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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7b32de0 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #64117 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/64117) diff --git a/old/64117-0.txt b/old/64117-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 4f0114b..0000000 --- a/old/64117-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,2127 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Christmas Holly, by Marion Harland - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: The Christmas Holly - -Author: Marion Harland - -Release Date: December 23, 2020 [eBook #64117] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: Charlene Taylor, Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was - produced from images generously made available by The Internet - Archive/American Libraries.) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CHRISTMAS HOLLY *** - - - - - CHRISTMAS HOLLY - - [Illustration] - - - - - [Illustration: THE CHRISTMAS HOLLY] - - BY - - MARION HARLAND - - New York: - - _SHELDON & Co., PUBLISHERS, - 498 & 500 BROADWAY._ - - 1867. - - - _Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by - SHELDON & Co., -In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States, for the - Southern District of New York._ - - - _Stereotyped by_ SMITH & MCDOUGAL, _84 Beckman St._ - - - - - SALUTATORY. - - -On a Christmas Eve, many years ago, before I had learned to accept Life -as it is,--as it must ever be while Man needs the discipline of -reverses, and while the ways of God are known but to Himself,--a -checquered scene, always; often grey and lowering; sometimes black with -midnight and chill with storm--on a certain Christmas Eve, then, when I -was young, unreasonable and rebellious, I took a long, lonely walk into -the country. The afternoon suited my temper, and both were gloomy. Low -heavens of clouded steel that yet seemed, now and then, to shiver with -the still, biting air, and with each shudder, to let down a few -wandering flakes of snow; a bleak landscape of commons, blasted by -invisible frost; of sterile hills, that must have been stony and bare in -the sunniest springtime,--and for a horizon, a girdle of leafless woods, -stretching up motionless boughs against the pitiless sky; in the hollow -formed by the amphitheatre of hills, an artificial pond--too intensely -tame in form and surroundings to deserve the name of lake, or be -mistaken for aught but what it was, viz., a pool dug and filled with a -single eye to the production of ice for the next summer’s use,--this was -the picture that greeted my outlooking sight. Within was the dull, icy -calm of stoical misanthropy; distrust of my fellows, which stubbornly -refused to ask of heavenly wisdom the solution of the human enigma that -had baffled, in disgusting me. - -Into the midst of this sunless mood came a surprise Right before me, in -my steady but aimless track across the waste, was a clump of dwarf -trees, poor, puny things that must have had a hard coming-up. I -marvelled, in surveying them, that the germs from which they had -struggled had had the courage to sprout in such a barren spot. In the -centre of the coppice, head and shoulders above his fellows, arose a -holly sapling, brave with leaves of glossy green and scarlet berries. -The only smile in the drear expanse, it was in itself a whole fountain -of cheer. The soil about the trunk might be frozen to stone-like -hardness, but below, the great heart of Mother Earth pulsed warmly -still; throwing up, at each beat, sap into the hardy frame of her -winter-child; strength to the lusty limbs; verdure to the spiky leaves; -blushes to the coral beads. And while I looked, a bevy of brown-coated -plump-breasted snow-birds whirled noisily across the plain, and -alighted, with much twittering and a deal of happy, useless fluttering, -among the inviting branches. - -I had conned my lesson, and I turned my face homewards with changed -spirits and a changed purpose. As one measure towards the fulfilment of -the latter, I send this Christmas greeting into the waste we know as the -common life of this working-day world. We make it too common, dear -reader. We choose for ourselves a path across a dead level, and then -perversely adapt our feelings to what we are pleased to call our -circumstances. I pray you, for this one holiday season, learn with me of -my holly-tree. Seek out present brightness, and in it read the promise -of happy days to come. Sigh not that - - --“All hope of Spring-time - Has perished with the year,” - -while the same Love that nourishes the tiny greenling of the forest into -brightness and beauty, despite wintry blast and wintry sleet, will keep -alive in your heart, if not the tender shoots of youthful joys, the -stronger, braver, worthier growth of love for your brother man; helpful -charity for all things weak and lowly and sorrowing; hope and faith in -the wise and tender Father of us all. - - MARION HARLAND. - - - - - Nettie’s Prayer. - - - - - Netties Prayer. - - -Mrs. Dryden was cross! - -She would have been at a loss to specify what especial grounds she had -for the discontent that possessed her on this particular night. If -interrogated, she would probably have returned an evasive reply to the -effect that it was none of the questioner’s business how she felt or -looked, so long as she did not obtrude her unhappiness upon other -people. Everybody had his and her own troubles with which others had no -right to intermeddle. She was responsible to no one for her behavior; -nobody should hinder her from being low-spirited, if she pleased to be -so. She was out of humor with the whole world, herself included. The -children were troublesome; the servants heedless; her husband -indifferent to her grievances--and it was Christmas eve. - -“Really,” she said, peevishly, at tea-time, “one would suppose that -Christmas came but once in a century, instead of once a year! Everybody -is as crazy to-night as if there were never to be another 25th of -December.” - -“By the way,” said her husband, looking up from his paper, “I suppose -you have baked some mince-pies and fried some dough-nuts--haven’t you?” - -“I have mince-pies and turkey for to-morrow!” was the curt reply. “I -knew you would not be satisfied unless you had as good a dinner as your -neighbors. But as for dough-nuts--they are oily, rank, indigestible -abominations, fit only for an ostrich’s stomach, and one doesn’t get the -smell of the hot fat out of the house in two weeks after they have been -cooked. I never mean to make another while I live.” - -Two pairs of sorrowful eyes stole a glance of mutual pity at one -another, when this announcement was made; two pairs of cherry lips took -a piteous curl, for a second; two curly heads bent lower over the plates -set before their owners. - -Not that there was any dearth of sweet things in the Dryden larder, or -that Ally and Nettie, the proprietors of the eyes, lips, and heads -aforesaid, were gormandizers. But this matter of frying doughnuts was -great fun to them, as it is to most other small people who have ever -been permitted to stand by and see the rings, leaves, birds, circles, -triangles, and the endless variety of nondescript figures leave the -kneading-board pale, flat surfaces of soft dough, and, upon being thrown -into the bubbling fat, sinking, like leaden shapes, with a tremendous -splutter and “fizz,” arise slowly and majestically to the top of the -caldron, as Mr. Weller has it, “swelling wisibly” before the enraptured -eye into puffy, crisp, toothsome morsels, fit, in the estimation of the -juvenile partakers thereof, for a queen’s luncheon. Last year, the -brother and sister had spent Christmas week with an aunt in another -town. This lady being the indulgent mamma of half a dozen boys and -girls, enjoyed nothing so much as making them merry and happy. The six -days passed in her abode lived in the memory of nephew and niece as a -dream of Paradisaical delight. But, this season, the holidays were to be -kept at home, and the prospect was, to say the least, not eminently -flattering. - -Mr. and Mrs. Dryden were estimable people in their way, but they had -studied to render themselves intensely and purely matter-of-fact. They -prided themselves secretly upon growing wiser and more practical--less -poetical--each revolving cycle. Each year, life assumed a more positive -and less romantic aspect; their own duties seemed more momentous and -imperative; the things which others call recreation and innocent -amusements were puerile and unworthy. Mr. Dryden was making money; Mrs. -Dryden was a notable housekeeper, and, so far as the physical needs of -the children were concerned, a careful mother. Four little ones, three -boys and a girl, claimed her love and maternal offices. Allison, the -eldest, was eight years old; Nettie, six; and a pair of twin babies were -in their third winter. The mother’s hands were certainly full, however -admirable might be her faculty of accomplishing with speed the work set -for her to do. It was not surprising that she should sometimes wear a -haggard, anxious look, or that, now and then, she should be, as she now -expressed it, “worried out of her senses.” - -“I don’t see, for my part,” she broke forth, impatiently, presently, -“how people find time or have the heart to frolic and observe holidays -and the like frivolous carryings-on! With me, it is work, work, work! -from morning until night, and from one year’s end to another. It frets -me to see grown-up men and women, who ought to know something about the -cares and solemn responsibilities of life, acting like silly children. -What is Christmas more than any other time--when one takes a sober, -common-sense view of the matter?” - -“That is what nobody does in this age of nonsense and dissipation,” -returned her husband. “I don’t know what the world is coming to!” - -“Wasn’t our Saviour born on Christmas-day, Mamma?” asked Nettie’s timid -voice. - -“That is not certain, by any means, child. And if it were true, there is -all the more scandal in making a frolic of it. If there were to be -prayer-meetings held all over the world to celebrate the event, it would -be far more appropriate.” - -The polysyllable staggered Nettie a little, but she retained sufficient -courage to reply: “Our teacher told us, last Sabbath, that everybody -ought to be very happy upon the Saviour’s birthday.” - -Before Mrs. Dryden could answer, Ally put in his oar. - -“Mamma! why doesn’t Santa Claus ever come down our chimney?” - -“There is no such creature, Allison! You are too old to believe in that -ridiculous fable.” - -“But, Mamma, he came to Aunt Mary’s last year!” cried both children, in -a breath. - -“And we all hung up our stockings in the parlor!” added Nettie. - -“And Aunt Mary let the fire go down on purpose, so that the old chap -might not be scorched!” shouted Ally, excitedly. “We wanted her to have -the chimney swept, but she said he wouldn’t mind a little dirt.” - -“For you know-- - - ‘His clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot!’” - -quoted Nettie, “and yet he was in a good humor - - --‘and filled all the stockings’”-- - - “‘Then turned with a jerk, - And laying his finger alongside his nose, - And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose!’” - -chanted Ally. “Oh! what times we had repeating that, after we went to -bed that night. - - ‘His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, - And the beard on his chin was as white as the snow. - He had a broad face and a little round--’” - -“You children will be the death of me!” cried Mrs. Dryden, distractedly, -putting her hands to her ears. “I shall certainly never let you spend -another Christmas at your Aunt Mary’s! Your heads were so crammed with -nonsense last year, that I am afraid you will never get rid of it. -Finish your suppers and be off to bed! You are as Christmas-mad as if -you had never been trained to more sensible things!” - -“I can not imagine,” said Mr. Dryden, severely, “how they have contrived -to remember the senseless doggerel your sister was so injudicious as to -teach them.” - -“That is the depravity of human nature!” sighed the wife. - -Very sober little faces were uplifted to father and mother for a -“good-night” kiss, and very slow footsteps went up the stairs to the -chamber which the brother and sister shared in common. There was a -pathos in the sound, so unlike was it to the brisk patter of other small -feet upon other floors and staircases on that jubilee eve. - -The father, albeit he was not an imaginative man, noticed this, and went -off to the parlor with a pained and yearning heart--saddened, he knew -not by what--longing for something he could not name. The children had -interrupted his evening reading, at supper, by their chatter, and he -bestowed himself in his armchair by the centre-table, to finish the -perusal of his newspaper. His seat was comfortable; the light clear and -soft; the evening news interesting; the room still; yet he could not fix -his mind upon his occupation. Through the quiet apartment came and went -the echoes of the four little feet, in slow dejection, going on up to -the repose that was to be visited by no happy dreams of the glories of -Christmas morning. He saw, between him and the printed column, the -sadly-serious countenances, that were, by this time, laid upon their -pillows. He wondered if the pair would cry themselves to sleep. He -purposely waxed angry with his sister-in-law for putting these silly -notions into the children’s heads. They were contented enough until that -unfortunate visit. Now, there was no telling where this mischief would -stop. It was too provoking to have two such fine natures soured by -repinings and foolish longings; two minds so intelligent filled with -superstitious fancies. Yes! they were fine children! if he _did_ say -it--and dutiful as handsome and intelligent. His wife had an excellent -method of discipline, and deserved much credit for her success in -training her offspring. She was a good woman--industrious and -conscientious--but he could have wished that her spirits were more -equable. He did not relish the idea that his blooming Nettie might, one -day, become a toil-worn, pains-taking wife and mother; her smooth -forehead be ploughed in two deep furrows, like those that crossed her -mother’s, from temple to temple; her pouting lips grow colorless and -drawn down at the corners; her bird-like voice sharpen into the shrill -peevishness of the tones that had ordered the bairns off to bed. He -would like to keep life fresh and bright for his darling so long as he -could. She would find out, soon enough, what a dry, dusty, detestable -cheat the world was. If he might have his wish, she should be a child -always; a merry, laughing, singing fairy, to gladden his old age; a -simple-hearted, trusting child, in whose love and purity he could find -refreshment, when disheartened by the faithlessness of his fellow-men. -She was very fond of him--grave and undemonstrative as he was. With the -unerring perception of childhood, she had discovered that she was his -favorite, and repaid his partiality in the coin he liked best. The sound -of his latch-key in the door was the signal, noon and night, for her to -bound down stairs to meet him; to kiss him, and offer, in her pretty, -womanly way, to relieve him of his overcoat; to hang up his hat and -bring him his slippers. Such nimble feet as hers were! Blithe, willing -little feet, how they twinkled to and fro, to perform whatever errands -he would suffer her to undertake for his comfort! Merry, dancing little -feet! - -But the echoes persisted in contradicting his recollection of their -lively music. Up and down--sad and slow--they wandered; never drowned -for a moment, while their monotonous beat was rendered more mournful by -the hurried, ceaseless tramp of pleasure-seekers upon the pavement -without. He wished that he had spoken a kindly word to the downcast -innocents, instead of the silent salute he had vouchsafed to their -mutely-offered lips. Perhaps they were not asleep yet! His wife was -still with the twins, in the bedroom overhead, for he heard her walking -about the floor, preparing, as he knew, to leave them for the night. He -could slip up noiselessly to the small chamber adjoining, and solace his -uneasy spirit by a loving “good-night,” that should dry Nettie’s eyes, -if they were wet, and comfort Ally’s disappointed soul, while the -partner of his bosom would be none the wiser for it. - -Mrs. Dryden did not allow the attendance of a nursery-maid to her elder -children in the evening. For more than a year they had undressed -themselves and retired to their respective cots, without noise or -complaint, leaving nothing for mother or servant to do, but to look in, -a few minutes later, and extinguish the gas. This had been done by -Ellen, the chamber-maid, before she went down to her own tea; but the -moonlight, streaming through the window-curtain, showed to the father, -as he stood without the partly-open door, the two white beds in opposite -corners of the room, and the forms that ought to have been snugly laid -under the blankets. Instead of this, they were raised upon their elbows -to a half-sitting posture, and the low hum of their earnest voices -arrested the spectator upon the threshold. - -“I wonder if Papa and Mamma ever were a little boy and girl!” said -Master Ally, in a doleful key. “If they were, I guess they have -forgotten how they used to feel. I could have cried right out, to-day, -at school, when the boys were all talking about Christmas gifts and what -they expected to get. You ought to have seen them stare at me when they -asked me what I thought I should have, and I said that we didn’t keep -Christmas at our house, and that I had never hung up my stockings but -once, and that was when I was at my aunt’s! And one boy asked me if my -father and mother were dead. And when I said ‘No,’ another fellow called -out, as rude as could be--‘I guess they don’t care much about you!’ I -tell you, Nettie, it makes a fellow feel real bad!” - -“I know it!” said the miniature woman, tenderly. “But, Ally, dear, Papa -and Mamma _do_ love us! Only they don’t know how much we think of -Christmas, and how children love to hang up their stockings, and all -that. But that was a very naughty boy that told you they didn’t care for -you. Papa works _ever_ so hard to get clothes and food for us, so Mamma -says; and Mamma sews for us, and takes care of us when we are sick, -and--and--a great many other kind things.” - -“Maybe so; but she was awful cross to-night, and scolded like every -thing, just for nothing at all, and I am very miserable! Just hear the -boys shouting out-doors, and the people laughing and talking, as they go -along! It’s downright mean in them, when they might know that there -isn’t to be any Christmas in our house. I wish they would be still! I -wish I was dead!” - -“Ally, Ally, that is wicked!” expostulated the gentle tones of the -sister. - -“I don’t care! where is the sense of living, if a fellow is never to -have any fun? Where is the use of being good? If I was the wickedest boy -in town, I could not be treated worse than I am now. How I hate this -stupid old house! When I am a man, and have boys and girls of my own, I -mean that Santa Claus shall come every week and bring them--oh, such -lots of nice things! and you shall live with me, Nettie, and we will fry -doughnuts and have New Year’s cake every day!” - -“Ally!” said Nettie, thoughtfully, “do you suppose there is such a man -as Santa Claus? Mamma says there isn’t!” - -“I _know_ there is!” returned the boy, confidently. “But he doesn’t come -to a house unless the father and mother of the children that live there -send him an invitation. One of the big boys told me so, to-day. And good -fathers and mothers always tell him what to bring.” - -“I was just thinking,” resumed Nettie’s liquid treble, “if Our Heavenly -Father knew how very badly we wanted to have a Christmas, whether He -wouldn’t send him to us. Suppose I pray to Him and tell Him all about -it!” - -“You may try it!” was the conclusion of the embryo skeptic. “But I don’t -believe it will do any good.” - -In a trice, Nettie had slipped to the floor, and was fumbling among a -heap of clothes laid upon a chair. Mr. Dryden watched her curiously. - -“Now, Ally!” he heard her say, presently, “Here are the clean stockings -that Ellen got out for us to put on to-morrow. Mamma wouldn’t like it if -we hung them up ourselves, so I will just lay them on the foot of the -bed. If Santa Claus should come, maybe he can pin them up for us.” - -Then, sinking to her knees, she put her hands together and raised her -pure face--angelic in the father’s sight--as the moonbeams revealed its -expression of meek devotion. - -“Our Father who art in Heaven! please make us good and happy, and let us -have a merry Christmas. If there is any Santa Claus, please let him come -to our house to-night, for he has never been here in all our lives, and -this makes us very sorry. Bless dear Papa and Mamma, and don’t let us -think hard of them, or say naughty things about them, only because they -don’t know how little children feel. Amen!” - -Ally gave a grunt that might mean acquiescence, or doubt, when his -sister arose and leaned over to kiss him; but Mr. Dryden could play the -eavesdropper no longer. - -Feeling that he must inevitably discover himself if he remained another -minute in his present position, he hurried down-stairs and into the -parlor, where he behaved more like a crazy man than the sober, -self-possessed head of a staid and decent household. Kicking off his -slippers, he thrust his feet violently into - -[Illustration] - -his boots, stamping, with unnecessary force, to get these fairly on; -blew his nose repeatedly and loudly, afterwards passing his handkerchief -over his eyes, as though the sudden catarrh from which he appeared to be -suffering had affected them also. Going into the hall, he snatched his -greatcoat from the rack and put it on--still in desperate haste, pulled -his hat over his brows, and rushed into the street. - -He found himself plunged directly into a rapid, buzzing crowd. Every -step was quick and light; every face wore a smile, and the air was full -of the pleasant confusion of happy voices. Bless the children! how they -ran under his feet, and trod upon his toes, and kicked against his -heels, and jostled him on the right and on the left! And not one of them -was empty-handed. Parcels of all sizes, shapes, and descriptions, filled -small fingers; were hugged by small arms; laid upon small shoulders and -slung upon small backs. Brown paper bundles; bundles tied in frailer -white paper, which, bursting, showed the wheel of a toy-wagon, or the -head of a toy-horse, or the arm of a doll; funnel-shaped bundles, fresh -from the hands of the confectioner; bundles, wrapped hastily in -newspaper by an economical shopkeeper, or one whose stock of wrapping -material had proved inadequate to the rush of custom; boxes, square, -oblong, and many-sided; mimic guns and drums, with gayly-painted sides, -upon whose heads the delighted owners could not refrain from beating -stirring Christmas marches, as they carried them home; here and there a -huge hobby-horse, with dilated eye and streaming mane, borne aloft by -the stalwart porter of some toy warehouse; these were but a few features -in the pageant that streamed past Mr. Dryden--a varied and joyous -torrent of life. He caught the infection of this atmosphere of gladness -before he had gone a dozen yards. He had come forth with the intention -of purchasing something with which to make his children happy; to answer -Nettie’s prayer so far as lay in his power. Awakened conscience and -remorseful affection for those he felt he had wronged, had driven him on -to the duty of making restitution. He soon began to understand that -there might be enjoyment, active and new, in the task. - -“How I wish I had brought them with me!” he said to himself, as he felt -his features relax into a smile at sight of the general hilarity. “It -was hard to send them to bed so early on Christmas eve. But, what would -their mother have said if I had asked her permission to take them out -after dark?” - -He stayed his rapid progress, as another query presented itself. What -would this very prudent and sedate help-meet say and think of another -bold innovation upon established rules, to wit, this expedition and its -probable results? How should he meet the stare of mingled astonishment -and rebuke that would rest upon his freight of “useless” playthings, -upon his return home? She disapproved of toys, except when great -moderation was displayed in their bestowal. Nettie had but one doll in -the world, and, careful as she was of this treasure, her loving arts -could not conceal the ravages of time; said manikin having been Aunt -Mary’s gift to her niece, upon her third birthday. Ally had never owned -a hobby-horse. His mother had a dread of “rough plays.” Our hero was -quite aware that on this occasion he was not inclined to moderation. He -would cheerfully have bought the entire contents of any one of the -illuminated windows whose splendors drew around them a swarm of admiring -juveniles, as a hive of honey