not believe him, and went away, but Anna followed, eager to hear more. She never tired of hearing about Goldflame and the hall of dolls, and in the days that followed he had to tell her about them over and over again, until he was quite comforted.

One day they went to the woods together to look for the entrance to that wonderful country. But though they followed the brooklet they never found a place resembling in the least the description Werner had given, and he was so ashamed and embarrassed, he knew not what to say.

And so Christmas drew near. A heavy snow had been falling for two whole days, and the world was beautiful, wrapped in its glistening, white Christmas robe. Night was falling, and the children sat in their dark chamber, eagerly waiting, whispering together and listening to their mother who was walking back and forth in the brightly lighted Christmas room, arranging their poor little gifts.

Suddenly from afar, they heard the jingling of sleigh bells coming nearer and nearer, and a whip cracked merrily. Now the sleigh was quite close, now it stopped before the house; they could hear the horses stamping and the bells jingling softly when the animals turned their heads.

“The Christmasman! The Christmasman!” cried Werner.

They heard doors opening and a man’s voice speaking – then their mother called to them, “Come in, children; your uncle is here.”

Werner and Anna ran into the room and there stood a man in a great fur coat who held out his hands to them, saying, “Come to me, my dear children.” He kissed each one and said, “You shall come with me to the city and live with me in my large house. I will be a father to you and I will care for you.”

In the meantime a gigantic coachman with a fur cap, a long white beard, and a cloak with seven collars was bringing many large packages into the room. When these were afterwards opened they contained so many beautiful gifts that the people in that little house had a Christmas such as they had never had before!

Later, when Werner and Anna went to bed, he whispered to her very mysteriously, “Do you know who the coachman was with the fur cap, the long white beard, and the big cloak? That was the Christmasman! Indeed, I recognized him, and he looked at me and winked.”

But what had happened to the rich old uncle who lived alone, an unsociable miser, and who had never given his poor sister and her children a thought – what had happened to him to change him so?

In the night following the day on which Werner had visited the Christmasman, the uncle had had a strange dream:

A man with a blue velvet cap and a long white beard, wrapped in a golden robe, suddenly stood before him, looked at him with great, blue, penetrating eyes, then spoke slowly and impressively: “Konrad Borodin, have you a sister?” Fear overcame him so that he could not answer. Then the apparition gradually vanished, the eyes only gazing threateningly upon him. Three successive nights he had the same dream.

Every day a restlessness beyond description drove him from room to room of his dreary, empty house, and ever in his ear there sounded that deep, reproachful voice of his dream, saying, “Have you a sister?”

On the morning after the third night he could endure it no longer, but hurried to the city, where to the astonishment of all the people who had known him as a miser, he bought the loveliest things, ordered a sleigh, filled it with his purchases, and drove directly to his poor sister.

Little Werner received a good education, and grew to be a famous and highly respected man. He himself told me this story.

Heinrich Seidel
(1842–1906)

The Christmas Princess



In the olden times there lived a king who was worthy of the name. He loved his people, and his people loved him in return. His kingdom must have been large; at least it appears to be beyond doubt that it extended a good way in different directions, for it was called the Kingdom of the Four Orts, which, of course, as everybody knows, means that he had possessions north, south, east, and west.

It was not so large, however, but that he was able to manage it well for himself – that is to say, with certain help which I will tell you of. A year never passed without his visiting every part of his dominions and inquiring for himself into the affairs of his subjects. Perhaps – who can say? – the world was not so big in those days; doubtless, however that may have been, there were not so many folk living on it.

Many things were different in those times: many things existed which nowadays would be thought strange and incredible. Human beings knew much more than they do now about the other dwellers on the earth. For instance, it was no uncommon case to find learned men who were able to converse with animals quite as well as with each other. Fairies, of course, were often visible to mortal eyes, and it was considered quite natural that they should interfere for good – sometimes, perhaps, for evil; as to that I cannot say – in human affairs. And good King Brave-Heart was especially favored in this way. For the help which, as I said, was his in governing his people was that of four very wise counselors indeed  – the four fairies of the North and the South, the East and the West.

These sisters were very beautiful as well as very wise. Though older than the world itself, they always looked young. They were very much attached to each other, though they seldom met, and it must be confessed that sometimes on such occasions there were stormy scenes, though they made it up afterward. And the advice they gave was always to be relied upon.

Now, King Brave-Heart was married. His wife was young and charming, and devotedly fond of him. But she was of a rather jealous and exacting disposition, and she had been much spoilt in her youth at her own home. She was sweet and loving, however, which makes up for a good deal, and always ready to take part in any scheme for the good of their people, provided it did not separate her from her husband.

They had no children, though they had been married for some years; but at last there came the hope of an heir, and the Queen’s delight was unbounded – nor was the King’s joy less than hers.

It was late autumn, or almost winter, when a great trouble befell the pretty Queen. The weather had grown suddenly cold, and a few snowflakes even had fallen before their time. But Queen Claribel only clapped her hands at the sight, for with the winter she hoped the baby would come, and she welcomed the signs of its approach on this account. The King, however, looked grave, and when the next morning the ground was all white, the trees and the bushes covered with silvery foliage, he looked graver still.

“Something is amiss,” he said. “The Fairy of the North must be on her way, and it is not yet time for her visit.”

And that very afternoon the snow fell again, more heavily than before, and the frost-wind whistled down the chimneys and burst open the doors and windows, and all the palace servants went hurrying and scurrying about to make great fires and hang up thick curtains and get everything in order for the cold season, which they had not expected so soon.

“It will not last,” said the King, quietly. “In a few days there will be milder weather again.” But, nevertheless, he still looked grave.

And early the next morning, as he was sitting with the Queen, who was beginning to feel a little frightened at the continuance of the storm, the double doors of her boudoir suddenly flew open, an icy blast filled the room, and a tall, white-shrouded figure stood before them.

“I have come to fetch you, Brave-Heart,” she said abruptly. “You are wanted, sorely wanted, in my part of the world. The people are starving: the season has been a poor one, and there has been bad faith. Some few powerful men have bought up the grain, which was already scarce, and refuse to let the poor folk have it. Nothing will save their lives or prevent sad suffering but your own immediate presence. Are you ready? You must have seen I was coming.”

She threw off her mantle as she spoke and sank on to a couch. Strong as she was, she seemed tired with the rate at which she had traveled, and the warm air of the room was oppressive to her. Her clear, beautiful features looked harassed; her gray eyes full of anxiety. For the moment she took no notice of the Queen.

“Are you ready?” she repeated.

“Yes, I am ready!” said Brave-Heart, as he rose to his feet.

But the Queen threw herself upon him, with bitter crying and reproaches. Would he leave her, and at such a time, a prey to all kinds of terrible anxiety? Then she turned to the fairy and upbraided her in unmeasured language. But the spirit of the North glanced at her with calm pity.

“Poor child!” she said, “I had almost forgotten you. The sights I have seen of late have been so terrible that they absorb me. Take courage, Claribel! Show yourself a queen. Think of the suffering mothers and their little ones whom your husband hastens to aid. All will be well with you, believe me. But you, too, must be brave and unselfish.”

It was no use. All she said but made the Queen more indignant. She would scarcely bid her husband farewell: she turned her back to the fairy with undignified petulance.

“Foolish child,” said the Northern spirit. “She will learn better some day.”

Then she gave all her attention to the matter she had come about, explaining to the King as they journeyed exactly the measures he must take and the difficulties to be overcome. But though the King had the greatest faith in her advice, and never doubted that it was his duty to obey, his heart was sore, as you can understand.

Things turned out as he had said. The severe weather disappeared again as if by magic, and some weeks of unusually mild days followed. And when the winter did set in for good at last, it was with no great rigor. From time to time news reached the palace of the King’s welfare. The tidings were cheering. His presence was effecting all that the fairy had hoped.

So Queen Claribel ought to have been happy. But she was determined not to be. She did nothing but cry and abuse the fairy, declaring that she would never see her dear Brave-Heart again, and that if ever her baby came she was sure it would not live, or that there would be something dreadful the matter with it.

“It is not fair,” she kept saying, “it is a shame that I should suffer so.”

And even when on Christmas Eve a beautiful little girl was born, as pretty and lively and healthy as could be wished, and even though the next day brought the announcement of the King’s immediate return, Claribel still nursed her resentment, though in the end it came to be directed entirely against the fairy. For when she saw Brave-Heart again, his tender affection and his delight in his little daughter made it impossible for her not to “forgive him,” as she expressed it, though she could not take any interest in his accounts of his visit to the north and all he had been able to do there.

A great feast was arranged in honor of the christening of the little Princess. All the grand people of the neighborhood were bidden to it, nor, you may be sure, did the good King forget the poorer folk. The four fairies were invited, for it was a matter of course that they should be the baby’s godmothers. And though the Queen would gladly have excluded the Northern fairy, she dared not even hint at such a thing.

But she resolved in her own mind to do all in her power to show that she was not the welcome fairy.

On such occasions, when human beings were honored by the presence of fairy visitors, these distinguished guests were naturally given precedence of all others, otherwise very certainly they would never have come again. Even among fairies themselves there are ranks and formalities, and the Queen well knew that the first place was due to the Northern spirit. But she gave instructions that this rule should be departed from, and the Snow fairy, as she was sometimes called, found herself placed at the King’s left hand, separated from him by her sister of the West, instead of next to him on the right, which seat, on the contrary, was occupied by the fairy of the South. She glanced round her calmly, but took no notice; and the King, imagining that by her own choice perhaps, she had chosen the unusual position, made no remark. And the feast progressed with the accustomed splendor and rejoicing.

But at the end, when the moment arrived at which the four godmothers were expected to state their gifts to the baby, the Queen’s spite could be no longer concealed.

“I request,” she exclaimed, “that for reasons well known to herself, to the King, and to myself, the Northern fairy’s gift may be the last in order instead of the first.”

The King started and grew pale. The beautiful, soft-voiced fairy of the South, in her glowing golden draperies, would fain have held back, for her affection for her sterner sister was largely mingled with awe. But the Snow fairy signed to her imperiously to speak.

“I bestow upon the Princess Sweet-Heart,” she said, half tremblingly, “the gift of great beauty.”

“And I,” said the spirit of the East, who came next, her red robes falling majestically around her, her dark hair lying smoothly in its thick masses on her broad, low forehead, “I give her great powers of intellect and intelligence.”

“And I,” said the Western fairy, with a bright, breezy flutter of her sea-green garments, “health – perfect health and strength of body, as my gift to the pretty child.”

“And you,” said the Queen bitterly, “you, cold-hearted fairy, who have done your best to kill me with misery, who came between my husband and me, making him neglect me as he never would have done but for your influence – what will you give my child? Will you do something to make amends for the suffering you caused? I would rather my pretty baby were dead than that she lived to endure what I have of late endured.”

“Life and death are not mine to bestow or to withhold,” said the Northern spirit calmly, as she drew her white garments more closely round her with a majestic air. “So your rash words, foolish woman, fortunately for you all, cannot touch the child. But something – much – I can do, and I will. She shall not know the suffering you dread for her with so cowardly a fear. She shall be what you choose to fancy I am. And instead of the name you have given her, she shall be known for what she is – Princess Ice-Heart.”

She turned to go, but the King on one hand, her three sisters on the other, started forward to detain her.

“Have pity!” exclaimed the former.

“Sister, bethink you,” said the latter; the Western fairy adding beseechingly, the tears springing in her blue eyes, which so quickly changed from bright to sad, “Say something to soften this hard fate. Undo it you cannot, I know. Or, at least, allow me to mitigate it if I can.”

The Snow fairy stopped; in truth, she was far from hard-hearted or remorseless, and already she was beginning to feel half sorry for what she had done.

“What would you propose?” she said coldly.

The fairy of the West threw back her auburn hair with a gesture of impatience.

“I would I knew!” she said. “’Tis a hard knot you have tied, my sister. For that which would mend the evil wrought seems to me impossible while the evil exists – the cure and the cessation of the disease are one. How could the heart of ice be melted till tender feelings warm it, and how can tender feelings find entrance into a feelingless heart? Alas! alas! I can but predict what sounds like a mockery of your trouble,” she went on, turning to the King, though indeed by this time she might have included the Queen in her sympathy, for Claribel stood, horrified at the result of her mad resentment, as pale as Brave-Heart himself. “Hearken!” and her expressive face, over which sunshine and showers were wont to chase each other as on an April day – for such, as all know, is the nature of the changeful, lovable spirit of the West – for once grew still and statue-like, while her blue eyes pierced far into the distance. “The day on which the Princess of the Icy Heart shall shed a tear, that heart shall melt – but then only.”

The Northern fairy murmured something under her breath, but what the words were no one heard, for it was not many that dared stand near to her, so terribly cold was her presence. The graceful spirit of the South fluttered her golden locks, and with a little sigh drew her radiant mantle round her, and kissed her hand in farewell, while the thoughtful-eyed, mysterious Eastern fairy linked her arm in that of her Western sister, and whispered that the solution of the problem should have her most earnest study. And the green-robed spirit tried to smile through her tears in farewell as she suffered herself to be led away.

So the four strange guests departed; but their absence was not followed by the usual outburst of unconstrained festivity. On the contrary, a sense of sorrow and dread hung over all who remained, and before long everyone not immediately connected with the palace respectfully but silently withdrew, leaving the King and Queen to their mysterious sorrow.

Claribel flew to the baby’s cradle. The little Princess was sleeping soundly; she looked rosy and content – a picture of health. Her mother called eagerly to the King.

“She seems just as usual,” she exclaimed. “Perhaps – oh! perhaps after all I have done no harm.”

For, strange to say, her resentment against the Northern fairy had died away. She now felt nothing but shame and regret for her own wild temper. “Perhaps,” she went on, “it was but to try me, to teach me a lesson, that the Snow fairy uttered those terrible words.”

Brave-Heart pitied his wife deeply, but he shook his head.

“I dare not comfort you with any such hopes,” he said, “my poor Claribel. The fairy is true – true as steel – if you could but have trusted her! Had you seen her, as I have done – full of tenderest pity for suffering – you could never have so maligned her.”

Claribel did not answer, but her tears dropped on the baby’s face. The little Princess seemed annoyed by them. She put up her tiny hand and, with a fretful expression, brushed them off.

And that very evening the certainty came.

The head nurse sent for the Queen while she was undressing the child, and the mother hastened to the nursery. The attendants were standing round in the greatest anxiety, for, though the baby looked quite well otherwise, there was the strangest coldness over her left side, in the region of the heart. The skin looked perfectly colorless, and the soft cambric and still softer flannel of the finest which had covered the spot were stiff, as if they had been exposed to a winter night’s frost.

“Alas!” exclaimed Claribel, but that was all. It was no use sending for doctors – no use doing anything. Her own delicate hand when she laid it on the baby’s heart was, as it were, blistered with cold. The next morning she found it covered with chilblains.

But the baby did not mind. She flourished amazingly, heart or no heart. She was perfectly healthy, ate well, slept well, and soon gave signs of unusual intelligence. She was seldom put out, but when angry she expressed her feelings by loud roars and screams, though with never a tear! At first this did not seem strange, as no infant sheds tears during the earliest weeks of its life. But when she grew to six months old, then to a year, then to two and three, and was near her fourth birthday without ever crying, it became plain that the prediction was indeed to be fulfilled.

And the name “Ice-Heart” clung to her. In spite of all her royal parents’ commands to the contrary, “Princess Ice-Heart” she was called far and near. It seemed as if people could not help it. “Sweet-Heart we cannot name her, for sweet she is not,” was murmured by all who came in contact with her.

And it was true. Sweet she certainly was not. She was beautiful and healthy and intelligent, but she had no feeling. In some ways she gave little trouble. Her temper, though occasionally violent, was, as a rule, placid; she seemed contented in almost all circumstances. When her good old nurse died, she remarked coolly that she hoped her new attendant would dress her hair more becomingly; when King Brave-Heart started on some of his distant journeys she bade him good-bye with a smile, observing that if he never came home again it would be rather amusing, as she would then reign instead of him, and when she saw her mother break into sobs at her unnatural speech she stared at her in blank astonishment.

And so things went on until Ice-Heart reached her seventeenth year. By this time she was, as regarded her outward appearance, as beautiful as the fondest of parents could desire; she was also exceedingly strong and healthy, and the powers of her mind were unusual. Her education had been carefully directed, and she had learnt with ease and interest. She could speak in several languages, her paintings were worthy of admiration, as they were skillful and well executed; she could play with brilliancy on various instruments. She had also been taught to sing, but her voice was metallic and unpleasing. But she could discuss scientific and philosophical subjects with the sages of her father’s kingdom like one of themselves.

And besides all this care bestowed upon her training, no stone had been left unturned in hopes of awakening in the unfortunate girl some affection or emotion. Every day the most soul-stirring poetry was read aloud to her by the greatest elocutionists, the most exciting and moving dramas were enacted before her; she was taken to visit the poor of the city in their pitiable homes; she was encouraged to see sad sights from which most soft-hearted maidens would instinctively flee. But all was in vain. She would express interest and ask intelligent questions with calm, unmoved features and dry eyes. Even music, from which much had been hoped, was powerless to move her to aught but admiration of the performers’ skill or curiosity as to the construction of their instruments. There was but one peculiarity about her, which sometimes, though they could not have explained why, seemed to Ice-Heart’s unhappy parents to hint at some shadowy hope. The sight of tears was evidently disagreeable to her. More certainly than anything else did the signs of weeping arouse one of her rare fits of anger – so much so that now and then, for days together, the poor Queen dared not come near her child, and tears were to her a frequent relief from her lifelong regrets.

