THE CHRISTMAS CAKE[4]MAUD LINDSAY

“Unto us a Child is born,Unto us a Gift is given.Hail with holiness the morn,Kneel before the Prince of Heaven.Blessed be this Day of Birth,God hath given his Son to earth.Jesu, Jesu, Nene Jesu,Hallelujah!”

Behind the little hills the sun went down leaving a million sparks of light upon the road.

“Yonder come the kings!” the children cried. “See, the splendor of their shining crowns and how the jewels sparkle on their mantles! They may be angry if they find us out so late; come, let us run home before they see us.”

The children turned. Back to the city gates they ran; back to their homes, to the goodmadreswatching for them and their own white beds ready for them.

But one they left behind them on the road: a little, bare-limbed boy whose name was Manuel. He watched until the children had disappeared within the gates, and then he turned again toward the setting sun.

“I have no gift for the kings,” he thought, “but there is fresh, green grass beside the way, that I can gather for the camels.”

He stopped; pulled his hands full, and stuffed it in the front of the little bluevestidothat he wore. He followed the road for a long way until heavy sleep came to his eyes.

“How still it is upon the road! God has blown out his light and soon it will be dark. I wish I were with the others, safe within the city; for the dark is full of fearsome things when one is all alone.... Mamita will becoming home soon and bringing supper for Rosita and me. Perhaps, to-night, there will be an almonddulceorpan de gloria,—perhaps.... I wonder will Rosita not forget the little prayer I told her to be always saying. My feet hurt with the many stones; the night wind blows cold; I am weary, and my feet stumble with me.... Oh, Nene Jesu, listen! I also make the prayer: ‘Send the three kings before Manuel is too weary and afraid!’ ”

A few more steps he took upon the road; and then, as a reed is blown down by the wind, Manuel swayed, unknowingly for a moment, and slowly sank upon the ground, fast asleep.

How long he slept, I cannot tell you; but a hand on his shoulder wakened him. Quickly he opened his eyes, wondering, and saw—yes, he saw the three kings! Tall and splendid they looked in the starlight; their mantles shimmered with myriad gems. One stood above Manuel, asking what he did upon the road at that late hour.

He rose to his feet—thrusting his hand inside the shirt for the grass he had gathered: “It is for the camels,señor; I have no other gift. But you—you ride horses this Christmas Eve!”

“Yes, we ride horses; what is that to you?”

“Pardon,señores, nothing. The three kings can ride horses if they wish; only—we were told you rode on camels from the East.”

“What does the child want?” The voice was kind but it sounded impatient; as though the one who spoke had work waiting to be done, and was anxious to be about it.

Manuel heard and felt all this, wondering, “What if there is not time for them to come, or gifts enough!” He laid an eager, pleading hand upon one king’s mantle. “I can hold the horses for you if you will come this once. It is a little street and hard to find,señores; I thought, perhaps, you would leave a present—just one little present—for the children there. You told the Christ Child you would give to every child, don’t you remember? There are many of us,señores, who have never had a gift—a Christmas gift.”

“Do you know who we are?”

Manuel answered joyfully: “Oh, yes,Excelencias, you are the Three Christmas Kings, riding from Bethlehem. Will you come with me?”

The kings spoke with one accord: “Verily, we will.”

One lifted Manuel on his horse; and silently they rode into the city. The Keeper slumbered at the gates; the streets were empty. On, pastthe houses that were garlanded they went unseen, and on through the great streets; until they came to the little street at last. The kings dismounted. They gave their bridles into Manuel’s hand; and then, gathering up their precious mantles of silk and rich brocade, they passed down the little street. With eyes that scarce believed what they saw, Manuel watched them go from house to house; saw them stop and feel for the shoes between the gratings—the shoes loaned by Enrique the cobbler; and saw them fill each one with shining goldpieces.

In the morning Manuel told the story to the children as they went to spend one goldendoblónfor toys and candy and sugared cakes. And a gift they bought for Doña Josefa, too: a little figure of the Holy Mother with the Christ Child in her arms.

And so, the promise made in Bethlehem was made again, and to a little child; and it was kept. For many, many years—long after Manuel was grown and hadniñosof his own—the kings remembered the little street, and brought their gifts there every Christmas Eve.

It was a joyful day for the McMulligan children when Mrs. McMulligan made the Christmas cake. There were raisins to seed and eggs to beat, and pans to scrape, and every one of the children, from the oldest to the youngest, helped to stir the batter when the good things were mixed together.