would tempt hungry bees. The difficulty -was to know what would best please the unsuspecting twain at home. - -“This sort of thing is not in my line!” he soliloquized. “I suppose -there is a difference between girls’ and boys’ playthings. I have it! -These people ought to know their business! I will state my dilemma, and -take whatever they advise.” - -Thus resolving, he entered the largest and most brilliant toy emporium -he had yet seen, and making his way, with considerable labor, through -the throng of eager buyers, presented himself at the counter. Luckily, -the saleswoman nearest him had just dismissed a customer, and turned to -him with an engaging smile. She looked tired--as well she might, poor -thing! having been on her feet for twelve hours, and hard at work all -the time--but it was not in a kind-hearted tradeswoman’s nature to be -cross on Christmas eve. - -“What can I show you, sir?” she asked, politely. - -“That is what you must tell _me_, madam! I want some toys for my little -girl, aged six, and my boy, who is two years older. If you can inform me -what will suit them, you will oblige me, and please them.” - -His fluent, pleasant speech amazed himself. Certainly, the witchery of -the festal eve was working upon him fast. - -“Has your daughter a tea or dinner set?” inquired the shop-woman, taking -down two wooden boxes; pulling back the sliding tops, and rummaging -among the shred paper used for packing the fragile contents. “Here is -something very handsome.” - -“Just the thing!” ejaculated the father, upon beholding the wee tureen; -covered and shallow dishes, gravy-boat, saltcellars, casters, and a -dozen plates, white, with a rim of gold; all so graceful in design, so -dainty in material, as to elicit his unqualified admiration. Already he -saw, in imagination, Nettie’s eyes glisten at sight of them; her deft -fingers arranging them--cunning little housewife that she was. - -“Then you don’t care for the tea-set?” making a movement to close the -box. - -“I--don’t--know!” hesitatingly. “I suppose she will want to spread a -supper and breakfast table, as well as play dinner, won’t she?” - -“If she has not cups and saucers already, I would certainly recommend -you to take these,” and the artful tempter made a tea-tray of the lid of -the case, setting out the service so attractively, that her -inexperienced customer speedily regarded the second array of china as a -“must have.” - -“Now, perhaps, you will look at a table!” pursued the woman, leading the -way to the back of the store. “We have a novelty in that line--an -extension-table.” - -“Of course! how stupid in me not to remember that the china would be -useless unless she had something upon which to arrange it!” - -Mr. Dryden had entered thoroughly into the spirit of the enterprise, and -was highly diverted at his oversight; very grateful to her who had -corrected his blunder. The table was a neat affair, with turned legs and -polished top, and constructed, as had been said, upon the extension -principle. Mr. Dryden took it on the spot. - -“Chairs?” he said, interrogatively. - -It was now the lady’s turn to be ashamed of _her_ forgetfulness. Half a -dozen cane-seat chairs were added to the pile, which betokened Mr. -Dryden to be a valuable customer. Then followed a case of knives, a -knife-box, and an assortment of silver (?) ware, and both parties came -to a momentary halt. The gentleman recovered himself first. - -“Now, a doll--for which she can keep house!” - -“Wax finish, porcelain, biscuit, or rubber?” said the other, glibly. -“Dressed, or undressed?” - -“Dressed--I suppose, since to-morrow is so near. As to the rest, I am no -judge. But I want the prettiest doll in the establishment.” - -His experience in this species of merchandise was so limited that he -might well be excused for starting at the wonderfully life-like lady -paraded for his inspection. Her hair waved in natural ringlets; she -rolled her eyes, as the shopwoman moved her to and fro. She was dressed -in the height of the mode--neither gloves, nor hat, nor parasol being -wanting to complete her toilet; and when, in obedience to a dexterous -pull of a wire upon her left side, she squeaked “Mamma!” and, responding -to a similar twitch of the corresponding muscle under the right arm, she -cried “Papa!” Mr. Dryden was overwhelmed. - -“What _will_ toy makers do next?” he articulated. - -“The art of manufacturing dolls is carried to great perfection,” quietly -replied the woman. “Did you say that you would take this, sir?” - -Take it! what could have bribed him to forego the treat of witnessing -Nettie’s rapture in the survey of this resplendent and accomplished -demoiselle? - -“We have some very pretty doll-carriages, in which the lady can take the -air,” was the next attack, and Mr. Dryden fell a willing sacrifice to -this new snare. - -In very compassion for her victim, the woman directed his thoughts to -the boy’s gifts. A velocipede; a wheelbarrow, with spade, rake, and hoe; -a set of jackstraws, for winter evenings; a football and a sled made up -the complement that was to transport the semi-infidel to the seventh -heaven of ecstacy. - -Truth obliges me to mention that the lavish parent sustained a slight -shock when the obliging saleswoman figured up and presented the amount -of his indebtedness; but he rallied bravely. - -“Christmas comes but once a year!” he said, manfully, and paid his bill -with a good grace. - -“You could not purchase the same quantity of happiness so cheaply in any -other manner,” remarked the bland merchant, oracularly. - -The tit-bit of wisdom was assuredly not original with her, but it -impressed the hearer as a profound and truthful observation--one well -worth remembering. He was getting on very swiftly, indeed, in the -acquisition of Christmas lore. - -“You have but two children, then, sir?” remarked the lady, casually, in -handing him his change. - -“Bless my life! I forgot the twins!” exclaimed the father, aghast. “But -I suppose they are too young to appreciate Christmas presents.” - -“What age?” queried the other, sweetly. - -“Two and a half.” - -“My dear sir! they would be disconsolate if they were overlooked! -Children understand these matters astonishingly soon.” - -And having ascertained the sex of the twins, she selected two rubber -balls, and two sets of building blocks for their delectation. - -“Our porter will take them for you,” she said, amused at Mr. Dryden’s -amazed contemplation of the dimensions of the pyramid she constructed of -his purchases. “Please favor us with your address!” - -“Really, a little more practice will render me an adept in toy -shopping!” thought Mr. Dryden, complacently, when he was beyond the -enchanted ground, the seductions of which had lightened both heart and -pocket. “It is not a disagreeable or difficult operation, after all.” - -As he neared his own door on his return, his pockets crammed with -conical packages of sugar-plums, nuts, and crystallized fruits, he -overtook the porter with his barrow. - -“Quietly, my man!” he said, inserting his latch-key in the lock with -secret trepidation of spirit. “It would never do to awaken the children. -Or to attract my wife’s attention,” he added, inly. - -The porter’s load was transferred to the hall so silently that even Mrs. -Dryden’s cat-like ears did not hear any bustle. Mr. Dryden sent the man -off with a gratuity, and proceeded to dispose of the presents in the -following style: the table bestraddled the right arm, and upon it were -the boxes of crockery, surmounted by the chairs; the case of jackstraws -and several other light articles. The velocipede was borne in like -manner upon the left coat sleeve; then came the wheelbarrow; the boxes -of building-blocks, the balls, and on the top, held firmly in its place -by Mr. Dryden’s chin, was the doll, In the right hand he carried the -sled; in the other Dolly’s carriage. This staid, prosaic -_pater-familias_ would have made no bad representation of the patron -saint of the anniversary, the suggestion of whose existence he had -scouted, a few hours previously, as he slowly ascended the stairs on -tiptoe, his face radiant with arch delight, despite the cowardly fear -tugging at his heart-strings, as to the reception in store for him at -the hands of his better half. Treading yet more delicately, in passing -his sleeping-room, wherein, he had no doubt, Mrs. Dryden was soundly -reposing, it being ten o’clock, her invariable bedtime, he pushed open -the door of the smaller chamber beyond, and entered. The gas was -burning--not brightly--but it enabled him to see with terrible -distinctness the figure that started up in the aisle between the beds -and confronted him with an excited air. It was his wife! - -Dropping the curtain upon a tableau which the reader can picture to -himself better than I can describe, we will take a step or two backward -in our story. - -“And it’s sorry for the children I am, this blessed night!” said Ellen, -to the cook, over their dish of tea. “Sorra a bit of a merry-making will -they have to-morrow--and they such good, peaceful little things, too! I -was asking Miss Nettie, just now, if I shouldn’t hang up her stockings, -at a venture-like; ‘for,’ sez I, ‘there’s no knowing but the saint might -pop down the chimney, unbeknownst to you, and ’twould be a pity not to -be ready for him.’ For, you see, my heart was that tinder towards the -lonesome craturs, that I thought I would step out myself, presently, and -buy some candies and apples to put into their poor, empty, desolate -little stockings. But, ‘No,’ says she, kinder pitiful, ‘I am afraid -Mamma might not like it, Ellen. She doesn’t believe in keeping -Christmas.’ And wid that she give a sigh, like a sorrowful woman, and -Master Ally growled over something cross to himself.” - -“It’s ra’al hard--that’s what it is!” responded Biddy. “They begged -their Mamma, to-day, to let me fry some doughnuts--‘Just this once, -Mamma,’ says they, ‘because to-morrow’s Christmas’--and she wouldn’t -hear a word to it. Ah! no good ever came of ch’ating childer out of the -fun the Lord meant they should have.” - -“There’s the parlor bell!” said Ellen, jumping up. “What’s wanted now, I -wonder?” - -Her mistress stood upon the rug before the fire in the parlor, hat and -cloak on. - -“Ellen, if you have finished your supper, I want you to get your bonnet -and shawl and go out with me. Take a basket along. I am going to buy -some things for the children.” - -Her voice shook in uttering these few sentences; and, although her face -was averted, the girl was positive that she had been weeping. Brimful of -curiosity and excitement, she dashed up-stairs for her wrappings, then -down to the kitchen to ask Biddy to listen for sounds from the nursery -while she was out. - -“For we are going a-Christmassing--glory be to all the saints--St. -Nicholas, in particular! for he must have put it into her head to -remember the swate innocents.” - -It is not our purpose to follow them in their tramp, as we have traced -the course of the lady’s husband. Suffice it to say, that Ellen’s basket -was heavily burdened when they re-entered the house, and her mistress -bore sundry parcels in her hands, all of which were carefully deposited -upon the carpet beside the cots of the calmly-sleeping children. Ellen -was made happy, on her own account, by the present of a bank-bill for -her private spending, and intrusted with another of the same value for -Biddy; then excused from further service. If the maid had been mistaken -in her surmise as to the tears she had seen in eyes which were generally -dry and bright, there was no doubt as to the melting mood that overtook -the mother when she removed the four stockings from the place where -Nettie had laid them. She even pressed them to her lips before fastening -the tops of each pair together with a stout pin, and hanging them over -the footboards of the beds. To unpack the basket and undo papers, with -as little rustling as was practicable, was her next act. She paused, -when everything was uncovered, to survey her acquisitions. Her -expenditures had been on a scale far less grand than her husband’s, but -maternal tact had guided her in the selection of acceptable gifts. There -were a cooking-stove, with its assortment of pans, griddles, and -kettles; a work-box of satinwood, lined with red velvet, and well -stocked; a cradle with a baby-doll asleep under the muslin curtain, for -Nettie. For Ally, she had provided a bag of beautiful agate marbles; a -fine humming-top; a paint-box, and a set--fourteen in number--of -Abbott’s inimitable “Rollo” books for boys. She had not forgotten the -twins, as was evidenced by a couple of whips; two picture-books, and two -tin horses mounted upon wheels; one attached to an express wagon, the -other to a baker’s cart. Nor had she disdained to call upon the -confectioner. Her conical bundles contained “Christmas mixture;” plain -sugar candy; peppermint lozenges and oranges; more wholesome, or, -rather, less hurtful sweets than the richer and costly delicacies that -had captivated her lord’s fancy. Altogether, the sight was a pleasant -one, and a satisfactory, if one might judge by the gleam of comfort that -overspread the tear-stained visage. She had just dropped a handful of -the “mixture” into the foot of Ally’s sock, when a soft tap at the door -startled her. It was Ellen, and she bore a plate, covered with a napkin, -in her hand. - -“If you plaze, mem--Biddy hopes you won’t be offended, mem--but the -children were so disappointed to-day, mem; and when I told her you were -going to give them a Christmas, she made so bold as to fry them a few -doughnuts. She wouldn’t have taken the privilege, only, seeing Christmas -comes but once a year, and it’s good children they are, mem!” - -“They are, Ellen! Tell Biddy that I am much obliged to her. These are -very nice, indeed!” - -Yet she cried over them when the girl was gone. Her very servants pitied -the cruelly-oppressed little ones! - -“I have been a hard, unsympathizing mother!” she thought, sobbingly. -“God forgive me this, my sin!” She wiped away the tears, and resumed her -task. “William will think I have lost my senses!” she ruminated, -cramming an orange into the leg of the tightly-stuffed sock. “But I -can’t help it, if he does!” - -And, as if invoked by her unspoken thought, her husband, accoutred as I -have described, stood before her. - -“William!” - -“Emily!” - -The two detected culprits stared at one another for an instant, in -unuttered, because unutterable amazement; then, as the truth dawned upon -their minds, they burst into a fit of laughter that threatened to awake -the dreamers. - -“Hush-sh-sh!” said Mrs. Dryden, wiping away the tears of mirth that now -hung where bitterer drops had trickled awhile ago, and pointing to the -beds, “Let me see what you have been doing?” - -The prudent economist could not repress a single exclamation of gentle -reproof, as she examined the store. “William Dryden! And in these hard -times, my dear!” - -“Christmas comes but once a year, wifie! and then I had to make up for -lost time, you know. I’ll tell you how it happened, and then you won’t -blame me. I felt badly after tea, and came up to say a kind word to -them”--nodding towards the brother and sister--“before they went to -sleep, and, that door being ajar, I heard them talking”-- - -“And listened, as I did at _that_ one!” cried Mrs. Dryden, throwing her -arms around his neck, and beginning to cry afresh. “O husband! I have -been so miserable ever since! have felt so guilty! Only to think, that I -was teaching my children to hate me and to hate their home--making their -lives wretched!” - -“Don’t think of it, dear! After this, there will be peace and good-will -among us!” soothed the husband, his own eyes shining suspiciously. “If -we have made a mistake, we are ready to correct it. Now, let us see what -disposition can be made of this cargo of valuables. And I left a lot of -gimcracks--sweet things, you know--down stairs.” - -Christmas morning came, clear and brilliant, with frosty sunlight, and -Mrs. Dryden, as was her custom, tapped at the children’s door, having -beforehand stealthily unclosed it far enough to allow herself and her -accomplice a view of the interior of the dormitory. - -“Come, little birds, it is time you were out of your nests!” - -The cheery, loving voice aroused the sleepers more thoroughly than -sterner accents would have done. The mother was spared the pain of -knowing that the novelty of the address made it so efficacious. - -“Yes, Mamma!” answered Nettie, starting up in bed. - -“All right!” responded Ally, and he turned over. - -Thus it happened that the eyes of both rested simultaneously upon an -object in the centre of the apartment, and a ringing cry of joy escaped -them. - -“Nettie, Santa Claus _did_ come!” - -“Ally, don’t you know what I prayed for?” - -They were upon the floor before the words had left their lips. The next -few minutes were passed in speechless admiration of the miraculous -edifice that had arisen during their hours of unconsciousness. Mr. -Dryden had made a second trip to the street, the night before, to buy a -Christmas tree. A broad, flat box, covered with a white cloth, formed -the base upon which this was set. The larger toys were placed around -the trunk, and smaller ones hung among the gilt balls, flags, and -flowers, that decked the boughs. Miss Dolly sat at the root upon one of -her new chairs, her foot upon the rocker of the new cradle, and, perched -up in the topmost branches, was Santa Claus--white beard, pipe, pack, -and all--smiling broadly upon his enraptured devotees. - -Nettie broke the spell of ecstatic silence. “Dear Mamma! Papa, darling!” -she screamed. “Come and see! It is just like fairy-land!” - -And flying to the door, her curls streaming back, and her face fairly -luminous with delight, she ran directly into her parents’ arms. - -“Christmas shall be an ‘institution’ in our family, hereafter!” said Mr. -Dryden, that night, when the happy children had kissed them “good-night” -over and over again. “I am a better man for last evening’s work and this -day’s innocent frolic. I feel twenty years younger, and fifty degrees -happier. It pays, my dear--_it pays!_” - - - - - A Christmas Talk - - With Mothers. - - [Illustration] - - - - - A Christmas Talk with Mothers. - - -“I do not approve of lady lecturers, as a general thing,” I remarked -meditatively, a while since, to a gentleman, in whose presence I am -somewhat prone to think aloud. - -“You allude to _public_ lectures?” said he, interrogatively, with -unnecessary emphasis. - -“Of course!” - -“Oh!” and he resumed the study of a very dry-looking volume. - -Affecting not to observe the mischievous gleam of his eye, I resumed:-- - -“But I am sometimes tempted to ask the use of your lecture-room for one -evening, to call together an audience from which all persons of the -masculine gender shall be excluded, and, then and there, harangue my own -sex upon a subject that has engrossed much of my time and thoughts for -eight years past.” - -“What is it--cookery or dry goods? Either topic would be popular.” - -“Something more important than both put together!” I retorted. My theme -would be-- - -“‘_The Rights of Babies and the Responsibilities of Mothers!_’” - -My auditor raised his eyebrows and pursed his lips very slightly--just -enough to give one the impression that he would have whistled, had not -politeness restrained him. Seeing that I was in nowise abashed by these -discouraging manifestations, he offered an amendment to my resolution. - -“Better write your discourse, instead, and have it printed.” - -“But,” I objected, “what I would say would be addressed to women alone. -We don’t care to let men know how unmercifully we can handle one -another. Moreover, I should use great plainness of speech”-- - -“I think I can set your mind at rest on that point,” interrupted my -companion, drily. “I don’t believe many men would read your treatise.” - -Whereupon he picked up _his_ treatise and withdrew to his sanctum, -leaving me to arrange the heads of my “discourse,” or to ponder the -meaning of his last equivocal observation. - -And thus it came to pass, that, sitting lonely here, and arranging plans -for the coming festival--the jubilee that, throughout Christendom, -commemorates the birth of a little Child in the grotto of far-off -Bethlehem; musing of that Child and his mother, while from the wall, the -Mater Dolorosa, wondrous in beauty and in sorrow, looked down upon -me--thought followed thought, and memories--sweet, tender, and full of -joy, others sad, yet precious, and mingled with wistful yearning, flowed -in upon me, and I have taken up my pen, not to indite a lecture or an -essay, but a simple, homely, heartfelt Christmas letter to my -fellow-workers in the great mission to which God has called us. - -“And first, let me remark, by way of ‘beginning at the beginning,’ as -old-time teachers were wont to exhort their scholars to do--that _Babies -have a right to be_.” - -This is not the page whereon to record a frank and full opinion upon -such a subject, nor is mine the will or ability to treat of the -mysteries of iniquity, the violence done to conscience, humanity, and -natural affection, that have come to be talked of in the so-called -higher circles as familiar things, convenient and expedient measures for -leaving fashionable mothers--(does not the holy word look like a bitter -sarcasm, written in this connection?)--for leaving frivolous, heartless -mothers, I say, at liberty to follow the devices of their own foolish -brains, and delivering sordid fathers from what I have heard professing -Christians style--“the curse of a large family.” I know that such -abominations do exist, and so does the fair reader, who is ready to -ostracize me for daring to hint thus publicly at what she privately -approves and advocates. I can see that our pleasure-loving neighbors -over the water are in a fair way to be rivaled, if not eclipsed, in -certain respects, by their American cousins. Further than this I will -not go. I only refer to this, to me revolting subject, to substantiate a -conclusion at which I have arrived in the course of my serious and often -sadly troubled lucubrations with regard to this matter. It is my -conviction that the real root of the evil lies back of this, its most -reprehensible offshoot. I have no means of settling the date at which -the opinion or prejudice was implanted on this continent, but certain it -is, that a vast proportion--I fear, a large majority--of American -mothers, would secretly, if not openly, controvert my first proposition. -There is among us, if not a woeful deficiency of genuine maternal -instinct, a style--a fashion, if you choose to call it, and a very vile -fashion it is--of deprecating as a grievous affliction the repeated -visits of what a higher authority than “the noted Dr. ----, from Paris,” -or the autocrat of neighborhood gossips, has declared to be among -Heaven’s best gifts to human kind. - -“Poor Mrs. A., with her eight children, like a flight of stairs--just -two years between them”--is, by her friends’ very pity, made to feel -that she is, in some sense, the inferior of Mrs. B., who “manages _so_ -beautifully!” She has but three, and they are seven years apart. - -It matters not that Mrs. A.’s household resembles a snug nest of -chirping birdlings, who lie all the warmer for being obliged to stow a -little closely; who learn patience and loving-kindness and generosity by -hourly practice of these graces upon one another, without being aware -that any lessons are set for them--they come so naturally; who never -lack company or sympathy, by reason of the abundance of home companions -and home love; who bid fair to keep their parents’ name long alive upon -the earth, and, in their own maturity, to transmit to an extended -circle--to a large community--it may be to a whole nation, the -principles taught them at their mother’s knees and from their father’s -lips. It signifies little to the feminine cabal that each one of the -little B.’s has been, for seven long weary years, that most forlorn and -pitiable of juvenile specimens--an only baby; has become dwarfed in -affections; narrowed as to ability to love and to enter into the -feelings of other children; thoroughly, and often incorrigibly selfish; -and when, at last, the lustrum being accomplished, the newer infant is -ushered into the world, the older regards it with dire distrust and -lurking jealousy, if not avowed dislike, as the usurper of his or her -hitherto undisputed rights. - -“My children will never be companions for one another; they are so far -apart!” sighs Mrs. B., as the pert Miss of fourteen pronounces the tiny -sister, who has not numbered as many hours of existence, “a regular -bore!” and “wonders why she came. Nobody wants her; and it is too -provoking to have a baby in the house just as one is beginning to go -into society, and wants a good deal of gay company.” - -But Mrs. Grundy--an American Mrs. Grundy, you may be sure, with a dash -of Parisian philosophy--has declared the one matron to be a broken-down -druge, a domestic slave--“quite behind the times, in fact!” while “Mrs. -B. is a truly fortunate and”--here Mrs. Grundy whispers--“a very -enlightened and judicious lady!” - -What an odious savor in