So beautiful and wealthy and accomplished a maiden was naturally not without suitors; and from this direction, too, at first, Queen Claribel trusted fondly that cure might come.

“If she could but fall in love,” she said, the first time the idea struck her.

“My poor dear!” replied the King, “to see, you must have eyes; to love, you must have a heart.”

“But a heart she has,” persisted the mother. “It is only, as it were, asleep – frozen, like the winter stream which bursts forth again into ever fresh life and movement with the awaking spring.”

So lovers were invited, and lovers came and were made welcome by the dozen. Lovers of every description – rich and poor, old and young, handsome and ugly – so long as they were of passable birth and fair character, King Brave-Heart was not too particular – in the forlorn hope that among them one fortunate wight might rouse some sentiment in the lovely statue he desired to win. But all in vain. Each prince, or duke, or simple knight, duly instructed in the sad case, did his best: one would try poetry, another his lute, a third sighs and appeals, a fourth, imagining he had made some way, would attempt the bold stroke of telling Ice-Heart that unless she could respond to his adoration he would drown himself. She only smiled, and begged him to allow her to witness the performance – she had never seen anyone drown. So, one by one, the troupe of aspirants – some in disgust, some in strange fear, some in annoyance – took their departure, preferring a more ordinary spouse than the bewitched though beautiful Princess.

And she saw them go with calmness, though, in one or two cases she had replied to her parents that she had no objection to marry Prince So-and-so, or Count Such-another, if they desired it – it would be rather agreeable to have a husband if he gave her plenty of presents and did all she asked. “Though a sighing and moaning lover, or a man who is always twiddling a fiddle or making verses I could not stand,” she would add contemptuously.

So King Brave-Heart thought it best to try no such experiment. And in future no gentleman was allowed to present himself except with the understanding that he alone who should succeed in making Princess Ice-Heart shed a tear would be accepted as her betrothed.

This proclamation diminished at once the number of suitors. Indeed, after one or two candidates had failed, no more appeared – so well did it come to be known that the attempt was hopeless.

And for more than a year Princess Ice-Heart was left to herself – very much, apparently, to her satisfaction.

But all this time the mystic sisters were not idle or forgetful. Several of the aspirants to Ice-Heart’s hand had been chosen by them and conveyed to the neighborhood of the palace by their intermediacy from remote lands. And among these, one of the few who had found some slight favor in the maiden’s eyes was a special protégé of the Western fairy – the young and spirited Prince Francolin.

He was not one of the sighing or sentimental order of swains; he was full of life and adventure and brightness, and his heart was warm and generous. He admired the beautiful girl, but he pitied her still more, and this pity was the real motive which made him yield to the fairy’s proposal that he should try again.

“You pleased the poor child,” she said, when she arrived one day at the Prince’s home to talk over her new idea. “You made her smile by your liveliness and fun. For I was there when you little knew it. The girl has been overdosed with sentimentality and doleful strains. I believe we have been on a wrong track all this time.”

“What do you propose?” said Francolin, gravely, for he could be serious enough when seriousness was called for. “She did not actually dislike me, but that is the most that can be said; and however I may feel for her, however I may admire her beauty and intelligence, nothing would induce me to wed a bride who could not return my affection. Indeed, I could scarcely feel any for such a one.”

“Ah no! I agree with you entirely,” said the fairy. “But listen – my power is great in some ways. I am well versed in ordinary enchantment, and am most willing to employ my utmost skill for my unfortunate god-daughter.”

She then unfolded to him her scheme, and obtained his consent to it.

“Now is your time,” she said, in conclusion. “I hear on the best authority that Ice-Heart is feeling rather dull and bored at present. It is some time since she has had the variety of a new suitor, and she will welcome any distraction.”

And she proceeded to arrange all the details of her plan.

So it came to pass that very shortly after the conversation I have related there was great excitement in the capital city of the Kingdom of the Four Orts. After an interval of more than a year a new suitor had at length presented himself for the hand of the Princess Ice-Heart. Only the King and Queen received the news with melancholy indifference.

“He may try as the others have done,” said Brave-Heart to the messenger announcing the arrival of the stranger at the gates, accompanied by a magnificent retinue; “but it is useless.” For the poor King was fast losing all hope of his daughter’s case; he was growing aged and care-worn before his time.

“Does he know the terms attached to his acceptance?” inquired the Queen.

Yes, the messenger from the unknown candidate for the hand of the beautiful Ice-Heart had been expressly charged to say that the Prince Jocko – such was the new-comer’s name – was fully informed as to all particulars, and prepared to comply with the conditions.

The Princess’ parents smiled somewhat bitterly. They had no hope, but still they could not forbid the attempt.

“Prince Jocko?” said the King, “not a very prince-like name. However, it matters little.”

A few hours later the royal pair and their daughter, with all their attendants, in great state and ceremony, were awaiting their guest. And soon a blast of trumpets announced his approach. His retinue was indeed magnificent; horsemen in splendid uniforms, followed by a troop of white mules with negro riders in gorgeous attire, then musicians, succeeded by the Prince’s immediate attendants, defiled before the great marble steps in front of the palace, at the summit of which the King, with the Queen and Princess, was seated in state.

Ice-Heart clapped her hands.

“’Tis as good as a show,” she said, “but where is the Prince?”

As she said the word the cortége halted. A litter, with closely drawn curtains, drew up at the foot of the steps.

“Gracious!” exclaimed the Princess, “I hope he is not a molly-coddle;” but before there was time to say more the curtains of the litter were drawn aside, and in another moment an attendant had lifted out its occupant, who forthwith proceeded to ascend the steps.

The parents and their daughter stared at each other and gasped.

Prince Jocko was neither more nor less than a monkey!

But such a monkey as never before had been seen. He was more comical than words can express, and when at last he stood before them, and bowed to the ground, a three-cornered hat in his hand, his sword sticking straight out behind, his tail sweeping the ground, the effect was irresistible. King Brave-Heart turned his head aside. Queen Claribel smothered her face in her handkerchief. Princess Ice-Heart opened her pretty mouth wide and forgot to close it again, while a curious expression stole into her beautiful eyes.

Was it a trick?

No; Prince Jocko proceeded to speak.

He laid his little brown paw on his heart, bowed again, coughed, sneezed, and finally began an oration. If his appearance was too funny, his words and gestures were a hundred times more so. He rolled his eyes, he declaimed, he posed and pirouetted like a miniature dancing-master, and his little cracked voice rose higher and higher as his own fine words and expressions increased in eloquence.

And at last a sound – which never before had been heard, save faintly – made everyone start. The Princess was laughing as if she could no longer contain herself. Clear, ringing, merry laughter, which it did one’s heart good to hear. And on she went, laughing ever, till – she flung herself at her mother’s feet, the tears rolling down her cheeks.

“Oh, mamma!” she exclaimed, “I never—” and then she went off again.

But Prince Jocko suddenly grew silent. He stepped up to Ice-Heart and, respectfully raising her hand to his lips, gazed earnestly, beseechingly into her face, his own keen sharp eyes gradually growing larger and deeper in expression, till they assumed the pathetic, wistful look of appeal one often sees in those of a noble dog.

“Ah, Princess!” he murmured.

And Ice-Heart stopped laughing. She pressed her hand to her side.

“Father! mother!” she cried, “help me! help me! Am I dying? What has happened to me?” And, with a strange, long drawn sigh she sank fainting to the ground.

There was great excitement in the palace, hurrying to and fro, fetching of doctors, and much alarm. But when the Princess had been carried indoors and laid on a couch, she soon revived. And who can describe the feelings of the King and Queen when she turned to them with a smile such as they had never seen on her face before.

“Dearest father, dearest mother,” she said, “how I love you! Those strange warm drops that filled my eyes seem to have brought new life to me,” and as the Queen passed her arm round the maiden she felt no chill of cold such as used to thrill her with misery every time she embraced her child.

“Sweet-Heart! my own Sweet-Heart!” she whispered.

And the Princess whispered back, “Yes, call me by that name always.”

All was rejoicing when the wonderful news of the miraculous cure spread through the palace and the city. But still the parents’ hearts were sore, for was not the King’s word pledged that his daughter should marry him who had effected this happy change? And this was no other than Jocko, the monkey!

The Prince had disappeared at the moment that Ice-Heart fainted, and now with his retinue he was encamped outside the walls. All sorts of ideas occurred to the King.

“I cannot break my word,” he said, “but we might try to persuade the little monster to release me from it.”

But the Princess would not hear of this.

“No,” she said. “I owe him too deep a debt of gratitude to think of such a thing. And in his eyes I read more than I can put in words. No, dear father! you must summon him at once to be presented to our people as my affianced husband.”

So again the cortége of Prince Jocko made its way to the palace, and again the litter, with its closely drawn curtains, drew up at the marble steps. And Sweet-Heart stood, pale, but calm and smiling, to welcome her ridiculous betrothed.

But who is this that quickly mounts the stairs with firm and manly tread? Sweet-Heart nearly swooned again.

“Jocko?” she murmured. “Where is Jocko? Why, this is Prince Francolin!”

“Yes, dear child,” said a bright voice beside her; and, turning round, Sweet-Heart beheld the Western fairy, who, with her sisters, had suddenly arrived. “Yes, indeed! Francolin, and no other!”

The universal joy may be imagined. Even the grave fairy of the North smiled with pleasure and delight, and, as she kissed her pretty god-daughter, she took the girl’s hand and pressed it against her own heart.

“Never misjudge me, Sweet-Heart,” she whispered. “Cold as I seem to those who have not courage to approach me closely, my heart, under my icy mantle, is as warm as is now your own.”

And so it was.

Where can we get a better ending than the time-honored one? Francolin and Sweet-Heart were married, and lived happy ever after, and who knows but what, in the Kingdom of the Four Orts, they are living happily still?

If only we knew the way thither, we might see for ourselves if it is so.

—Mrs. Molesworth
[Mary Louisa Molesworth]
(1839–1921)

The Christmas Cuckoo



Once upon a time there stood in the midst of a bleak moor, in the north country, a certain village; all its inhabitants were poor, for their fields were barren, and they had little trade, but the poorest of them all were two brothers called Scrub and Spare, who followed the cobbler’s craft, and had but one stall between them. It was a hut built of clay and wattles. The door was low and always open, for there was no window. The roof did not entirely keep out the rain, and the only thing comfortable about it was a wide hearth, for which the brothers could never find wood enough to make a sufficient fire. There they worked in most brotherly friendship, though with little encouragement.

The people of that village were not extravagant in shoes, and better cobblers than Scrub and Spare might be found. Spiteful people said there were no shoes so bad that they would not be worse for their mending. Nevertheless Scrub and Spare managed to live between their own trade, a small barley field, and a cottage garden, till one unlucky day when a new cobbler arrived in the village. He had lived in the capital city of the kingdom, and, by his own account, cobbled for the queen and the princesses. His awls were sharp, his lasts were new; he set up his stall in a neat cottage with two windows. The villagers soon found out that one patch of his would outwear two of the brothers’. In short, all the mending left Scrub and Spare, and went to the new cobbler. The season had been wet and cold, their barley did not ripen well, and the cabbages never half closed in the garden. So the brothers were poor that winter, and when Christmas came they had nothing to feast on but a barley loaf, a piece of rusty bacon, and some small beer of their own brewing. Worse than that, the snow was very deep, and they could get no firewood. Their hut stood at the end of the village, beyond it spread the bleak moor, now all white and silent; but that moor had once been a forest, great roots of old trees were still to be found in it, loosened from the soil and laid bare by the winds and rains – one of these, a rough, gnarled log, lay hard by their door, the half of it above the snow, and Spare said to this brother—

“Shall we sit here cold on Christmas while the great root lies yonder? Let us chop it up for firewood, the work will make us warm.”

“No,” said Scrub; “it’s not right to chop wood on Christmas; besides, that root is too hard to be broken with any hatchet.”

“Hard or not we must have a fire,” replied Spare. “Come, brother, help me in with it. Poor as we are, there is nobody in the village will have such a yule log as ours.”

Scrub liked a little grandeur, and in hopes of having a fine yule log, both brothers strained and strove with all their might till, between pulling and pushing, the great old root was safe on the hearth, and beginning to crackle and blaze with the red embers. In high glee, the cobblers sat down to their beer and bacon. The door was shut, for there was nothing but cold moonlight and snow outside; but the hut, strewn with fir boughs, and ornamented with holly, looked cheerful as the ruddy blaze flared up and rejoiced their hearts.

“Long life and good fortune to ourselves brother!” said Spare. “I hope you will drink that toast, and may we never have a worse fire on Christmas – but what is that?”

Spare set down the drinking-horn, and the brothers listened astonished, for out of the blazing root they heard, “Cuckoo! cuckoo!” as plain as ever the spring-bird’s voice came over the moor on a May morning.

“It is something bad,” said Scrub, terribly frightened.

“May be not,” said Spare; and out of the deep hole at the side which the fire had not reached flew a large grey cuckoo, and lit on the table before them. Much as the cobblers had been surprised, they were still more so when it said—

“Good gentlemen, what season is this?”

“It’s Christmas,” said Spare.

“Then a merry Christmas to you!” said the cuckoo. “I went to sleep in the hollow of that old root one evening last summer, and never woke till the heat of your fire made me think it was summer again; but now since you have burned my lodging, let me stay in your hut till the spring comes round – I only want a hole to sleep in, and when I go on my travels next summer be assured I will bring you some present for your trouble.”

“Stay, and welcome,” said Spare, while Scrub sat wondering if it were something bad or not; “I’ll make you a good warm hole in the thatch. But you must be hungry after that long sleep? – here is a slice of barley bread. Come help us to keep Christmas!”

The cuckoo ate up the slice, drank water from the brown jug, for he would take no beer, and flew into a snug hole which Spare scooped for him in the thatch of the hut.

Scrub said he was afraid it wouldn’t be lucky; but as it slept on, and the days passed he forgot his fears. So the snow melted, the heavy rains came, the cold grew less, the days lengthened, and one sunny morning the brothers were awoke by the cuckoo shouting its own cry to let them know the spring had come.

“Now I’m going on my travels,” said the bird, “over the world to tell men of the spring. There is no country where trees bud or flowers bloom, that I will not cry in before the year goes round. Give me another slice of barley bread to keep me on my journey, and tell me what present I shall bring you at the twelve-month’s end.”

Scrub would have been angry with his brother for cutting so large a slice, their store of barley-meal being low; but his mind was occupied with what present would be most prudent to ask: at length a lucky thought struck him.

“Good master cuckoo,” said he, “if a great traveller who sees all the world like you, could know of any place where diamonds or pearls were to be found, one of a tolerable size brought in your beak would help such poor men as my brother and I to provide something better than barley bread for your next entertainment.”

“I know nothing of diamonds or pearls,” said the cuckoo; “they are in the hearts of rocks and the sands of rivers. My knowledge is only of that which grows on the earth. But there are two trees hard by the well that lies at the world’s end – one of them is called the golden tree, for its leaves are all of beaten gold: every winter they fall into the well with a sound like scattered coin, and I know not what becomes of them. As for the other, it is always green like a laurel. Some call it the wise, and some the merry tree. Its leaves never fall, but they that get one of them keep a blithe heart in spite of all misfortunes, and can make themselves as merry in a hut as in a palace.”

“Good master cuckoo, bring me a leaf off that tree!” cried Spare.

“Now, brother, don’t be a fool!” said Scrub! “think of the leaves of beaten gold! Dear master cuckoo, bring me one of them!”

Before another word could be spoken, the cuckoo had flown out of the open door, and was shouting its spring cry over moor and meadow. The brothers were poorer than ever that year; nobody would send them a single shoe to mend. The new cobbler said, in scorn, they should come to be his apprentices; and Scrub and Spare would have left the village but for their barley field, their cabbage garden, and a certain maid called Fairfeather, whom both the cobblers had courted for seven years without even knowing which she meant to favor.

Sometimes Fairfeather seemed inclined to Scrub, sometimes she smiled on Spare; but the brothers never disputed for that. They sowed their barley, planted their cabbage, and now that their trade was gone, worked in the rich villagers’ fields to make out a scanty living. So the seasons came and passed: spring, summer, harvest, and winter followed each other as they have done from the beginning. At the end of the latter, Scrub and Spare had grown so poor and ragged that Fairfeather thought them beneath her notice. Old neighbors forgot to invite them to wedding feasts or merrymaking; and they thought the cuckoo had forgotten them too, when at daybreak, on the first of April, they heard a hard beak knocking at their door, and a voice crying—

“Cuckoo! Cuckoo! Let me in with my presents.”

Spare ran to open the door, and in came the cuckoo, carrying on one side of his bill a golden leaf larger than that of any tree in the north country; and in the other, one like that of the common laurel, only it had a fresher green.

