The Bemidji daily pioneer. [volume] (Bemidji, Minn.) 1904-1971, 1909-12-17


nobody can. Why, Baby Deb alone is
material enough of which to make a
Christmas. and very rollicking, jolly
sort of Christmas, too, but when to
her you add Tom and Sue and Ann
and Ike and Sam-well, the grim old
lighthouse fairly overfows with Christ
mas every 25th Of December.
If it is lonely. old, one eyed light
house, has it not chimney? And do
not children there have stockings
good, long stockings? Indeed, they
have. And does not Christmas eve
see them all temptingly hung. so in
willingly limp and empty, under the
mantelshelf? And does not Christmas
Hnorning-very early. mind you-see six
graduated. white robed ghosts per-
forming mysterious ceremonies around
SIX bullying stockings?
All, then. If you suppose that that
cunning old gentleman Santa Claus
does not know how to find q chimney,
even when the cold waves are pelting
1t with frozen spray drops ten miles
from land. you little know what a re-
markable gift he has that way.
And the Christmas dinners they have
there-the goose, the brown. crisp.
Juicy, melting roast goose! What
would that dinner be without that
goose? What, indeed!
But once-they turn pale at that
lighthouse now when they think Of it
they came very near having no goose
for dinner on Christmas day!
It came about in this way. Papa-ah,
If you could only hear Baby Deb tell
about it, it you'd be worth the jour.
ney. but you cannot. Of course. 80
never mind-Papa Stoughton. the light
house keeper. you know. had lost all
his money in savings bank that had
failed early In that December.
A goose Is really not very expen-
sive fowl. but If one has not the
money of course one cannot buy even
a cheap thing. Papa Stoughton could
not afford a goose. He said so-said
80 before all the family.
Ike says that the silence that fell
upon that family then was painful tc
hear. They looked at one another with
eyes so wide that it's a mercy they
could ever shut them again.
"No goose!'' at last cried Tom, who
was the oldest.
mo goose!" cried the others in
chorus, all except Baby Deb. who was
busy at the time gently admonishing
Scu1pin, her most troublesome child,
for being SO dirty. Baby Deb said
's'Ne doose!" after all the others were
quiet
That made them all laugh. No doubt
they thought that, after all. so long as
Baby Deb was there II would be
Christmas anyhow. goose or no goose
SO they were happy for moment until
the thought came that roast goose was
good ON Christmas even with Baby
Deb, and then they looked dismayed
again.
However, when Papa Stoughton ex-
p1a1ned how it was they saw it as
plainly as he did, and SO they made
no more complaint. Only Tom fell
a-thinking, and when the others saw
what he was doing they did the same,
the difference being that Tom was
trying to think what he could do to
get the goose anyhow and they were
trying to think what he was thinking
about so that they could think the
same-all except Baby Deb, of course.
who. being only four years old. gave
herself very little eonesrn about the
thoughts Of others. Her own Thoughts
took all her time.
Tom finally said "AhP' undAr his
breath and mysteriously Vanished into
anothar room altar hsckoniag his
brothers and sisters T. -taaeW him.