Mrs. G.’s delicate nostrils would be the -antiquated but pious friend who should, out of the plenitude of his love -and good will for Mr. Grundy, pray, in the words of the Psalmist, that -his wife might be a fruitful vine, and his children olive plants round -about his table! - -No! we do not, as a class, appreciate the dignity--I use the word -advisedly--the _dignity_ and privilege of maternity! In this respect, -our English sisters are far ahead of us. The Hebrew women, under the -Theocracy, understood it better still, when Rachel pined in her quiet -tent for the murmur of baby-voices and the touch of baby-fingers, and -Hannah knelt in the court of the temple, to supplicate, with strong -crying and tears, that the holy fountains of motherly love within her -heart might flow out upon offspring of her own. In those days it was the -childless wife, and not she who had borne many sons and daughters, who -besought that her reproach might be taken away; that she might be -accounted worthy to be intrusted with the high duty of rearing children -to swell the ranks of the Lord’s chosen people. - -“If I felt as you do,” said a lady, sneeringly, to a friend of mine; -“if I considered the gift of children a blessing, and the care of them a -delightful task, I would not wait for the slow process by which Nature -creates families, but adopt a dozen at a time from an asylum.” - -“They would not be mine!” was the quiet reply. - -I do not envy that mother her heart, who does not enter into the meaning -of this rejoinder; who has not felt the delicious thrill of ownership in -an object so lovely and precious as the helpless babe she has braved -death itself to win; the awed delight of contemplating the new -creation--living, intelligent, immortal--given to be _hers_! It may -be--I have seen it somewhere asserted--that there is, after all, a -species of sublimated selfishness in the ecstatic sweetness of the -thought so well expressed by Emily Judson:-- - - “The pulse first caught its tiny stroke, - The blood its crimson hue from _mine_! - The life which _I_ have dared invoke - Henceforth is parallel with THINE!” - -The candid reader who has known the depth and strength of a mother’s -love, her patience, constancy, and self-sacrifice, will, I fancy, agree -with me in pronouncing the selfishness to be _very_ “sublimated.” - -Said Mr. Toots, upon the occasion of the birth of his fourth -daughter--“The oftener we can repeat that extraordinary woman the -better!” Everybody laughs at the proud husband’s praise of his spouse, -but--ask your heart, loving mother, if there is not a strange fullness -of joy in watching the reproduction of your traits, physical, mental, -and moral, in your child? How many times a day does she bring back some -half-forgotten scene of your own childhood? How frequently, at the -expression of her fancies, or opinions, or desires, do you say, with a -smile, a sigh--perchance a tear--“I felt, or thought, or longed the same -at her years; it is her inheritance?” Is there not a joy yet greater, an -inexpressible swelling of love and pride, as you see in the lineaments -and gesture of your boy, the faithful portraiture of one dearer to you -than your own soul? I am not talking now to those who have felt nothing -of all this; from whom the knowledge of these sacred mysteries has been -withheld, and who are incapable, from the barrenness and shallowness of -their own spiritual natures, of ever entering fully into them. It is -useless to say to these that motherhood is a holy thing, and offspring -the boon of Heaven; that, amidst the wild clamor of woman’s rights and -woman’s sphere, she best enacts the rôle appointed her by the wise -Parent of all, does most to elevate her race, who rears strong, good -men, and gentle, noble daughters to serve God and the generation to -come. To the gross, all things are gross, and these truths are pearls, -too clear in their purity to be trampled by such. I appeal to -mothers--to brave, pious women who fear God and love their husbands--but -who have yet never arisen to the perfect realization of the grandeur of -the work assigned them; never thought of themselves as the architects of -the nation’s fortunes, the sculptors, whose fair or foul handiwork is to -outlast their age, to outlive Time, to remain through all Eternity. I -would awaken those whom the prejudices of education or the plausible -sophistries of the modern fashionable school have blinded to the deep -significance of those words--“Behold, children are an heritage from the -Lord, and the fruit of the womb is His reward!” - -Women! sisters! be assured there is something tearfully and radically -wrong in a system that teaches us to despise or refuse our rightful -share in our Father’s riches! Look to it, lest haply ye be found to sin -against God! - -My second assertion is that it is a _right of babies to have mothers_. - -“I have never desired children; have always been bitterly opposed to the -coming of each new claimant upon my time and labor,” I once heard a lady -say. “Two of mine never breathed, and I experienced a sensation of -joyful relief when I found that my cares were not then to be increased. -Yet I love my children very much as they grow older, and my conscience -assures me that I have discharged my duty to them faithfully. I accept -them as inevitable evils which religion and philosophy require me to -endure as well and gracefully as possible.” - -Yet the speaker was not a “strong-minded woman,” in the popular -acceptation of the term. She believed in St. Paul, and had never read a -word of Malthus in her life, if indeed she were aware of the existence -of that author. She reprobated women’s colleges and learned ladies; -stayed at home and kept her husband’s house with all diligence, and was -generally regarded as a pattern wife and estimable member of society. I -declare, nevertheless, that if she spoke the truth in this instance, her -babies were motherless. They had a capable nurse; one who discharged the -external duties of her position with conscientious fidelity, and who, in -the course of time, as any tolerably warm-hearted nursery-maid could not -but have done, grew into a more lively degree of interest in the -winsome beings committed to her charge. But of true mother-love--the -beautiful instinct, and sacred as beauful--the blending of hope and -longing and solicitude that, not content with receiving the dear trust -with eager embrace at the threshold of what we call life, goes forth to -meet it in that mysterious, imperfect existence which even she does not -wholly comprehend, and from the moment the revelation of the coming -advent is known to herself, studies the comfort and well-being of the -one whose name may perhaps never be written among the living upon the -earth; watching and regulating the workings of her physical nature; -keeping her mind calm and free; hushing every wild heart-beat, lest the -irregular throb should disturb the exquisitely susceptible organization -of that which lies so near it--that always marvelous, yet ever-renewed -miracle of human devotion, which Deity does not shun to name in -connection with His own boundless, perfect love; of this, the decent -matron in question knew about as much as I do of Sanscrit, or the -dialect spoken by the natives among the coffee groves of -Borrioboola-Gha. - -I am happy to believe that the maternal care which antedates the birth -of its object is becoming daily a subject of deeper thought and more -enlightened comprehension, with those whose duty it is to be instructed -in this regard. It is only among the ignorant or the reckless that we -find total disbelief and utter neglect of the laws which treat of the -intimate and subtle relation existing between mother and child. It is no -longer customary to scout as old wives’ fables the tales of horrible -wrong done by passionate or imprudent women to the bodies and intellects -of their unborn babes. But we have still much to learn, and more to heed -upon this vital point. - -Passing thus briefly over the earliest phase of motherly duty, we come -to the education of the living, breathing, “necessary evil,” or -cherished blessing, as the parent’s taste or principles may determine -the little stranger to be. The pink, plump, piping bantling has been -exhibited to the usual round of ceremonious visitors, and passed muster -with all--in the mother’s hearing--having been praised by one as the -image of his papa, and by another, no less discerning, as his mother’s -miniature, and, content with having acted well its part, in voting him -to be a “remarkably fine child,” the “finest of the season,” Society -dismisses the subject and remands baby to his curtained crib in the -darkest corner of the nursery. For all that Society cares or thinks, he -may, in that convenient retreat, slumber away the seasons of infancy and -adolescence in a sort of Rip Van Winkle torpor, until his long clothes -drop from his growing frame like the husk from a ripe nut. Society does -not regard a “human boy”--as Mr. Chadband has it--as having arrived at -the “interesting age” until he attains the age of discretion. Young lady -cousins, enthusiastic school-girls, or matrons, incited to the -examination by thoughts of their own little ones, occasionally lift the -lace curtain and turn down the coverlet; call him an “angel,” and remark -in rapturous whispers upon his increasing size and comeliness, and -forget all about him by the time they reach the foot of the stairs. Or, -an old friend of the family who “dotes upon babies,” begs that the -“cherub” may be brought down to the parlor, saying, in pathetic -reproach, “To think, my love, how seldom I see the darling!” Really -deceived into a belief of the sincerity of her visitor’s desire, mamma -sends off an order to nurse; baby is caught up from his crib of ease, -thrust into a clean slip, his tender scalp brushed to the right and left -of the line--more or less imaginary--where the down--_alias_ hair--ought -to part, until the soft, throbbing spot on the top of his head pulsates -faster and harder with pain and fright. Duly prepared for inspection, -he performs the journey to the lower floor, where he undergoes a -vigorous kissing from the baby-lover, who “must hold him” herself. The -blinds are opened, that his budding beauties may be clearly seen, and -while the connoisseur goes into a transport of admiration, Master Baby, -alarmed, fluttered, and uncomfortable, first looks long and piteously -into the strange visage above him, and proceeds to express his -sentiments by wrinkling up his cherubic nose and opening his cherry -mouth for a squall. - -“There! take him, nurse!” says the visitor, hastily. “He does not fancy -new acquaintances. In a year or two, he will be just at the interesting -age, and we shall be capital friends. Not a word, my dear!”--to Mamma, -who stammers an apology. “All young children behave worst when we want -them to show off their prettiest ways.” - -This may be true, but for my part I don’t blame the babies. - -Most Papas are shy or negligent of their heirs or heiresses at this -epoch. It is quite common to hear ladies relate, as a proof, I suppose, -of their spouses’ superiority to small matters, that they are utterly -careless of their babies while they are in arms. - -“Mr. C. never notices one of his until it is two years of age,” remarks -Mrs. C. “Then, when he sees that it is a pretty plaything, he becomes -quite fond of it, enjoys frolicking with it.” - -As he would with a puppy, which, frisking about his feet, should attract -his lordship’s attention to its graceful shape and winning ways! - -“Mr. D. thinks young babies disgusting little animals,” laughs Mrs. D., -in reply. “He says that he would not kiss one under eighteen months old, -for five hundred dollars!” - -My private opinion, which, of course, I do not divulge to Mrs. D., is -that her husband is a Yahoo, and ought to be banished to Gulliver’s -famous island, in order that he might consort with his fellows. - -Even good, right-minded, affectionate Papas--like your stronger half and -mine, dear reader!--do not overwhelm his very littleness with -demonstrations of esteem. - -“Say good-by to Baby!” you plead, as his paternal progenitor enters the -nursery to take leave of you until dinner-time. - -If he does not smoke, and is _very_ amiable, he stoops and touches the -little forehead with his lips--a very different salute from that -bestowed upon yourself. If he has lighted a cigar, he replies: “I won’t -kiss him. The tobacco might sicken him. Good-by, monkey!” tapping the -velvet cheek with one finger. - -Baby blinks and throws his fat arms about in a blind, senseless fashion, -which you think very cunning. - -“Did you ever see a child grow and improve as he does!” you ask, -delightedly. - -“Oh, very!” is the good-natured, but not very pertinent response. “The -fact is, wifie, I am not much of a judge of the article in its present -state. Wait until he reaches the interesting age, and you will have no -cause to complain of my lukewarm praise.” - -Bridget, also, “is very fond of children, when they get to be knowing -and wise, and full of pretty tricks, but she finds the care of a young -baby very confining,” and but for the tip-top wages she gets, would -probably look out for another place. - -No, fond mother--and proud as fond! your blessed baby is, during the -first months of helpless, dumb infancy, “interesting” to nobody except -yourself. But there are weighty reasons besides the indifference of -others that should make him, now, the object of your especial care, and -this period one of continual watchfulness and affectionate solicitude. -Intrust to no nurse, however experienced, the task of bathing and -feeding, dressing and undressing, the tender little body. It will never -need your gentle handling, your quick eye, more than at present. A pin -misplaced, a sudden wrench of a joint; the twist of the upholding hand, -bringing the head or a limb into contact with table or chair, may lay -the foundation of years of pain and disease, if not of incurable -deformity. - -We hear much talk about good and bad babies; how Mrs. Such-an-one always -has model children, that give her no trouble at all; but sleep and eat -at regular seasons, and never cry when awake, unless they are in pain, -while Mrs. So-and-so’s existence is a woeful burden with her restless, -fretful progeny, who turn day into night, and night into day, and -sometimes decline having any night at all in the course of the -twenty-four hours; who are continually crying to be fed at all manner of -inconvenient times; who are, in short, as wrong-headed and peevish brats -as one can find in a day’s ride. Yet, Mrs. So-and-so says that they are -healthy and hearty, and suffer no pain. “It is just her luck to have -cross children. All hers are born crabbed.” - -In behalf of the infant tribe I enter a protest against this calumny. -Well-bred, healthy, comfortable babies are never cross until they are -rendered so, in spite of themselves, by mismanagement. If Mrs. -So-and-so puts her Bobby to sleep where he is liable to be awakened by -the ordinary noises of the household machinery, and, furthermore, when -these, or some untoward accident has started him from the slumber that -should have lasted two hours, before one-half of this time has elapsed, -if she makes matters worse by taking him up, instead of quieting all -external disturbance and lulling him again to rest before he knows where -he is, or what has happened; if he is fed just when it suits Mrs. S.’s -or Bridget’s convenience or Bobby’s whim, at intervals of varying -lengths; the probability, I may say, the certainty is, that Bobby will -become an unreasonable, discontented tyrant, a nuisance to himself and -to all around him. And if Susy, and Jenny, and Dicky are all trained -after the like manner, there is an equal certainty that Mrs. So-and-so -will have, among her acquaintances, the deserved reputation of being the -worn-out, irritable mother of a brood of cross, spoiled, “hateful” -children. But, again I say, I don’t blame the babies! First of all, make -the darlings welcome; that is half the battle! Then, make them -comfortable. A celebrated medical man gives three capital rules for -securing this desirable end: “Plenty of milk, plenty of sleep, and -plenty of flannel.” I would add a cardinal principle, governing every -other--begin from the outset--from the day of birth, if possible, a -gentle, firm system of punctuality in feeding, dressing, and putting to -sleep the wee things that lie, like breathing automata, upon the hands -that foster them. Like their fellows of a larger growth, they are -creatures of habit. - -I wish--how fervently and how frequently, I dare not pretend to -say--that _method_, a wise and just system of duty and recreation, could -be made the chief earthly law of every household. Let there not only be -“a place for every thing and every thing in its place,” but a time for -every thing, and let every thing be done in its season. When I see the -mistress of a family toiling and worried from morning until night, -pulled a dozen different ways at once, by as many duties, all of -apparently equal importance, driving herself and servants, wearying her -husband by incessant complaints, and dragging, rather than bringing up -her children, I wonder not that American women break down so early, but -at the tenacity of life that enables them to endure their load for a -single year. The clever writer of an article, entitled “A Spasm of -Sense,” published not long since, in one of our most clever monthlies, -finds the cause of the lamentable condition of so many a domestic -establishment in the superabundance of olive-plants that crowd American -nurseries. From my different standpoint, I am inclined to believe the -trouble to be, not that there are too many babies, but that there are -not more wise and capable mothers. - -I know a lady who was, when she married, a delicate, beautiful girl, the -petted favorite of a large circle of admiring friends. The seventh -anniversary of her wedding-day saw her the mother of five children. -Acquaintances, who only heard of this rapid increase of cares, shook -mournful heads and drew pitying sighs, between contemptuous smiles. -“What a change!” - -It was a change, than which my eyes have rarely beheld a fairer. Her -babies were not pattern, spiritless dolls, but hearty, roguish -youngsters, who frolicked, and shouted, and disputed, as all sound, -sprightly children will do, and as they should not be hindered from -doing. But Mamma was at once the motive-power and centre of attraction -of the system, wherein these lively planets revolved. She was more -lovely, with a chastened, matronly beauty, than in her girlhood, and -discontent had ploughed no furrows in her smooth brow. To each of the -fast-coming troop she gave a motherly greeting, and, as by magic, -brought it, with its wishes and needs, under the influence of the -judicious law of order that extended over the rest of her band. She -nourished them from her bosom; bathed, dressed, and undressed them, and -herself laid them down for the nightly and midday slumber; made most of -their clothing with her own hands; as they grew older, directed their -studies--she “could not bear to send them from her to school!” Yet she -was the ever-patient, ever-cheerful referee in their sports and -quarrels; looked well to the other ways of her household; was a faithful -mistress, a good housekeeper, and a kind neighbor, and, withal, managed -to keep up with the best literature of the day; and when her husband’s -business hours were over, became his companion, at home and abroad, with -more ease and frequency than any other wife I ever saw. - -This is no fancy sketch, nor have I done the original justice. It is not -surprising that the offspring of such a woman should rise up and call -her blessed; the marvel and disgrace are, that there are not hundreds -and thousands like her, throughout the country. I do not ask that our -daughters should be brought up in the belief that matrimony is the chief -end of woman’s existence. I do hold, in consideration of the fact that -an immense majority of our sex _do_ marry and have the cares of a family -laid upon them, that girls ought to receive a training which shall fit -them, in some degree, for a position involving responsibilities so -solemn and onerous. - -I know the popular outcry against the slavishness of maternal duties. - -“As well bury me alive after the first year of married life!” cries Mrs. -A-la-mode. “I, with my education and accomplishments, may surely aspire -to a higher position than that of nursery-maid! I consider that I serve -my children more effectually by reserving my strength and cultivating my -talents against such time as their maturer minds shall require my -companionship.” - -In other words, Mrs. A-la-mode leaves it to hired menials to work, -irrigate, and plant the virgin soil, and expects, in the ripening of the -harvest, to put in her patent sickle--latest style--and gather such -grain as she shall then decree. I am acquainted with but one way in -which a woman can conscientiously and surely evade the fulfilment of a -mother’s obligations. In this day and country, there are no forced -marriages. If Miss Faintheart and Miss Easy abhor the prospect of -directing and fostering a young family, they can remain single; and, to -be frank, I think the next generation will be the gainers by their -celibacy. - -Again, and strictly apropos to this division of my subject--_Babies have -a right to be heard_. - -“My dear children,” said a Sabbath-school lecturer; “when I say ‘boys’ I -mean girls, and when I say ‘girls’ I mean boys.” - -He designed to be entirely comprehensive in his address, and engage the -attention of both sexes; but his juvenile auditors were evidently in a -state of terrible confusion after this lucid preamble, most of them -imagining that he meditated some game of cross-purposes; as when “Rise, -No. 2” means that No. 2 must do quite the opposite thing and not budge, -upon penalty of a forfeit. But when I say “babies,” I mean children of -tender years--legal infants--and do not confine myself altogether to -those in arms. - -Especially has a baby a right to a hearing from Mamma. Unless you have -been so foolish as to let him form a habit of crying--and this should be -carefully avoided--his wail or scream always means that something is -amiss, and it is your business to find out what it is. If you choose to -send Bridget to see “what ails that child, now!” at least let him be -brought to you for inquiry and for judgment. Take the convulsed, -struggling little fellow in your arms; draw his head to your bosom; pat -the wet cheeks and kiss the mouth quivering in distress, that is more -than he can bear, slight and ridiculous as it may be to you. Soothe and -quiet, before you chide, should there seem to be need for reproof. -Remember--and it is a sadly solemn thought--that your arms form the only -refuge outside the bosom of Infinite Compassion, to which he can, as man -and boy, flee alike in sin and woe, in innocence and joy. Don’t hush his -sobbed confession or complaint, however strangled and unintelligible. It -does him good to utter it, whether you understand it or not. Don’t call -him “a silly boy” for crying because he has broken the whip Papa gave -him only this morning, or because the pretty kitty Auntie sent him has -proved ungrateful and deserted her doting master. It is doubtful if you -ever had what was to you a greater loss than either of these is to him. -If his are tears of bereavement, kiss them away and hold up some promise -of future delight that shall cast a rainbow athwart the cloud of grief. -If he weeps in childish anger, be loving, while you rebuke. He loses -much--how much, Eternity can only tell--who has not learned, from -experience, the fullness and sweetness of that simple line--“_As one -whom his mother comforteth_.” - -Never let your child have his cry out alone. If he is old enough to -observe that yours is studied neglect, he has also sense sufficient to -enable him to put his own construction upon what is, to him, your cruel -indifference to his suffering; and just in proportion as he recognizes -and resents this, your influence over him is weakened; his faith in your -love shaken. If he is too young to guess why you disregard his outcry, -terror and pain lay hold of his spirit, as is evinced by the changed -tone of his lamentation. Shall I tell you a little story, just here, one -which is unfortunately drawn from life? - -A mother--a good woman, but a trifle too strong of will, and wedded to a -pet theory of family government, according to which, children were but -machines, to be subject in every particular to the authority of the -chief engineer--one evening laid her babe, about ten months old, in his -crib, for the night. The child manifested great unwillingness to lie -still, and presently began to cry. The mother seated herself quietly to -work upon the other side of the room, and took no outward notice of his -screams. An elderly gentleman, a relative, was present, and -remonstrated with her upon her silence. - -“He will certainly injure himself, if you do not stop his crying!” - -“That is the old-fashioned doctrine,” replied the parent, with a smile -of conscious