“Here,” it said, giving the gold to Scrub and the green to Spare, “it is a long carriage from the world’s end. Give me a slice of barley bread, for I must tell the north country that the spring has come.”

Scrub did not grudge the thickness of that slice, though it was cut from their last loaf. So much gold had never been in the cobbler’s hands before, and he could not help exulting over his brother.

“See the wisdom of my choice!” he said, holding up the large leaf of gold. “As for yours, as good might be plucked from any hedge. I wonder a sensible bird would carry the like so far.”

“Good master cobbler,” cried the cuckoo, finishing the slice, “your conclusions are more hasty than courteous. If your brother be disappointed this time, I go on the same journey every year, and for your hospitable entertainment will think it no trouble to bring each of you whichever leaf you desire.”

“Darling cuckoo!” cried Scrub, “bring me a golden one”; and Spare, looking up from the green leaf on which he gazed as though it were a crown jewel, said—

“Be sure to bring me one from the merry tree,” and away flew the cuckoo.

“This is the Feast of All Fools, and it ought to be your birthday,” said Scrub. “Did ever man fling away such an opportunity of getting rich! Much good your merry leaves will do in the midst of rags and poverty!” So he went on, but Spare laughed at him, and answered with quaint old proverbs concerning the cares that come with gold, till Scrub, at length getting angry, vowed his brother was not fit to live with a respectable man; and taking his lasts, his awls, and his golden leaf, he left the wattle hut, and went to tell the villagers.

They were astonished at the folly of Spare and charmed with Scrub’s good sense, particularly when he showed them the golden leaf, and told that the cuckoo would bring him one every spring. The new cobbler immediately took him into partnership; the greatest people sent him their shoes to mend; Fairfeather smiled graciously upon him, and in the course of that summer they were married, with a grand wedding feast, at which the whole village danced, except Spare, who was not invited, because the bride could not bear his low-mindedness, and his brother thought him a disgrace to the family.

Indeed, all who heard the story concluded that Spare must be mad, and nobody would associate with him but a lame tinker, a beggar boy, and a poor woman reputed to be a witch because she was old and ugly. As for Scrub, he established himself with Fairfeather in a cottage close by that of the new cobbler, and quite as fine. There he mended shoes to everybody’s satisfaction, had a scarlet coat for holidays, and a fat goose for dinner every wedding-day. Fairfeather, too, had a crimson gown and fine blue ribands; but neither she nor Scrub were content, for to buy this grandeur the golden leaf had to be broken and parted with piece by piece, so the last morsel was gone before the cuckoo came with another.

Spare lived on in the old hut, and worked in the cabbage garden. (Scrub had got the barley field because he was the eldest.) Every day his coat grew more ragged, and the hut more weather-beaten; but people remarked that he never looked sad nor sour; and the wonder was, that from the time they began to keep his company, the tinker grew kinder to the poor ass with which he travelled the country, the beggar-boy kept out of mischief, and the old woman was never cross to her cat or angry with the children.

Every first of April the cuckoo came tapping at their doors with the golden leaf to Scrub and the green to Spare. Fairfeather would have entertained him nobly with wheaten bread and honey, for she had some notion of persuading him to bring two gold leaves instead of one; but the cuckoo flew away to eat barley bread with Spare, saying he was not fit company for fine people, and liked the old hut where he slept so snugly from Christmas till Spring.

Scrub spent the golden leaves, and Spare kept the merry ones; and I know not how many years passed in this manner, when a certain great lord, who owned that village came to the neighborhood. His castle stood on the moor. It was ancient and strong, with high towers and a deep moat. All the country, as far as one could see from the highest turret, belonged to its lord; but he had not been there for twenty years, and would not have come then, only he was melancholy. The cause of his grief was that he had been prime-minister at court, and in high favor, till somebody told the crown-prince that he had spoken disrespectfully concerning the turning out of his royal highness’s toes, and the king that he did not lay on taxes enough, whereon the north country lord was turned out of office, and banished to his own estate. There he lived for some weeks in very bad temper. The servants said nothing would please him, and the villagers put on their worst clothes lest he should raise their rents; but one day in the harvest time his lordship chanced to meet Spare gathering watercresses at a meadow stream, and fell into talk with the cobbler.

How it was nobody could tell, but from the hour of that discourse the great lord cast away his melancholy: he forgot his lost office and his court enemies, the king’s taxes and the crown-prince’s toes, and went about with a noble train hunting, fishing, and making merry in his hall, where all travellers were entertained and all the poor were welcome. This strange story spread through the north country, and great company came to the cobbler’s hut – rich men who had lost their money, poor men who had lost their friends, beauties who had grown old, wits who had gone out of fashion, all came to talk with Spare, and whatever their troubles had been, all went home merry. The rich gave him presents, the poor gave him thanks. Spare’s coat ceased to be ragged, he had bacon with his cabbage, and the villagers began to think there was some sense in him.

By this time his fame had reached the capital city, and even the court. There were a great many discontented people there besides the king, who had lately fallen into ill-humor because a neighboring princess, with seven islands for her dowry, would not marry his eldest son. So a royal messenger was sent to Spare, with a velvet mantle, a diamond ring, and a command that he should repair to court immediately.

“Tomorrow is the first of April,” said Spare, “and I will go with you two hours after sunrise.”

The messenger lodged all night at the castle, and the cuckoo came at sunrise with the merry leaf.

“Court is a fine place,” he said when the cobbler told him he was going; “but I cannot come there, they would lay snares and catch me; so be careful of the leaves I have brought you, and give me a farewell slice of barley bread.”

Spare was sorry to part with the cuckoo, little as he had of his company; but he gave him a slice which would have broken Scrub’s heart in former times, it was so thick and large; and having sewed up the leaves in the lining of his leathern doublet, he set out with the messenger on his way to court.

His coming caused great surprise there. Everybody wondered what the king could see in such a common-looking man; but scarce had his majesty conversed with him half an hour, when the princess and her seven islands were forgotten, and orders given that a feast for all comers should be spread in the banquet hall. The princess of the blood, the great lords and ladies, ministers of state, and judges of the land, after that discoursed with Spare, and the more they talked the lighter grew their hearts, so that such changes had never been seen at court. The lords forgot their spites and the ladies their envies, the princes and ministers made friends among themselves, and the judges showed no favor.

As for Spare, he had a chamber assigned him in the palace, and a seat at the king’s table; one sent him rich robes and another costly jewels; but in the midst of all his grandeur he still wore the leathern doublet, which the palace servants thought remarkably mean. One day the king’s attention being drawn to it by the chief page, his majesty inquired why Spare didn’t give it to a beggar? But the cobbler answered:

“High and mighty monarch, this doublet was with me before silk and velvet came – I find it easier to wear than the court cut; moreover, it serves to keep me humble, by recalling the days when it was my holiday garment.”

The king thought this a wise speech, and commanded that no one should find fault with the leathern doublet. So things went, till tidings of his brother’s good fortune reached Scrub in the moorland cottage on another first of April, when the cuckoo came with two golden leaves, because he had none to carry for Spare.

“Think of that!” said Fairfeather. “Here we are spending our lives in this humdrum place, and Spare making his fortune at court with two or three paltry green leaves! What would they say to our golden ones? Let us pack up and make our way to the king’s palace; I’m sure he will make you a lord and me a lady of honor, not to speak of all the fine clothes and presents we shall have.”

Scrub thought this excellent reasoning, and their packing up began: but it was soon found that the cottage contained few things fit for carrying to court. Fairfeather could not think of her wooden bowls, spoons, and trenchers being seen there. Scrub considered his lasts and awls better left behind, as without them, he concluded, no one would suspect him of being a cobbler. So putting on their holiday clothes, Fairfeather took her looking-glass and Scrub his drinking-horn, which happened to have a very thin rim of silver, and each carrying a golden leaf carefully wrapped up that none might see it till they reached the palace, the pair set out in great expectation.

How far Scrub and Fairfeather journeyed I cannot say, but when the sun was high and warm at noon, they came into a wood both tired and hungry.

“If I had known it was so far to court,” said Scrub, “I would have brought the end of that barley loaf which we left in the cupboard.”

“Husband,” said Fairfeather, “you shouldn’t have such mean thoughts: how could one eat barley bread on the way to a palace? Let us rest ourselves under this tree, and look at our golden leaves to see if they are safe.” In looking at the leaves, and talking of their fine prospects, Scrub and Fairfeather did not perceive that a very thin old woman had slipped from behind the tree, with a long staff in her hand and a great wallet by her side.

“Noble lord and lady,” she said, “for I know ye are such by your voices, though my eyes are dim and my hearing none of the sharpest, will ye condescend to tell me where I may find some water to mix a bottle of mead which I carry in my wallet, because it is too strong for me?”

As the old woman spoke, she pulled out a large wooden bottle such as shepherds used in the ancient times, corked with leaves rolled together, and having a small wooden cup hanging from its handle.

“Perhaps ye will do me the favor to taste,” she said. “It is only made of the best honey. I have also cream cheese, and a wheaten loaf here, if such honorable persons as you would eat the like.”

Scrub and Fairfeather became very condescending after this speech. They were now sure that there must be some appearance of nobility about them; besides, they were very hungry, and having hastily wrapped up the golden leaves, they assured the old woman they were not at all proud, notwithstanding the lands and castles they had left behind them in the north country, and would willingly help to lighten the wallet. The old woman could scarcely be persuaded to sit down for pure humility, but at length she did, and before the wallet was half empty, Scrub and Fairfeather firmly believed that there must be something remarkably noble-looking about them. This was not entirely owing to her ingenious discourse. The old woman was a wood-witch; her name was Buttertongue; and all her time was spent in making mead, which, being boiled with curious herbs and spells, had the power of making all who drank it fall asleep and dream with their eyes open. She had two dwarfs of sons; one was named Spy, and the other Pounce. Wherever their mother went they were not far behind; and whoever tasted her mead was sure to be robbed by the dwarfs.

Scrub and Fairfeather sat leaning against the old tree. The cobbler had a lump of cheese in his hand; his wife held fast a hunch of bread. Their eyes and mouths were both open, but they were dreaming of great grandeur at court, when the old woman raised her shrill voice:

“What ho, my sons! come here and carry home the harvest.”

No sooner had she spoken, than the two little dwarfs darted out of the neighboring thicket.

“Idle boys!” cried the mother, “what have ye done today to help our living?”

“I have been to the city,” said Spy, “and could see nothing. These are hard times for us – everybody minds their business so contentedly since that cobbler came; but here is a leathern doublet which his page threw out of the window; it’s of no use, but I brought it to let you see I was not idle.” And he tossed down Spare’s doublet, with the merry leaves in it, which he had carried like a bundle on his little back.

To explain how Spy came by it, I must tell you that the forest was not far from the great city where Spare lived in such high esteem. All things had gone well with the cobbler till the king thought that it was quite unbecoming to see such a worthy man without a servant. His majesty, therefore, to let all men understand his royal favor toward Spare, appointed one of his own pages to wait upon him. The name of this youth was Tinseltoes, and, though he was the seventh of the king’s pages, nobody in all court had grander notions. Nothing could please him that had not gold or silver about it, and his grandmother feared he would hang himself for being appointed page to a cobbler. As for Spare, if anything could have troubled him, this token of his majesty’s kindness would have done it.

The honest man had been so used to serve himself that the page was always in the way, but his merry leaves came to his assistance; and, to the great surprise of his grandmother, Tinseltoes took wonderfully to the new service. Some said it was because Spare gave him nothing to do but play at bowls all day on the palace-green. Yet one thing grieved the heart of Tinseltoes, and that was his master’s leathern doublet; but for it he was persuaded people would never remember that Spare had been a cobbler, and the page took a deal of pains to let him see how unfashionable it was at court; but Spare answered Tinseltoes as he had done the king, and at last, finding nothing better would do, the page got up one fine morning earlier than his master, and tossed the leathern doublet out of the back window into a certain lane where Spy found it, and brought it to his mother.

“That nasty thing!” said the old woman; “where is the good in it?”

By this time, Pounce had taken everything of value from Scrub and Fairfeather – the looking-glass, the silver-rimmed horn, the husband’s scarlet coat, the wife’s gay mantle, and, above all, the golden leaves, which so rejoiced old Buttertongue and her sons, that they threw the leathern doublet over the sleeping cobbler for a jest, and went off to their hut in the heart of the forest.

The sun was going down when Scrub and Fairfeather awoke from dreaming that they had been made a lord and a lady, and sat clothed in silk and velvet, feasting with the king in his palace-hall. It was a great disappointment to find their golden leaves and all their best things gone. Scrub tore his hair, and vowed to take the old woman’s life, while Fairfeather lamented sore; but Scrub, feeling cold for want of his coat, put on the leathern doublet without asking or caring whence it came.

Scarcely was it buttoned on when a change came over him; he addressed such merry discourse to Fairfeather, that, instead of lamentations, she made the wood ring with laughter. Both busied themselves in getting up a hut of boughs, in which Scrub kindled a fire with a flint and steel, which, together with his pipe, he had brought unknown to Fairfeather, who had told him the like was never heard of at court. Then they found a pheasant’s nest at the root of an old oak, made a meal of roasted eggs, and went to sleep on a heap of long green grass which they had gathered, with nightingales singing all night long in the old trees about them. So it happened that Scrub and Fairfeather stayed day after day in the forest, making their hut larger and more comfortable against the winter, living on wild birds’ eggs and berries, and never thinking of their lost golden leaves, or their journey to court.

In the meantime Spare had got up and missed his doublet. Tinseltoes, of course, said he knew nothing about it. The whole palace was searched, and every servant questioned, till all the court wondered why such a fuss was made about an old leathern doublet. That very day things came back to their old fashion. Quarrels began among lords, and jealousies among the ladies. The king said his subjects did not pay him half enough taxes, the queen wanted more jewels, the servants took to their old bickerings and got up some new ones. Spare found himself getting wonderfully dull, and very much out of place: nobles began to ask what business a cobbler had at the king’s table, and his majesty ordered the palace chronicles to be searched for a precedent. The cobbler was too wise to tell all he had lost with that doublet, but being by this time somewhat familiar with court customs, he proclaimed a reward of fifty gold pieces to any who would bring him news concerning it.

Scarcely was this made known in the city, when the gates and outer courts of the palace were filled by men, women, and children, some bringing leathern doublets of every cut and color; some with tales of what they had heard and seen in their walks about the neighborhood; and so much news concerning all sorts of great people came out of these stores, that the lords and ladies ran to the king with complaints of Spare as a speaker of slander; and his majesty, being now satisfied that there was no example in all the palace records of such a retainer, issued a decree banishing the cobbler forever from court, and confiscating all his goods in favor of Tinseltoes.

That royal edict was scarcely published before the page was in full possession of his rich chamber, his costly garments, and all the presents the courtiers had given him; while Spare, having no longer the fifty pieces of gold to give, was glad to make his escape out of the back window, for fear of the nobles, who vowed to be revenged on him, and the crowd, who were prepared to stone him for cheating them about his doublet.

The window from which Spare let himself down with a strong rope, was that from which Tinseltoes had tossed the doublet, and as the cobbler came down late in the twilight, a poor woodman, with a heavy load of fagots, stopped and stared at him in great astonishment.

“What’s the matter, friend?” said Spare. “Did you never see a man coming down from a back window before?”

“Why,” said the woodman, “the last morning I passed here a leathern doublet came out of that very window, and I’ll be bound you are the owner of it.”

“That I am, friend,” said the cobbler. “Can you tell me which way that doublet went?”

“As I walked on,” said the woodman, “a dwarf, called Spy, bundled it up and ran off to his mother in the forest.”

“Honest friend,” said Spare, taking off the last of his fine clothes (a grass-green mantle edged with gold), “I’ll give you this if you will follow the dwarf, and bring me back my doublet.”

“It would not be good to carry fagots in,” said the woodman. “But if you want back your doublet, the road to the forest lies at the end of this lane,” and he trudged away.

Determined to find his doublet, and sure that neither crowd nor courtiers could catch him in the forest, Spare went on his way, and was soon among the tall trees; but neither hut nor dwarf could he see. Moreover, the night came on; the wood was dark and tangled, but here and there the moon shone through its alleys, the great owls flitted about, and the nightingales sang. So he went on, hoping to find some place of shelter. At last the red light of a fire, gleaming through a thicket, led him to the door of a low hut. It stood half open, as if there was nothing to fear, and within he saw his brother Scrub snoring loudly on a bed of grass, at the foot of which lay his own leathern doublet; while Fairfeather, in a kirtle made of plaited rushes, sat roasting pheasants’ eggs by the fire.

“Good-evening, mistress,” said Spare, stepping in.

The blaze shone on him, but so changed was her brother-in-law with his court-life, that Fairfeather did not know him, and she answered far more courteously than was her wont.

“Good-evening, master. Whence come ye so late? but speak low, for my good man has sorely tired himself cleaving wood, and is taking a sleep, as you see, before supper.”

“A good rest to him,” said Spare, perceiving he was not known. “I come from the court for a day’s hunting, and have lost my way in the forest.”

