St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1893-12-24

range on which a savory roast sizzled cheerily
in its pot, sending up clouds Of appetizing
steam. The sand on the white pine floor was
swept in tongues, old country fashion. Joe and
his wife were both born across the sea and
liked to keep Christmas eve as they had when
they were children. Two little boys and a
younger girl than the one who had met him at
the gate, received him with shouts of glee and
pulled him straight from the door to look at a
hemlock branch stuck in the tub of sand in the
| corner. 1t was their Christmas tree and they
were to light it with candles-they pranced
about like little colts at the thought-mamma
got them at the grocer's where the big Santa
Claus stood on the shelf, red and yellow and
green. They chung to Joe and shouted all at
once, each one anxious to tell the great news
| first and loudest.
Joe took them on his knee, all three and
when they had shouted until they had to stop
for breath, he pulled from under his coat a
paper bundle at which the children's eyes
bulged. He undid the wrapping slowly.
"Who do you think has come home with me, -
he said, "but Sante Claus himself" and he
held up before them the veritable Christmas
fairy done in plaster and shouldering a sprig
of fir in his folded arms as a soldier does his
N. L
Island where Liza and was to-day, and gave
him ride to town" He had bought it at the
toy store on the corner for the quarter he found.
"They say it's luck falling in with Sante
Claus, partickler when there's a horseshoe
along. Iput his'n up in the barn, in Liza stall.
Maybe our luck VIII turn yet, ehl old woman?"
and he put his around his wife who was setting
out the dinner with Jenny and gave her good
| o1,s I,a;-
| Santa Claus.
| She was comely little woman yet and she
tried hard to be cheerful. She gave him a
brave look and smile, but there were tears in
her eyes, and Joe saw them, though he tried
| to let on that he didn't. He patted her tenderly
on the back and smoothed his Jenny's yellow
braids while he swallowed the lump in his
| throat and got it down and out of the way.
He needed no doctor to tell him that Santa
| Claus would not come again and find her cook
ing their Christmas dinner unless she mended
| soon and swiftly.
| 1t may be it was the thought of that, that
made him keep hold of her hand in his lap as
they sat down together and he read from the
good book the "tidings of great joy, which
shall be to all the people" and said the simple
grace of a plain and ignorant but reverent man.
|
port. when he came to the petition for those
dear to us and far away from home, for his
| glance strayed to the empty place beside the
mothers chair and his voice would tremble in
spite of himself. He met his wifes eyes there,
| but, strangely, he saw no faltering in them.
They rested upon Jim's vacant seat with a
new look of trust that almost frightened him.
It was as if the Christmas peace, the tidings of
I bod ~ ;,,fo har
and hope that presently throbbed through his
with new life and promise, and echoed in the
childrens happy voices.
| So they ate their Christmas dinner together
and sang and talked until it was time to go to
bed. Joe went out to make all snug about Liza
for the night and to give her an extra feed.
He stopped in the door, coming back, to shake
the snow out of his clothes. 1t was coming on
with bad weather and a northerly storm, he
reported. The snow was falling thick already
and drifting badly. He saw to the kitchen fire
and put the children to bed. Long before the
clock in the neighboring church tower struck
twelve and its doors were opened for the
throngs come to worship at the midnight mass,
the lights in the cottage were out and al
within it fast asleep.
The murmur of the homeward hurrying
liebl Oub UllO 1ssoO oA1OuI
of Merry Christmas had been whirled away
on the storm, now grown fierce with bitter
cold, when lonely wanderer came down the
street. 1t was boy, big and strong-limbed
and, judging from the manner in which he
pushed his way through the gathering drifts,
not unused to battle with the world, but evil
IDENTIFY in hard luck. His jacket, white with
the falling snow, was scant and worn nearly to
rags, and there was that in his face which
spoke of hunger and suffering silently endured
He stopped at the gate in the stone fence and
looked long and steadily at the cottage in the
chestnuts. No life stirred within and he walk
ed through the gap with slow and hesitating
step. Under the kitchen window he stood