superiority. “I always expect one grand struggle for -supremacy with each of my children. He is in revolt now, and must be -treated as a rebel. If I yield, and take him up, the lesson is lost.” - -“I don’t ask you to take him up! Only speak to him. He is well-nigh -heart-broken. He will rupture a blood-vessel.” - -“No danger! It strengthens his lungs to cry in that uproarious manner. I -have known babies to scream for two or three hours, without sustaining -the least injury.” - -“You will excuse me, at any rate, from staying here to see the battle -out!” and the uncle left the room. - -Returning, at the end of an hour, he found the child still -screaming--now, in an anguished shriek that rent the man’s heart. The -woman and mother sat still and sewed steadily--it seemed calmly. - -“I can not and will not bear this!” ejaculated the old gentleman. “If -you don’t take pity on that poor little thing, I will!” - -“Uncle!” the niece lifted her stern eyes. “I permit no one--not even my -husband--to interfere in my management of my child. His passion is at -its height. It will soon subside.” - -The cries were, indeed, growing less vehement. Too anxious to retire -again until the scene was over, the uncle walked the room, hearkening, -with tortured nerves, to the feebler and still feebler wail; sinking, by -and by, into fitful sobbings; then, into pants like those of a tired, -hunted-down animal. These came at longer and longer intervals--and all -was still. The uncle approached the crib, and bent over it. - -“An hour and three-quarters!” said the mother, triumphantly, looking at -the clock. “You will find, uncle, that, having gained this victory, I -shall never have another contest with him.” - -“You never will, madam!” was the awful rejoinder. “Your child is dead!” - -I wish I could say that this incident was of doubtful authenticity, but -it is _true_, from beginning to end. I grant you that it is an extreme -case, but the like might occur with any young child. Ask yourself how -you would endure a fit of violent hysterical weeping, for the space of -an hour, or an hour and three-quarters! Days would elapse ere you -recovered from the effects of the shock to nerves and heart; but “it -never hurts an infant to cry.” That which would exhaust and irritate -your lungs, “strengthens” his! - -If your older child has any thing to divulge which he deems important, -contrive to give him a patient hearing; encourage him to full -confidence. Many a life has been embittered by fears or fancies, that -could have been removed as soon as they were formed, by five minutes’ -free conversation with a kind, sensible parent. To this day, I own to -feeling an unpleasant sensation at the sight of any singularly-shaped or -colored cloud in the heavens. This I attribute directly to a terrible -fright I had when but four and a half years old. - -My nurse, a young colored girl--a genuine Topsey, by the way--had early -instructed me in the popular belief concerning the personal appearance -of His Satanic Majesty, and I had swallowed every word, until his horns, -cloven hoof, forked tail, fiery breath, and worst of all, a certain -three-pronged fork he was in the habit of carrying about with him, that -he might impale unwary sinners, as Indians spear salmon--were articles -of as firm faith with me as was the fact of my own existence. He had an -inconvenient practice of careering through mid-air--Topsey had -added--with this trident already poised, on the lookout for bad little -girls, who were supposed to be dainty tidbits in his estimation. One -day, I was walking in the garden, unconscious of coming ill, when, -chancing to look up, I saw, right above me, a small, dark cloud, -irregular in outline, and moving swiftly before a strong wind. My first -glance caught only this; my second traced, with the rapidity of -lightning, the head, the tail, the lower limbs, and, brandishing wildly -in air, the right arm, holding the fatal flesh-fork! - -St. Dunstan or Luther would have stood his ground, as did Christian -against Apollyon, but I had not the pluck of these worthies, and had I -been endowed with the spirit of all three, there were neither tongs, -ink-stand, nor two-edged sword handy. So I chose the wiser part of -valor, and ran, in frenzied haste, for the house, never stopping until I -was safely ensconced under my mother’s bed. Here I lay for a long time, -quaking with fear, queer shivers running down my spine at thought of the -sharp points I had so narrowly escaped. Then the supper-bell rang, and I -crept out, unperceived. I had no appetite, and must have worn a -strange, scared look, for my mother asked if I were sick. I answered, -“No,” very shame-facedly, and she did not press her inquiries. Children -are not apt to be very communicative as to any great fright, except in -the excitement of the first alarm. They fear to live it over in the -recital. - -That night, for the first time in my life, I cried to have the lamp left -burning in the chamber where I slept. My mother reasoned with me, for a -while, telling me that the angels watched over good children, etc. This -I did not doubt, but I was by no means sure that I _was_ a good child. -The apparition of the afternoon was frightful circumstantial evidence to -the contrary. At last she scolded me for my cowardice and went away, -taking the precious light with her. I wonder that my hair did not turn -white during the ensuing hours of thick darkness. I pity myself now, as -I remember the poor, frightened baby, lying trembling on her little bed, -and staring into the gloom, peopled by her imagination with horrors. -Driven to desperation, I once awoke my older sister, who shared my -couch, and, in an awe-stricken whisper, imparted my fears and their -origin. She was not credulous or imaginative, and, perhaps, did not -quite understand what I said, for her only answer was--“pshaw!” and she -was sound asleep again in a second. How and when slumber came to me I -know not, but my mother reproved me, next morning, for wrapping the -coverlet so tightly about my head, saying that I would be smothered some -night, if I continued the practice. - -Three sentences from either of my parents would have laid the hobgoblin -to rest forever, and I recollect that I did, several times, essay to -broach the subject to my mother, very unskillfully, I dare say, for she -did not encourage my preliminary remarks, and resolution failed me -before I reached the point. I was a tall girl of fourteen when I -confessed to her that, for five or six years, I believed that I had -really seen the devil! - -Lastly--for my rambling “talk” has already transcended the limits I at -first assigned to it--_Babies have a right to be babies_. - -That precocious and unnatural growth of prudence, propriety, and -learning in young children, which is variously described as -“old-fashioned,” “smart,” and “wearing a gray head upon green -shoulders,” is sometimes an offensive, always a pitiable sight. A life -without childhood is like an arid summer day, to which the dew of -morning has been denied. There are blossoms which the heat of incipient -decay has forced into premature expansion. We all understand this law -of Divine husbandry. Happy is she who has never had reason to tremble at -sight of this early and brilliant bloom; who has not wept unavailing -tears over the pale blossom, as it lay, crushed and faded, at the -grave’s mouth! Well is it then for the bereaved mother’s peace of mind -if she can, in the review of the brief years during which the gifted one -was lent to her, comfort herself with the thought that she strove, in -patient, far-seeing love, to repress, rather than stimulate, the -unhealthy growth of intellectual powers that were in danger of -outstripping physical vigor; that she rose superior to the vulgar -ambition to have her child excel all others of his age in scholarship -and showy accomplishments. Ah! it is not until the golden locks are -hidden by the green sod, and the busy brain forever still, that, -recalling the deep sayings and vivid thought-flashes that made us look -upon our noble boy with such triumphant affection, we measure the short -mound with tear-blinded eyes, and say: “We should have known, from the -first, that all our bright dreams for him were to suffer rude, terrible -awakening _here_! When we should have looked for the blade only, the -bud appeared and the flowers. The fruit could only ripen in heaven!” - -Do not seek to make of your children monstrous, uncomely, infant -phenomena. If, by some special interposition of preserving mercy, their -lives and health do not fall a sacrifice to your weak vanity, you will -discover, when your prodigy has completed his course of book-study, that -he is not one whit better fitted for the actual fight with life and -labor than is the fellow-student who used to ran wild, with torn hat, -trousers out at the knees, rough fists, chapped by wind and weather, and -pockets frightfully distended by a miscellaneous collection of unripe -apples, jack-stones, peanuts, top-cord, “taffey,” whistles, gingerbread, -pocket-knife, hard-boiled eggs, iron nails, of assorted sizes, and, -perhaps, a living specimen or two, in the shape of a spotted terrapin or -a June-bug, with a string tied to its leg; the while your Pindar -Augustus, in white linen pants and cheeks to match, sat in learned -abstraction from all mean and common things, his spine curved, and his -baby-brows knit over his Homer or Euclid. It is distressing, yet -instructive, to see how the mill of every-day life grinds down college -geniuses into very ordinary men; how the oft-quoted logic of events -proves the “bright particular star” of - -[Illustration] - -the family circle and the school-room to be, after all, a luminary of, -at best, the fourth or fifth magnitude. You gain nothing except -mortification and disappointment, by cheating your wonderful scion out -of his childhood. - -I am afraid that most of us, even those who have not fallen into the -gravely absurd error just referred to, are yet apt to expect too much of -our bairns. They may be marvels of sweetness, and sprightliness, and -filial devotion, but they are only babies after all. “Children should be -seen--not heard!” is often repeated by us in thoughtlessness or -ignorance of the real character of the maxim. It is illiberal and cruel, -and belongs to the age when a father held almost unlimited power over -the very life of his child; when the younger members of the household -never dared to sit down in the presence of their parents, without their -express and gracious permission. I agree that a pert, loud-tongued child -is an offence, at all times, but do not let us, on this account, condemn -to silence the bird-like voices that make sweetest music in our hearts -and homes. Even birds sing sometimes when we would rather they should -refrain; so let us be forbearing with the clamor of the babies. Do not -pretend to judge them by the rules you would apply to grown people. - -“Father!” says a bright-eyed boy, as his parent enters the house at -evening, “did you remember to get me the ball you promised?” - -“I did not, Tom. You shall certainly have it to-morrow.” - -Tom goes off, in apparent content. In reality, he is sorely -disappointed; but he is a good child, and does not wish to make his -father unhappy. The promise for to-morrow helps him to bear the trial -tolerably well. The next evening, he is more backward about asking. He -hangs around his parent’s chair for some time, in hopeful suspense, but -as the longed-for plaything does not appear, he ventures timidly upon a -diplomatic “feeler”-- - -“Father, maybe you’ve forgot your promise, again?” - -The father has had a harassing day--filled with carking care--and the -smouldering temper needs but a spark to influence it. - -“Boy!” he says, hastily, “if you ever say ‘ball’ to me again, you shall -not have it at all! I will not be teased out of my life about your -jimcracks!” - -Tom shrinks back, as if he had been struck in the face; creeps silently -off to his little room, and there, in solitude, cries as if his heart -would break. He _has_ had a blow. It is not so much the loss of the toy, -but his is a sensitive nature, and his father’s words were sharp swords. -He meant to be very good, very patient. Nothing was further from his -thoughts than to annoy his usually kind parent. Mingling with, and -embittering his grief, is a burning sense of injustice. He knows that -the injury was undeserved. - -“Father wouldn’t have talked so to a grown man! It’s just because I’m a -poor little boy, and can’t help myself!” - -I fear there is too much truth in this shrewd conclusion of Tom’s. We -would not dare insult those of our own age, as we do our children. - -“That boy is growing sulky!” growls the father. “Did you see how glum he -looked because I forgot a paltry plaything? I must take him in hand!” - -Then is the time for you, the mother of the wronged child, to speak up -boldly in his behalf. Represent kindly, but candidly, to your irritated -lord, the true value of the promised gift to the boy, and the greatness -of the disappointment. - -“And after all, Papa, we can not expect Tom to exercise much -self-control or self-denial yet. Remember, he is just five years old, -and babies will be babies, you know!” - -If he is the husband so good a wife and mother deserves to have, he will -not only acknowledge his fault to you, but seek out little Tom in his -lonely chamber, and with a fond kiss tell him that “Papa spoke shortly -awhile ago, because he was very tired and had had a great deal to -trouble him to-day, but that he will surely remember to bring him a -famous great ball to-morrow night.” - -There are times and circumstances in which it is very hard to remember -that “babies will be babies.” Bessy, and Kitty, and Freddy are playing -in the nursery adjoining your bedroom, where you lie in the agonies of -“one of your headaches.” Every not-very-strong mother knows just what -that means. You have told the little ones that you are in great pain, -and having provided them with books, blocks, slates, and the like -“sitting-still plays,” as Bessie calls them, and begging them to try and -be quiet for half an hour, have withdrawn to your darkened retreat. They -are loving, well-meaning children, and, for almost ten minutes, there is -a refreshing season of calm. You are just forgetting torture in a -soothing slumber, when, thump! bang! down comes the castle, the -erection of which has kept Freddy still thus long. He would not be a boy -if he did not hurrah at the crash; the girls laugh and clap their hands; -and uproar is shortly the order of the hour. Don’t spring from your bed, -and, confronting them with your pale face and bloodshot eyes, accuse -them of disobedience and want of affection for you. They love you very -dearly, and they “did mean to mind,” they will tell you penitently, “but -they just forgot!” - -It is baby-nature to be forgetful, and I am glad that it is. The -injuries, and slights, and wounded feeling of maturer years are enough -to make of memory a whip of scorpions. I am thankful that, with the -child, a kiss, a smile, a kind word will efface the recollection of the -hasty reproof, the cross look, or--I blush for human nature as -illustrated in some women while I write it!--the impatient blow that has -wrung blood from the tender little heart. Thank Heaven that babies have -short memories! so short that the suffering of cutting one tooth is -clean forgotten before the next saws its jagged edge through the swollen -gum. - -Furthermore, keep them babies so long as you can without making yourself -and them ridiculous, and interfering with the graver duty of preparing -them for their place in the working-world. The dew-drop must exhale by -and by, but it lingers longest in the bosom of the flower that folds its -petals most jealously and fondly above it. The virgin purity of the snow -must change, with dust and melting, into the hue of the earth beneath; -but it is a woeful sight. We would fain delay the process by every means -in our power. Above all, let us make it our prayer that we may never -forget that we were once children, and how we felt, reasoned, and acted -then. - -Who of us does not treasure in her casket of remembrance certain golden -days or hours that we would not lose for the wealth of a kingdom? Your -daughter leans against your knee, as my little five-year-old does on -mine, with “Mamma, please tell me a story about when you were a little -girl; how glad you were when your Papa brought you home a new doll, with -blue eyes and curling hair, in place of the one the dogs tore up; or -about the grand holidays you used to have in the woods; or how your Papa -once took you to slide on the ice-pond--and O, Mamma! do tell me about -all the Christmases you ever had!” - -All the Christmases I ever had! I wish I could remember them, every -one--for those I do recall are strung upon my memory like pearls upon a -silken cord, and each is a joy forever. There is but one against which -I have set a black cross--the dreadful morning when the first thing I -drew from my stocking was a switch! I seem to see the lithe, keen, -wicked-looking rod now, and hear the shout of laughter that greeted its -appearance--mirth, that quickly subsided before my torrent of grief and -shame. I was soon told that the obnoxious article was placed there “in -fun,” by a visitor in the family. - -I should like to see the visitor who should dare to practice such a -piece of “fun” upon one of _my_ children! - -Never deny the babies their Christmas! It is the shining seal set upon a -year of happiness. If the preparations for it--the delicious mystery -with which these are invested; the solemn parade of clean, whole -stockings in the chimney corner; or the tree, decked in secret, to be -revealed in glad pomp upon the festal day--if these and many other -features of the anniversary are tedious or contemptible in your sight, -you are an object of pity; but do not defraud your children of joys -which are their right, merely because you have never tasted them. Let -them believe in Santa Claus, or St. Nicholas, or Kriss Kringle, or -whatever name the jolly Dutch saint bears in your region. Some -latter-day zealots, more puritanical than wise, have felt themselves -called upon, in schools, and before other juvenile audiences, to deny -the claims of the patron of merry Christmas to popular love and -gratitude. Theirs is a thankless office; both parents and children -feeling themselves to be aggrieved by the gratuitous disclosure, and -this is as it should be. If it be wicked to encourage such a delusion in -infant minds, it must be a transgression that leans very far indeed to -virtue’s side. - -All honor and love to dear old Santa Claus! May his stay in our land be -long, and his pack grow every year more plethoric! And when, throughout -the broad earth, he shall find, on Christmas night, an entrance into -every home, and every heart throbbing with joyful gratitude at the -return of the blessed day that gave the Christ-child to a sinful world, -the reign of the Prince of Peace shall have begun below; everywhere -there shall be rendered, “Glory to God in the highest,” and “Good-will -to men” shall be the universal law--we shall all have _become as little -children_. - - -C. S. WESTCOTT & CO., - -Printers, - -_No. 79 John Street, N. 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If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: The Christmas Holly</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Marion Harland</div> -<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Release Date: December 23, 2020 [eBook #64117]</div> -<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> -<div style='display:block;margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> -<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Charlene Taylor, Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)</div> -<div style='margin-top:2em;margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CHRISTMAS HOLLY ***</div> -<hr class="full" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<a href="images/cover.jpg"> -<img src="images/cover.jpg" height="550" alt="[The image -of the book's cover is unavailable.]" /></a> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_i" id="page_i">{i}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_ii" id="page_ii">{ii}</a></span> </p> - -<p class="c"><img src="images/halftitle.jpg" -width="400" -alt="CHRISTMAS HOLLY" -/></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_iii" id="page_iii">{iii}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<a href="images/frontis.jpg"> -<img src="images/frontis.jpg" height="550" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -</div> - -<p class="c"> -<img src="images/titlepage.jpg" -width="450" -alt="THE CHRISTMAS HOLLY - -BY - -MARION HARLAND" /></p> - -<h1> -THE <br />CHRISTMAS<br /> HOLLY</h1> - -<p class="cb">BY<br /> - -<span class="sans">MARION HARLAND</span><br /> -<br /> -<span class="eng">New York:</span><br /> -<i>SHELDON & Co., PUBLISHERS,<br /> -498 & 500 BROADWAY.</i><br /> -1867.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_iv" id="page_iv">{iv}</a></span><br /> -<br /> -<i>Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by<br /> -SHELDON & Co.,<br /> -In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States, for the<br /> -Southern District of New York.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<i>Stereotyped by</i> <span class="smcap">Smith & McDougal</span>, <i>84 Beckman St.</i><br /> -</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_v" id="page_v">{v}</a></span> </p> - -<h2><img src="images/image_v_a.jpg" -width="220" -alt="SALUTATORY." /></h2> - -<p class="c"><span class="letra"> -<img src="images/image_v_b.jpg" -width="80" -alt="O" /></span>N a Christmas Eve, many years ago, before I had learned to accept Life -as it is,—as it must ever be while Man needs the discipline of -reverses, and while the ways of God are known but to Himself,—a -checquered scene, always; often grey and lowering; sometimes black with -midnight and chill with storm—on a certain Christmas Eve, then, when I -was young, unreasonable and rebellious, I took a long, lonely walk into -the country. The afternoon suited my temper, and both were gloomy. Low -heavens of clouded steel that yet seemed, now and then, to shiver with -the still, biting air, and with each shudder, to let down a few -wandering flakes of snow; a bleak landscape of commons, blasted by -invisible frost; of sterile hills, that must have been stony and bare in -the sunniest springtime,—and for a horizon, a girdle of leafless woods, -stretching up motionless boughs against the pitiless sky; in the hollow -formed by the amphitheatre of hills, an artificial pond—too intensely -tame in form<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_vi" id="page_vi">{vi}</a></span> and surroundings to deserve the name of lake, or be -mistaken for aught but what it was, viz., a pool dug and filled with a -single eye to the production of ice for the next summer’s use,—this was -the picture that greeted my outlooking sight. Within was the dull, icy -calm of stoical misanthropy; distrust of my fellows, which stubbornly -refused to ask of heavenly wisdom the solution of the human enigma that -had baffled, in disgusting me.</p> - -<p>Into the midst of this sunless mood came a surprise Right before me, in -my steady but aimless track across the waste, was a clump of dwarf -trees, poor, puny things that must have had a hard coming-up. I -marvelled, in surveying them, that the germs from which they had -struggled had had the courage to sprout in such a barren spot. In the -centre of the coppice, head and shoulders above his fellows, arose a -holly sapling, brave with leaves of glossy green and scarlet berries. -The only smile in the drear expanse, it was in itself a whole fountain -of cheer. The soil about the trunk might be frozen to stone-like -hardness, but below, the great heart of Mother Earth pulsed warmly -still; throwing up, at each beat, sap into the hardy frame of her -winter-child; strength to the lusty limbs; verdure to the spiky leaves; -blushes to the coral beads. And while I looked, a bevy of brown-coated -plump-breasted snow-birds whirled noisily across the plain, and -alighted, with much twittering and a deal of happy, useless fluttering, -among the inviting branches.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_vii" id="page_vii">{vii}</a></span></p> - -<p>I had conned my lesson, and I turned my face homewards with changed -spirits and a changed purpose. As one measure towards the fulfilment of -the latter, I send this Christmas greeting into the waste we know as the -common life of this working-day world. We make it too common, dear -reader. We choose for ourselves a path across a dead level, and then -perversely adapt our feelings to what we are pleased to call our -circumstances. I pray you, for this one holiday season, learn with me of -my holly-tree. Seek out present brightness, and in it read the promise -of happy days to come. Sigh not that</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">—“All hope of Spring-time<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Has perished with the year,”<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">while the same Love that nourishes the tiny greenling of the forest into -brightness and beauty, despite wintry blast and wintry sleet, will keep -alive in your heart, if not the tender shoots of youthful joys, the -stronger, braver, worthier growth of love for your brother man; helpful -charity for all things weak and lowly and sorrowing; hope and faith in -the wise and tender Father of us all.