“Sit down and have a share of our supper,” said Fairfeather, “I will put some more eggs in the ashes; and tell me the news of court – I used to think of it long ago when I was young and foolish.”

“Did you never go there?” said the cobbler. “So fair a dame as you would make the ladies marvel.”

“You are pleased to flatter,” said Fairfeather; “but my husband has a brother there, and we left our moorland village to try our fortune also. An old woman enticed us with fair words and strong drink at the entrance of this forest, where we fell asleep and dreamt of great things; but when we woke, everything had been robbed from us – my looking-glass, my scarlet cloak, my husband’s Sunday coat; and, in place of all, the robbers left him that old leathern doublet, which he has worn ever since, and never was so merry in all his life, though we live in this poor hut.”

“It is a shabby doublet, that,” said Spare, taking up the garment, and seeing that it was his own, for the merry leaves were still sewed in its lining. “It would be good for hunting in, however – your husband would be glad to part with it, I dare say, in exchange for this handsome cloak”; and he pulled off the green mantle and buttoned on the doublet, much to Fairfeather’s delight, who ran and shook Scrub, crying:

“Husband! husband! rise and see what a good bargain I have made.”

“Scrub gave one closing snore, and muttered something about the root being hard; but he rubbed his eyes, gazed up at his brother, and said:

“Spare, is that really you? How did you like the court, and have you made your fortune?”

“That I have, brother,” said Spare, “in getting back my own good leathern doublet. Come, let us eat eggs, and rest ourselves here this night. In the morning we will return to our own old hut, at the end of the moorland village where the Christmas Cuckoo will come and bring us leaves.”

Scrub and Fairfeather agreed. So in the morning they all returned, and found the old hut little the worse for wear and weather. The neighbors came about them to ask the news of court, and see if they had made their fortune. Everybody was astonished to find the three poorer than ever, but somehow they liked to go back to the hut. Spare brought out the lasts and awls he had hidden in a corner; Scrub and he began their old trade, and the whole north country found out that there never were such cobblers.

They mended the shoes of lords and ladies as well as the common people; everybody was satisfied. Their custom increased from day to day, and all that were disappointed, discontented, or unlucky, came to the hut as in old times, before Spare went to court.

The rich brought them presents, the poor did them service. The hut itself changed, no one knew how. Flowering honeysuckle grew over its roof; red and white roses grew thick about its door. Moreover, the Christmas Cuckoo always came on the first of April, bringing three leaves of the merry tree – for Scrub and Fairfeather would have no more golden ones. So it was with them when I last heard the news of the north country.

—Frances Browne
(1816–1879)

Toinette and the Elves



The winter’s sun was nearing the horizon’s edge. Each moment the tree shadows grew longer in the forest; each moment the crimson light on the upper boughs became more red and bright. It was Christmas Eve, or would be in half an hour, when the sun should be fairly set; but it did not feel like Christmas, for the afternoon was mild and sweet, and the wind in the leafless boughs sang, as it moved about, as though to imitate the vanished birds. Soft trills and whistles, odd little shakes and twitters – it was astonishing what pretty noises the wind made, for it was in good humor, as winds should be on the Blessed Night; all its storm-tones and bass-notes were for the moment laid aside, and gently as though hushing a baby to sleep, it cooed and rustled and brushed to and fro in the leafless woods.

Toinette stood, pitcher in hand, beside the well. “Wishing Well,” the people called it, for they believed that if anyone standing there bowed to the East, repeated a certain rhyme and wished a wish, the wish would certainly come true. Unluckily, nobody knew exactly what the rhyme should be. Toinette did not; she was wishing that she did, as she stood with her eyes fixed on the bubbling water. How nice it would be! she thought. What beautiful things should be hers, if it were only to wish and to have. She would be beautiful, rich, good – oh, so good. The children should love her dearly, and never be disagreeable. Mother should not work so hard – they should all go back to France – which mother said was si belle. Oh, dear, how nice it would be. Meantime, the sun sank lower, and mother at home was waiting for the water, but Toinette forgot that.

Suddenly she started. A low sound of crying met her ear, and something like a tiny moan. It seemed close by but she saw nothing.

Hastily she filled her pitcher and turned to go. But again the sound came, an unmistakable sob, right under her feet. Toinette stopped short.

“What is the matter?” she called out bravely. “Is anybody there? and if there is, why don’t I see you?”

A third sob – and all at once, down on the ground beside her, a tiny figure became visible, so small that Toinette had to kneel and stoop her head to see it plainly. The figure was that of an odd little man. He wore a garb of green bright and glancing as the scales of a beetle. In his mite of a hand was a cap, out of which stuck a long pointed feather. Two specks of tears stood on his cheeks and he fixed on Toinette a glance so sharp and so sad that it made her feel sorry and frightened and confused all at once.

“Why how funny this is!” she said, speaking to herself out loud.

“Not at all,” replied the little man, in a voice as dry and crisp as the chirr of a grasshopper. “Anything but funny. I wish you wouldn’t use such words. It hurts my feelings, Toinette.”

“Do you know my name, then?” cried Toinette, astonished. “That’s strange. But what is the matter? Why are you crying so, little man?”

“I’m not a little man. I’m an elf,” responded the dry voice; “and I think you’d cry if you had an engagement out to tea, and found yourself spiked on a great bayonet, so that you couldn’t move an inch. Look!” He turned a little as he spoke and Toinette saw a long rose-thorn sticking through the back of the green robe. The little man could by no means reach the thorn, and it held him fast prisoner to the place.

“Is that all? I’ll take it out for you,” she said.

“Be careful – oh, be careful,” entreated the little man. “This is my new dress, you know – my Christmas suit, and it’s got to last a year. If there is a hole in it, Peascod will tickle me and Bean Blossom tease, till I shall wish myself dead.” He stamped with vexation at the thought.

“Now, you mustn’t do that,” said Toinette, in a motherly tone, “else you’ll tear it yourself, you know.” She broke off the thorn as she spoke, and gently drew it out. The elf anxiously examined the stuff. A tiny puncture only was visible and his face brightened.

“You’re a good child,” he said. “I’ll do as much for you some day, perhaps.”

“I would have come before if I had seen you,” remarked Toinette, timidly. “But I didn’t see you a bit.”

“No, because I had my cap on,” cried the elf. He placed it on his head as he spoke, and hey, presto! nobody was there, only a voice which laughed and said: “Well – don’t stare so. Lay your finger on me now.”

“Oh,” said Toinette, with a gasp. “How wonderful. What fun it must be to do that. The children wouldn’t see me. I should steal in and surprise them; they would go on talking, and never guess that I was there. I should so like it. Do elves ever lend their caps to anybody? I wish you’d lend me yours. It must be so nice to be invisible.”

“Ho,” cried the elf, appearing suddenly again. “Lend my cap, indeed! Why it wouldn’t stay on the very tip of your ear, it’s so small. As for nice, that depends. Sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn’t. No, the only way for mortal people to be invisible is to gather the fern-seed and put it in their shoes.”

“Gather it? Where? I never saw any seed to the ferns,” said Toinette, staring about her.

“Of course not – we elves take care of that,” replied the little man. “Nobody finds the fern-seed but ourselves. I’ll tell you what, though. You were such a nice child to take out the thorn so cleverly, that I’ll give you a little of the seed. Then you can try the fun of being invisible, to your heart’s content.”

“Will you really? How delightful. May I have it now?”

“Bless me. Do you think I carry my pockets stuffed with it?” said the elf. “Not at all. Go home, say not a word to anyone, but leave your bedroom window open to night, and you’ll see what you’ll see.”

He laid his finger on his nose as he spoke, gave a jump like a grasshopper, clapping on his cap as he went, and vanished. Toinette lingered a moment, in hopes that he might come back, then took her pitcher and hurried home. The woods were very dusky by this time; but full of her strange adventures, she did not remember to feel afraid.

“How long you have been,” said her mother. “It’s late for a little maid like you to be up. You must make better speed another time, my child.”

Toinette pouted as she was apt to do when reproved. The children clamored to know what had kept her, and she spoke pettishly and crossly; so that they too became cross, and presently went away into the outer kitchen to play by themselves. The children were apt to creep away when Toinette came. It made her angry and unhappy at times that they should do so, but she did not realize that it was in great part her own fault, and so did not set herself to mend it.

“Tell me a ’tory,” said baby Jeanneton, creeping to her knee a little later. But Toinette’s head was full of the elf; she had no time to spare for Jeanneton.

“Oh, not tonight,” she replied. “Ask mother to tell you one.”

“Mother’s busy,” said Jeanneton wistfully.

Toinette took no notice and the little one crept away disconsolately.

Bedtime at last. Toinette set the casement open, and lay a long time waiting and watching; then she fell asleep. She waked with a sneeze and jump and sat up in bed. Behold, on the coverlet stood her elfin friend, with a long train of other elves beside him, all clad in the beetle-wing green, and wearing little pointed caps. More were coming in at the window; outside a few were drifting about in the moon rays, which lit their sparkling robes till they glittered like so many fireflies. The odd thing was, that though the caps were on, Toinette could see the elves distinctly and this surprised her so much, that again she thought out loud and said, “How funny.”

“You mean about the caps,” replied her special elf, who seemed to have the power of reading thought.

“Yes, you can see us tonight, caps and all. Spells lose their value on Christmas Eve, always. Peascod, where is the box? Do you still wish to try the experiment of being invisible, Toinette?”

“Oh, yes – indeed I do.”

“Very well; so let it be.”

As he spoke he beckoned, and two elves puffing and panting like little men with a heavy load, dragged forward a droll little box about the size of a pumpkin-seed.

One of them lifted the cover.

“Pay the porter, please, ma’am,” he said giving Toinette’s ear a mischievous tweak with his sharp fingers.

“Hands off, you bad Peascod!” cried Toinette’s elf. “This is my girl. She shan’t be pinched!” He dealt Peascod a blow with his tiny hand as he spoke and looked so brave and warlike that he seemed at least an inch taller than he had before. Toinette admired him very much; and Peascod slunk away with an abashed giggle muttering that Thistle needn’t be so ready with his fist.

Thistle – for thus, it seemed, Toinette’s friend was named – dipped his fingers in the box, which was full of fine brown seeds, and shook a handful into each of Toinette’s shoes, as they stood, toes together by the bedside.

“Now you have your wish,” he said, and can go about and do what you like, no one seeing. The charm will end at sunset. Make the most of it while you can; but if you want to end it sooner, shake the seeds from the shoes and then you are just as usual.”

“Oh, I shan’t want to,” protested Toinette; “I’m sure I shan’t.”

“Good-bye,” said Thistle, with a mocking little laugh.

“Good-bye, and thank you ever so much,” replied Toinette.

“Good-bye, good-bye,” replied the other elves, in shrill chorus. They clustered together, as if in consultation; then straight out of the window they flew like a swarm of gauzy-winged bees, and melted into the moonlight. Toinette jumped up and ran to watch them but the little men were gone – not a trace of them was to be seen; so she shut the window, went back to bed and presently in the midst of her amazed and excited thoughts fell asleep.

She waked in the morning, with a queer, doubtful feeling. Had she dreamed, or had it really happened? She put on her best petticoat and laced her blue bodice; for she thought the mother would perhaps take them across the wood to the little chapel for the Christmas service. Her long hair smoothed and tied, her shoes trimly fastened, downstairs she ran. The mother was stirring porridge over the fire. Toinette went close to her, but she did not move or turn her head.

“How late the children are,” she said at last, lifting the boiling pot on the hob. Then she went to the stair-foot and called, “Marc, Jeanneton, Pierre, Marie. Breakfast is ready, my children. Toinette – but where, then, is Toinette? She is used to be down long before this.”

“Toinette isn’t upstairs,” said Marie from above.

“Her door is wide open, and she isn’t there.”

“That is strange,” said the mother. “I have been here an hour, and she has not passed this way since.” She went to the outer door and called, “Toinette! Toinette!” passing close to Toinette as she did so. And looking straight at her with unseeing eyes. Toinette, half frightened, half pleased, giggled low to herself. She really was invisible, then. How strange it seemed and what fun it was going to be.

The children sat down to breakfast, little Jeanneton, as the youngest, saying grace. The mother distributed the porridge and gave each a spoon but she looked anxious.

“Where can Toinette have gone?” she said to herself. Toinette was conscious-pricked. She was half inclined to dispel the charm on the spot. But just then she caught a whisper from Pierre to Marc which so surprised her as to put the idea out of her head.

“Perhaps a wolf has eaten her up – a great big wolf like the ‘Capuchon Rouge,’ you know.” This was what Pierre said; and Marc answered unfeelingly:

“If he has, I shall ask mother to let me have her room for my own.”

Poor Toinette, her cheeks burned and her eyes filled with tears at this. Didn’t the boys love her a bit then? Next she grew angry, and longed to box Marc’s ears, only she recollected in time that she was invisible. What a bad boy he was, she thought.

The smoking porridge reminded her that she was hungry; so brushing away the tears she slipped a spoon off the table and whenever she found the chance, dipped it into the bowl for a mouthful. The porridge disappeared rapidly.

“I want some more,” said Jeanneton.

“Bless me, how fast you have eaten,” said the mother, turning to the bowl.

This made Toinette laugh, which shook her spoon, and a drop of the hot mixture fell right on the tip of Marie’s nose as she sat with upturned face waiting her turn for a second helping. Marie gave a little scream.

“What is it?” said the mother.

“Hot water! Right in my face!” sputtered Marie.

“Water!” cried Marc. “It’s porridge.”

“You spattered with your spoon. Eat more carefully, my child,” said the mother, and Toinette laughed again as she heard her. After all, there was some fun in being invisible.

The morning went by. Constantly the mother went to the door, and, shading her eyes with her hand, looked out, in hopes of seeing a little figure come down the wood-path, for she thought perhaps the child went to the spring after water, and fell asleep there. The children played happily, meanwhile. They were used to doing without Toinette and did not seem to miss her, except that now and then baby Jeanneton said: “Poor Toinette gone – not here – all gone.”

“Well, what if she has?” said Marc at last looking up from the wooden cup he was carving for Marie’s doll. “We can play all the better.”

Marc was a bold, outspoken boy, who always told his whole mind about things.

“If she were here,” he went on,” she’d only scold and interfere. Toinette almost always scolds. I like to have her go away. It makes it pleasanter.”

“It is rather pleasanter,” admitted Marie, “only I’d like her to be having a nice time somewhere else.”

“Bother about Toinette,” cried Pierre. “Let’s play ‘My godmother has cabbage to sell.’”

I don’t think Toinette had ever felt so unhappy in her life, as when she stood by unseen, and heard the children say these words. She had never meant to be unkind to them, but she was quick-tempered, dreamy, wrapped up in herself. She did not like being interrupted by them, it put her out, and she spoke sharply and was cross. She had taken it for granted that the others must love her, by a sort of right, and the knowledge that they did not grieved over very much. Creeping away, she hid herself in the woods. It was a sparkling day, but the sun did not look so bright as usual. Cuddled down under a rosebush, Toinette sat sobbing as if her heart would break at the recollection of the speeches she had overheard.

By and by a little voice within her woke up and began to make itself audible. All of us know this little voice. We call it conscience.

“Jeanneton missed me,” she thought. “And, oh, dear! I pushed her away only last night and wouldn’t tell her a story. And Marie hoped I was having a pleasant time somewhere. I wish I hadn’t slapped Marie last Friday. And I wish I hadn’t thrown Marc’s ball into the fire that day I was angry with him. How unkind he was to say that – but I wasn’t always kind to him. And once I said that I wished a bear would eat Pierre up. That was because he broke my cup. Oh, dear, oh, dear. What a bad girl I’ve been to them all.”

“But you could be better and kinder if you tried, couldn’t you?” said the inward voice. “I think you could.”

And Toinette clasped her hands tight and said out loud: “I could. Yes – and I will.”

The first thing to be done was to get rid of the fern-seed which she now regarded as a hateful thing. She untied her shoes and shook it out in the grass. It dropped and seemed to melt into the air, for it instantly vanished. A mischievous laugh sounded close behind, and a beetle-green coat-tail was visible whisking under a tuft of rushes. But Toinette had had enough of the elves, and, tying her shoes, took the road toward home, running with all her might.

“Where have you been all day, Toinette?” cried the children, as, breathless and panting, she flew in at the gate. But Toinette could not speak. She made slowly for her mother, who stood in the doorway, flung herself into her arms and burst into a passion of tears.

“Ma cherie, what is it, whence hast thou come?” asked the good mother alarmed. She lifted Toinette into her arms as she spoke, and hastened indoors. The other children followed, whispering and peeping, but the mother sent them away, and sitting down by the fire with Toinette in her lap, she rocked and hushed and comforted, as though Toinette had been again a little baby. Gradually the sobs ceased. For a while Toinette lay quiet, with her head on her mother’s breast. Then she wiped her wet eyes, put her arms around her mother’s neck, and told her all from the very beginning, keeping not a single thing back. The dame listened with alarm.

“Saints protect us,” she muttered. Then feeling Toinette’s hands and head, “Thou hast a fever,” she said. “I will make thee a tisane, my darling, and thou must at once go to bed.” Toinette vainly protested; to bed she went and perhaps it was the wisest thing, for the warm drink threw her into a long sound sleep and when she woke she was herself again, bright and well, hungry for dinner, and ready to do her usual tasks.