“Oh, mix it, and stir it, and stir it and taste;For ev’rything’s in it, and nothing to waste;And ev’ry one’s helped—even Baby—to makeThe nice, brown, sugary Christmas cake,”

said Mrs. McMulligan, as she poured the batter into the cake pan.

The Baker who lived at the corner was to bake the Christmas cake, so Joseph, the oldest boy, made haste to carry it to him. All the other children followed him, and together they went, oh, so carefully, out of the front door, down the sidewalk, straight to the shop where the Baker was waiting for them.

The Baker’s face was so round and so jollythat the McMulligan children thought he must look like Santa Claus. He could bake the whitest bread and the lightest cake, and as soon as the children spied him they began to call:

“The cake is all ready! ’T is here in the pan;Now bake it, good Baker, as fast as you can”;“No, no,” said the Baker, “ ’T would be a mistakeTo hurry in baking the Christmas cake.I’ll not bake it fast, and I’ll not bake it slow;My little round clock on the wall there will showHow long I must watch and how long I must bakeThe nice, brown, sugary Christmas cake.”

“The cake is all ready! ’T is here in the pan;Now bake it, good Baker, as fast as you can”;

“No, no,” said the Baker, “ ’T would be a mistakeTo hurry in baking the Christmas cake.I’ll not bake it fast, and I’ll not bake it slow;My little round clock on the wall there will showHow long I must watch and how long I must bakeThe nice, brown, sugary Christmas cake.”

The little round clock hung on the wall above the oven. Its face was so bright, and its tick was so merry, and it was busy night and day telling the Baker when to sleep and when to eat and when to do his baking. When the McMulligan children looked at it, it was just striking ten, and it seemed to them very plainly to say:

“ ’T is just the right time for the Baker to bakeThe nice, brown, sugary Christmas cake.”

The oven was ready, and the Baker made haste to put the cake in.

“Ho, ho,” he cried gayly, “now isn’t this fun?’T is ten o’ the clock, and the baking’s begun,And ‘tickity, tickity,’ when it strikes one,If nothing should hinder the cake will be done.”

Then the McMulligan children ran home to tell their mother what he had said, and the Baker went on with his work. It was the day before Christmas, and a great many people came to his shop to buy pies and cakes, but no matter how busy he was waiting on them, he never forgot the McMulligans’ cake, and every time he looked at the clock, it reminded him to peep into the oven.

So well did he watch it, and so carefully did he bake it, that the cake was done on the stroke of one, just as he had promised, and he had scarcely taken it out of the oven when the shop door flew open; and in came the McMulligan children, every one of them saying:

“The clock has struck one. The clock has struck one.We waited to hear it—and is the cake done?”

When they saw it they thought it was the nicest, brownest, spiciest cake that was ever baked in a Baker’s oven. The Baker himself said it was a beautiful cake, and if you had been at the McMulligans’ on Christmas Day, I am sure you would have thought so too.

Joseph carried it home, walking very slowly and carefully, and all the other children followed him, out of the Baker’s shop, down the sidewalk, straight home where Mrs. McMulliganwas waiting for them. She was smiling at them from the window, and when they spied her they all began to call:

“Hurrah for our Mamma! She surely can makeThe nicest and spiciest Christmas cake!“Hurrah for the Baker! Hurrah for the fun!Hurrah for our Christmas cake! Now it is done!”

“Hurrah for our Mamma! She surely can makeThe nicest and spiciest Christmas cake!

“Hurrah for the Baker! Hurrah for the fun!Hurrah for our Christmas cake! Now it is done!”

The children liked the tiny shop around the corner better than any of the stores on the main street of the town. It was a doll shop! No wonder the little boys and girls loved to look in the show window. There they saw all kinds of dolls,—rubber babies, fat kewpies with roguish eyes, doll soldiers, tiny Japanese ladies dressed in flowered silk kimonos, little Eskimo boys in pointed hoods and woolly coats, Dutch dolls in wooden shoes and snow-white caps, brown-eyed dolls with rich dark hair, blue-eyed dolls with golden curls.

Nothing could look lovelier than the little shop at Christmas time when the ground was white with snow. Then many of the dolls wore their gayest dresses, and when the lights were turned on, the little show window sparkled like fairyland.