</p> - -<p class="r"> -MARION HARLAND.<br /></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_viii" id="page_viii">{viii}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_9" id="page_9">{9}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_10" id="page_10">{10}</a></span> </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_11" id="page_11">{11}</a></span> </p> - -<h2><img src="images/image009.jpg" -width="400" -alt="Nettie’s Prayer." /></h2> - -<h2><img src="images/image011a.jpg" -width="220" -alt="Nettie’s Prayer." /></h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="letra"> -<img src="images/image011b.jpg" -width="80" -alt="M" /></span>RS. DRYDEN was cross!</p> - -<p>She would have been at a loss to specify what especial grounds she had -for the discontent that possessed her on this particular night. If -interrogated, she would probably have returned an evasive reply to the -effect that it was none of the questioner’s business how she felt or -looked, so long as she did not obtrude her unhappiness upon other -people. Everybody had his and her own troubles with which others had no -right to intermeddle. She was responsible to no one for her behavior; -nobody should hinder her from being low-spirited, if she pleased to be -so. She was out of humor with the whole world, herself included. The -children were troublesome; the servants heedless; her husband -indifferent to her grievances—and it was Christmas eve.</p> - -<p>“Really,” she said, peevishly, at tea-time, “one would suppose that -Christmas came but once in a century,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_12" id="page_12">{12}</a></span> instead of once a year! Everybody -is as crazy to-night as if there were never to be another 25th of -December.”</p> - -<p>“By the way,” said her husband, looking up from his paper, “I suppose -you have baked some mince-pies and fried some dough-nuts—haven’t you?”</p> - -<p>“I have mince-pies and turkey for to-morrow!” was the curt reply. “I -knew you would not be satisfied unless you had as good a dinner as your -neighbors. But as for dough-nuts—they are oily, rank, indigestible -abominations, fit only for an ostrich’s stomach, and one doesn’t get the -smell of the hot fat out of the house in two weeks after they have been -cooked. I never mean to make another while I live.”</p> - -<p>Two pairs of sorrowful eyes stole a glance of mutual pity at one -another, when this announcement was made; two pairs of cherry lips took -a piteous curl, for a second; two curly heads bent lower over the plates -set before their owners.</p> - -<p>Not that there was any dearth of sweet things in the Dryden larder, or -that Ally and Nettie, the proprietors of the eyes, lips, and heads -aforesaid, were gormandizers. But this matter of frying doughnuts was -great fun to them, as it is to most other small people who have ever -been permitted to stand by and see the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_13" id="page_13">{13}</a></span> rings, leaves, birds, circles, -triangles, and the endless variety of nondescript figures leave the -kneading-board pale, flat surfaces of soft dough, and, upon being thrown -into the bubbling fat, sinking, like leaden shapes, with a tremendous -splutter and “fizz,” arise slowly and majestically to the top of the -caldron, as Mr. Weller has it, “swelling wisibly” before the enraptured -eye into puffy, crisp, toothsome morsels, fit, in the estimation of the -juvenile partakers thereof, for a queen’s luncheon. Last year, the -brother and sister had spent Christmas week with an aunt in another -town. This lady being the indulgent mamma of half a dozen boys and -girls, enjoyed nothing so much as making them merry and happy. The six -days passed in her abode lived in the memory of nephew and niece as a -dream of Paradisaical delight. But, this season, the holidays were to be -kept at home, and the prospect was, to say the least, not eminently -flattering.</p> - -<p>Mr. and Mrs. Dryden were estimable people in their way, but they had -studied to render themselves intensely and purely matter-of-fact. They -prided themselves secretly upon growing wiser and more practical—less -poetical—each revolving cycle. Each year, life assumed a more positive -and less romantic aspect; their own duties seemed more momentous and -imper<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_14" id="page_14">{14}</a></span>ative; the things which others call recreation and innocent -amusements were puerile and unworthy. Mr. Dryden was making money; Mrs. -Dryden was a notable housekeeper, and, so far as the physical needs of -the children were concerned, a careful mother. Four little ones, three -boys and a girl, claimed her love and maternal offices. Allison, the -eldest, was eight years old; Nettie, six; and a pair of twin babies were -in their third winter. The mother’s hands were certainly full, however -admirable might be her faculty of accomplishing with speed the work set -for her to do. It was not surprising that she should sometimes wear a -haggard, anxious look, or that, now and then, she should be, as she now -expressed it, “worried out of her senses.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t see, for my part,” she broke forth, impatiently, presently, -“how people find time or have the heart to frolic and observe holidays -and the like frivolous carryings-on! With me, it is work, work, work! -from morning until night, and from one year’s end to another. It frets -me to see grown-up men and women, who ought to know something about the -cares and solemn responsibilities of life, acting like silly children. -What is Christmas more than any other time—when one takes a sober, -common-sense view of the matter?<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_15" id="page_15">{15}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>“That is what nobody does in this age of nonsense and dissipation,” -returned her husband. “I don’t know what the world is coming to!”</p> - -<p>“Wasn’t our Saviour born on Christmas-day, Mamma?” asked Nettie’s timid -voice.</p> - -<p>“That is not certain, by any means, child. And if it were true, there is -all the more scandal in making a frolic of it. If there were to be -prayer-meetings held all over the world to celebrate the event, it would -be far more appropriate.”</p> - -<p>The polysyllable staggered Nettie a little, but she retained sufficient -courage to reply: “Our teacher told us, last Sabbath, that everybody -ought to be very happy upon the Saviour’s birthday.”</p> - -<p>Before Mrs. Dryden could answer, Ally put in his oar.</p> - -<p>“Mamma! why doesn’t Santa Claus ever come down our chimney?”</p> - -<p>“There is no such creature, Allison! You are too old to believe in that -ridiculous fable.”</p> - -<p>“But, Mamma, he came to Aunt Mary’s last year!” cried both children, in -a breath.</p> - -<p>“And we all hung up our stockings in the parlor!” added Nettie.</p> - -<p>“And Aunt Mary let the fire go down on purpose,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_16" id="page_16">{16}</a></span> so that the old chap -might not be scorched!” shouted Ally, excitedly. “We wanted her to have -the chimney swept, but she said he wouldn’t mind a little dirt.”</p> - -<p>“For you know—</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">‘His clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot!’<span class="lftspc">”</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">quoted Nettie, “and yet he was in a good humor</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">—‘and filled all the stockings’<span class="lftspc">”</span>—<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i8">“<span class="lftspc">‘</span>Then turned with a jerk,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And laying his finger alongside his nose,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose!’<span class="lftspc">”</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="nind">chanted Ally. “Oh! what times we had repeating that, after we went to -bed that night.</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">‘His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,<br /></span> -<span class="i1">And the beard on his chin was as white as the snow.<br /></span> -<span class="i1">He had a broad face and a little round—’<span class="lftspc">”</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>“You children will be the death of me!” cried Mrs. Dryden, distractedly, -putting her hands to her ears. “I shall certainly never let you spend -another Christmas at your Aunt Mary’s! Your heads were so crammed with -nonsense last year, that I am afraid you will never get rid of it. -Finish your suppers and be off<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_17" id="page_17">{17}</a></span> to bed! You are as Christmas-mad as if -you had never been trained to more sensible things!”</p> - -<p>“I can not imagine,” said Mr. Dryden, severely, “how they have contrived -to remember the senseless doggerel your sister was so injudicious as to -teach them.”</p> - -<p>“That is the depravity of human nature!” sighed the wife.</p> - -<p>Very sober little faces were uplifted to father and mother for a -“good-night” kiss, and very slow footsteps went up the stairs to the -chamber which the brother and sister shared in common. There was a -pathos in the sound, so unlike was it to the brisk patter of other small -feet upon other floors and staircases on that jubilee eve.</p> - -<p>The father, albeit he was not an imaginative man, noticed this, and went -off to the parlor with a pained and yearning heart—saddened, he knew -not by what—longing for something he could not name. The children had -interrupted his evening reading, at supper, by their chatter, and he -bestowed himself in his armchair by the centre-table, to finish the -perusal of his newspaper. His seat was comfortable; the light clear and -soft; the evening news interesting; the room still; yet he could not fix -his mind upon his occupation.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_18" id="page_18">{18}</a></span> Through the quiet apartment came and went -the echoes of the four little feet, in slow dejection, going on up to -the repose that was to be visited by no happy dreams of the glories of -Christmas morning. He saw, between him and the printed column, the -sadly-serious countenances, that were, by this time, laid upon their -pillows. He wondered if the pair would cry themselves to sleep. He -purposely waxed angry with his sister-in-law for putting these silly -notions into the children’s heads. They were contented enough until that -unfortunate visit. Now, there was no telling where this mischief would -stop. It was too provoking to have two such fine natures soured by -repinings and foolish longings; two minds so intelligent filled with -superstitious fancies. Yes! they were fine children! if he <i>did</i> say -it—and dutiful as handsome and intelligent. His wife had an excellent -method of discipline, and deserved much credit for her success in -training her offspring. She was a good woman—industrious and -conscientious—but he could have wished that her spirits were more -equable. He did not relish the idea that his blooming Nettie might, one -day, become a toil-worn, pains-taking wife and mother; her smooth -forehead be ploughed in two deep furrows, like those that crossed her -mother’s, from temple to temple; her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_19" id="page_19">{19}</a></span> pouting lips grow colorless and -drawn down at the corners; her bird-like voice sharpen into the shrill -peevishness of the tones that had ordered the bairns off to bed. He -would like to keep life fresh and bright for his darling so long as he -could. She would find out, soon enough, what a dry, dusty, detestable -cheat the world was. If he might have his wish, she should be a child -always; a merry, laughing, singing fairy, to gladden his old age; a -simple-hearted, trusting child, in whose love and purity he could find -refreshment, when disheartened by the faithlessness of his fellow-men. -She was very fond of him—grave and undemonstrative as he was. With the -unerring perception of childhood, she had discovered that she was his -favorite, and repaid his partiality in the coin he liked best. The sound -of his latch-key in the door was the signal, noon and night, for her to -bound down stairs to meet him; to kiss him, and offer, in her pretty, -womanly way, to relieve him of his overcoat; to hang up his hat and -bring him his slippers. Such nimble feet as hers were! Blithe, willing -little feet, how they twinkled to and fro, to perform whatever errands -he would suffer her to undertake for his comfort! Merry, dancing little -feet!</p> - -<p>But the echoes persisted in contradicting his rec<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_20" id="page_20">{20}</a></span>ollection of their -lively music. Up and down—sad and slow—they wandered; never drowned -for a moment, while their monotonous beat was rendered more mournful by -the hurried, ceaseless tramp of pleasure-seekers upon the pavement -without. He wished that he had spoken a kindly word to the downcast -innocents, instead of the silent salute he had vouchsafed to their -mutely-offered lips. Perhaps they were not asleep yet! His wife was -still with the twins, in the bedroom overhead, for he heard her walking -about the floor, preparing, as he knew, to leave them for the night. He -could slip up noiselessly to the small chamber adjoining, and solace his -uneasy spirit by a loving “good-night,” that should dry Nettie’s eyes, -if they were wet, and comfort Ally’s disappointed soul, while the -partner of his bosom would be none the wiser for it.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Dryden did not allow the attendance of a nursery-maid to her elder -children in the evening. For more than a year they had undressed -themselves and retired to their respective cots, without noise or -complaint, leaving nothing for mother or servant to do, but to look in, -a few minutes later, and extinguish the gas. This had been done by -Ellen, the chamber-maid, before she went down to her own tea; but<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_21" id="page_21">{21}</a></span> the -moonlight, streaming through the window-curtain, showed to the father, -as he stood without the partly-open door, the two white beds in opposite -corners of the room, and the forms that ought to have been snugly laid -under the blankets. Instead of this, they were raised upon their elbows -to a half-sitting posture, and the low hum of their earnest voices -arrested the spectator upon the threshold.</p> - -<p>“I wonder if Papa and Mamma ever were a little boy and girl!” said -Master Ally, in a doleful key. “If they were, I guess they have -forgotten how they used to feel. I could have cried right out, to-day, -at school, when the boys were all talking about Christmas gifts and what -they expected to get. You ought to have seen them stare at me when they -asked me what I thought I should have, and I said that we didn’t keep -Christmas at our house, and that I had never hung up my stockings but -once, and that was when I was at my aunt’s! And one boy asked me if my -father and mother were dead. And when I said ‘No,’ another fellow called -out, as rude as could be—‘I guess they don’t care much about you!’ I -tell you, Nettie, it makes a fellow feel real bad!”</p> - -<p>“I know it!” said the miniature woman, tenderly. “But, Ally, dear, Papa -and Mamma <i>do</i> love us! Only<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_22" id="page_22">{22}</a></span> they don’t know how much we think of -Christmas, and how children love to hang up their stockings, and all -that. But that was a very naughty boy that told you they didn’t care for -you. Papa works <i>ever</i> so hard to get clothes and food for us, so Mamma -says; and Mamma sews for us, and takes care of us when we are sick, -and—and—a great many other kind things.”</p> - -<p>“Maybe so; but she was awful cross to-night, and scolded like every -thing, just for nothing at all, and I am very miserable! Just hear the -boys shouting out-doors, and the people laughing and talking, as they go -along! It’s downright mean in them, when they might know that there -isn’t to be any Christmas in our house. I wish they would be still! I -wish I was dead!”</p> - -<p>“Ally, Ally, that is wicked!” expostulated the gentle tones of the -sister.</p> - -<p>“I don’t care! where is the sense of living, if a fellow is never to -have any fun? Where is the use of being good? If I was the wickedest boy -in town, I could not be treated worse than I am now. How I hate this -stupid old house! When I am a man, and have boys and girls of my own, I -mean that Santa Claus shall come every week and bring them<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_23" id="page_23">{23}</a></span>—oh, such -lots of nice things! and you shall live with me, Nettie, and we will fry -doughnuts and have New Year’s cake every day!”</p> - -<p>“Ally!” said Nettie, thoughtfully, “do you suppose there is such a man -as Santa Claus? Mamma says there isn’t!”</p> - -<p>“I <i>know</i> there is!” returned the boy, confidently. “But he doesn’t come -to a house unless the father and mother of the children that live there -send him an invitation. One of the big boys told me so, to-day. And good -fathers and mothers always tell him what to bring.”</p> - -<p>“I was just thinking,” resumed Nettie’s liquid treble, “if Our Heavenly -Father knew how very badly we wanted to have a Christmas, whether He -wouldn’t send him to us. Suppose I pray to Him and tell Him all about -it!”</p> - -<p>“You may try it!” was the conclusion of the embryo skeptic. “But I don’t -believe it will do any good.”</p> - -<p>In a trice, Nettie had slipped to the floor, and was fumbling among a -heap of clothes laid upon a chair. Mr. Dryden watched her curiously.</p> - -<p>“Now, Ally!” he heard her say, presently, “Here are the clean stockings -that Ellen got out for us to put on to-morrow. Mamma wouldn’t like it if -we<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_24" id="page_24">{24}</a></span> hung them up ourselves, so I will just lay them on the foot of the -bed. If Santa Claus should come, maybe he can pin them up for us.”</p> - -<p>Then, sinking to her knees, she put her hands together and raised her -pure face—angelic in the father’s sight—as the moonbeams revealed its -expression of meek devotion.</p> - -<p>“Our Father who art in Heaven! please make us good and happy, and let us -have a merry Christmas. If there is any Santa Claus, please let him come -to our house to-night, for he has never been here in all our lives, and -this makes us very sorry. Bless dear Papa and Mamma, and don’t let us -think hard of them, or say naughty things about them, only because they -don’t know how little children feel. Amen!”</p> - -<p>Ally gave a grunt that might mean acquiescence, or doubt, when his -sister arose and leaned over to kiss him; but Mr. Dryden could play the -eavesdropper no longer.</p> - -<p>Feeling that he must inevitably discover himself if he remained another -minute in his present position, he hurried down-stairs and into the -parlor, where he behaved more like a crazy man than the sober, -self-possessed head of a staid and decent household. Kicking off his -slippers, he thrust his feet violently into</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<a href="images/facing024.jpg"> -<img src="images/facing024.jpg" height="550" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_25" id="page_25">{25}</a></span></p> - -<p class="nind">his boots, stamping, with unnecessary force, to get these fairly on; -blew his nose repeatedly and loudly, afterwards passing his handkerchief -over his eyes, as though the sudden catarrh from which he appeared to be -suffering had affected them also. Going into the hall, he snatched his -greatcoat from the rack and put it on—still in desperate haste, pulled -his hat over his brows, and rushed into the street.</p> - -<p>He found himself plunged directly into a rapid, buzzing crowd. Every -step was quick and light; every face wore a smile, and the air was full -of the pleasant confusion of happy voices. Bless the children! how they -ran under his feet, and trod upon his toes, and kicked against his -heels, and jostled him on the right and on the left! And not one of them -was empty-handed. Parcels of all sizes, shapes, and descriptions, filled -small fingers; were hugged by small arms; laid upon small shoulders and -slung upon small backs. Brown paper bundles; bundles tied in frailer -white paper, which, bursting, showed the wheel of a toy-wagon, or the -head of a toy-horse, or the arm of a doll; funnel-shaped bundles, fresh -from the hands of the confectioner; bundles, wrapped hastily in -newspaper by an economical shopkeeper, or one whose stock of wrapping -material had proved inadequate to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_26" id="page_26">{26}</a></span> the rush of custom; boxes, square, -oblong, and many-sided; mimic guns and drums, with gayly-painted sides, -upon whose heads the delighted owners could not refrain from beating -stirring Christmas marches, as they carried them home; here and there a -huge hobby-horse, with dilated eye and streaming mane, borne aloft by -the stalwart porter of some toy warehouse; these were but a few features -in the pageant that streamed past Mr. Dryden—a varied and joyous -torrent of life. He caught the infection of this atmosphere of gladness -before he had gone a dozen yards. He had come forth with the intention -of purchasing something with which to make his children happy; to answer -Nettie’s prayer so far as lay in his power. Awakened conscience and -remorseful affection for those he felt he had wronged, had driven him on -to the duty of making restitution. He soon began to understand that -there might be enjoyment, active and new, in the task.</p> - -<p>“How I wish I had brought them with me!” he said to himself, as he felt -his features relax into a smile at sight of the general hilarity. “It -was hard to send them to bed so early on Christmas eve. But, what would -their mother have said if I had asked her permission to take them out -after dark?<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_27" id="page_27">{27}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>He stayed his rapid progress, as another query presented itself. What -would this very prudent and sedate help-meet say and think of another -bold innovation upon established rules, to wit, this expedition and its -probable results? How should he meet the stare of mingled astonishment -and rebuke that would rest upon his freight of “useless” playthings, -upon his return home? She disapproved of toys, except when great -moderation was displayed in their bestowal. Nettie had but one doll in -the world, and, careful as she was of this treasure, her loving arts -could not conceal the ravages of time; said manikin having been Aunt -Mary’s gift to her niece, upon her third birthday. Ally had never owned -a hobby-horse. His mother had a dread of “rough plays.” Our hero was -quite aware that on this occasion he was not inclined to moderation. He -would cheerfully have bought the entire contents of any one of the -illuminated windows whose splendors drew around them a swarm of admiring -juveniles, as a hive of honey would tempt hungry bees. The difficulty -was to know what would best please the unsuspecting twain at home.</p> - -<p>“This sort of thing is not in my line!” he soliloquized. “I suppose -there is a difference between girls’ and boys’ playthings. I have it! -These people ought to know<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_28" id="page_28">{28}</a></span> their business! I will state my dilemma, and -take whatever they advise.”</p> - -<p>Thus resolving, he entered the largest and most brilliant toy emporium -he had yet seen, and making his way, with considerable labor, through -the throng of eager buyers, presented himself at the counter. Luckily, -the saleswoman nearest him had just dismissed a customer, and turned to -him with an engaging smile. She looked tired—as well she might, poor -thing! having been on her feet for twelve hours, and hard at work all -the time—but it was not in a kind-hearted tradeswoman’s nature to be -cross on Christmas eve.</p> - -<p>“What can I show you, sir?” she asked, politely.</p> - -<p>“That is what you must tell <i>me</i>, madam! I want some toys for my little -girl, aged six, and my boy, who is two years older. If you can inform me -what will suit them, you will oblige me, and please them.”</p> - -<p>His fluent, pleasant speech amazed himself. Certainly, the witchery of -the festal eve was working upon him fast.