Herself – but not quite the same Toinette that she had been before. Nobody changes from bad to better in a minute. It takes time for that, time and effort, and a long struggle with evil habits and tempers. But there is sometimes a certain minute or day in which people begin to change, and thus it was with Toinette. The fairy lesson was not lost upon her. She began to fight with herself, to watch her faults and try to conquer them. It was hard work; often she felt discouraged, but she kept on. Week after week and month after month she grew less selfish, kinder, more obliging than she used to be. When she failed and her old fractious temper got the better of her, she was sorry and begged everyone’s pardon so humbly that they could not but forgive. The mother began to think that the elves really had bewitched her child. As for the children they learned to love Toinette as never before, and came to her with all their pains and pleasures, as children should to a kind older sister. Each fresh proof of this, every kiss from Jeanneton, every confidence from Marc, was a comfort to Toinette, for she never forgot Christmas Day, and felt that no trouble was too much to wipe out that unhappy recollection. “I think they like me better than they did then,” she would say; but then the thought came, “Perhaps if I were invisible again, if they did not know I was there, I might hear something to make me feel as badly as I did that morning.” These sad thoughts were part of the bitter fruit of the fairy fern-seed.

So with doubts and fears the year went by, and again it was Christmas Eve. Toinette had been asleep some hours when she was roused by a sharp tapping at the window pane. Startled, and only half awake, she sat up in bed and saw by the moonlight a tiny figure outside which she recognized. It was Thistle drumming with his knuckles on the glass.

“Let me in,” cried the dry little voice. So Toinette opened the casement, and Thistle flew in and perched as before on the coverlet.

“Merry Christmas, my girl.” he said, “and a Happy New Year when it comes. I’ve brought you a present;” and, dipping into a pouch tied round his waist, he pulled out a handful of something brown. Toinette knew what it was in a moment.

“Oh, no,” she cried shrinking back. “Don’t give me any fern-seeds. They frighten me. I don’t like them.”

“Don’t be silly,” said Thistle, his voice sounding kind this time, and earnest. “It wasn’t pleasant being invisible last year, but perhaps this year it will be. Take my advice, and try it. You’ll not be sorry.”

“Shan’t I?” said Toinette, brightening. “Very well, then, I will.” She leaned out of bed, and watched Thistle strew the fine dustlike grains in each shoe.

“I’ll drop in tomorrow night, and just see how you like it,” he said. Then, with a nod, he was gone.

The old fear came back when she woke in the morning, and she tied on her shoes with a tremble at her heart. Downstairs she stole. The first thing she saw was a wooden ship standing on her plate. Marc had made the ship, but Toinette had no idea it was for her.

The little ones sat round the table with their eyes on the door, watching till Toinette should come in and be surprised.

“I wish she’d hurry,” said Pierre, drumming on his bowl with a spoon.

“We all want Toinette, don’t we?” said the mother, smiling as she poured the hot porridge.

“It will be fun to see her stare,” declared Marc.

“Toinette is jolly when she stares. Her eyes look big and her cheeks grow pink. Andre Brugen thinks his sister Aline is prettiest, but I don’t. Our Toinette is ever so pretty.”

“She is ever so nice, too,” said Pierre. “She’s as good to play with as – as – a boy,” finished triumphantly.

“Oh, I wish my Toinette would come,” said Jeanneton.

Toinette waited no longer, but sped upstairs with glad tears in her eyes. Two minutes, and down she came again visible this time. Her heart was light as a feather.

“Merry Christmas!” clamored the children. The ship was presented, Toinette was duly surprised, and so the happy day began.

That night Toinette left the window open, and lay down in her clothes; for she felt, as Thistle had been so kind, she ought to receive him politely. He came at midnight, and with him all the other little men in green.

“Well, how was it?” asked Thistle.

“Oh, I liked it this time,” declared Toinette, with shining eyes, “and I thank you so much.”

“I’m glad you did,” said the elf. “And I’m glad you are thankful, for we want you to do something for us.”

“What can it be?” inquired Toinette, wondering.

“You must know,” went on Thistle, “that there is no dainty in the world which we elves enjoy like a bowl of fern-seed broth. But it has to be cooked over a real fire, and we dare not go near fire, you know, lest our wings scorch. So we seldom get any fern-seed broth. Now, Toinette, will you make us some?”

“Indeed, I will!” cried Toinette, “only you must tell me how.”

“It is very simple,” said Peascod; “only seed and honey dew, stirred from left to right with a sprig of fennel. Here’s the seed and the fennel, and here’s the dew. Be sure and stir from the left; if you don’t, it curdles, and the flavor will be spoiled.”

Down into the kitchen they went, and Toinette, moving very softly, quickened the fire, set on the smallest bowl she could find, and spread the doll’s table with the wooden saucers which Marc had made for Jeanneton to play with. Then she mixed and stirred as the elves bade, and when the soup was done, served it to them smoking hot. How they feasted! No bumblebee, dipping into a flower-cup, ever sipped and twinkled more rapturously than they.

When the last drop was eaten, they made ready to go. Each in turn kissed Toinette’s hand, and said a word of farewell. Thistle brushed his feathered cap over the door-post as he passed.

“Be lucky, house,” he said, “for you have received and entertained the luck-bringers. And be lucky, Toinette. Good temper is good luck, and sweet words and kind looks and peace in the heart are the fairest of fortunes. See that you never lose them again, my girl.” With this, he, too, kissed Toinette’s hand, waved his feathered cap, and – whir! they all were gone, while Toinette, covering the fire with ashes and putting aside the little cups, stole up to her bed a happy child.

—Susan Coolidge
[Sarah Chauncey Woolsey]
(1835–1905)

The Visit of
the Wishing Man



It was Christmas night at Castle Havenough in the Land of Nothing Strange. It had been a day of gifts and guests, and now the king and queen had gone to a great dinner in the banquet hall, and the young prince and princess were left alone to spend the rest of the day as they chose. A great fire blazed in the fireplace. It cracked and roared and chuckled as the young prince and princess threw in pitchy sprays of evergreen. The Christmas tree across the room, bespangled with tinsel and tassels and sheen, now glowed in the light of the fireplace and gleamed and twinkled and sparkled as if every twig were set with rubies and diamonds. The floor, the chairs, the table – everything – were heaped high with gifts, for this young prince and princess had received everything that they had wished for. And it was almost always so – whatever they wished for, they received. It seems strange to us, indeed, that this young prince and princess were not always or altogether happy. But it was not strange at all in the Land of Nothing Strange.

Before the king went out to the great banquet, he called the prince and princess to his side and putting his arms about their slender shoulders, said, “My children, I hope you have had a happy day and have received everything that you desire. If not, I promise you that if you can agree exactly on what you wish, and will tell me, if money can purchase it, it shall be yours.”

“But cannot money purchase everything, father?”

“No, my son, not quite everything.”

“But if money cannot purchase it, father?”

“Then, princess, I will try and get it for you in some other way.”

“And if you cannot?”

“Well – then I will tell the Wishing Man.”

And with that he was off. But not until he had told them that since this was Christmas Day they might stay up just as late as they wished.

Just as late as they wished! Why, this was the very best Christmas gift of all! Because not even princes and princesses, you know, can sit up always, or often, just as late as they wish.

Just as late as they wished! What in the world would they do? Why, everything, of course, in all that time. But first of all they must decide whether there was anything more that they wished and whether they could agree upon their wish.

So they threw themselves upon the floor at full length before the fire^ upon the great white bearskin with the head that snarled and showed his long, gleaming, harmless teeth as if he would eat just one more thing. With their chins resting upon their hands, and their elbows on the floor, and the fire throwing lights and shadows on their faces, they lay and talked.

“You wish first,” said the prince, who had not quite made up his mind what he wished, and wanted time to think. “You are the younger, and you are a girl. What do you wish?”

“Well, I wish that all the snow were sugar and all the mud were chocolate. Don’t you?”

“No, of course not. Why, you couldn’t coast! The runners would stick, and if you ran and fell upon your sled you would go heels over head, and like as not you would break your neck. Besides, there wouldn’t be any sugar in summer, and there would be no chocolate except when it rained.”

“I never thought of that,” said the princess. “What do you wish?”

“I wish that – that – my Christmas stocking were as tall as this house and I had to take a ladder to get up to it and another ladder to get down into it. Don’t you?”

“Why, no, of course not.”

“Why not?”

“Why, because the Christmas stocking is just the same size as all your other stockings, and if your Christmas stocking were as big as the house, all your other stockings would be as big as the house, and you never could get one on; and if you did get it on, it would go clear over your head.”

“That’s so,” said the prince; “I never thought of that. Well, what do you wish?”

“Well, I wish – that every day was Christmas, and there wasn’t any school. Don’t you?”

“No! If there wasn’t any school, you’d be a dunce. And who wants to be a dunce? I’ll tell you what I wish.”

“What?”

“I wish that every day was just as nice as Christmas, but different. Different, you know, but just as nice. That’s what I wish.”

“So do I.”

And so they agreed upon their wish – that every day should be like Christmas – different, but just as nice. And they would tell that wish to their father in the morning.

“But do you suppose that money can purchase it, prince?”

“I don’t know. I – I’m afraid it can’t. But Father said he would tell the Wishing Man. I wonder what he looks like; I should like to see him.”

“So should I.”

Just then there was a commotion in the fireplace. It sounded as if the wood had fallen forward on the andirons. And so it had. But something else had happened. On the backlog, which was blazing fiercely, there sat a funnier little man than you would see in going around the world. He was red from the top of his cap to the tip of his boot; his coat, which was flung over his little red wings, was red. His face was red, but perhaps that was just a reflection from the coals of the fire. You would think that he would have burned up or that he would have jumped out of the fireplace in a hurry. But he didn’t do anything of the sort. It seems very strange, but it was not strange at all in the Land of Nothing Strange. As he sat there upon that blazing backlog, his hands upon his knees, with the flames leaping around him, and his feet resting down in the red-hot coals, you would have said that this was the most comfortable seat that he had ever found in all his life.

“Well?” the little man drawled.

“Well?” drawled the prince and princess, as they drew back on their elbows and sat up in amazement.

“Well? I’m here.”

“Who’s here?” asked the prince.

“Why, I am here. You said you would like to see what I looked like, and so I have come. I’m here.”

“Are you the Wishing Man?” asked the princess.

“That’s my name.” And then he broke into a snatch of a song:

“I have wishbones on my fingers,
I have myst’ry in my eyes;
My clothes are lined with four-leaf clovers
And are stained with magic dyes.

“I have pockets full of rabbits’ feet,
And amulets and charms;
Just for luck I pick up horseshoes;
I have tattoos on my arms.

“I know a world of wonders.

And if you would believe,

I have fortunes in my wallet

And surprises up my sleeve.

“I come from a distant country.

Away up near the sky.

From the golden palace, Overhead,

In the land of Wonder Why.

“I’m the best of friends of children,
And I’ll help you if I can;
Now tell me what your wishes are,
For I’m the Wishing Man.”

They told him that they had decided to wish that every day should be just as nice as Christmas – different, but, then, just as nice.

“That is a good wish,” said the Wishing Man. “I hope that you will get it, but you never can tell.”

“You never can tell! Aren’t you the Wishing Man? Don’t you know? Don’t you give folks their wishes?”

“Oh, no! I am not wise enough for that. The Angel of Blessings does that. I merely go through the world and carry to him all the wishes that I hear people make.”

“How do you carry them?” asked the prince.

“Oh, right here,” and he pointed to a little jeweled box that he had at his belt. “Right here. You see I have a padlock on it and I never lose a wish.”

“Are you the only wishing man in the world?” asked the princess.

“Oh, bless my soul, no! If I were, do you think I would have time to sit here on this nice cool seat and chat with you? There are a great many of us, but we all look just alike, we are all dressed just alike, and we are all twins.”

That seems strange, but it was not strange at all in the Land of Nothing Strange.

“My country is the country of Wonder Why. I come here every morning, and I stay till I have my little box full of wishes, and then I take it back. By the way, I see that it is full now, and your wish is right on top. Would you like to go with me to see the Angel of Blessings? Those who talk with him are most apt to have their wishes granted. Many folks do not get their wishes just because they do not seem to understand how to get them. Would you like to go with me?”

“Is it very far?” asked the prince. “Could we get back before bedtime?”

“Oh, yes, with time to spare.”

“Shouldn’t we be cold?” asked the princess.

“No, we would fly very fast, and we shouldn’t have time to shiver more than once before we got there. Come, then, get on my back,” and he tucked his red coat between his little red wings, which he shook out, and made ready to fly.

“Now part your hair in the middle so you won’t be any heavier on one side than on the other. Step right in here; the fire won’t hurt you. Now, prince, put your right arm around my neck like this, and hold on to my left wing with your left hand – so, and princess, put your left arm around my neck and hold on to my right wing with your right hand – so. Now, ready.”

Up they went, and off they went, through the frosty air, faster than the fastest airplane. Below them lay the beautiful white snow; above them hung the beautiful white stars. They had just shivered once and were nearly ready to shiver again when the Wishing Man folded his red wings and they landed upon the doorstep of the golden palace, Overhead, in the Land of Wonder Why.

The Wishing Man took them by the hand, one on either side, walked up the white marble steps, opened the great doors, which swung at a touch, and stepped inside. This was the palace. Overhead, Anybody could see that this was the House of Wishes. Why, there was everything here that anybody had ever wished for or ever could wish for. Down the side here at the right there were great possessions. There were carloads of gold heaped up, and carloads of silver heaped up, and there were houses – every kind of house – and there were farms that reached away just as far as the sun shone, and there were gardens in which there was every kind of flower that anybody had ever seen grow in any place in the world. Over on the other side were things to wear and things to eat; there were gowns and furs and hats and suits, and beyond these there were bricks of ice cream as big as ice cakes – just for one! And plum puddings as big as your head – just for one! And whole mince pies that you could eat and never see anything afterward. Before them, across the room, were the very best things of life, the very best of all, just plain something to eat, happy days and sleepy nights, and good friends – just the things that men like most. These things that I have mentioned were simply what you could see right in the first rows, but behind these things at the right and left and over in front – there is nobody who ever lived who could tell you all that was there, because, as I have told you, there was everything that anybody had ever wished for, and everything that anybody could ever wish for.

Now, right in the center of the hall, to which a golden carpet ran, there was a platform, and upon the platform a great white desk, bright as the moon, and at the desk, clothed in white, sat the Angel of Blessings. At the right of the Angel of Blessings stood his messengers. He called them pages. The line was sometimes short and sometimes long. They wore no uniform. Some were rich and some were poor, some had beautiful clothes and some had ragged clothes, but the face of everyone shone like a star, and it was their duty to carry blessings and wishes to people who had got their wish.

Upon that golden carpet, that ran from the door to the platform, the little red Wishing Men were continually passing each other as they came up to the desk to leave their wishes and went out again to listen for more. All day, all night, they came and went, came and went, and all day and all night the Angel of Blessings, clad in white, at the great white desk, opened the wishes and read them. Sometimes he shook his head sorrowfully, and even frowned; sometimes he smiled and nodded ! When he frowned or looked sorrowful it meant that the wish was lost, and he dropped it into the huge waste-basket at his left and it fell to the bottom of the earth. But when he smiled and nodded, it meant that the wish was granted, and he handed it to one of his pages waiting at the right, who fell upon one knee, took the wish, and carried it to the wisher.

The Wishing Man took the prince and the princess by the hand, walked along the golden carpet to the great white desk upon the platform, and announced the visitors to the Angel of Blessings: “Prince and Princess Havenough from the Land of Nothing Strange.” Then the prince and princess, who, of course, had been trained in court, made their most beautiful bow, but spoke no word until the Angel of Blessings had spoken to them. The Wishing Man laid upon the desk the wish which they had made and which he had carried in his little golden casket, and then he retired with many a bow until the Angel should summon him again.

“Prince and Princess Havenough,” said the Angel as he read the wish and smiled, “it is a good wish. It will be granted, on one condition – that you will be my pages, carry my blessings, and take the wishes which I send to those who have their wishes granted. Will you be my pages?”

“Must one go very far, Mr. Angel?” asked the prince, “because we are small; we have never traveled far; we don’t know where many places are.”

“Oh, not at all, prince,” said the Angel; “merely to the Land of Nothing Strange – to your home, to your friends, to your acquaintances. Will you be my pages?”

“We will, Mr. Angel,” and they bowed.

“Then stand here at my right. I may have some commissions for you now. Let me look at these wishes which have just been brought to me. Here is a wish from a little boy in the Land of Nothing Strange, not far from Castle Havenough. He wishes that he had a pair of skates; he hasn’t any; all his friends have some.”

“He may have a pair of mine,” said the prince, “I will take them to him,”

“Good!” said the Angel; “his wish is granted.” And he handed the wish to the prince with the name and the address of the wisher.

“Let me see; here is a wish from a little girl in the Land of Nothing Strange, not far from Castle Havenough. She wishes that she had a doll. She asked Santa Claus for one last night and he didn’t bring it today. He must have forgotten it. She wants one very much.”

