Part 4 (1/2)

Grandpa sat next to the high-chair. ”Cheer up, little man: it will be found.”

And mother said, ”Never mind, pet; it can't be really _lost_!”

Stevie's thumb hurt him, and he felt so miserable that he couldn't bear his trouble ”all alone by himself” any longer, so he sobbed out, ”'Tisn't lost! it is in the fountain! Wanted it all by myself!”

Mother took him on her lap till she had made out what had happened. Then she tied up the poor cut thumb while grandpa went down to the fountain and fished up the knife and fork. Stevie ate his dinner with a spoon, for grandpa said he thought the knife and fork had better go away till the poor thumb was well. The pretty case was quite, _quite_ spoiled. But Stevie got his knife and fork back; and we noticed that we didn't have to say, ”Don't touch, Stevie!” nearly so often to him, and that he was not nearly so eager to have things ”all alone.”

THE WREN'S GIFT.

A little maid was sitting Upon the wild-brook's edge.

A little Wren came flitting, And chirrupped from the hedge.

Close up to her he hopped, With eyes both bright and merry, And in her lap he dropped A golden s.h.i.+ning berry.

”Eat it never fearing,”

Said the little Wren, ”It will give you hearing Seldom given to men.”

It made her tongue to tingle When she bit it through, And straightway all the dingle Seemed full of words she knew.

She understood the words The wild brook sang in straying, And what the woodland birds Among themselves were saying.

But sweeter than all singing Of brook or birds above, She heard the bluebells ringing The chimes the fairies love.

VERA'S CHRISTMAS GIFT.

It was Christmas Day, and very, very hot; for Christmas in South Africa comes at mid-summer, whilst the winter, or rainy season, occurs there in July and August, which certainly seems a strange arrangement to our ideas. However, whatever the temperature may be, Christmas is ever kept by all English people as nearly as possible in the same way as they were wont to keep it ”at Home,” for it is thus that all colonists lovingly speak of the land of their birth.

So, though little Vera Everest lived on an African farm, she knew all about Christmas, and did not forget to hang up both her fat, white socks, to find them well filled with presents on Christmas morning; and there were roast turkey and plum-pudding for dinner, just as you had last year.

She was not old enough to ride to the distant village church with her parents, but she amused herself during their absence with singing all the Christmas carols she knew to Sixpence, her Zulu nurse; and by and by she heard the tramp of the horse's feet, and ran to the door.

Instead of the cheerful greeting she expected, Mother hardly noticed her little girl. She held an open letter in her hand, and was crying--yes, crying on Christmas Day!

Mrs. Everest was indeed in sad grief; the mail had just come in, and she had a letter to say that her mother was seriously ill, and longing to see her. A few months ago there would have been no difficulty about the journey; but the Everests had lost a great deal of money lately, and an expensive journey was now quite out of the question, and yet it cut her to the heart not to be able to go to her mother when she was ill, and perhaps dying.

Vera was too young to be told all this, but she was not too young to see that Mother was in trouble.

”I do believe Santa Claus forgot Mammy's stocking,” she said to herself: ”she has not had a present to-day, and that's why she's crying.”

So Vera turned the matter over in her mind, and came to the conclusion that _she_ must give Mother a present, as Santa Claus had so shamefully neglected her.

She went to her treasure-box--a tin biscuit-case in which she kept the pretty stones and crystals which she picked up in her walks, and, after thinking a little, she chose a bright, irregular-shaped stone, and, clasping her hands tightly behind her, she went on to the veranda.

Mother was lying back in a cane chair and gazing with sad eyes over the sea.