</p> - -<p>“Has your daughter a tea or dinner set?” inquired the shop-woman, taking -down two wooden boxes; pulling back the sliding tops, and rummaging -among the shred paper used for packing the fragile contents. “Here is -something very handsome.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_29" id="page_29">{29}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>“Just the thing!” ejaculated the father, upon beholding the wee tureen; -covered and shallow dishes, gravy-boat, saltcellars, casters, and a -dozen plates, white, with a rim of gold; all so graceful in design, so -dainty in material, as to elicit his unqualified admiration. Already he -saw, in imagination, Nettie’s eyes glisten at sight of them; her deft -fingers arranging them—cunning little housewife that she was.</p> - -<p>“Then you don’t care for the tea-set?” making a movement to close the -box.</p> - -<p>“I—don’t—know!” hesitatingly. “I suppose she will want to spread a -supper and breakfast table, as well as play dinner, won’t she?”</p> - -<p>“If she has not cups and saucers already, I would certainly recommend -you to take these,” and the artful tempter made a tea-tray of the lid of -the case, setting out the service so attractively, that her -inexperienced customer speedily regarded the second array of china as a -“must have.”</p> - -<p>“Now, perhaps, you will look at a table!” pursued the woman, leading the -way to the back of the store. “We have a novelty in that line—an -extension-table.”</p> - -<p>“Of course! how stupid in me not to remember that the china would be -useless unless she had something upon which to arrange it!<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_30" id="page_30">{30}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>Mr. Dryden had entered thoroughly into the spirit of the enterprise, and -was highly diverted at his oversight; very grateful to her who had -corrected his blunder. The table was a neat affair, with turned legs and -polished top, and constructed, as had been said, upon the extension -principle. Mr. Dryden took it on the spot.</p> - -<p>“Chairs?” he said, interrogatively.</p> - -<p>It was now the lady’s turn to be ashamed of <i>her</i> forgetfulness. Half a -dozen cane-seat chairs were added to the pile, which betokened Mr. -Dryden to be a valuable customer. Then followed a case of knives, a -knife-box, and an assortment of silver (?) ware, and both parties came -to a momentary halt. The gentleman recovered himself first.</p> - -<p>“Now, a doll—for which she can keep house!”</p> - -<p>“Wax finish, porcelain, biscuit, or rubber?” said the other, glibly. -“Dressed, or undressed?”</p> - -<p>“Dressed—I suppose, since to-morrow is so near. As to the rest, I am no -judge. But I want the prettiest doll in the establishment.”</p> - -<p>His experience in this species of merchandise was so limited that he -might well be excused for starting at the wonderfully life-like lady -paraded for his inspection. Her hair waved in natural ringlets; she -rolled<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_31" id="page_31">{31}</a></span> her eyes, as the shopwoman moved her to and fro. She was dressed -in the height of the mode—neither gloves, nor hat, nor parasol being -wanting to complete her toilet; and when, in obedience to a dexterous -pull of a wire upon her left side, she squeaked “Mamma!” and, responding -to a similar twitch of the corresponding muscle under the right arm, she -cried “Papa!” Mr. Dryden was overwhelmed.</p> - -<p>“What <i>will</i> toy makers do next?” he articulated.</p> - -<p>“The art of manufacturing dolls is carried to great perfection,” quietly -replied the woman. “Did you say that you would take this, sir?”</p> - -<p>Take it! what could have bribed him to forego the treat of witnessing -Nettie’s rapture in the survey of this resplendent and accomplished -demoiselle?</p> - -<p>“We have some very pretty doll-carriages, in which the lady can take the -air,” was the next attack, and Mr. Dryden fell a willing sacrifice to -this new snare.</p> - -<p>In very compassion for her victim, the woman directed his thoughts to -the boy’s gifts. A velocipede; a wheelbarrow, with spade, rake, and hoe; -a set of jackstraws, for winter evenings; a football and a sled made up -the complement that was to transport the semi-infidel to the seventh -heaven of ecstacy.</p> - -<p>Truth obliges me to mention that the lavish parent<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_32" id="page_32">{32}</a></span> sustained a slight -shock when the obliging saleswoman figured up and presented the amount -of his indebtedness; but he rallied bravely.</p> - -<p>“Christmas comes but once a year!” he said, manfully, and paid his bill -with a good grace.</p> - -<p>“You could not purchase the same quantity of happiness so cheaply in any -other manner,” remarked the bland merchant, oracularly.</p> - -<p>The tit-bit of wisdom was assuredly not original with her, but it -impressed the hearer as a profound and truthful observation—one well -worth remembering. He was getting on very swiftly, indeed, in the -acquisition of Christmas lore.</p> - -<p>“You have but two children, then, sir?” remarked the lady, casually, in -handing him his change.</p> - -<p>“Bless my life! I forgot the twins!” exclaimed the father, aghast. “But -I suppose they are too young to appreciate Christmas presents.”</p> - -<p>“What age?” queried the other, sweetly.</p> - -<p>“Two and a half.”</p> - -<p>“My dear sir! they would be disconsolate if they were overlooked! -Children understand these matters astonishingly soon.”</p> - -<p>And having ascertained the sex of the twins, she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_33" id="page_33">{33}</a></span> selected two rubber -balls, and two sets of building blocks for their delectation.</p> - -<p>“Our porter will take them for you,” she said, amused at Mr. Dryden’s -amazed contemplation of the dimensions of the pyramid she constructed of -his purchases. “Please favor us with your address!”</p> - -<p>“Really, a little more practice will render me an adept in toy -shopping!” thought Mr. Dryden, complacently, when he was beyond the -enchanted ground, the seductions of which had lightened both heart and -pocket. “It is not a disagreeable or difficult operation, after all.”</p> - -<p>As he neared his own door on his return, his pockets crammed with -conical packages of sugar-plums, nuts, and crystallized fruits, he -overtook the porter with his barrow.</p> - -<p>“Quietly, my man!” he said, inserting his latch-key in the lock with -secret trepidation of spirit. “It would never do to awaken the children. -Or to attract my wife’s attention,” he added, inly.</p> - -<p>The porter’s load was transferred to the hall so silently that even Mrs. -Dryden’s cat-like ears did not hear any bustle. Mr. Dryden sent the man -off with a gratuity, and proceeded to dispose of the presents in the -following style: the table bestraddled the right<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_34" id="page_34">{34}</a></span> arm, and upon it were -the boxes of crockery, surmounted by the chairs; the case of jackstraws -and several other light articles. The velocipede was borne in like -manner upon the left coat sleeve; then came the wheelbarrow; the boxes -of building-blocks, the balls, and on the top, held firmly in its place -by Mr. Dryden’s chin, was the doll, In the right hand he carried the -sled; in the other Dolly’s carriage. This staid, prosaic -<i>pater-familias</i> would have made no bad representation of the patron -saint of the anniversary, the suggestion of whose existence he had -scouted, a few hours previously, as he slowly ascended the stairs on -tiptoe, his face radiant with arch delight, despite the cowardly fear -tugging at his heart-strings, as to the reception in store for him at -the hands of his better half. Treading yet more delicately, in passing -his sleeping-room, wherein, he had no doubt, Mrs. Dryden was soundly -reposing, it being ten o’clock, her invariable bedtime, he pushed open -the door of the smaller chamber beyond, and entered. The gas was -burning—not brightly—but it enabled him to see with terrible -distinctness the figure that started up in the aisle between the beds -and confronted him with an excited air. It was his wife!</p> - -<p>Dropping the curtain upon a tableau which the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_35" id="page_35">{35}</a></span> reader can picture to -himself better than I can describe, we will take a step or two backward -in our story.</p> - -<p>“And it’s sorry for the children I am, this blessed night!” said Ellen, -to the cook, over their dish of tea. “Sorra a bit of a merry-making will -they have to-morrow—and they such good, peaceful little things, too! I -was asking Miss Nettie, just now, if I shouldn’t hang up her stockings, -at a venture-like; ‘for,’ sez I, ‘there’s no knowing but the saint might -pop down the chimney, unbeknownst to you, and ’twould be a pity not to -be ready for him.’ For, you see, my heart was that tinder towards the -lonesome craturs, that I thought I would step out myself, presently, and -buy some candies and apples to put into their poor, empty, desolate -little stockings. But, ‘No,’ says she, kinder pitiful, ‘I am afraid -Mamma might not like it, Ellen. She doesn’t believe in keeping -Christmas.’ And wid that she give a sigh, like a sorrowful woman, and -Master Ally growled over something cross to himself.”</p> - -<p>“It’s ra’al hard—that’s what it is!” responded Biddy. “They begged -their Mamma, to-day, to let me fry some doughnuts—‘Just this once, -Mamma,’ says they, ‘because to-morrow’s Christmas’—and she wouldn’t -hear a word to it. Ah! no good ever came of ch’ating<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_36" id="page_36">{36}</a></span> childer out of the -fun the Lord meant they should have.”</p> - -<p>“There’s the parlor bell!” said Ellen, jumping up. “What’s wanted now, I -wonder?”</p> - -<p>Her mistress stood upon the rug before the fire in the parlor, hat and -cloak on.</p> - -<p>“Ellen, if you have finished your supper, I want you to get your bonnet -and shawl and go out with me. Take a basket along. I am going to buy -some things for the children.”</p> - -<p>Her voice shook in uttering these few sentences; and, although her face -was averted, the girl was positive that she had been weeping. Brimful of -curiosity and excitement, she dashed up-stairs for her wrappings, then -down to the kitchen to ask Biddy to listen for sounds from the nursery -while she was out.</p> - -<p>“For we are going a-Christmassing—glory be to all the saints—St. -Nicholas, in particular! for he must have put it into her head to -remember the swate innocents.”</p> - -<p>It is not our purpose to follow them in their tramp, as we have traced -the course of the lady’s husband. Suffice it to say, that Ellen’s basket -was heavily burdened when they re-entered the house, and her mistress -bore sundry parcels in her hands, all of which<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_37" id="page_37">{37}</a></span> were carefully deposited -upon the carpet beside the cots of the calmly-sleeping children. Ellen -was made happy, on her own account, by the present of a bank-bill for -her private spending, and intrusted with another of the same value for -Biddy; then excused from further service. If the maid had been mistaken -in her surmise as to the tears she had seen in eyes which were generally -dry and bright, there was no doubt as to the melting mood that overtook -the mother when she removed the four stockings from the place where -Nettie had laid them. She even pressed them to her lips before fastening -the tops of each pair together with a stout pin, and hanging them over -the footboards of the beds. To unpack the basket and undo papers, with -as little rustling as was practicable, was her next act. She paused, -when everything was uncovered, to survey her acquisitions. Her -expenditures had been on a scale far less grand than her husband’s, but -maternal tact had guided her in the selection of acceptable gifts. There -were a cooking-stove, with its assortment of pans, griddles, and -kettles; a work-box of satinwood, lined with red velvet, and well -stocked; a cradle with a baby-doll asleep under the muslin curtain, for -Nettie. For Ally, she had provided a bag of beautiful agate marbles; a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_38" id="page_38">{38}</a></span> -fine humming-top; a paint-box, and a set—fourteen in number—of -Abbott’s inimitable “Rollo” books for boys. She had not forgotten the -twins, as was evidenced by a couple of whips; two picture-books, and two -tin horses mounted upon wheels; one attached to an express wagon, the -other to a baker’s cart. Nor had she disdained to call upon the -confectioner. Her conical bundles contained “Christmas mixture;” plain -sugar candy; peppermint lozenges and oranges; more wholesome, or, -rather, less hurtful sweets than the richer and costly delicacies that -had captivated her lord’s fancy. Altogether, the sight was a pleasant -one, and a satisfactory, if one might judge by the gleam of comfort that -overspread the tear-stained visage. She had just dropped a handful of -the “mixture” into the foot of Ally’s sock, when a soft tap at the door -startled her. It was Ellen, and she bore a plate, covered with a napkin, -in her hand.</p> - -<p>“If you plaze, mem—Biddy hopes you won’t be offended, mem—but the -children were so disappointed to-day, mem; and when I told her you were -going to give them a Christmas, she made so bold as to fry them a few -doughnuts. She wouldn’t have taken the privilege, only, seeing Christmas -comes but once a year, and it’s good children they are, mem!<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_39" id="page_39">{39}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>“They are, Ellen! Tell Biddy that I am much obliged to her. These are -very nice, indeed!”</p> - -<p>Yet she cried over them when the girl was gone. Her very servants pitied -the cruelly-oppressed little ones!</p> - -<p>“I have been a hard, unsympathizing mother!” she thought, sobbingly. -“God forgive me this, my sin!” She wiped away the tears, and resumed her -task. “William will think I have lost my senses!” she ruminated, -cramming an orange into the leg of the tightly-stuffed sock. “But I -can’t help it, if he does!”</p> - -<p>And, as if invoked by her unspoken thought, her husband, accoutred as I -have described, stood before her.</p> - -<p>“William!”</p> - -<p>“Emily!”</p> - -<p>The two detected culprits stared at one another for an instant, in -unuttered, because unutterable amazement; then, as the truth dawned upon -their minds, they burst into a fit of laughter that threatened to awake -the dreamers.</p> - -<p>“Hush-sh-sh!” said Mrs. Dryden, wiping away the tears of mirth that now -hung where bitterer drops had trickled awhile ago, and pointing to the -beds, “Let me see what you have been doing?<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_40" id="page_40">{40}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>The prudent economist could not repress a single exclamation of gentle -reproof, as she examined the store. “William Dryden! And in these hard -times, my dear!”</p> - -<p>“Christmas comes but once a year, wifie! and then I had to make up for -lost time, you know. I’ll tell you how it happened, and then you won’t -blame me. I felt badly after tea, and came up to say a kind word to -them”—nodding towards the brother and sister—“before they went to -sleep, and, that door being ajar, I heard them talking”—</p> - -<p>“And listened, as I did at <i>that</i> one!” cried Mrs. Dryden, throwing her -arms around his neck, and beginning to cry afresh. “O husband! I have -been so miserable ever since! have felt so guilty! Only to think, that I -was teaching my children to hate me and to hate their home—making their -lives wretched!”</p> - -<p>“Don’t think of it, dear! After this, there will be peace and good-will -among us!” soothed the husband, his own eyes shining suspiciously. “If -we have made a mistake, we are ready to correct it. Now, let us see what -disposition can be made of this cargo of valuables. And I left a lot of -gimcracks—sweet things, you know—down stairs.”</p> - -<p>Christmas morning came, clear and brilliant, with<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_41" id="page_41">{41}</a></span> frosty sunlight, and -Mrs. Dryden, as was her custom, tapped at the children’s door, having -beforehand stealthily unclosed it far enough to allow herself and her -accomplice a view of the interior of the dormitory.</p> - -<p>“Come, little birds, it is time you were out of your nests!”</p> - -<p>The cheery, loving voice aroused the sleepers more thoroughly than -sterner accents would have done. The mother was spared the pain of -knowing that the novelty of the address made it so efficacious.</p> - -<p>“Yes, Mamma!” answered Nettie, starting up in bed.</p> - -<p>“All right!” responded Ally, and he turned over.</p> - -<p>Thus it happened that the eyes of both rested simultaneously upon an -object in the centre of the apartment, and a ringing cry of joy escaped -them.</p> - -<p>“Nettie, Santa Claus <i>did</i> come!”</p> - -<p>“Ally, don’t you know what I prayed for?”</p> - -<p>They were upon the floor before the words had left their lips. The next -few minutes were passed in speechless admiration of the miraculous -edifice that had arisen during their hours of unconsciousness. Mr. -Dryden had made a second trip to the street, the night before, to buy a -Christmas tree. A broad, flat box, covered with a white cloth, formed -the base upon<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_42" id="page_42">{42}</a></span> which this was set. The larger toys were placed around -the trunk, and smaller ones hung among the gilt balls, flags, and -flowers, that decked the boughs. Miss Dolly sat at the root upon one of -her new chairs, her foot upon the rocker of the new cradle, and, perched -up in the topmost branches, was Santa Claus—white beard, pipe, pack, -and all—smiling broadly upon his enraptured devotees.</p> - -<p>Nettie broke the spell of ecstatic silence. “Dear Mamma! Papa, darling!” -she screamed. “Come and see! It is just like fairy-land!”</p> - -<p>And flying to the door, her curls streaming back, and her face fairly -luminous with delight, she ran directly into her parents’ arms.</p> - -<p>“Christmas shall be an ‘institution’ in our family, hereafter!” said Mr. -Dryden, that night, when the happy children had kissed them “good-night” -over and over again. “I am a better man for last evening’s work and this -day’s innocent frolic. I feel twenty years younger, and fifty degrees -happier. It pays, my dear—<i>it pays!</i><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_43" id="page_43">{43}</a></span>”</p> - -<h2><img src="images/image043.jpg" -width="450" -alt="A Christmas Talk With Mothers." /> -</h2> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_44" id="page_44">{44}</a></span> </p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<a href="images/facing045.jpg"> -<img src="images/facing045.jpg" height="550" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_45" id="page_45">{45}</a></span></p> - -<h2><img src="images/image045a.jpg" -width="450" -alt="A Christmas Talk with Mothers." /></h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="letra"> -<img src="images/image045b.jpg" -width="80" -alt="“I" /></span> DO not approve of lady lecturers, as a general thing,” I remarked -meditatively, a while since, to a gentleman, in whose presence I am -somewhat prone to think aloud.</p> - -<p>“You allude to <i>public</i> lectures?” said he, interrogatively, with -unnecessary emphasis.</p> - -<p>“Of course!”</p> - -<p>“Oh!” and he resumed the study of a very dry-looking volume.</p> - -<p>Affecting not to observe the mischievous gleam of his eye, I resumed:—</p> - -<p>“But I am sometimes tempted to ask the use of your lecture-room for one -evening, to call together an audience from which all persons of the -masculine gender shall be excluded, and, then and there, harangue my own -sex upon a subject that has engrossed much of my time and thoughts for -eight years past.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_46" id="page_46">{46}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>“What is it—cookery or dry goods? Either topic would be popular.”</p> - -<p>“Something more important than both put together!” I retorted. My theme -would be—</p> - -<p>“<span class="lftspc">‘</span><i>The Rights of Babies and the Responsibilities of Mothers!</i>’<span class="lftspc">”</span></p> - -<p>My auditor raised his eyebrows and pursed his lips very slightly—just -enough to give one the impression that he would have whistled, had not -politeness restrained him. Seeing that I was in nowise abashed by these -discouraging manifestations, he offered an amendment to my resolution.</p> - -<p>“Better write your discourse, instead, and have it printed.”</p> - -<p>“But,” I objected, “what I would say would be addressed to women alone. -We don’t care to let men know how unmercifully we can handle one -another. Moreover, I should use great plainness of speech”—</p> - -<p>“I think I can set your mind at rest on that point,” interrupted my -companion, drily. “I don’t believe many men would read your treatise.”</p> - -<p>Whereupon he picked up <i>his</i> treatise and withdrew to his sanctum, -leaving me to arrange the heads of my “discourse,” or to ponder the -meaning of his last equivocal observation.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_47" id="page_47">{47}</a></span></p> - -<p>And thus it came to pass, that, sitting lonely here, and arranging plans -for the coming festival—the jubilee that, throughout Christendom, -commemorates the birth of a little Child in the grotto of far-off -Bethlehem; musing of that Child and his mother, while from the wall, the -Mater Dolorosa, wondrous in beauty and in sorrow, looked down upon -me—thought followed thought, and memories—sweet, tender, and full of -joy, others sad, yet precious, and mingled with wistful yearning, flowed -in upon me, and I have taken up my pen, not to indite a lecture or an -essay, but a simple, homely, heartfelt Christmas letter to my -fellow-workers in the great mission to which God has called us.</p> - -<p>“And first, let me remark, by way of ‘beginning at the beginning,’ as -old-time teachers were wont to exhort their scholars to do—that <i>Babies -have a right to be</i>.”</p> - -<p>This is not the page whereon to record a frank and full opinion upon -such a subject, nor is mine the will or ability to treat of the -mysteries of iniquity, the violence done to conscience, humanity, and -natural affection, that have come to be talked of in the so-called -higher circles as familiar things, convenient and expedient measures for -leaving fashionable mothers<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_48" id="page_48">{48}</a></span>—(does not the holy word look like a bitter -sarcasm, written in this connection?)—for leaving frivolous, heartless -mothers, I say, at liberty to follow the devices of their own foolish -brains, and delivering sordid fathers from what I have heard professing -Christians style—“the curse of a large family.” I know that such -abominations do exist, and so does the fair reader, who is ready to -ostracize me for daring to hint thus publicly at what she privately -approves and advocates. I can see that our pleasure-loving neighbors -over the water are in a fair way to be rivaled, if not eclipsed, in -certain respects, by their American cousins. Further than this I will -not go. I only refer to this, to me revolting subject, to substantiate a -conclusion at which I have arrived in the course of my serious and often -sadly troubled lucubrations with regard to this matter. It is my -conviction that the real root of the evil lies back of this, its most -reprehensible offshoot. I have no means of settling the date at which -the opinion or prejudice was implanted on this continent, but certain it -is, that a vast proportion—I fear, a large majority—of American -mothers, would secretly, if not openly, controvert my first proposition. -There is among us, if not a woeful deficiency of genuine maternal -instinct, a style—a fashion, if you choose to call it, and a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_49" id="page_49">{49}</a></span> very vile -fashion it is—of deprecating as a grievous affliction the repeated -visits of what a higher authority than “the noted Dr. ——, from Paris,” -or the autocrat of neighborhood gossips, has declared to be among -Heaven’s best gifts to human kind.</p> - -<p>“Poor Mrs. A., with her eight children, like a flight of stairs—just -two years between them”—is, by her friends’ very pity, made to feel -that she is, in some sense, the inferior of Mrs. B., who “manages <i>so</i> -beautifully!” She has but three, and they are seven years apart.