“She may have one of mine! I have very many,” said the princess.

“Good!” said the Angel; “it is granted.” And he handed the wish to the princess, with the name and the address of the wisher.

“Here is another,” said the Angel. “It is from the teachers and the servants of Castle Havenough. They wish that they were happier. – that the prince and the princess were somewhat more thoughtful and kind. Shall their wish be granted?”

“We will try, Mr. Angel.”

“Good! And here is one from the royal house. I see the seal. Why, it is from the King and Queen of the Land of Nothing Strange. ‘We wish that our son and daughter were more dutiful, thoughtful, loving, and kind.’ Shall the wish be granted, pages?”

“We will try, Mr. Angel.”

“Good! That is enough for tonight. Tomorrow I shall have some more blessings for you to carry. Every day I will send you some, so long as you are in my service. And I promise you that every day will be as happy as Christmas – different, but just as nice. Wait a minute.” And then he wrote something on a card and handed it to them – he called it their

COMMISSION

“Be it known to all those who may read this short line.

That the prince and the princess are pages of mine;

They carry my blessings, will seek what you wish,

Will be kind and regardful, polite, unselfish.

For wages, I now and hereafter decree.

Their days shall be happy as happy can be.”

Then he pressed a little golden button, and the Wishing Man came and took the prince and princess by the hand and led them down the golden carpet to the great door, and in less time than it takes to tell you they were back again, and down again upon the skin of the great white bear, which still lay snarling and showing his teeth at the flickering fire.

The Wishing Man wanted to be off, but the prince and princess asked him so eagerly to sing again that he finally consented to sing what he had sung before – “Just by way of encore,” he said:

“I have wishbones on my fingers,
I have myst’ry in my eyes;
My clothes are lined with four-leaf clovers
And are stained with magic dyes.

“I have pockets full of rabbits’ feet,
And amulets and charms;
Just for luck I pick up horseshoes;
I have tattoos on my arms.

“I know a world of wonders.

And if you would believe,

I have fortunes in my wallet

And surprises up my sleeve.

“I come from a distant country.

Away up near the sky.

From the golden palace, Overhead,

In the land of Wonder Why.

“I’m the best of friends of children,
And I’ll help you if I can;
Now tell me what your wishes are,
For I’m the Wishing Man.”

And then he was gone.

It may be that it was a very long, tiresome journey to the palace; it may be that the cold had made the prince and princess very sleepy; it may have been due to something else. At any rate, when the servants came at ten o’clock and opened the door softly, the prince and princess lay fast asleep before the fire, which was burning very low, and the clock was tick-tock, tick-tocking very loud indeed.

What the prince and princess told the king in the morning, how long they were pages of the Angel of Blessings, how many people they carried blessings to, I cannot tell; I never heard. But this I know: that night, and for many days after, the servants and the teachers said that it seemed to them the prince and princess were kinder than usual, and the king and the queen not long after were heard to say they never in their lives had seen the prince and princess so loving and so happy.

—Jay T. Stocking
(1870-1936)

The Great Walled Country



Away at the northern end of the world, farther than men have ever gone with their ships or their sleds, and where most people suppose that there is nothing but ice and snow, is a land full of children, called The Great Walled Country. This name is given because all around the country is a great wall, hundreds of feet thick and hundreds of feet high. It is made of ice, and never melts, winter or summer, and of course it is for this reason that more people have not discovered the place.

The land, as I said, is filled with children, for nobody who lives there ever grows up. The king and the queen, the princes and the courtiers, may be as old as you please, but they are children for all that. They play a great deal of the time with dolls and tin soldiers, and every night at seven o’clock have a bowl of bread and milk and go to bed. But they make excellent rulers, and the other children are well pleased with the government.

There are all sorts of curious things about the way they live in The Great Walled Country, but this story is only of their Christmas season. One can imagine what a fine thing their Christmas must be, so near the North Pole, with ice and snow everywhere; but this is not all. Grandfather Christmas lives just on the north side of the country, so that his house leans against the great wall and would tip over if it were not for its support. Grandfather Christmas is his name in The Great Walled Country; no doubt we should call him Santa Claus here. At any rate, he is the same person, and, best of all the children in the world, he loves the children behind the great wall of ice.

One very pleasant thing about having Grandfather Christmas for a neighbor is that in The Great Walled Country they never have to buy their Christmas presents. Every year, on the day before Christmas, before he makes up his bundles for the rest of the world Grandfather Christmas goes into a great forest of Christmas trees, that grows just back of the palace of the king of The Great Walled Country, and fills the trees with candy and books and toys and all sorts of good things. So when night comes, all the children wrap up snugly, while the children in all other lands are waiting in their beds, and go to the forest to gather gifts for their friends. Each one goes by himself so that none of his friends can see what he has gathered; and no one ever thinks of such a thing as taking a present for himself. The forest is so big that there is room for everyone to wander about without meeting the people from whom he has secrets, and there are always enough nice things to go around.

So Christmas time is a great holiday in that land, as it is in all the best places in the world. They have been celebrating it in this way for hundreds of years, and since Grandfather Christmas does not seem to grow old any faster than the children, they will probably do so for hundreds of years to come.

But there was once a time, so many years ago that they would have forgotten all about it if the story were not written in their Big Book and read to them every year, when the children in The Great Walled Country had a very strange Christmas. There came a visitor to the land. He was an old man, and was the first stranger for very many years that had succeeded in getting over the wall. He looked so wise, and was so much interested in what he saw and heard, that the king invited him to the palace, and he was treated with every possible honor. When this old man had inquired about their Christmas celebration, and was told how they carried it on every year, he listened gravely and then, looking wiser than ever, he said to the king:

“That is all very well, but I should think that children who have Grandfather Christmas for a neighbor could find a better and easier way. You tell me that you all go out on Christmas Eve to gather presents to give to one another the next morning. Why take so much trouble, and act in such a roundabout way? Why not go out together, and everyone get his own presents? That would save the trouble of dividing them again, and everyone would be better satisfied, for he could pick out just what he wanted for himself. No one can tell what you want as well as you can.”

This seemed to the king a very wise saying, and he called all his courtiers and counselors about him to hear it. The wise stranger talked further about his plan, and when he had finished they all agreed that they had been very foolish never to have thought of this simple way of getting their Christmas gifts.

“If we do this,” they said, “no one can ever complain of what he has, or wish that someone had taken more pains to find what he wanted. We will make a proclamation, and always after this follow the new plan.”

So the proclamation was made, and the plan seemed as wise to the children of the country as it had to the king and the counselors. Every one had at some time been a little disappointed with his Christmas gifts; now there would be no danger of that.

On Christmas Eve they always had a meeting at the palace, and sang carols until the time for going to the forest. When the clock struck ten everyone said, “I wish you a Merry Christmas!” to the person nearest him, and then they separated to go their ways to the forest. On this particular night it seemed to the king that the music was not quite so merry as usual, and that when the children spoke to one another their eyes did not shine as gladly as he had noticed them in other years; but there could be no good reason for this, since everyone was expecting a better time than usual. So he thought no more of it.

There was only one person at the palace that night who was not pleased with the new proclamation about the Christmas gifts. This was a little boy named Inge, who lived not far from the palace with his sister. Now his sister was a cripple, and had to sit all day looking out of the window from her chair; and Inge took care of her, and tried to make her life happy from morning till night. He had always gone to the forest on Christmas Eve and returned with his arms and pockets loaded with pretty things for his sister, which would keep her amused all the coming year. And although she was not able to go after presents for her brother, he did not mind that at all, especially as he had other friends who never forgot to divide their good things with him.

But now, said Inge to himself, what would his sister do? For the king had ordered that no one should gather any presents except for himself, or any more than he could carry away at once. All of Inge’s friends were busy planning what they would pick for themselves, but the poor crippled child could not go a step toward the forest. After thinking about it a long time, Inge decided that it would not be wrong, if, instead of taking gifts for himself, he took them altogether for his sister. This he would be very glad to do; for what did a boy who could run about and play in the snow care for presents, compared with a little girl who could only sit still and watch others having a good time? Inge did not ask the advice of anyone, for he was a little afraid others would tell him he must not do it; but he silently made up his mind not to obey the proclamation.

And now the chimes had struck ten, and the children were making their way toward the forest, in starlight that was so bright that it almost showed their shadows on the sparkling snow. As soon as they came to the edge of the forest, they separated, each one going by himself in the old way, though now there was really no reason why they should have secrets from one another.

Ten minutes later, if you had been in the forest, you might have seen the children standing in dismay, with tears on their faces, and exclaiming that there had never been such a Christmas Eve before. For as they looked eagerly about them to the low-bending branches of the evergreen trees, they saw nothing hanging from them that could not be seen every day in the year. High and low they searched, wandering farther into the forest than ever before, lest Grandfather Christmas might have chosen a new place this year for hanging his presents; but still no presents appeared. The king called his counselors about him, and asked them if they knew whether anything of this kind had happened before, but they could tell him nothing. So no one could guess whether Grandfather Christmas had forgotten them, or whether some dreadful accident had kept him away.

As the children were trooping out of the forest, after hours of weary searching, some of them came upon little Inge, who carried over his shoulder a bag that seemed to be full to overflowing. When he saw them looking at him, he cried:

“Are they not beautiful things? I think Grandfather Christmas was never so good to us before.”

“Why, what do you mean?” cried the children. “There are no presents in the forest!”

“No presents!” Inge said. “I have my bag full of them.” But he did not offer to show them, because he did not want the children to see that they were all for his little sister instead of for himself.

Then the children begged him to tell them in what part of the forest he had found his presents, and he turned back and pointed them to the place where he had been. “I left many more behind than I brought away,” he said. “There they are! I can see some of the things shining on the trees even from here.”

But when the children followed his footprints in the snow to the place where he had been, they still saw nothing on the trees, and thought that Inge must be walking in his sleep, and dreaming that he had found presents. Perhaps he had filled his bag with the cones from the evergreen trees.

On Christmas Day there was sadness all through The Great Walled Country. But those who came to the house of Inge and his sister saw plenty of books and dolls and beautiful toys piled up about the little cripple’s chair, and when they asked where these things came from, they were told, “Why, from the Christmas-tree forest.” And they shook their heads, not knowing what it could mean.

The king held a council in the palace, and appointed a committee of his most faithful courtiers to visit Grandfather Christmas, and see if they could find what was the matter. In a day or two more the committee set out on their journey.

They had very hard work to climb the great wall of ice that lay between their country and the place where Grandfather Christmas lived, but at last they reached the top. And when they came to the other side of the wall they were looking down into the top of his chimney. It was not hard to go down this chimney into the house, and when they reached the bottom of it they found themselves in the very room where Grandfather Christmas lay sound asleep.

It was hard enough to waken him, for he always slept one hundred days after his Christmas work was over, and it was only by turning the hands of the clock around two hundred times that the committee could do anything. When the clock had struck twelve times two hundred hours. Grandfather Christmas thought it was time for his nap to be over, and he sat up in bed, rubbing his eyes.

“Oh, sir!” cried the prince who was in charge of the committee, “we have come from the king of The Great Walled Country, who has sent us to ask why you forgot us this Christmas, and left no presents in the forest.”

“No presents!” said Grandfather Christmas. “I never forgot anything. The presents were there. You did not see them, that’s all.” But the children told him that they had searched long and carefully, and in the whole forest there had not been found a thing that could be called a Christmas gift.

“Indeed!” said Grandfather Christmas. “And did little Inge, the boy with the crippled sister, find none?”

Then the committee was silent, for they had heard of the gifts at Inge’s house, and did not know what to say about them.

“You had better go home,” said Grandfather Christmas, who now began to realize that he had been awakened too soon, “and let me finish my nap. The presents were there, but they were never intended for children who were looking only for themselves. I am not surprised that you could not see them. Remember, that not everything that wise travelers tell you is wise.” And he turned over and went to sleep again.

The committee returned silently to The Great Walled Country, and told the king what they had heard. The king did not tell all the children of the land what Grandfather Christmas had said, but, when the next December came, he made another proclamation bidding everyone to seek gifts for others, in the old way, in the Christmas-tree forest. So that is what they have been doing ever since; and in order that they may not forget what happened, in case anyone should ever ask for another change they have read to them every year from their Big Book the story of the time when they had no Christmas gifts.

—Raymond Macdonald Alden
(1873–1924)

The Symbol
and the Saint



Once upon a time a young man made ready for a voyage. His name was Norss; broad were his shoulders, his cheeks were ruddy, his hair was fair and long, his body betokened strength, and good-nature shone from his blue eyes and lurked about the corners of his mouth.

“Where are you going?” asked his neighbor Jans, the forge-master.

“I am going sailing for a wife,” said Norss.

“For a wife, indeed!” cried Jans. “And why go you to seek her in foreign lands? Are not our maidens good enough and fair enough, that you must need search for a wife elsewhere? For shame, Norss! for shame!”

But Norss said: “A spirit came to me in my dreams last night and said, ‘Launch the boat and set sail tomorrow. Have no fear; for I will guide you to the bride that awaits you.’ Then, standing there, all white and beautiful, the spirit held forth a symbol – such as I had never before seen – in the figure of a cross, and the spirit said: ‘By this symbol shall she be known to you.’”

“If this be so, you must need go,” said Jans. “But are you well victualled? Come to my cabin, and let me give you venison and bear’s meat.”

Norss shook his head. “The spirit will provide,” said he. “I have no fear, and I shall take no care, trusting in the spirit.”

So Norss pushed his boat down the beach into the sea, and leaped into the boat, and unfurled the sail to the wind. Jans stood wondering on the beach, and watched the boat speed out of sight.

On, on, many days on sailed Norss – so many leagues that he thought he must have compassed the earth. In all this time he knew no hunger nor thirst; it was as the spirit had told him in his dream – no cares nor dangers beset him. By day the dolphins and the other creatures of the sea gambolled about his boat; by night a beauteous Star seemed to direct his course; and when he slept and dreamed, he saw ever the spirit clad in white, and holding forth to him the symbol in the similitude of a cross.

At last he came to a strange country – a country so very different from his own that he could scarcely trust his senses. Instead of the rugged mountains of the North, he saw a gentle landscape of velvety green; the trees were not pines and firs, but cypresses, cedars, and palms; instead of the cold, crisp air of his native land, he scented the perfumed zephyrs of the Orient; and the wind that filled the sail of his boat and smote his tanned cheeks was heavy and hot with the odor of cinnamon and spices. The waters were calm and blue – very different from the white and angry waves of Norss’s native fiord.

As if guided by an unseen hand, the boat pointed straight for the beach of this strangely beautiful land; and ere its prow cleaved the shallower waters, Norss saw a maiden standing on the shore, shading her eyes with her right hand, and gazing intently at him. She was the most beautiful maiden he had ever looked upon. As Norss was fair, so was this maiden dark; her black hair fell loosely about her shoulders in charming contrast with the white raiment in which her slender, graceful form was clad. Around her neck she wore a golden chain, and therefrom was suspended a small symbol, which Norss did not immediately recognize.

“Hast thou come sailing out of the North into the East?” asked the maiden.

“Yes,” said Norss.

“And thou art Norss?” she asked.

“I am Norss; and I come seeking my bride,” he answered.

“I am she,” said the maiden. “My name is Faia. An angel came to me in my dreams last night, and the angel said: ‘Stand upon the beach today, and Norss shall come out of the North to bear thee home a bride.’ So, coming here, I found thee sailing to our shore.”

Remembering then the spirit’s words, Norss said: “What symbol have you, Faia, that I may know how truly you have spoken?”

“No symbol have I but this,” said Faia, holding out the symbol that was attached to the golden chain about her neck. Norss looked upon it, and lo! it was the symbol of his dreams – a tiny wooden cross.

Then Norss clasped Faia in his arms and kissed her, and entering into the boat they sailed away into the North. In all their voyage neither care nor danger beset them; for as it had been told to them in their dreams, so it came to pass. By day the dolphins and the other creatures of the sea gambolled about them; by night the winds and the waves sang them to sleep; and, strangely enough, the Star which before had led Norss into the East, now shone bright and beautiful in the Northern sky!

When Norss and his bride reached their home, Jans, the forge-master, and the other neighbors made great joy, and all said that Faia was more beautiful than any other maiden in the land. So merry was Jans that he built a huge fire in his forge, and the flames thereof filled the whole Northern sky with rays of light that danced up, up, up to the Star, singing glad songs the while. So Norss and Faia were wed, and they went to live in the cabin in the fir grove.

To these two was born in good time a son, whom they named Claus. On the night that he was born wondrous things came to pass. To the cabin in the fir grove came all the quaint, weird spirits – the fairies, the elves, the trolls, the pixies, the fadas, the crions, the goblins, the kobolds, the moss-people, the gnomes, the dwarfs, the water-sprites, the courils, the bogles, the brownies, the nixies, the trows, the stille-volk – all came to the cabin in the fir grove, and capered about and sang the strange, beautiful songs of the Mist-Land. And the flames of old Jans’s forge leaped up higher than ever into the Northern sky, carrying the joyous tidings to the Star, and full of music was that happy night.