One night, at about twelve o’clock, a brown-haired doll with bright dark eyes said, “Oh! how glad I am the lights are turned out at last! I’m sure at least five hundred people stopped in front of this window to-day.”

“It has been a long day,” said the soldier boy who stood near her. “Even a soldier gets tired once in a while.”

“It is only a few days now until Christmas. I do wonder where we shall all be this time next week,” whispered a wide-eyed kewpie.

“Well, I hope I shall be in a pleasant, beautiful home,” said a lovely doll, smoothing out her pale blue silk dress. “A lady who wore a rich fur coat looked at me a long while this morning.”

“Some of us are sure to go to rich homes. You and I are worth a good deal of money. Indeed, there is only one doll in the show window more expensive than we are,” answered the golden-haired maiden in white lace.

“I suppose you mean the large doll dressed in pink satin?”

“Yes; I heard several children call her the most beautiful doll of all.”

“Did you notice the shabby looking little girl who stood before the window a long time this morning?” asked the doll in blue.

“I did!” answered the soldier boy. “She carried a cunning looking little dog in her arms. If I should go where that silky-haired dog lives my soldier clothes would be ruined in about ten minutes.”

“Well, I should be very unhappy, I’m sure, in that little girl’s home. She must be very poor.”

“I liked her sweet face very much,” said the most beautiful doll, who was dressed in pink satin. “She was very kind to the little dog.”

“A cozy place is my choice,” said the lass who wore wooden shoes. “I hope I shall live where everything is kept warm and cheerful.”

“Yes, that is really where you belong, I suppose,” said the Eskimo boy. “These clothes will be too warm if I am taken to one of those houses where the rooms are all as hot as a summer’s day.”

“Where should you like to go?” asked the little Dutch maiden.

The Eskimo boy thought for a moment, and then said, “I hope I shall live with some romping boy who will take me with him when he makes a snow man. That would be jolly!”

“Oh, do you think so?” asked the tiny doll dressed in green gauze.

“That I do,” he answered. “I’m from the north, where there is nothing but ice and snow.”

“I would rather stand here in the show window than on a parlor mantel,” pouted little Kewpie.

“Never mind, dear,” said the Japanese doll, “I think you are to go to a lovely little girl.I saw one looking at you this afternoon, and she clapped her hands with delight when she saw you.”

“Where do you think you will go?” asked Kewpie.

“I’m afraid that I shall be chosen for some queer little person. You see my style is quite different from that of other dolls. I hope I shall be allowed to wear kimonos. They are very comfortable.”

“Perhaps you will be added to some one’s collection of dolls from all nations,” said the soldier boy.

“Oh, I hope not,” spoke up the most beautiful doll of all. “If you were one of a large collection I’m sure you wouldn’t be loved very much, because collections are kept chiefly for show.”

“You haven’t told us yet where you would like to go,” said the doll in white lace. “No doubt some very rich person will buy you. I heard the shopkeeper say that you are the costliest doll of all. We are all wondering where you would like to go.”

“I am longing to go to some little girl who will love me with all her heart,” said the most beautiful doll. “I don’t care how humble the home is where I live, but I want to be loved.”

“How strange!” was the answer.

“I hope we shall all be satisfied,” said Kewpie, yawning.

“We shall soon know,” sighed the soldier boy. “Good night to all!”

“Good night! Good night!”

A hard snowstorm did not keep the people away from the doll shop the next morning.

Among those that crowded the store was an old gentleman with a fine, generous face.

“Show me a pretty doll,” he said.

“There are some beauties in the window, sir,” answered the shopkeeper. “Come and look at them.”

“I’ll take the large one dressed in pink,” said the gentleman. “I’m going to send it to a dear little girl who did me a great kindness. My little dog strayed a long distance from home. She found him, and carried him to me. I’m sure her kind heart will love a doll.”

In the afternoon an old gentleman knocked at the door of a very humble home and said, “I have brought a gift to the little girl who took the trouble to carry my lost dog home to me. Please give it to her on Christmas Day.”

And so the most beautiful doll’s wish came true.

Among the tall trees in the forest grew a little spruce tree. It was no taller than a man, and that is very short for a tree.

The other trees near it grew so tall and had such large branches that the poor little tree could not grow at all.

She liked to listen when the other trees were talking, but it often made her sad.

“I am king of the forest,” said the oak. “Look at my huge trunk and my branches. How they reach up toward heaven! I furnish planks for men from which they build their ships. Then I defy the storm on the ocean as I do the thunder in the forest.”