</p> - -<p>It matters not that Mrs. A.’s household resembles a snug nest of -chirping birdlings, who lie all the warmer for being obliged to stow a -little closely; who learn patience and loving-kindness and generosity by -hourly practice of these graces upon one another, without being aware -that any lessons are set for them—they come so naturally; who never -lack company or sympathy, by reason of the abundance of home companions -and home love; who bid fair to keep their parents’ name long alive upon -the earth, and, in their own maturity, to transmit to an extended -circle—to a large community—it may be to a whole nation, the -principles taught them at their mother’s knees and from their father’s -lips. It signifies little<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_50" id="page_50">{50}</a></span> to the feminine cabal that each one of the -little B.’s has been, for seven long weary years, that most forlorn and -pitiable of juvenile specimens—an only baby; has become dwarfed in -affections; narrowed as to ability to love and to enter into the -feelings of other children; thoroughly, and often incorrigibly selfish; -and when, at last, the lustrum being accomplished, the newer infant is -ushered into the world, the older regards it with dire distrust and -lurking jealousy, if not avowed dislike, as the usurper of his or her -hitherto undisputed rights.</p> - -<p>“My children will never be companions for one another; they are so far -apart!” sighs Mrs. B., as the pert Miss of fourteen pronounces the tiny -sister, who has not numbered as many hours of existence, “a regular -bore!” and “wonders why she came. Nobody wants her; and it is too -provoking to have a baby in the house just as one is beginning to go -into society, and wants a good deal of gay company.”</p> - -<p>But Mrs. Grundy—an American Mrs. Grundy, you may be sure, with a dash -of Parisian philosophy—has declared the one matron to be a broken-down -druge, a domestic slave—“quite behind the times, in fact!” while “Mrs. -B. is a truly fortunate and”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_51" id="page_51">{51}</a></span>—here Mrs. Grundy whispers—“a very -enlightened and judicious lady!”</p> - -<p>What an odious savor in Mrs. G.’s delicate nostrils would be the -antiquated but pious friend who should, out of the plenitude of his love -and good will for Mr. Grundy, pray, in the words of the Psalmist, that -his wife might be a fruitful vine, and his children olive plants round -about his table!</p> - -<p>No! we do not, as a class, appreciate the dignity—I use the word -advisedly—the <i>dignity</i> and privilege of maternity! In this respect, -our English sisters are far ahead of us. The Hebrew women, under the -Theocracy, understood it better still, when Rachel pined in her quiet -tent for the murmur of baby-voices and the touch of baby-fingers, and -Hannah knelt in the court of the temple, to supplicate, with strong -crying and tears, that the holy fountains of motherly love within her -heart might flow out upon offspring of her own. In those days it was the -childless wife, and not she who had borne many sons and daughters, who -besought that her reproach might be taken away; that she might be -accounted worthy to be intrusted with the high duty of rearing children -to swell the ranks of the Lord’s chosen people.</p> - -<p>“If I felt as you do,” said a lady, sneeringly, to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_52" id="page_52">{52}</a></span> a friend of mine; -“if I considered the gift of children a blessing, and the care of them a -delightful task, I would not wait for the slow process by which Nature -creates families, but adopt a dozen at a time from an asylum.”</p> - -<p>“They would not be mine!” was the quiet reply.</p> - -<p>I do not envy that mother her heart, who does not enter into the meaning -of this rejoinder; who has not felt the delicious thrill of ownership in -an object so lovely and precious as the helpless babe she has braved -death itself to win; the awed delight of contemplating the new -creation—living, intelligent, immortal—given to be <i>hers</i>! It may -be—I have seen it somewhere asserted—that there is, after all, a -species of sublimated selfishness in the ecstatic sweetness of the -thought so well expressed by Emily Judson:—</p> - -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“The pulse first caught its tiny stroke,<br /></span> -<span class="i3">The blood its crimson hue from <i>mine</i>!<br /></span> -<span class="i1">The life which <i>I</i> have dared invoke<br /></span> -<span class="i3">Henceforth is parallel with <span class="smcap">Thine</span>!”<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p>The candid reader who has known the depth and strength of a mother’s -love, her patience, constancy, and self-sacrifice, will, I fancy, agree -with me in pronouncing the selfishness to be <i>very</i> “sublimated.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_53" id="page_53">{53}</a></span>”</p> - -<p>Said Mr. Toots, upon the occasion of the birth of his fourth -daughter—“The oftener we can repeat that extraordinary woman the -better!” Everybody laughs at the proud husband’s praise of his spouse, -but—ask your heart, loving mother, if there is not a strange fullness -of joy in watching the reproduction of your traits, physical, mental, -and moral, in your child? How many times a day does she bring back some -half-forgotten scene of your own childhood? How frequently, at the -expression of her fancies, or opinions, or desires, do you say, with a -smile, a sigh—perchance a tear—“I felt, or thought, or longed the same -at her years; it is her inheritance?” Is there not a joy yet greater, an -inexpressible swelling of love and pride, as you see in the lineaments -and gesture of your boy, the faithful portraiture of one dearer to you -than your own soul? I am not talking now to those who have felt nothing -of all this; from whom the knowledge of these sacred mysteries has been -withheld, and who are incapable, from the barrenness and shallowness of -their own spiritual natures, of ever entering fully into them. It is -useless to say to these that motherhood is a holy thing, and offspring -the boon of Heaven; that, amidst the wild clamor of woman’s rights and -woman’s sphere, she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_54" id="page_54">{54}</a></span> best enacts the rôle appointed her by the wise -Parent of all, does most to elevate her race, who rears strong, good -men, and gentle, noble daughters to serve God and the generation to -come. To the gross, all things are gross, and these truths are pearls, -too clear in their purity to be trampled by such. I appeal to -mothers—to brave, pious women who fear God and love their husbands—but -who have yet never arisen to the perfect realization of the grandeur of -the work assigned them; never thought of themselves as the architects of -the nation’s fortunes, the sculptors, whose fair or foul handiwork is to -outlast their age, to outlive Time, to remain through all Eternity. I -would awaken those whom the prejudices of education or the plausible -sophistries of the modern fashionable school have blinded to the deep -significance of those words—“Behold, children are an heritage from the -Lord, and the fruit of the womb is His reward!”</p> - -<p>Women! sisters! be assured there is something tearfully and radically -wrong in a system that teaches us to despise or refuse our rightful -share in our Father’s riches! Look to it, lest haply ye be found to sin -against God!</p> - -<p>My second assertion is that it is a <i>right of babies to have mothers</i>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_55" id="page_55">{55}</a></span></p> - -<p>“I have never desired children; have always been bitterly opposed to the -coming of each new claimant upon my time and labor,” I once heard a lady -say. “Two of mine never breathed, and I experienced a sensation of -joyful relief when I found that my cares were not then to be increased. -Yet I love my children very much as they grow older, and my conscience -assures me that I have discharged my duty to them faithfully. I accept -them as inevitable evils which religion and philosophy require me to -endure as well and gracefully as possible.”</p> - -<p>Yet the speaker was not a “strong-minded woman,” in the popular -acceptation of the term. She believed in St. Paul, and had never read a -word of Malthus in her life, if indeed she were aware of the existence -of that author. She reprobated women’s colleges and learned ladies; -stayed at home and kept her husband’s house with all diligence, and was -generally regarded as a pattern wife and estimable member of society. I -declare, nevertheless, that if she spoke the truth in this instance, her -babies were motherless. They had a capable nurse; one who discharged the -external duties of her position with conscientious fidelity, and who, in -the course of time, as any tolerably warm-hearted nursery-maid could not -but have done,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_56" id="page_56">{56}</a></span> grew into a more lively degree of interest in the -winsome beings committed to her charge. But of true mother-love—the -beautiful instinct, and sacred as beauful—the blending of hope and -longing and solicitude that, not content with receiving the dear trust -with eager embrace at the threshold of what we call life, goes forth to -meet it in that mysterious, imperfect existence which even she does not -wholly comprehend, and from the moment the revelation of the coming -advent is known to herself, studies the comfort and well-being of the -one whose name may perhaps never be written among the living upon the -earth; watching and regulating the workings of her physical nature; -keeping her mind calm and free; hushing every wild heart-beat, lest the -irregular throb should disturb the exquisitely susceptible organization -of that which lies so near it—that always marvelous, yet ever-renewed -miracle of human devotion, which Deity does not shun to name in -connection with His own boundless, perfect love; of this, the decent -matron in question knew about as much as I do of Sanscrit, or the -dialect spoken by the natives among the coffee groves of -Borrioboola-Gha.</p> - -<p>I am happy to believe that the maternal care which antedates the birth -of its object is becoming daily a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_57" id="page_57">{57}</a></span> subject of deeper thought and more -enlightened comprehension, with those whose duty it is to be instructed -in this regard. It is only among the ignorant or the reckless that we -find total disbelief and utter neglect of the laws which treat of the -intimate and subtle relation existing between mother and child. It is no -longer customary to scout as old wives’ fables the tales of horrible -wrong done by passionate or imprudent women to the bodies and intellects -of their unborn babes. But we have still much to learn, and more to heed -upon this vital point.</p> - -<p>Passing thus briefly over the earliest phase of motherly duty, we come -to the education of the living, breathing, “necessary evil,” or -cherished blessing, as the parent’s taste or principles may determine -the little stranger to be. The pink, plump, piping bantling has been -exhibited to the usual round of ceremonious visitors, and passed muster -with all—in the mother’s hearing—having been praised by one as the -image of his papa, and by another, no less discerning, as his mother’s -miniature, and, content with having acted well its part, in voting him -to be a “remarkably fine child,” the “finest of the season,” Society -dismisses the subject and remands baby to his curtained crib in the -darkest corner of the nursery. For all that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_58" id="page_58">{58}</a></span> Society cares or thinks, he -may, in that convenient retreat, slumber away the seasons of infancy and -adolescence in a sort of Rip Van Winkle torpor, until his long clothes -drop from his growing frame like the husk from a ripe nut. Society does -not regard a “human boy”—as Mr. Chadband has it—as having arrived at -the “interesting age” until he attains the age of discretion. Young lady -cousins, enthusiastic school-girls, or matrons, incited to the -examination by thoughts of their own little ones, occasionally lift the -lace curtain and turn down the coverlet; call him an “angel,” and remark -in rapturous whispers upon his increasing size and comeliness, and -forget all about him by the time they reach the foot of the stairs. Or, -an old friend of the family who “dotes upon babies,” begs that the -“cherub” may be brought down to the parlor, saying, in pathetic -reproach, “To think, my love, how seldom I see the darling!” Really -deceived into a belief of the sincerity of her visitor’s desire, mamma -sends off an order to nurse; baby is caught up from his crib of ease, -thrust into a clean slip, his tender scalp brushed to the right and left -of the line—more or less imaginary—where the down—<i>alias</i> hair—ought -to part, until the soft, throbbing spot on the top of his head pulsates -faster<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_59" id="page_59">{59}</a></span> and harder with pain and fright. Duly prepared for inspection, -he performs the journey to the lower floor, where he undergoes a -vigorous kissing from the baby-lover, who “must hold him” herself. The -blinds are opened, that his budding beauties may be clearly seen, and -while the connoisseur goes into a transport of admiration, Master Baby, -alarmed, fluttered, and uncomfortable, first looks long and piteously -into the strange visage above him, and proceeds to express his -sentiments by wrinkling up his cherubic nose and opening his cherry -mouth for a squall.</p> - -<p>“There! take him, nurse!” says the visitor, hastily. “He does not fancy -new acquaintances. In a year or two, he will be just at the interesting -age, and we shall be capital friends. Not a word, my dear!”—to Mamma, -who stammers an apology. “All young children behave worst when we want -them to show off their prettiest ways.”</p> - -<p>This may be true, but for my part I don’t blame the babies.</p> - -<p>Most Papas are shy or negligent of their heirs or heiresses at this -epoch. It is quite common to hear ladies relate, as a proof, I suppose, -of their spouses’ superiority to small matters, that they are utterly -careless of their babies while they are in arms.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_60" id="page_60">{60}</a></span></p> - -<p>“Mr. C. never notices one of his until it is two years of age,” remarks -Mrs. C. “Then, when he sees that it is a pretty plaything, he becomes -quite fond of it, enjoys frolicking with it.”</p> - -<p>As he would with a puppy, which, frisking about his feet, should attract -his lordship’s attention to its graceful shape and winning ways!</p> - -<p>“Mr. D. thinks young babies disgusting little animals,” laughs Mrs. D., -in reply. “He says that he would not kiss one under eighteen months old, -for five hundred dollars!”</p> - -<p>My private opinion, which, of course, I do not divulge to Mrs. D., is -that her husband is a Yahoo, and ought to be banished to Gulliver’s -famous island, in order that he might consort with his fellows.</p> - -<p>Even good, right-minded, affectionate Papas—like your stronger half and -mine, dear reader!—do not overwhelm his very littleness with -demonstrations of esteem.</p> - -<p>“Say good-by to Baby!” you plead, as his paternal progenitor enters the -nursery to take leave of you until dinner-time.</p> - -<p>If he does not smoke, and is <i>very</i> amiable, he stoops and touches the -little forehead with his lips—a very different salute from that -bestowed upon yourself. If<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_61" id="page_61">{61}</a></span> he has lighted a cigar, he replies: “I won’t -kiss him. The tobacco might sicken him. Good-by, monkey!” tapping the -velvet cheek with one finger.</p> - -<p>Baby blinks and throws his fat arms about in a blind, senseless fashion, -which you think very cunning.</p> - -<p>“Did you ever see a child grow and improve as he does!” you ask, -delightedly.</p> - -<p>“Oh, very!” is the good-natured, but not very pertinent response. “The -fact is, wifie, I am not much of a judge of the article in its present -state. Wait until he reaches the interesting age, and you will have no -cause to complain of my lukewarm praise.”</p> - -<p>Bridget, also, “is very fond of children, when they get to be knowing -and wise, and full of pretty tricks, but she finds the care of a young -baby very confining,” and but for the tip-top wages she gets, would -probably look out for another place.</p> - -<p>No, fond mother—and proud as fond! your blessed baby is, during the -first months of helpless, dumb infancy, “interesting” to nobody except -yourself. But there are weighty reasons besides the indifference of -others that should make him, now, the object of your especial care, and -this period one of continual watchfulness and affectionate solicitude. -Intrust to no nurse, however experienced, the task of bathing and -feeding,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_62" id="page_62">{62}</a></span> dressing and undressing, the tender little body. It will never -need your gentle handling, your quick eye, more than at present. A pin -misplaced, a sudden wrench of a joint; the twist of the upholding hand, -bringing the head or a limb into contact with table or chair, may lay -the foundation of years of pain and disease, if not of incurable -deformity.</p> - -<p>We hear much talk about good and bad babies; how Mrs. Such-an-one always -has model children, that give her no trouble at all; but sleep and eat -at regular seasons, and never cry when awake, unless they are in pain, -while Mrs. So-and-so’s existence is a woeful burden with her restless, -fretful progeny, who turn day into night, and night into day, and -sometimes decline having any night at all in the course of the -twenty-four hours; who are continually crying to be fed at all manner of -inconvenient times; who are, in short, as wrong-headed and peevish brats -as one can find in a day’s ride. Yet, Mrs. So-and-so says that they are -healthy and hearty, and suffer no pain. “It is just her luck to have -cross children. All hers are born crabbed.”</p> - -<p>In behalf of the infant tribe I enter a protest against this calumny. -Well-bred, healthy, comfortable babies are never cross until they are -rendered so, in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_63" id="page_63">{63}</a></span> spite of themselves, by mismanagement. If Mrs. -So-and-so puts her Bobby to sleep where he is liable to be awakened by -the ordinary noises of the household machinery, and, furthermore, when -these, or some untoward accident has started him from the slumber that -should have lasted two hours, before one-half of this time has elapsed, -if she makes matters worse by taking him up, instead of quieting all -external disturbance and lulling him again to rest before he knows where -he is, or what has happened; if he is fed just when it suits Mrs. S.’s -or Bridget’s convenience or Bobby’s whim, at intervals of varying -lengths; the probability, I may say, the certainty is, that Bobby will -become an unreasonable, discontented tyrant, a nuisance to himself and -to all around him. And if Susy, and Jenny, and Dicky are all trained -after the like manner, there is an equal certainty that Mrs. So-and-so -will have, among her acquaintances, the deserved reputation of being the -worn-out, irritable mother of a brood of cross, spoiled, “hateful” -children. But, again I say, I don’t blame the babies! First of all, make -the darlings welcome; that is half the battle! Then, make them -comfortable. A celebrated medical man gives three capital rules for -securing this desirable end: “Plenty of milk, plenty of sleep,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_64" id="page_64">{64}</a></span> and -plenty of flannel.” I would add a cardinal principle, governing every -other—begin from the outset—from the day of birth, if possible, a -gentle, firm system of punctuality in feeding, dressing, and putting to -sleep the wee things that lie, like breathing automata, upon the hands -that foster them. Like their fellows of a larger growth, they are -creatures of habit.</p> - -<p>I wish—how fervently and how frequently, I dare not pretend to -say—that <i>method</i>, a wise and just system of duty and recreation, could -be made the chief earthly law of every household. Let there not only be -“a place for every thing and every thing in its place,” but a time for -every thing, and let every thing be done in its season. When I see the -mistress of a family toiling and worried from morning until night, -pulled a dozen different ways at once, by as many duties, all of -apparently equal importance, driving herself and servants, wearying her -husband by incessant complaints, and dragging, rather than bringing up -her children, I wonder not that American women break down so early, but -at the tenacity of life that enables them to endure their load for a -single year. The clever writer of an article, entitled “A Spasm of -Sense,” published not long since, in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_65" id="page_65">{65}</a></span> one of our most clever monthlies, -finds the cause of the lamentable condition of so many a domestic -establishment in the superabundance of olive-plants that crowd American -nurseries. From my different standpoint, I am inclined to believe the -trouble to be, not that there are too many babies, but that there are -not more wise and capable mothers.</p> - -<p>I know a lady who was, when she married, a delicate, beautiful girl, the -petted favorite of a large circle of admiring friends. The seventh -anniversary of her wedding-day saw her the mother of five children. -Acquaintances, who only heard of this rapid increase of cares, shook -mournful heads and drew pitying sighs, between contemptuous smiles. -“What a change!”</p> - -<p>It was a change, than which my eyes have rarely beheld a fairer. Her -babies were not pattern, spiritless dolls, but hearty, roguish -youngsters, who frolicked, and shouted, and disputed, as all sound, -sprightly children will do, and as they should not be hindered from -doing. But Mamma was at once the motive-power and centre of attraction -of the system, wherein these lively planets revolved. She was more -lovely, with a chastened, matronly beauty, than in her girlhood, and -discontent had ploughed no furrows in her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_66" id="page_66">{66}</a></span> smooth brow. To each of the -fast-coming troop she gave a motherly greeting, and, as by magic, -brought it, with its wishes and needs, under the influence of the -judicious law of order that extended over the rest of her band. She -nourished them from her bosom; bathed, dressed, and undressed them, and -herself laid them down for the nightly and midday slumber; made most of -their clothing with her own hands; as they grew older, directed their -studies—she “could not bear to send them from her to school!” Yet she -was the ever-patient, ever-cheerful referee in their sports and -quarrels; looked well to the other ways of her household; was a faithful -mistress, a good housekeeper, and a kind neighbor, and, withal, managed -to keep up with the best literature of the day; and when her husband’s -business hours were over, became his companion, at home and abroad, with -more ease and frequency than any other wife I ever saw.</p> - -<p>This is no fancy sketch, nor have I done the original justice. It is not -surprising that the offspring of such a woman should rise up and call -her blessed; the marvel and disgrace are, that there are not hundreds -and thousands like her, throughout the country. I do not ask that our -daughters should be brought up in the belief that matrimony is the chief -end of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_67" id="page_67">{67}</a></span> woman’s existence. I do hold, in consideration of the fact that -an immense majority of our sex <i>do</i> marry and have the cares of a family -laid upon them, that girls ought to receive a training which shall fit -them, in some degree, for a position involving responsibilities so -solemn and onerous.</p> - -<p>I know the popular outcry against the slavishness of maternal duties.</p> - -<p>“As well bury me alive after the first year of married life!” cries Mrs. -A-la-mode. “I, with my education and accomplishments, may surely aspire -to a higher position than that of nursery-maid! I consider that I serve -my children more effectually by reserving my strength and cultivating my -talents against such time as their maturer minds shall require my -companionship.”</p> - -<p>In other words, Mrs. A-la-mode leaves it to hired menials to work, -irrigate, and plant the virgin soil, and expects, in the ripening of the -harvest, to put in her patent sickle—latest style—and gather such -grain as she shall then decree. I am acquainted with but one way in -which a woman can conscientiously and surely evade the fulfilment of a -mother’s obligations. In this day and country, there are no forced -marriages. If Miss Faintheart and Miss Easy abhor<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_68" id="page_68">{68}</a></span> the prospect of -directing and fostering a young family, they can remain single; and, to -be frank, I think the next generation will be the gainers by their -celibacy.</p> - -<p>Again, and strictly apropos to this division of my subject—<i>Babies have -a right to be heard</i>.