Even in infancy Claus did marvelous things. With his baby hands he wrought into pretty figures the willows that were given him to play with. As he grew older, he fashioned, with the knife old Jans had made for him, many curious toys – carts, horses, dogs, lambs, houses, trees, cats, and birds, all of wood and very like to nature. His mother taught him how to make dolls too – dolls of every kind, condition, temper, and color; proud dolls, homely dolls, boy dolls, lady dolls, wax dolls, rubber dolls, paper dolls, worsted dolls, rag dolls – dolls of every description and without end. So Claus became at once quite as popular with the little girls as with the little boys of his native village; for he was so generous that he gave away all these pretty things as fast as he made them.

Claus seemed to know by instinct every language. As he grew older he would ramble off into the woods and talk with the trees, the rocks, and the beasts of the greenwood; or he would sit on the cliffs overlooking the fiord, and listen to the stories that the waves of the sea loved to tell him; then, too, he knew the haunts of the elves and the stille-volk, and many a pretty tale he learned from these little people. When night came, old Jans told him the quaint legends of the North, and his mother sang to him the lullabies she had heard when a little child herself in the far-distant East. And every night his mother held out to him the symbol in the similitude of the cross, and bade him kiss it ere he went to sleep.

So Claus grew to manhood, increasing each day in knowledge and in wisdom. His works increased too; and his liberality dispensed everywhere the beauteous things which his fancy conceived and his skill executed. Jans, being now a very old man, and having no son of his own, gave to Claus his forge and workshop, and taught him those secret arts which he in youth had learned from cunning masters. Right joyous now was Claus; and many, many times the Northern sky glowed with the flames that danced singing from the forge while Claus molded his pretty toys. Every color of the rainbow were these flames; for they reflected the bright colors of the beauteous things strewn round that wonderful workshop. Just as of old he had dispensed to all children alike the homelier toys of his youth, so now he gave to all children alike these more beautiful and more curious gifts. So little children everywhere loved Claus, because he gave them pretty toys, and their parents loved him because he made their little ones so happy.

For he was so generous that he gave away all these pretty things as fast as he made them.

But now Norss and Faia were come to old age. After long years of love and happiness, they knew that death could not be far distant. And one day Faia said to Norss: “Neither you nor I, dear love, fear death; but if we could choose, would we not choose to live always in this our son Claus, who has been so sweet a joy to us?”

“Ay, ay,” said Norss; “but how is that possible?”

“We shall see,” said Faia.

That night Norss dreamed that a spirit came to him, and that the spirit said to him: “Norss, thou shalt surely live forever in thy son Claus, if thou wilt but acknowledge the symbol.”

Then when the morning was come Norss told his dream to Faia, his wife; and Faia said:

“The same dream had I – an angel appearing to me and speaking these very words.”

“But what of the symbol?” cried Norss.

“I have it here, about my neck,” said Faia.

So saying, Faia drew from her bosom the symbol of wood – a tiny cross suspended about her neck by the golden chain. And as she stood there holding the symbol out to Norss, he – he thought of the time when first he saw her on the far-distant Orient shore, standing beneath the Star in all her maidenly glory, shading her beauteous eyes with one hand, and with the other clasping the cross – the holy talisman of her faith.

“Faia, Faia!” cried Norss, “it is the same – the same you wore when I fetched you a bride from the East!”

“It is the same,” said Faia, “yet see how my kisses and my prayers have worn it away; for many, many times in these years, dear Norss, have I pressed it to my lips and breathed your name upon it. See now – see what a beauteous light its shadow makes upon your aged face!”

The sunbeams, indeed, streaming through the window at that moment, cast the shadow of the symbol on old Norss’s brow. Norss felt a glorious warmth suffuse him, his heart leaped with joy, and he stretched out his arms and fell about Faia’s neck, and kissed the symbol and acknowledged it. Then likewise did Faia; and suddenly the place was filled with a wondrous brightness and with strange music, and never thereafter were Norss and Faia beholden of men.

Until late that night Claus toiled at his forge; for it was a busy season with him, and he had many, many curious and beauteous things to make for the little children in the country round about. The colored flames leaped singing from his forge, so that the Northern sky seemed to be lighted by a thousand rainbows; but above all this voiceful glory beamed the Star, bright, beautiful, serene.

Coming late to the cabin in the fir grove, Claus wondered that no sign of his father or of his mother was to be seen. “Father – mother!” he cried, but he received no answer. Just then the Star cast its golden gleam through the latticed window, and this strange, holy light fell and rested upon the symbol of the cross that lay upon the floor. Seeing it, Claus stooped and picked it up, and kissing it reverently, he cried: “Dear talisman, be thou my inspiration evermore; and wheresoever thy blessed influence is felt, there also let my works be known henceforth forever!”

No sooner had he said these words than Claus felt the gift of immortality bestowed upon him; and in that moment, too, there came to him a knowledge that his parents’ prayer had been answered, and that Norss and Faia would live in him through all time.

And lo! to that place and in that hour came all the people of Mist-Land and of Dream-Land to declare allegiance to him: yes, the elves, the fairies, the pixies – all came to Claus, prepared to do his bidding. Joyously they capered about him, and merrily they sang.

“Now haste ye all,” cried Claus – “haste ye all to your homes and bring to my workshop the best ye have. Search, little hill-people, deep in the bowels of the earth for finest gold and choicest jewels; fetch me, O mermaids, from the bottom of the sea the treasures hidden there – the shells of rainbow tints, the smooth, bright pebbles, and the strange ocean flowers; go, pixies, and other water-sprites, to your secret lakes, and bring me pearls! Speed! speed you all! for many pretty things have we to make for the little ones of earth we love!”

But to the kobolds and the brownies Claus said: “Fly to every house on earth where the cross is known; loiter unseen in the corners, and watch and hear the children through the day. Keep a strict account of good and bad, and every night bring back to me the names of good and bad that I may know them.”

The kobolds and the brownies laughed gleefully, and sped away on noiseless wings; and so, too, did the other fairies and elves.

There came also to Claus the beasts of the forest and the birds of the air, and bade him be their master. And up danced the Four Winds, and they said: “May we not serve you, too?”

The Snow King came stealing along in his feathery chariot. “Oho!” he cried, “I shall speed over all the world and tell them you are coming. In town and country, on the mountain-tops and in the valleys – wheresoever the cross is raised – there will I herald your approach, and thither will I strew you a pathway of feathery white. Oho! oho!” So, singing softly, the Snow King stole upon his way.

But of all the beasts that begged to do him service, Claus liked the reindeer best. “You shall go with me in my travels; for henceforth I shall bear my treasures not only to the children of the North, but to the children in every land whither the Star points me and where the cross is lifted up!” So said Claus to the reindeer, and the reindeer neighed joyously and stamped their hoofs impatiently, as though they longed to start immediately.

Oh, many, many times has Claus whirled away from his far Northern home in his sledge drawn by the reindeer, and thousands upon thousands of beautiful gifts – all of his own making – has he borne to the children of every land; for he loves them all alike, and they all alike love him, I trow. So truly do they love him that they call him Santa Claus, and I am sure that he must be a saint; for he has lived these many hundred years, and we, who know that he was born of Faith and Love, believe that he will live forever.

—Eugene Field
(1850–1895)

Little Wolff’s
Wooden Shoes



Once upon a time – so long ago that everybody has forgotten the date – in a city in the north of Europe – with such a hard name that nobody can ever remember it – there was a little seven-year-old boy named Wolff, whose parents were dead, who lived with a cross and stingy old aunt, who never thought of kissing him more than once a year and who sighed deeply whenever she gave him a bowlful of soup.

But the poor little fellow had such a sweet nature that in spite of everything, he loved the old woman, although he was terribly afraid of her and could never look at her ugly old face without shivering.

As this aunt of little Wolff was known to have a house of her own and an old woolen stocking full of gold, she had not dared to send the boy to a charity school; but, in order to get a reduction in the price, she had so wrangled with the master of the school, to which little Wolff finally went, that this bad man, vexed at having a pupil so poorly dressed and paying so little, often punished him unjustly, and even prejudiced his companions against him, so that the three boys, all sons of rich parents, made a drudge and laughing stock of the little fellow.

The poor little one was thus as wretched as a child could be and used to hide himself in corners to weep whenever Christmas time came.

It was the schoolmaster’s custom to take all his pupils to the midnight mass on Christmas Eve, and to bring them home again afterward.

Now, as the winter this year was very bitter, and as heavy snow had been falling for several days, all the boys came well bundled up in warm clothes, with fur caps pulled over their ears, padded jackets, gloves and knitted mittens, and strong, thick-soled boots. Only little Wolff presented himself shivering in the poor clothes he used to wear both weekdays and Sundays and having on his feet only thin socks in heavy wooden shoes.

His naughty companions noticing his sad face and awkward appearance, made many jokes at his expense; but the little fellow was so busy blowing on his fingers, and was suffering so much with chilblains, that he took no notice of them. So the band of youngsters, walking two and two behind the master, started for the church.

It was pleasant in the church which was brilliant with lighted candles; and the boys excited by the warmth took advantage of the music of the choir and the organ to chatter among themselves in low tones. They bragged about the fun that was awaiting them at home. The mayor’s son had seen, just before starting off, an immense goose ready stuffed and dressed for cooking. At the alderman’s home there was a little pine-tree with branches laden down with oranges, sweets, and toys. And the lawyer’s cook had put on her cap with such care as she never thought of taking unless she was expecting something very good!

Then they talked, too, of all that the Christ-Child was going to bring them, of all he was going to put in their shoes which, you might be sure, they would take good care to leave in the chimney place before going to bed; and the eyes of these little urchins, as lively as a cage of mice, were sparkling in advance over the joy they would have when they awoke in the morning and saw the pink bag full of sugar-plums, the little lead soldiers ranged in companies in their boxes, the menageries smelling of varnished wood, and the magnificent jumping-jacks in purple and tinsel.

Alas! Little Wolff knew by experience that his old miser of an aunt would send him to bed supperless, but, with childlike faith and certain of having been, all the year, as good and industrious as possible, he hoped that the Christ-Child would not forget him, and so he, too, planned to place his wooden shoes in good time in the fireplace.

Midnight mass over, the worshippers departed, eager for their fun, and the band of pupils always walking two and two, and following the teacher, left the church.

Now, in the porch and seated on a stone bench set in the niche of a painted arch, a child was sleeping – a child in a white woolen garment, but with his little feet bare, in spite of the cold. He was not a beggar, for his garment was white and new, and near him on the floor was a bundle of carpenter’s tools.

In the clear light of the stars, his face, with its closed eyes, shone with an expression of divine sweetness, and his long, curling, blond locks seemed to form a halo about his brow. But his little child’s feet, made blue by the cold of this bitter December night, were pitiful to see!

The boys so well clothed for the winter weather passed by quite indifferent to the unknown child; several of them, sons of the notables of the town, however, cast on the vagabond looks in which could be read all the scorn of the rich for the poor, of the well-fed for the hungry.

But little Wolff, coming last out of the church, stopped, deeply touched, before the beautiful sleeping child.

“Oh, dear!” said the little fellow to himself, “this is frightful! This poor little one has no shoes and stockings in this bad weather – and, what is still worse, he has not even a wooden shoe to leave near him tonight while he sleeps, into which the little Christ-Child can put something good to soothe his misery.”

And carried away by his loving heart, Wolff drew the wooden shoe from his right foot, laid it down before the sleeping child, and, as best he could, sometimes hopping, sometimes limping with his sock wet by the snow, he went home to his aunt.

“Look at the good-for-nothing!” cried the old woman, full of wrath at the sight of the shoeless boy. “What have you done with your shoe, you little villain?”

Little Wolff did not know how to lie, so, although trembling with terror when he saw the rage of the old shrew, he tried to relate his adventure.

But the miserly old creature only burst into a frightful fit of laughter.

“Aha! So my young gentleman strips himself for the beggars. Aha! My young gentleman breaks his pair of shoes for a bare-foot! Here is something new, forsooth. Very well, since it is this way, I shall put the only shoe that is left into the chimney-place, and I’ll answer for it that the Christ-Child will put in something tonight to beat you with in the morning! And you will have only a crust of bread and water tomorrow. And we shall see if the next time, you will be giving your shoes to the first vagabond that happens along.”

And the wicked woman having boxed the ears of the poor little fellow, made him climb up into the loft where he had his wretched cubbyhole.

Desolate, the child went to bed in the dark and soon fell asleep, but his pillow was wet with tears.

But behold! the next morning when the old woman, awakened early by the cold, went downstairs – oh, wonder of wonders – she saw the big chimney filled with shining toys, bags of magnificent bonbons, and riches of every sort, and standing out in front of all this treasure, was the right wooden shoe which the boy had given to the little vagabond, yes, and beside it, the one which she had placed in the chimney to hold the bunch of switches.

As little Wolff, attracted by the cries of his aunt, stood in an ecstasy of childish delight before the splendid Christmas gifts, shouts of laughter were heard outside. The woman and child ran out to see what all this meant, and behold! all the gossips of the town were standing around the public fountain. What could have happened? Oh, a most ridiculous and extraordinary thing! The children of the richest men in the town, whom their parents had planned to surprise with the most beautiful presents had found only switches in their shoes!

Then the old woman and the child thinking of all the riches in their chimney were filled with fear. But suddenly they saw the priest appear, his countenance full of astonishment. Just above the bench placed near the door of the church, in the very spot where, the night before, a child in a white garment and with bare feet, in spite of the cold, had rested his lovely head, the priest had found a circlet of gold imbedded in the old stones.

Then, they all crossed themselves devoutly, perceiving that this beautiful sleeping child with the carpenter’s tools had been Jesus of Nazareth himself, who had come back for one hour just as he had been when he used to work in the home of his parents; and reverently they bowed before this miracle, which the good God had done to reward the faith and the love of a little child.

—François Coppée
(1842–1908)

Why the Chimes Rang



There was once in a faraway country where few people have ever travelled, a wonderful church. It stood on a high hill in the midst of a great city; and every Sunday, as well as on sacred days like Christmas, thousands of people climbed the hill to its great archways, looking like lines of ants all moving in the same direction.

When you came to the building itself, you found stone columns and dark passages, and a grand entrance leading to the main room of the church. This room was so long that one standing at the doorway could scarcely see to the other end, where the choir stood by the marble altar. In the farthest corner was the organ; and this organ was so loud, that sometimes when it played, the people for miles around would close their shutters and prepare for a great thunderstorm. Altogether, no such church as this was ever seen before, especially when it was lighted up for some festival, and crowded with people, young and old. But the strangest thing about the whole building was the wonderful chime of bells.

At one corner of the church was a great gray tower, with ivy growing over it as far up as one could see. I say as far as one could see, because the tower was quite great enough to fit the great church, and it rose so far into the sky that it was only in very fair weather that anyone claimed to be able to see the top. Even then one could not be certain that it was in sight. Up, and up, and up climbed the stones and the ivy; and as the men who built the church had been dead for hundreds of years, everyone had forgotten how high the tower was supposed to be.

Now all the people knew that at the top of the tower was a chime of Christmas bells. They had hung there ever since the church had been built, and were the most beautiful bells in the world. Some thought it was because a great musician had cast them and arranged them in their place; others said it was because of the great height, which reached up where the air was clearest and purest; however that might be no one who had ever heard the chimes denied that they were the sweetest in the world. Some described them as sounding like angels far up in the sky; others as sounding like strange winds singing through the trees.

But the fact was that no one had heard them for years and years. There was an old man living not far from the church who said that his mother had spoken of hearing them when she was a little girl, and he was the only one who was sure of as much as that. They were Christmas chimes, you see, and were not meant to be played by men or on common days. It was the custom on Christmas Eve for all the people to bring to the church their offerings to the Christ-Child; and when the greatest and best offering was laid on the altar there used to come sounding through the music of the choir the Christmas chimes far up in the tower. Some said that the wind rang them, and others, that they were so high that the angels could set them swinging. But for many long years they had never been heard. It was said that people had been growing less careful of their gifts for the Christ-Child, and that no offering was brought great enough to deserve the music of the chimes.

Every Christmas Eve the rich people still crowded to the altar, each one trying to bring some better gift than any other, without giving anything that he wanted for himself, and the church was crowded with those who thought that perhaps the wonderful bells might be heard again. But although the service was splendid, and the offerings plenty, only the roar of the wind could be heard, far up in the stone tower.

Now, a number of miles from the city, in a little country village, where nothing could be seen of the great church but glimpses of the tower when the weather was fine, lived a boy named Pedro, and his little brother. They knew very little about the Christmas chimes, but they had heard of the service in the church on Christmas Eve, and had a secret plan which they had often talked over when by themselves, to go to see the beautiful celebration.

“Nobody can guess, Little Brother,” Pedro would say; “all the fine things there are to see and hear; and I have even heard it said that the Christ-Child sometimes comes down to bless the service. What if we could see Him?”

The day before Christmas was bitterly cold, with a few lonely snowflakes flying in the air, and a hard white crust on the ground. Sure enough Pedro and Little Brother were able to slip quietly away early in the afternoon; and although the walking was hard in the frosty air, before nightfall they had trudged so far, hand in hand, that they saw the lights of the big city just ahead of them. Indeed they were about to enter one of the great gates in the wall that surrounded it, when they saw something dark on the snow near their path, and stepped aside to look at it.

