h's care, and of course
Brownie's gifts, besides the nearer and dearer excitement of the
breakfast table. To the latter she attended first, scattering parcels
at each plate before any one else arrived on the scene. Then she raced
off, just escaping in the hall Jim, who immediately put his hands
behind him and began to whistle with great carelessness. Jim was a man
of tact.

Mrs. Brown, narrowly watching some fried potatoes, heard flying
footsteps, and turned to receive Norah bodily.

"Merry Christmas, Brownie, dear!" said the breathless one. She hung
over the stout shoulders a tiny shawl of softest white wool.

"It's only a shawl-let," Norah explained, "just for when you feel the
summer evenings get cool, you know."

"An' you made it, my precious!"

"Why, of course," said Norah, lifting her brows; "do you think I'd buy
it, when you taught me to knit? Ah, Brownie, I'm having such a good
time!"

"Look at me!" said Mrs. Brown, sitting down in rapture, and forgetting
her frying pan entirely. "This lovely shawl--an' your Pa's cheque--and
here's even Master Wally brung me down a cap, an' Master Jim--don't 'e
always think!--a frame with the photer 'e took of you an' your Pa, an'
it's sollud silver, no less, if you'll believe me, an' then it's none
too good for the photer, but the dear lamb knew wot I'd like more than
anything on earth! Of all the loving--kindest children--" At this point
Brownie's feelings overcame her, and she sniffed and, inhaling a threat
of burnt potato, rushed to conceal her emotions over the stove.

Sarah and Mary felt delighted with the pretty collars Mrs. Stephenson
had chosen for Norah in Melbourne; the daughter of the house
encountered Jim returning from the back regions, with a broad smile on
his brown face. Jim's invariable gift to Lee Wing was a felt hat, and
as the Celestial still wore the one first given, eight Christmases
before, it was popularly supposed that the intermediate half-dozen went
to support his starving relatives in China! Lee Wing had never
mentioned the existence of any starving relatives, but Wally said it
was well known that all Chinese gardeners had them--speaking, as Norah
remarked, as though it was a new complaint, like measles or mumps!

"You didn't give Wing another hat, Jim?" queried his sister.

"I did, though," returned Jim, firmly. "Asked him at midwinter what
he'd have, and he grinned and said, 'Allee same hat!' So he got it--a
lovely green one!"

"Jim!--