“And I go with you over the foaming waves,” said the tall straight pine. “I hold up the flapping sails when the ships fly over the ocean.”

“And we warm the houses when winter comes and the cold north wind drives the snow before him,” said the birches.

“We have the same work to do,” said a tallfir tree, and she bowed gracefully, drooping her branches toward the ground.

The little spruce tree heard the other trees talking about their work in the world. This made her sad, and she thought, “What work can I do? What will become of me?”

But she could not think of any way in which she could be useful. She decided to ask the other trees in the forest.

So she asked the oak, the pine, and the fir, but they were so proud and stately they did not even hear her.

Then she asked the beautiful white birch that stood near by. “You have no work to do,” said the birch, “because you can never grow large enough. Perhaps you might be a Christmas tree, but that is all.”

“What is a Christmas tree?” asked the little spruce.

“I do not know exactly,” replied the birch. “Sometimes when the days are short and cold, and the ground is covered with snow, men come out here into the forest. They look at all the little spruce trees and choose the prettiest, saying, ‘This will do for a Christmas tree.’ Then they chop it down and carry it away. What they do with it I cannot tell.”

The little spruce asked the rabbit thathopped over the snow, and the owls that slept in the pines, and the squirrels that came to find nuts and acorns.

But no one knew more than the birch tree. No one could tell what men did with the Christmas trees.

Then the little spruce tree wept because she had no work to do and could not be of any use in the world.

The tears hardened into clear, round drops, which we call gum.

At last a boy came into the forest with an ax in his hand. He looked the little tree all over. “Perhaps this will do for a Christmas tree,” he said. So he chopped it down, laid it on a sled, and dragged it home.

The next day the boy sold the tree, and it was taken into a large room and dressed up with popcorn and gilded nuts and candles. Packages of all sizes and shapes, and tiny bags filled with candy, were tied on its branches.

The tree was trembling with the excitement, but she stood as still as she could. “What if I should drop some of this fruit,” she thought.

When it began to grow dark, every one left the room and the tree was alone. It began to feel lonely and to think sad thoughts.

Soon the door opened and a lady came in. She lighted all the candles.

How light and glowing it was then!

The tree had never even dreamed of anything so beautiful!

Then the children came and danced about the tree, singing a Christmas song. The father played on his violin, and the baby sat in her mother’s arms, smiling and cooing.

“Now I know what I was made for,” thought the spruce tree; “I was intended to give joy to the little ones, because I, myself, am so small and humble.”

His name was Bruno and he lived a long, long way from here on the Roman Campagna. His house was a pointed hut thatched with straw, and back of it was the fold where the sheep lived, and then, for miles and miles, there was no other living thing for a little boy to see. There was no one to play with; there was nothing for a little boy to do but tend the sheep and milk the goats and wish, oh, so hard, that he might go on that long Appian Way to the gate of St. Sebastian and to Rome, on the other side.

Piccola had told him about Rome. Piccola’s father bought wool and sold it to the traders at Rome. Twice a year Piccola and her father came out to the Campagna at shearing time. The father haggled over thelirahe must pay Bruno’s father. Piccola and Bruno sat under an olive tree, their hands tightly clasped, as Piccola told Bruno of Rome.

“You should see it at thefestaof Christmas,” she exclaimed. “Every shop is full of lightsin the evening and the flower carts stand at all the corners. There is a manger and Babe in the chapel and,” Piccola’s voice was rich with wonder, “there is abox that talksin a shop on the Corso.”

“I don’t believe you; how could it talk? What makes it talk?” Bruno asked; but this Piccola could not tell.

“Ittalks—that is all I know,” she said, “and itsings,” and she might have told more but her father came and she must say good-by to Bruno. In a moment he could see nothing of Piccola but the flash of her little scarlet and green skirt and the blue cornflower she wore in her black braids. Then there was only a cloud of dust to hide the yellow cart wheels, and Piccola was gone—to Rome where there was a box that would talk and sing.

There came long, sweet, all-alike days for Bruno and the sheep. The wheat grew yellow and heavy to breaking with sweetness and Bruno watched the harvesters. The olives ripened, and the grapes, and the figs. Then the sun set earlier, and the nights were chilly with frost, and Bruno and his father put warm cloaks made of skin over their blue smocks.

“It is near thefestaof Christmas,” said Bruno one day. “I have never been to Rome. Willyou take me there to hear the talking box on the Corso, father? It both speaks and sings.”

