, like a speckled
cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern of
ignited brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top.

Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchit said, and calmly, too, that he
regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs. Cratchit since
their marriage. Mrs. Cratchit said that, now the weight was off her
mind, she would confess she had her doubts about the quantity of flour.
Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody thought or said it
was at all a small pudding for a large family. It would have been flat
heresy to do so. Any Cratchit would have blushed to hint at such a
thing.

At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the hearth
swept, and the fire made up. The compound in the jug being tasted, and
considered perfect, tipples and oranges were put upon the table, and a
shovelful of chestnuts on the fire. Then all the Cratchit family drew
round the hearth in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a
one; and at Bob Cratchit's elbow stood the family display of glass--two
tumblers and a custard-cup without a handle.

These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden
goblets would have done; and Bob served it out with beaming looks,
while the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and cracked noisily. Then Bob
proposed:

"A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us!"

Which all the family reechoed.

"God bless us every one!" said Tiny Tim, the last of all.

XXVIII. CHRISTMAS IN SEVENTEEN SEVENTY-SIX*

*From "A Last Century Maid and Other Stories for Children," by A.H.W.
Lippincott, 1895.

ANNE HOLLINGSWORTH WHARTON

"On Christmas day in Seventy-six,
Our gallant troops with bayonets fixed,
To Trenton marched away."

Children, have any of you ever thought of what little people like you
were doing in this country more than a hundred years ago, when the
cruel tide of war swept over its bosom? From many homes the fathers were
absent, fighting bravely for the liberty which we now enjoy, while the
mothers no less valiantly struggled against hardships and discomforts
in order to keep a home for their children, whom you only know as your
great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers, dignified gentlemen and
beautiful ladies, whose painted portraits hang upon the walls in some
of your homes. Merry, romping children they were in those far-off times,
yet their bright faces must have looked grave somet