</p> - -<p>“My dear children,” said a Sabbath-school lecturer; “when I say ‘boys’ I -mean girls, and when I say ‘girls’ I mean boys.”</p> - -<p>He designed to be entirely comprehensive in his address, and engage the -attention of both sexes; but his juvenile auditors were evidently in a -state of terrible confusion after this lucid preamble, most of them -imagining that he meditated some game of cross-purposes; as when “Rise, -No. 2” means that No. 2 must do quite the opposite thing and not budge, -upon penalty of a forfeit. But when I say “babies,” I mean children of -tender years—legal infants—and do not confine myself altogether to -those in arms.</p> - -<p>Especially has a baby a right to a hearing from Mamma. Unless you have -been so foolish as to let him form a habit of crying—and this should be -carefully avoided—his wail or scream always means that something is -amiss, and it is your business to find out what it is. If you choose to -send Bridget to see<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_69" id="page_69">{69}</a></span> “what ails that child, now!” at least let him be -brought to you for inquiry and for judgment. Take the convulsed, -struggling little fellow in your arms; draw his head to your bosom; pat -the wet cheeks and kiss the mouth quivering in distress, that is more -than he can bear, slight and ridiculous as it may be to you. Soothe and -quiet, before you chide, should there seem to be need for reproof. -Remember—and it is a sadly solemn thought—that your arms form the only -refuge outside the bosom of Infinite Compassion, to which he can, as man -and boy, flee alike in sin and woe, in innocence and joy. Don’t hush his -sobbed confession or complaint, however strangled and unintelligible. It -does him good to utter it, whether you understand it or not. Don’t call -him “a silly boy” for crying because he has broken the whip Papa gave -him only this morning, or because the pretty kitty Auntie sent him has -proved ungrateful and deserted her doting master. It is doubtful if you -ever had what was to you a greater loss than either of these is to him. -If his are tears of bereavement, kiss them away and hold up some promise -of future delight that shall cast a rainbow athwart the cloud of grief. -If he weeps in childish anger, be loving, while you rebuke. He loses -much—how much,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_70" id="page_70">{70}</a></span> Eternity can only tell—who has not learned, from -experience, the fullness and sweetness of that simple line—“<i>As one -whom his mother comforteth</i>.”</p> - -<p>Never let your child have his cry out alone. If he is old enough to -observe that yours is studied neglect, he has also sense sufficient to -enable him to put his own construction upon what is, to him, your cruel -indifference to his suffering; and just in proportion as he recognizes -and resents this, your influence over him is weakened; his faith in your -love shaken. If he is too young to guess why you disregard his outcry, -terror and pain lay hold of his spirit, as is evinced by the changed -tone of his lamentation. Shall I tell you a little story, just here, one -which is unfortunately drawn from life?</p> - -<p>A mother—a good woman, but a trifle too strong of will, and wedded to a -pet theory of family government, according to which, children were but -machines, to be subject in every particular to the authority of the -chief engineer—one evening laid her babe, about ten months old, in his -crib, for the night. The child manifested great unwillingness to lie -still, and presently began to cry. The mother seated herself quietly to -work upon the other side of the room, and took no outward notice of his -screams. An elderly gentle<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_71" id="page_71">{71}</a></span>man, a relative, was present, and -remonstrated with her upon her silence.</p> - -<p>“He will certainly injure himself, if you do not stop his crying!”</p> - -<p>“That is the old-fashioned doctrine,” replied the parent, with a smile -of conscious superiority. “I always expect one grand struggle for -supremacy with each of my children. He is in revolt now, and must be -treated as a rebel. If I yield, and take him up, the lesson is lost.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t ask you to take him up! Only speak to him. He is well-nigh -heart-broken. He will rupture a blood-vessel.”</p> - -<p>“No danger! It strengthens his lungs to cry in that uproarious manner. I -have known babies to scream for two or three hours, without sustaining -the least injury.”</p> - -<p>“You will excuse me, at any rate, from staying here to see the battle -out!” and the uncle left the room.</p> - -<p>Returning, at the end of an hour, he found the child still -screaming—now, in an anguished shriek that rent the man’s heart. The -woman and mother sat still and sewed steadily—it seemed calmly.</p> - -<p>“I can not and will not bear this!” ejaculated the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_72" id="page_72">{72}</a></span> old gentleman. “If -you don’t take pity on that poor little thing, I will!”</p> - -<p>“Uncle!” the niece lifted her stern eyes. “I permit no one—not even my -husband—to interfere in my management of my child. His passion is at -its height. It will soon subside.”</p> - -<p>The cries were, indeed, growing less vehement. Too anxious to retire -again until the scene was over, the uncle walked the room, hearkening, -with tortured nerves, to the feebler and still feebler wail; sinking, by -and by, into fitful sobbings; then, into pants like those of a tired, -hunted-down animal. These came at longer and longer intervals—and all -was still. The uncle approached the crib, and bent over it.</p> - -<p>“An hour and three-quarters!” said the mother, triumphantly, looking at -the clock. “You will find, uncle, that, having gained this victory, I -shall never have another contest with him.”</p> - -<p>“You never will, madam!” was the awful rejoinder. “Your child is dead!”</p> - -<p>I wish I could say that this incident was of doubtful authenticity, but -it is <i>true</i>, from beginning to end. I grant you that it is an extreme -case, but the like might occur with any young child. Ask yourself how -you would endure a fit of violent hysterical<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_73" id="page_73">{73}</a></span> weeping, for the space of -an hour, or an hour and three-quarters! Days would elapse ere you -recovered from the effects of the shock to nerves and heart; but “it -never hurts an infant to cry.” That which would exhaust and irritate -your lungs, “strengthens” his!</p> - -<p>If your older child has any thing to divulge which he deems important, -contrive to give him a patient hearing; encourage him to full -confidence. Many a life has been embittered by fears or fancies, that -could have been removed as soon as they were formed, by five minutes’ -free conversation with a kind, sensible parent. To this day, I own to -feeling an unpleasant sensation at the sight of any singularly-shaped or -colored cloud in the heavens. This I attribute directly to a terrible -fright I had when but four and a half years old.</p> - -<p>My nurse, a young colored girl—a genuine Topsey, by the way—had early -instructed me in the popular belief concerning the personal appearance -of His Satanic Majesty, and I had swallowed every word, until his horns, -cloven hoof, forked tail, fiery breath, and worst of all, a certain -three-pronged fork he was in the habit of carrying about with him, that -he might impale unwary sinners, as Indians spear salmon<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_74" id="page_74">{74}</a></span>—were articles -of as firm faith with me as was the fact of my own existence. He had an -inconvenient practice of careering through mid-air—Topsey had -added—with this trident already poised, on the lookout for bad little -girls, who were supposed to be dainty tidbits in his estimation. One -day, I was walking in the garden, unconscious of coming ill, when, -chancing to look up, I saw, right above me, a small, dark cloud, -irregular in outline, and moving swiftly before a strong wind. My first -glance caught only this; my second traced, with the rapidity of -lightning, the head, the tail, the lower limbs, and, brandishing wildly -in air, the right arm, holding the fatal flesh-fork!</p> - -<p>St. Dunstan or Luther would have stood his ground, as did Christian -against Apollyon, but I had not the pluck of these worthies, and had I -been endowed with the spirit of all three, there were neither tongs, -ink-stand, nor two-edged sword handy. So I chose the wiser part of -valor, and ran, in frenzied haste, for the house, never stopping until I -was safely ensconced under my mother’s bed. Here I lay for a long time, -quaking with fear, queer shivers running down my spine at thought of the -sharp points I had so narrowly escaped. Then the supper-bell rang, and I -crept out, unperceived. I had no appetite, and must<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_75" id="page_75">{75}</a></span> have worn a -strange, scared look, for my mother asked if I were sick. I answered, -“No,” very shame-facedly, and she did not press her inquiries. Children -are not apt to be very communicative as to any great fright, except in -the excitement of the first alarm. They fear to live it over in the -recital.</p> - -<p>That night, for the first time in my life, I cried to have the lamp left -burning in the chamber where I slept. My mother reasoned with me, for a -while, telling me that the angels watched over good children, etc. This -I did not doubt, but I was by no means sure that I <i>was</i> a good child. -The apparition of the afternoon was frightful circumstantial evidence to -the contrary. At last she scolded me for my cowardice and went away, -taking the precious light with her. I wonder that my hair did not turn -white during the ensuing hours of thick darkness. I pity myself now, as -I remember the poor, frightened baby, lying trembling on her little bed, -and staring into the gloom, peopled by her imagination with horrors. -Driven to desperation, I once awoke my older sister, who shared my -couch, and, in an awe-stricken whisper, imparted my fears and their -origin. She was not credulous or imaginative, and, perhaps, did not -quite understand what I said, for her only answer was—“pshaw!” and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_76" id="page_76">{76}</a></span> she -was sound asleep again in a second. How and when slumber came to me I -know not, but my mother reproved me, next morning, for wrapping the -coverlet so tightly about my head, saying that I would be smothered some -night, if I continued the practice.</p> - -<p>Three sentences from either of my parents would have laid the hobgoblin -to rest forever, and I recollect that I did, several times, essay to -broach the subject to my mother, very unskillfully, I dare say, for she -did not encourage my preliminary remarks, and resolution failed me -before I reached the point. I was a tall girl of fourteen when I -confessed to her that, for five or six years, I believed that I had -really seen the devil!</p> - -<p>Lastly—for my rambling “talk” has already transcended the limits I at -first assigned to it—<i>Babies have a right to be babies</i>.</p> - -<p>That precocious and unnatural growth of prudence, propriety, and -learning in young children, which is variously described as -“old-fashioned,” “smart,” and “wearing a gray head upon green -shoulders,” is sometimes an offensive, always a pitiable sight. A life -without childhood is like an arid summer day, to which the dew of -morning has been denied. There are blossoms which the heat of incipient -decay has<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_77" id="page_77">{77}</a></span> forced into premature expansion. We all understand this law -of Divine husbandry. Happy is she who has never had reason to tremble at -sight of this early and brilliant bloom; who has not wept unavailing -tears over the pale blossom, as it lay, crushed and faded, at the -grave’s mouth! Well is it then for the bereaved mother’s peace of mind -if she can, in the review of the brief years during which the gifted one -was lent to her, comfort herself with the thought that she strove, in -patient, far-seeing love, to repress, rather than stimulate, the -unhealthy growth of intellectual powers that were in danger of -outstripping physical vigor; that she rose superior to the vulgar -ambition to have her child excel all others of his age in scholarship -and showy accomplishments. Ah! it is not until the golden locks are -hidden by the green sod, and the busy brain forever still, that, -recalling the deep sayings and vivid thought-flashes that made us look -upon our noble boy with such triumphant affection, we measure the short -mound with tear-blinded eyes, and say: “We should have known, from the -first, that all our bright dreams for him were to suffer rude, terrible -awakening <i>here</i>! When we should have looked for the blade only, the -bud<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_78" id="page_78">{78}</a></span> appeared and the flowers. The fruit could only ripen in heaven!”</p> - -<p>Do not seek to make of your children monstrous, uncomely, infant -phenomena. If, by some special interposition of preserving mercy, their -lives and health do not fall a sacrifice to your weak vanity, you will -discover, when your prodigy has completed his course of book-study, that -he is not one whit better fitted for the actual fight with life and -labor than is the fellow-student who used to ran wild, with torn hat, -trousers out at the knees, rough fists, chapped by wind and weather, and -pockets frightfully distended by a miscellaneous collection of unripe -apples, jack-stones, peanuts, top-cord, “taffey,” whistles, gingerbread, -pocket-knife, hard-boiled eggs, iron nails, of assorted sizes, and, -perhaps, a living specimen or two, in the shape of a spotted terrapin or -a June-bug, with a string tied to its leg; the while your Pindar -Augustus, in white linen pants and cheeks to match, sat in learned -abstraction from all mean and common things, his spine curved, and his -baby-brows knit over his Homer or Euclid. It is distressing, yet -instructive, to see how the mill of every-day life grinds down college -geniuses into very ordinary men; how the oft-quoted logic of events -proves the “bright particular star” of</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<a href="images/facing078.jpg"> -<img src="images/facing078.jpg" height="550" alt="[Image unavailable.]" /></a> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_79" id="page_79">{79}</a></span></p> - -<p class="nind">the family circle and the school-room to be, after all, a luminary of, -at best, the fourth or fifth magnitude. You gain nothing except -mortification and disappointment, by cheating your wonderful scion out -of his childhood.</p> - -<p>I am afraid that most of us, even those who have not fallen into the -gravely absurd error just referred to, are yet apt to expect too much of -our bairns. They may be marvels of sweetness, and sprightliness, and -filial devotion, but they are only babies after all. “Children should be -seen—not heard!” is often repeated by us in thoughtlessness or -ignorance of the real character of the maxim. It is illiberal and cruel, -and belongs to the age when a father held almost unlimited power over -the very life of his child; when the younger members of the household -never dared to sit down in the presence of their parents, without their -express and gracious permission. I agree that a pert, loud-tongued child -is an offence, at all times, but do not let us, on this account, condemn -to silence the bird-like voices that make sweetest music in our hearts -and homes. Even birds sing sometimes when we would rather they should -refrain; so let us be forbearing with the clamor of the babies. Do not<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_80" id="page_80">{80}</a></span> -pretend to judge them by the rules you would apply to grown people.</p> - -<p>“Father!” says a bright-eyed boy, as his parent enters the house at -evening, “did you remember to get me the ball you promised?”</p> - -<p>“I did not, Tom. You shall certainly have it to-morrow.”</p> - -<p>Tom goes off, in apparent content. In reality, he is sorely -disappointed; but he is a good child, and does not wish to make his -father unhappy. The promise for to-morrow helps him to bear the trial -tolerably well. The next evening, he is more backward about asking. He -hangs around his parent’s chair for some time, in hopeful suspense, but -as the longed-for plaything does not appear, he ventures timidly upon a -diplomatic “feeler”—</p> - -<p>“Father, maybe you’ve forgot your promise, again?”</p> - -<p>The father has had a harassing day—filled with carking care—and the -smouldering temper needs but a spark to influence it.</p> - -<p>“Boy!” he says, hastily, “if you ever say ‘ball’ to me again, you shall -not have it at all! I will not be teased out of my life about your -jimcracks!”</p> - -<p>Tom shrinks back, as if he had been struck in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_81" id="page_81">{81}</a></span> face; creeps silently -off to his little room, and there, in solitude, cries as if his heart -would break. He <i>has</i> had a blow. It is not so much the loss of the toy, -but his is a sensitive nature, and his father’s words were sharp swords. -He meant to be very good, very patient. Nothing was further from his -thoughts than to annoy his usually kind parent. Mingling with, and -embittering his grief, is a burning sense of injustice. He knows that -the injury was undeserved.</p> - -<p>“Father wouldn’t have talked so to a grown man! It’s just because I’m a -poor little boy, and can’t help myself!”</p> - -<p>I fear there is too much truth in this shrewd conclusion of Tom’s. We -would not dare insult those of our own age, as we do our children.</p> - -<p>“That boy is growing sulky!” growls the father. “Did you see how glum he -looked because I forgot a paltry plaything? I must take him in hand!”</p> - -<p>Then is the time for you, the mother of the wronged child, to speak up -boldly in his behalf. Represent kindly, but candidly, to your irritated -lord, the true value of the promised gift to the boy, and the greatness -of the disappointment.</p> - -<p>“And after all, Papa, we can not expect Tom to exercise much -self-control or self-denial yet. Remem<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_82" id="page_82">{82}</a></span>ber, he is just five years old, -and babies will be babies, you know!”</p> - -<p>If he is the husband so good a wife and mother deserves to have, he will -not only acknowledge his fault to you, but seek out little Tom in his -lonely chamber, and with a fond kiss tell him that “Papa spoke shortly -awhile ago, because he was very tired and had had a great deal to -trouble him to-day, but that he will surely remember to bring him a -famous great ball to-morrow night.”</p> - -<p>There are times and circumstances in which it is very hard to remember -that “babies will be babies.” Bessy, and Kitty, and Freddy are playing -in the nursery adjoining your bedroom, where you lie in the agonies of -“one of your headaches.” Every not-very-strong mother knows just what -that means. You have told the little ones that you are in great pain, -and having provided them with books, blocks, slates, and the like -“sitting-still plays,” as Bessie calls them, and begging them to try and -be quiet for half an hour, have withdrawn to your darkened retreat. They -are loving, well-meaning children, and, for almost ten minutes, there is -a refreshing season of calm. You are just forgetting torture in a -soothing slumber, when, thump! bang! down comes the castle, the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_83" id="page_83">{83}</a></span> -erection of which has kept Freddy still thus long. He would not be a boy -if he did not hurrah at the crash; the girls laugh and clap their hands; -and uproar is shortly the order of the hour. Don’t spring from your bed, -and, confronting them with your pale face and bloodshot eyes, accuse -them of disobedience and want of affection for you. They love you very -dearly, and they “did mean to mind,” they will tell you penitently, “but -they just forgot!”</p> - -<p>It is baby-nature to be forgetful, and I am glad that it is. The -injuries, and slights, and wounded feeling of maturer years are enough -to make of memory a whip of scorpions. I am thankful that, with the -child, a kiss, a smile, a kind word will efface the recollection of the -hasty reproof, the cross look, or—I blush for human nature as -illustrated in some women while I write it!—the impatient blow that has -wrung blood from the tender little heart. Thank Heaven that babies have -short memories! so short that the suffering of cutting one tooth is -clean forgotten before the next saws its jagged edge through the swollen -gum.</p> - -<p>Furthermore, keep them babies so long as you can without making yourself -and them ridiculous, and interfering with the graver duty of preparing -them<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_84" id="page_84">{84}</a></span> for their place in the working-world. The dew-drop must exhale by -and by, but it lingers longest in the bosom of the flower that folds its -petals most jealously and fondly above it. The virgin purity of the snow -must change, with dust and melting, into the hue of the earth beneath; -but it is a woeful sight. We would fain delay the process by every means -in our power. Above all, let us make it our prayer that we may never -forget that we were once children, and how we felt, reasoned, and acted -then.</p> - -<p>Who of us does not treasure in her casket of remembrance certain golden -days or hours that we would not lose for the wealth of a kingdom? Your -daughter leans against your knee, as my little five-year-old does on -mine, with “Mamma, please tell me a story about when you were a little -girl; how glad you were when your Papa brought you home a new doll, with -blue eyes and curling hair, in place of the one the dogs tore up; or -about the grand holidays you used to have in the woods; or how your Papa -once took you to slide on the ice-pond—and O, Mamma! do tell me about -all the Christmases you ever had!”</p> - -<p>All the Christmases I ever had! I wish I could remember them, every -one—for those I do recall are strung upon my memory like pearls upon a -silken<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_85" id="page_85">{85}</a></span> cord, and each is a joy forever. There is but one against which -I have set a black cross—the dreadful morning when the first thing I -drew from my stocking was a switch! I seem to see the lithe, keen, -wicked-looking rod now, and hear the shout of laughter that greeted its -appearance—mirth, that quickly subsided before my torrent of grief and -shame. I was soon told that the obnoxious article was placed there “in -fun,” by a visitor in the family.</p> - -<p>I should like to see the visitor who should dare to practice such a -piece of “fun” upon one of <i>my</i> children!</p> - -<p>Never deny the babies their Christmas! It is the shining seal set upon a -year of happiness. If the preparations for it—the delicious mystery -with which these are invested; the solemn parade of clean, whole -stockings in the chimney corner; or the tree, decked in secret, to be -revealed in glad pomp upon the festal day—if these and many other -features of the anniversary are tedious or contemptible in your sight, -you are an object of pity; but do not defraud your children of joys -which are their right, merely because you have never tasted them. Let -them believe in Santa Claus, or St. Nicholas, or Kriss Kringle, or -whatever name the jolly Dutch saint bears in your<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_86" id="page_86">{86}</a></span> region. Some -latter-day zealots, more puritanical than wise, have felt themselves -called upon, in schools, and before other juvenile audiences, to deny -the claims of the patron of merry Christmas to popular love and -gratitude. Theirs is a thankless office; both parents and children -feeling themselves to be aggrieved by the gratuitous disclosure, and -this is as it should be. If it be wicked to encourage such a delusion in -infant minds, it must be a transgression that leans very far indeed to -virtue’s side.</p> - -<p>All honor and love to dear old Santa Claus! May his stay in our land be -long, and his pack grow every year more plethoric! And when, throughout -the broad earth, he shall find, on Christmas night, an entrance into -every home, and every heart throbbing with joyful gratitude at the -return of the blessed day that gave the Christ-child to a sinful world, -the reign of the Prince of Peace shall have begun below; everywhere -there shall be rendered, “Glory to God in the highest,” and “Good-will -to men” shall be the universal law—we shall all have <i>become as little -children</i>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_87" id="page_87">{87}</a></span></p> - -<p class="fint">C. S. 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