“No,” Bruno’s father was quick in his reply, being a hard man after many lonely years. “The ewe lambs are ailing, and I cannot leave them. And there are no singing boxes in Rome.”

So Bruno followed the old sheep and the lambs to their grassy hill and helped to drive them home at night until it was the eve of the Christmasfesta. On this eve, he locked the gate of the fold and turned to go into the hut. His father would be dozing, perhaps, for the cold dusk had crept over the great Campagna and one star shone out in the purple sky. It hung, pointing, over Rome. As Bruno looked up at it, he heard a sound of far-away bells. They might be the bells of Rome. Oh, beautiful Rome, with its gay, bright streets, and its flower carts, and its magic box that could sing and turn loneliness into music!

Bruno pulled the hood of his cloak over his head. His bare feet flashed over the fields of dry grass and wheat stubble. He found the old Appian Road and raced along it in the path of starlight. He was running away. He was going to Rome. For an hour he ran.

He had gone so far and so fast, and his earsrang so with the singing Christmas bells that, at first, he did not hear it—the bleating of a foolish little ewe lamb. Then it came again, and Bruno stopped. The lamb lay under a bunch of dried brown stalks, its flesh torn by thistles and its eyes dull with fear because it had lost its mother.

“Stupid! Why did you run away? I can’t take you home!” Bruno stamped one little brown foot, “I’m going to Rome for Christmas, do you hear? I won’t take you home—” but as he spoke, he stooped down and lifted the trembling, fearful little creature in his arms and turned back toward the fold.

The star path stretched at Bruno’s back now. Ahead were black shadows, and a biting wind whirled small stones that cut his face and made mocking sounds as it scurried through the ruined arches of the aqueduct. He lost the road, and stiff cactus thorns cut his slim ankles. The lamb was heavier with each step. He wouldn’t cry; no Roman lad cries, his father had told him; but he couldn’t find his way. The little shepherd boy dropped to the ground. He could hear the Christmas bells; no, it was a clear, sweet voice coming from a polished wood box that sang him to sleep.

When he opened his heavy eyelids, Piccola’sdancing eyes met his. What a gay little Christmas sprite she looked in her warm crimson hood and cloak! Bruno, himself, lay in his father’s arms and Piccola’s father was lifting the strayed lamb into the two-wheeled yellow cart, a lantern in one hand.

“We had to go to Albano with wool, and on the way back I begged father to stop for you, Bruno, to go back to Rome for Christmas. We couldn’t find you. Your father came with us to look for you, and the lamb told us where you were.”

“My brave little Roman lad!” It was Bruno’s father who stroked his head with long, thin fingers. “We will return with the lamb to the fold and find warm milk for you. Then you may go to Rome for thefestawith the littlesignorina.”

“And we’re going tobuya box that talks,” added Piccola, happily.

“And sings!” smiled back Bruno as he looked toward the Christmas star and the gate of St. Sebastian.

With wild surpriseFour great eyesIn two small headsFrom neighboring bedsLooked out—and winktAnd glittered and blinktAt a very queer sightIn the dim dawn-light.As plain as can beA fairy treeFlashes and glimmersAnd shakes and shimmers.Red, green, and blueMeet their view;Silver and goldSharp eyes behold;Small moons, big stars;And jams in jars,And cakes and honeyAnd thimbles and money;Pink dogs, blue cats,Little squeaking rats,And candles and dollsAnd crackers and polls,A real bird that sings,And tokens and favors,And all sorts of things,For the little shavers.Four black eyesGrow big with surprise,And then grow bigger,When a tiny little figure,Jaunty and airy,A fairy, a fairy!From the treetop cries,“Open wide, Black Eyes!Come, children, wake now!Your joys you may take now.”Quick as you can thinkTwenty small toesIn four pretty rows,Like little piggies pink,All kick in the air—And before you can winkThe tree stands bare!

With wild surpriseFour great eyesIn two small headsFrom neighboring bedsLooked out—and winktAnd glittered and blinktAt a very queer sightIn the dim dawn-light.

As plain as can beA fairy treeFlashes and glimmersAnd shakes and shimmers.Red, green, and blueMeet their view;Silver and goldSharp eyes behold;Small moons, big stars;

And jams in jars,And cakes and honeyAnd thimbles and money;Pink dogs, blue cats,Little squeaking rats,And candles and dollsAnd crackers and polls,A real bird that sings,And tokens and favors,And all sorts of things,For the little shavers.

