ound the roots, and then tell me
if the Christmas time of a New York child isn't like living among the
people of a fairy book.

This was the sort of tree set up at Cousin Dempster's, Sunday night
before this last Christmas day. Of course, we couldn't think of
breaking the Sabbath, but the minute it was sundown, at it we went. Of
course, we didn't want the little girl to know what we were a-doing; but
the first we knew, in she hopped, as chipper as a humming-bird, and
would keep interfering and changing things, in spite of all we could do.

At last, her mother got her dander up and told her to march right off to
bed, just as a woman born in Vermont ought to order her own child; but
the tantalizing thing just hitched up her shoulder, and said, "She
wouldn't go, nor touch to the tree was for her own self. The house was
her par's, and she'd do just as she'd a mind to in it."

With that, Cousin E. E. blazed into a passion, and took her child by the
arm, with a jerk that sent her flying into the hall. Then I heard a
screeching and a scrambling up the stairs, and it seemed to me a slap or
two--I hope I wasn't mistaken about that--then a door slammed, and
Cousin E. E. came downstairs like a house o' fire, with both eyes
blazing, and one cheek red as flame. Could it be that the slap I heard
was from the other side, or had it been a free fight?

"That girl will be the death of me," says she, walking about like a lion
in its cage. "I never knew a worse child."

"I'm sure I never did," says I, with more than my usual spontaneity, for
I felt it.

"You never made a greater mistake," says E. E., fierce as a hen hawk.
"It is because she has so much more brains--spirit--genius than any
other children. A more splendid character never lived than my daughter
Cecilia."

I said nothing; maybe it would have been just as well if I had held my
tongue before.

"She is a favorite everywhere," E. E. went on, cooling down like a brick
oven after the coals are hauled out.

I said nothing.

"Ahead of girls twice her age," E. E. went on. "She speaks French like a
native."

"Is there anything more to put on?" says I.

"Yes," says she, "we will have the presents ready for the morning. I
meant to have some of Cecelia's friends here to-morrow night, but she
wanted the tree to herself."

With this, E. E. brought an armful of boxes and things from the next
room. The first thing she set up against the stem of the tree was a
doll, dressed in