It was a poor woman, who had fallen just outside the city, too sick and tired to get in where she might have found shelter. The soft snow made of a drift a sort of pillow for her, and she would soon be so sound asleep, in the wintry air, that no one could ever waken her again. All this Pedro saw in a moment and he knelt down beside her and tried to rouse her, even tugging at her arm a little, as though he would have tried to carry her away. He turned her face toward him, so that he could rub some of the snow on it, and when he had looked at her silently a moment he stood up again, and said:

“It’s no use, Little Brother. You will have to go on alone.”

“Alone?” cried Little Brother. “And you not see the Christmas festival?”

“No,” said Pedro, and he could not keep back a bit of a choking sound in his throat. “See this poor woman. Her face looks like the Madonna in the chapel window, and she will freeze to death if nobody cares for her. Every one has gone to the church now, but when you come back you can bring someone to help her. I will rub her to keep her from freezing, and perhaps get her to eat the bun that is left in my pocket.”

“But I cannot bear to leave you, and go on alone,” said Little Brother.

“Both of us need not miss the service,” said Pedro, “and it had better be I than you. You can easily find your way to church; and you must see and hear everything twice, Little Brother – once for you and once for me. I am sure the Christ-Child must know how I should love to come with you and worship Him; and oh! if you get a chance, Little Brother, to slip up to the altar without getting in anyone’s way, take this little silver piece of mine, and lay it down for my offering, when no one is looking. Do not forget where you have left me, and forgive me for not going with you.”

In this way he hurried Little Brother off to the city and winked hard to keep back the tears, as he heard the crunching footsteps sounding farther and farther away in the twilight. It was pretty hard to lose the music and splendor of the Christmas celebration that he had been planning for so long, and spend the time instead in that lonely place in the snow.

The great church was a wonderful place that night. Every one said that it had never looked so bright and beautiful before. When the organ played and the thousands of people sang, the walls shook with the sound, and little Pedro, away outside the city wall, felt the earth tremble around them.

At the close of the service came the procession with the offerings to be laid on the altar. Rich men and great men marched proudly up to lay down their gifts to the Christ-Child. Some brought wonderful jewels, some baskets of gold so heavy that they could scarcely carry them down the aisle. A great writer laid down a book that he had been making for years and years. And last of all walked the king of the country, hoping with all the rest to win for himself the chime of the Christmas bells. There went a great murmur through the church as the people saw the king take from his head the royal crown, all set with precious stones, and lay it gleaming on the altar, as his offering to the Holy Child. “Surely,” everyone said, “we shall hear the bells now, for nothing like this has ever happened before.”

But still only the cold old wind was heard in the tower and the people shook their heads; and some of them said, as they had before, that they never really believed the story of the chimes, and doubted if they ever rang at all.

The procession was over, and the choir began the closing hymn. Suddenly the organist stopped playing; and everyone looked at the old minister, who was standing by the altar, holding up his hand for silence. Not a sound could be heard from anyone in the church, but as all the people strained their ears to listen, there came softly, but distinctly, swinging through the air, the sound of the chimes in the tower. So far away, and yet so clear the music seemed – so much sweeter were the notes than anything that had been heard before, rising and falling away up there in the sky, that the people in the church sat for a moment as still as though something held each of them by the shoulders. Then they all stood up together and stared straight at the altar, to see what great gift had awakened the long silent bells.

But all that the nearest of them saw was the childish figure of Little Brother, who had crept softly down the aisle when no one was looking, and had laid Pedro’s little piece of silver on the altar.

—Raymond Macdonald Alden
(1873–1924)

Little Gretchen
and the Wooden Shoe



Once upon a time, a long time ago, far away across the great ocean, in a country called Germany, there could be seen a small log hut on the edge of a great forest, whose fir-trees extended for miles and miles to the north. This little house, made of heavy hewn logs, had but one room in it. A rough pine door gave entrance to this room, and a small square window admitted the light. At the back of the house was built an old-fashioned stone chimney, out of which in winter usually curled a thin, blue smoke, showing that there was not very much fire within.

Small as the house was, it was large enough for the two people who lived in it. I want to tell you a story today about these two people. One was an old, gray-haired woman, so old that the little children of the village, nearly half a mile away, often wondered whether she had come into the world with the huge mountains, and the great fir-trees, which stood like giants back of her small hut. Her face was wrinkled all over with deep lines, which, if the children could only have read aright, would have told them of many years of cheerful, happy, self-sacrifice, of loving, anxious watching beside sick-beds, of quiet endurance of pain, of many a day of hunger and cold, and of a thousand deeds of unselfish love for other people; but, of course, they could not read this strange handwriting. They only knew that she was old and wrinkled, and that she stooped as she walked. None of them seemed to fear her, for her smile was always cheerful, and she had a kindly word for each of them if they chanced to meet her on her way to and from the village. With this old, old woman lived a very little girl. So bright and happy was she that the travellers who passed by the lonesome little house on the edge of the forest often thought of a sunbeam as they saw her. These two people were known in the village as Granny Goodyear and Little Gretchen.

The winter had come and the frost had snapped off many of the smaller branches from the pine-trees in the forest. Gretchen and her Granny were up by daybreak each morning. After their simple breakfast of oatmeal, Gretchen would run to the little closet and fetch Granny’s old woolen shawl, which seemed almost as old as Granny herself. Gretchen always claimed the right to put the shawl over her Granny’s head, even though she had to climb onto the wooden bench to do it. After carefully pinning it under Granny’s chin, she gave her a good-bye kiss, and Granny started out for her morning’s work in the forest. This work was nothing more nor less than the gathering up of the twigs and branches which the autumn winds and winter frosts had thrown upon the ground. These were carefully gathered into a large bundle which Granny tied together with a strong linen band. She then managed to lift the bundle to her shoulder and trudged off to the village with it. Here she sold the fagots for kindling wood to the people of the village. Sometimes she would get only a few pence each day, and sometimes a dozen or more, but on this money little Gretchen and she managed to live; they had their home, and the forest kindly furnished the wood for the fire which kept them warm in cold weather.

In the summer time Granny had a little garden at the back of the hut where she raised, with little Gretchen’s help, a few potatoes and turnips and onions. These she carefully stored away for winter use. To this meager supply, the pennies, gained by selling the twigs from the forest, added the oatmeal for Gretchen and a little black coffee for Granny. Meat was a thing they never thought of having. It cost too much money. Still, Granny and Gretchen were very happy, because they loved each other dearly. Sometimes Gretchen would be left alone all day long in the hut, because Granny would have some work to do in the village after selling her bundle of sticks and twigs. It was during these long days that little Gretchen had taught herself to sing the song which the wind sang to the pine branches. In the summer time she learned the chirp and twitter of the birds, until her voice might almost be mistaken for a bird’s voice; she learned to dance as the swaying shadows did, and even to talk to the stars which shone through the little square window when Granny came home too late or too tired to talk.

Sometimes, when the weather was fine, or her Granny had an extra bundle of newly knitted stockings to take to the village, she would let little Gretchen go along with her. It chanced that one of these trips to the town came just the week before Christmas, and Gretchen’s eyes were delighted by the sight of the lovely Christmas-trees which stood in the window of the village store. It seemed to her that she would never tire of looking at the knit dolls, the woolly lambs, the little wooden shops with their queer, painted men and women in them, and all the other fine things. She had never owned a plaything in her whole life; therefore, toys which you and I would not think much of, seemed to her to be very beautiful.

That night, after their supper of baked potatoes was over, and little Gretchen had cleared away the dishes and swept up the hearth, because Granny dear was so tired, she brought her own small wooden stool and placed it very near Granny’s feet and sat down upon it, folding her hands on her lap. Granny knew that this meant she wanted to talk about something, so she smilingly laid away the large Bible which she had been reading, and took up her knitting, which was as much as to say: “Well, Gretchen, dear, Granny is ready to listen.”

“Granny,” said Gretchen slowly, “it’s almost Christmas time, isn’t it?”

“Yes, dearie,” said Granny, “only five more days now,” and then she sighed, but little Gretchen was so happy that she did not notice Granny’s sigh.

“What do you think, Granny, I’ll get this Christmas?” said she, looking up eagerly into Granny’s face.

“Ah, child, child,” said Granny, shaking her head, “you’ll have no Christmas this year. We are too poor for that.”

“Oh, but, Granny,” interrupted little Gretchen, “think of all the beautiful toys we saw in the village today. Surely Santa Claus has sent enough for every little child.”

“Ah, dearie,” said Granny, “those toys are for people who can pay money for them, and we have no money to spend for Christmas toys.”

“Well, Granny,” said Gretchen, “perhaps some of the little children who live in the great house on the hill at the other end of the village will be willing to share some of their toys with me. They will be so glad to give some to a little girl who has none.”

“Dear child, dear child,” said Granny, leaning forward and stroking the soft, shiny hair of the little girl, “your heart is full of love. You would be glad to bring a Christmas to every child; but their heads are so full of what they are going to get that they forget all about anybody else but themselves.” Then she sighed and shook her head.

“Well, Granny,” said Gretchen, her bright, happy tone of voice growing a little less joyous, “perhaps the dear Santa Claus will show some of the village children how to make presents that do not cost money, and some of them may surprise me Christmas morning with a present. And, Granny, dear,” added she, springing up from her low stool, “can’t I gather some of the pine branches and take them to the old sick man who lives in the house by the mill, so that he can have the sweet smell of our pine forest in his room all Christmas day?”

“Yes, dearie,” said Granny, “you may do what you can to make the Christmas bright and happy, but you must not expect any present yourself.”

“Oh, but, Granny,” said little Gretchen, her face brightening, “you forget all about the shining Christmas angels, who came down to earth and sang their wonderful song the night the beautiful Christ-Child was born! They are so loving and good that they will not forget any little child. I shall ask my dear stars tonight to tell them of us. You know,” she added, with a look of relief, “the stars are so very high that they must know the angels quite well, as they come and go with their messages from the loving God.”

Granny sighed, as she half whispered, “Poor child, poor child!” but Gretchen threw her arm around Granny’s neck and gave her a hearty kiss, saying as she did so: “Oh, Granny, Granny, you don’t talk to the stars often enough, else you wouldn’t be sad at Christmas time.” Then she danced all around the room, whirling her little skirts about her to show Granny how the wind had made the snow dance that day. She looked so droll and funny that Granny forgot her cares and worries and laughed with little Gretchen over her new snow-dance. The days passed on, and the morning before Christmas Eve came. Gretchen having tidied up the little room – for Granny had taught her to be a careful little housewife – was off to the forest, singing a birdlike song, almost as happy and free as the birds themselves. She was very busy that day, preparing a surprise for Granny. First, however, she gathered the most beautiful of the fir branches within her reach to take the next morning to the old sick man who lived by the mill. The day was all too short for the happy little girl. When Granny came trudging wearily home that night, she found the frame of the doorway covered with green pine branches.

“It’s to welcome you, Granny! It’s to welcome you!” cried Gretchen; “our old dear home wanted to give you a Christmas welcome. Don’t you see, the branches of evergreen make it look as if it were smiling all over, and it is trying to say, ‘A happy Christmas’ to you, Granny!”

Granny laughed and kissed the little girl, as they opened the door and went in together. Here was a new surprise for Granny. The four posts of the wooden bed, which stood in one corner of the room, had been trimmed by the busy little fingers, with smaller and more flexible branches of the pine-trees. A small bouquet of red mountain-ash berries stood at each side of the fireplace, and these, together with the trimmed posts of the bed, gave the plain old room quite a festival look. Gretchen laughed and clapped her hands and danced about until the house seemed full of music to poor, tired Granny, whose heart had been sad as she turned toward their home that night, thinking of the disappointment which must come to loving little Gretchen the next morning.

After supper was over little Gretchen drew her stool up to Granny’s side, and laying her soft, little hands on Granny’s knee, asked to be told once again the story of the coming of the Christ-Child; how the night that he was born the beautiful angels had sung their wonderful song, and how the whole sky had become bright with a strange and glorious light, never seen by the people of earth before. Gretchen had heard the story many, many times before, but she never grew tired of it, and now that Christmas Eve had come again, the happy little child wanted to hear it once more.

When Granny had finished telling it the two sat quiet and silent for a little while thinking it over; then Granny rose and said that it was time for them to go to bed. She slowly took off her heavy wooden shoes, such as are worn in that country, and placed them beside the hearth. Gretchen looked thoughtfully at them for a minute or two, and then she said, “Granny, don’t you think that somebody in all this wide world will think of us tonight?”

“Nay, Gretchen,” said Granny, “I don’t think anyone will.”

“Well, then, Granny,” said Gretchen, “the Christmas angels will, I know; so I am going to take one of your wooden shoes, and put it on the windowsill outside, so that they may see it as they pass by. I am sure the stars will tell the Christmas angels where the shoe is.”

“Ah, you foolish, foolish child,” said Granny, “you are only getting ready for a disappointment Tomorrow morning there will be nothing whatever in the shoe. I can tell you that now.”

But little Gretchen would not listen. She only shook her head and cried out: “Ah, Granny, you don’t talk enough to the stars.” With this she seized the shoe, and, opening the door, hurried out to place it on the windowsill. It was very dark without, and something soft and cold seemed to gently kiss her hair and face. Gretchen knew by this that it was snowing, and she looked up to the sky, anxious to see if the stars were in sight, but a strong wind was tumbling the dark, heavy snow-clouds about and had shut away all else.

“Never mind,” said Gretchen softly to herself, “the stars are up there, even if I can’t see them, and the Christmas angels do not mind snowstorms.”

Just then a rough wind went sweeping by the little girl, whispering something to her which she could not understand, and then it made a sudden rush up to the snow-clouds and parted them, so that the deep, mysterious sky appeared beyond, and shining down out of the midst of it was Gretchen’s favorite star.

“Ah, little star, little star!” said the child, laughing aloud, “I knew you were there, though I couldn’t see you. Will you whisper to the Christmas angels as they come by that little Gretchen wants so very much to have a Christmas gift tomorrow morning, if they have one to spare, and that she has put one of Granny’s shoes upon the windowsill ready for it?”

A moment more and the little girl, standing on tiptoe, had reached the windowsill and placed the shoe upon it, and was back again in the house beside Granny and the warm fire.

The two went quietly to bed, and that night as little Gretchen knelt to pray to the Heavenly Father, she thanked him for having sent the Christ-Child into the world to teach all mankind how to be loving and unselfish, and in a few moments she was quietly sleeping, dreaming of the Christmas angels.

The next morning, very early, even before the sun was up, little Gretchen was awakened by the sound of sweet music coming from the village. She listened for a moment and then she knew that the choir-boys were singing the Christmas carols in the open air of the village street. She sprang up out of bed and began to dress herself as quickly as possible, singing as she dressed. While Granny was slowly putting on her clothes, little Gretchen, having finished dressing herself, unfastened the door and hurried out to see what the Christmas angels had left in the old wooden shoe.

The white snow covered everything – trees, stumps, roads, and pastures – until the whole world looked like fairyland. Gretchen climbed up on a large stone which was beneath the window and carefully lifted down the wooden shoe. The snow tumbled off of it in a shower over the little girl’s hands, but she did not heed that; she ran hurriedly back into the house, putting her hand into the toe of the shoe as she ran.

“Oh, Granny! Oh, Granny!” she exclaimed, “you didn’t believe the Christmas angels would think about us, but see, they have, they have! Here is a dear little bird nestled down in the toe of your shoe! Oh, isn’t he beautiful?”

Granny came forward and looked at what the child was holding lovingly in her hand. There she saw a tiny chick-a-dee, whose wing was evidently broken by the rough and boisterous winds of the night before, and who had taken shelter in the safe, dry toe of the old wooden shoe. She gently took the little bird out of Gretchen’s hands, and skillfully bound his broken wing to his side, so that he need not hurt himself by trying to fly with it. Then she showed Gretchen how to make a nice warm nest for the little stranger, close beside the fire, and when their breakfast was ready she let Gretchen feed the little bird with a few moist crumbs.

Later in the day Gretchen carried the fresh, green boughs to the old sick man by the mill, and on her way home stopped to see and enjoy the Christmas toys of some other children whom she knew, never once wishing that they were hers. When she reached home she found that the little bird had gone to sleep. Soon, however, he opened his eyes and stretched his head up, saying just as plain as a bird could say, “Now, my new friends, I want you to give me something more to eat.” Gretchen gladly fed him again, and then, holding him in her lap, she softly and gently stroked his gray feathers until the little creature seemed to lose all fear of her. That evening Granny taught her a Christmas hymn and told her another beautiful Christmas story. Then Gretchen made up a funny little story to tell to the birdie. He winked his eyes and turned his head from side to side in such a droll fashion that Gretchen laughed until the tears came.

As Granny and she got ready for bed that night, Gretchen put her arms softly around Granny’s neck, and whispered: “What a beautiful Christmas we have had today, Granny! Is there anything in the world more lovely than Christmas?”

“Nay, child, nay,” said Granny, “not to such loving hearts as yours.”

—Elizabeth Harrison
(1849–1927)