Four black eyesGrow big with surprise,And then grow bigger,When a tiny little figure,Jaunty and airy,A fairy, a fairy!From the treetop cries,“Open wide, Black Eyes!Come, children, wake now!Your joys you may take now.”

Quick as you can thinkTwenty small toesIn four pretty rows,Like little piggies pink,All kick in the air—And before you can winkThe tree stands bare!

Long, long ago—so long that even the old gray hills have forgotten—the beautiful stars in the sky used to sing together very early every morning, before any of the little people of the world were up. Their songs were made of light, and were so clear and strong that the whole heaven would shine when they sang.

One morning, as the stars sang and listened to each other, they heard beautiful music coming swiftly toward them. It was so much louder and sweeter than their own that they all stopped and listened and wondered. It came from far above them, from out the very deepest blue of the sky. It was a new star, and it sang an entirely new song that no one had ever heard before.

“Hark, hark!” the stars cried. “Let us hear what it is saying.”

And the beautiful star sang it over and over again, and its song told of a lovely Babe that had come on earth—a Babe so beautiful that it was the joy of the whole world. Yes, sobeautiful that when you looked at it you saw real light streaming from its face.

Every little child in the world has light in its face if we but know how to see it; but this little one had so very much that its mother wondered as she looked down upon her lap and saw it there. And there were shepherds there to look at the Babe, and many other people saw it and could not understand.

But the one beautiful star knew—yes, it knew all about it; and what do you think it knew? Why, that this Child was God’s own Child, and was so good and loving that the whole world when it heard of it would want to know how to be so, too.

This one beautiful star traveled on and on, telling all the way what it knew of the Child, and its light fairly danced through the sky, and hung over the very place where the little one lay.

’Twas Christmas Eve and, birdlike over the snow, flew a little stranger child. It ran along the sparkling ground. Its face beamed with gladness. It listened to the merry chimes of the Christmas bells and clapped its hands for joy.

It frolicked in the bright beams of light that fell from a cottage window, and, peeping in, saw the Christmas tree hung full of shining light and glittering gifts, and it watched the little children play about the tree.

“Oh, where,” cried the little stranger child, “where is my candles’ light? And why is there no tree for me, nor pretty toys? Once in my house my dear mother decked my tree! Oh, little children, may I not come in to see your tree and play with you?”

Then with frail hand the stranger child knocked on the window and the door, but no one heard the sound. Then down in the cold, white snow the little one sat, and wept.

“O Christ Child, the children’s Friend, Ihave no one to love me! Oh, why hast thou forgotten to send me a little tree with lights on every bough?”

And the little stranger child, with cold hands, drew its white cloak closer around its silken hair and pretty eyes so clear and blue.

Then came another pilgrim child. He held in His hand a shining light, and in a sweet, mild voice, like gentle music, he soothed the little stranger child.

“I am the Christmas Friend. Once I was a little child. Just now I heard your pleadings, and have come to deck a tree for you more beautiful than any tree ever before seen. Here in the open air is your Christmas tree, my little flower.” And the little stranger child looked up—far up—into the deep, deep sky, and saw there a glorious tree. Stars hung among its branches, and angels sang songs of joy around it.

And the little child smiled with joy, and troops of radiant beings descended and lifted the little one in their arms. They bore him to the Christ Child’s house, which is sweeter far than any home that earth can give.

Tell us, thou clear and heavenly tongue,Where is the Babe that lately sprung?Lies he the lily banks among?

Or say, if this new Birth of oursSleeps, laid within some ark of flowers,Spangled with dew-light, thou can’st clearAll doubts, and manifest the where.

Declare to us, bright star, if we shall seekHim in the morning’s blushing cheek,Or search the beds of spices through,To find Him out?

No, this ye need not do;But only come and see Him rest,A Princely Babe, in’s mother’s breast.

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

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

“But cannot money purchase everything, father?”

“No, my son, not quite everything.”

“But if money cannot purchase it, father?”

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

“And if you cannot?”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“I never thought of that,” said the princess. “What doyouwish?”

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

“Why, no, of course not.”

“Why not?”

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

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

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

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

“What?”

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

“So do I.”

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

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

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

“So should I.”

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

“Well?” the little man drawled.

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

“Well? I’m here.”

“Who’s here?” asked the prince.

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

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

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

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