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What do you think my grandmother said,

Telling Christmas stories to me

To-night, when I went and coaxed and coaxed With my head and arms upon her knee?

She thinks she really told me so

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That good Mr. Santa Claus, long ago,
Was as old and gray as he is to-day,
Going around with his loaded sleigh.

She thinks he's driven through frost and snow
For a hundred, yes, a thousand times or so,
With jingling bells and a bag of toys-

Ho, ho! for good little girls and boys,

With a carol gay,

Crying, "Clear the way

For a rollicking, merry Christmas day!"

Grandmother knows almost everything
All that I ask her she can tell;

1 By Sydney Dare.

Rivers and towns in geography,

And the hardest words she can always spell.

But the wisest ones, sometimes, they say,

Mistake and even grandmother may.

If Santa Claus never had been a boy
How would he always know so well
What all the boys are longing for

On Christmas day? Can grandmother tell?

Why does he take the shiny rings,

The baby houses, the dolls with curls, The little lockets and other such things Never to boys, but always to girls?

Why does he take the skates and all

The bats and balls, and arrows and bows,

And trumpets and drums, and guns

hurrah!

To the boys? I wonder if grandmother knows?

But there's one thing that don't seem right

If Santa Claus was a boy at play

And hung up his stocking on Christmas night,
Who filled it for him on Christmas day?

EXPRESSION: Repeat in a bright way Santa Claus's gay carol. What is a carol? Repeat the little boy's questions.

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It was getting very near to Christmas time, and all the boys at Miss Ware's school were talking about going home for the holidays.

"I shall go to the Christmas festival," said Bertie Fellows," and my mother will give a party, and Aunt Mary will give another. Oh! I shall have a splendid time at home."

"My Uncle Bob is going to give me a pair of skates," remarked Harry Wadham.

66

My father is going to give me a bicycle," put in George Alderson.

"Will you bring it back to school with you?" asked Harry.

"Oh! yes, if Miss Ware doesn't say no!”

"Well, Tom," cried Bertie, "where are you going to spend your holidays?"

"I am going to stay here," answered Tom, in a very forlorn voice.

"Here at school — oh, dear! Why can't you go home?"

"I can't go home to India," answered Tom.

"Nobody said you could. But haven't you any relatives anywhere?"

By John Strange Winter (Mrs. H. E. V. Stannard), an English writer.

Tom shook his head. "Only in India," he said sadly. "Poor fellow! That's hard luck for you. I'll tell you what it is, boys, if I couldn't go home for the holidays, especially at Christmas, I think I would just sit down and die."

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"Oh! no, you wouldn't," said Tom. "You would get ever so homesick, but you wouldn't die. You would just get through somehow, and hope something would happen before next year, or that some kind fairy would - "

"There are no fairies nowadays," said Bertie. "See here, Tom, I'll write and ask my mother to invite you to go home with me for the holidays."

Will you, really?"

"Yes, I will. And if she says yes, we shall have such a splendid time. We live in London, you know, and have lots of parties and fun."

"Perhaps she will say no," suggested poor little Tom. "My mother isn't the kind that says no," Bertie declared loudly.

In a few days' time a letter arrived from Bertie's mother. The boy opened it eagerly. It said:

"My own dear Bertie,

“I am very sorry to tell you that little Alice is ill with scarlet fever. And so you cannot come home for

your holidays. I would have been glad to have you bring your little friend with you if all had been well here.

"Your father and I have decided that the best thing that you can do is to stay at Miss Ware's. We shall send your Christmas to you as well as we can.

"It will not be like coming home, but I am sure you will try to be happy, and make me feel that you are helping me in this sad time.

"Dear little Alice is very ill, very ill indeed. Tell Tom that I am sending a box for both of you with two of everything. And tell him that it makes me so much happier to know that you will not be alone.

"Your own Mother."

When Bertie Fellows received this letter, which ended all his Christmas hopes and joys, he hid his face upon his desk and sobbed aloud. The lonely boy from India, who sat next to him, tried to comfort his friend in every way he could think of. He patted his shoulder, and whispered many kind words to him.

At last Bertie put the letter into Tom's hands. "Read it," he sobbed.

So Tom then understood the cause of Bertie's grief. "Don't fret over it," he said at last. "It might be worse. Why, your father and mother might be thou

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