The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-01-14
THE CHRISTMAS WALTER HAD IA

mere wasn't vast amount of Christ mas in Walters home. Prosperity. of which so much had been heard, didn't quite get round to his father in time for a real old+fashioned celebration. The usual tree. was lacking. But out side4Was the snow, which always makes up for a whole lot of things that are not inside. Of course there were tur- keyan celery and rice pudding and egg nogg and nuts. and romp about the fiat, and piggle back, and a plenty of good health and vivacity. Walter is nine and philosophical to the last de- gree. He said: "oh, there'll be more Christnases, and all the trees ain't dead yet" < s
 Walters papa takes a bath every morning and gauges the temperature of the water with a thermometer, so as to have it exactly one hundred degrees. Christmas morning the thermometer failed to work. Examination. proved that the mercury in the tube of glass was like a knitting needle cut in many pieces, each refusing to have anything to do with the other. A more critical investigation showed that the small tube was cracked. So. Walter was called before the. bar of paternal jus tice. How did you manage to break the thermometer" he was asked. 1T don't remember breaking it." he said. You were playing with it In the. water when you last bathed, weren't you?" "Yes, pop And sliding down a plank with it in your fand?" "I think so.' Well, you broke it. That means sixty cents for another Shall I take it out of your bank?'' i"If you are confident broke 1t you may charge it; to me" 'sWell, we'll think it over; but be more careful hereafter" "All right"
 Cordial relations being restored, papa undertook to show Walter something about thermometers-how the mercury climbed LID and down the tube, and all that. He accidentally broke the bulb at the bottom, when out danced, like a fairy sprite, little ball of what looked exactly like liquid silver. It was full of life, nervous, quick as a flash, and waltzed off a sheet of paper. on to the floor before you could say Jack Robin son." When Walter sprang to pick it up he saw on the carpet a dozen beau tiful silver balls instead of one, and when he tried to gather them up they eluded his fingers in a most amazing manner until he had to laugh all over.
 Papa came to the rescue. we shall marry them,'' he said, and, moving them towards each other with the point of a paper-cutter, he nearly made Walters hair stand on end when they leaped all together and became one silver ball again. Was there ever anything more astounding? Why, papa, they just ate each other up," said the boy, while his mother, deeply inter- ested in something she had never seen before in her born days, remarked, If you call that marriage, it is polygamy." ." With creased sheet of paper papa picked up the one ball and rolled it in on top of his desk. Then, with the lightest of tack hammers, he smote smartly the metallic sprite, separating it into numerous very small spheres 'IIow many balls do you count, Wal | ter?" he asked. Walter counted twen' l ty-one. Papa shook the desk slightly
 and, presto! there was but one. And
 the boy yelled, "Oh, this is the best Christmas I ever had!"
 Papa then filled a small vial three' fourths full of clear water and dropped
 the. original liquid silver ball into. it
 After corking it tightly, he said:
 "Now you see the ball in the bottle?' "Yes, the one large ball." replied Wal
 ter Now, then, am going to make that ball into powder so fine that il i will look like paste,' With that he shook the bottle violently for few sec