ould run down their cheeks,--and again entreated him not to bring
their snow-image into the house.

"Not bring her in!" exclaimed the kind-hearted man. "Why, you are
crazy, my little Violet!--quite crazy, my small Peony! She is so cold,
already, that her hand has almost frozen mine, in spite of my thick
gloves. Would you have her freeze to death?"

His wife, as he came up the steps, had been taking another long,
earnest, almost awe-stricken gaze at the little white stranger. She
hardly knew whether it was a dream or no; but she could not help
fancying that she saw the delicate print of Violet's fingers on the
child's neck. It looked just as if, while Violet was shaping out the
image, she had given it a gentle pat with her hand, and had neglected
to smooth the impression quite away.

"After all, husband," said the mother, recurring to her idea that the
angels would be as much delighted to play with Violet and Peony as she
herself was, "after all, she does look strangely like a snow-image! I
do believe she is made of snow!"

A puff of the west wind blew against the snow-child, and again she
sparkled like a star.

"Snow!" repeated good Mr. Lindsey, drawing the reluctant guest over
his hospitable threshold. "No wonder she looks like snow. She is half
frozen, poor little thing! But a good fire will put every thing to
rights."

[Illustration: {The children watch with their mother as their father
pulls the snow girl towards the house}]

Without further talk, and always with the same best intentions, this
highly benevolent and common-sensible individual led the little white
damsel--drooping, drooping, drooping, more and more--out of the frosty
air, and into his comfortable parlor. A Heidenberg stove, filled to
the brim with intensely burning anthracite, was sending a bright gleam
through the isinglass of its iron door, and causing the vase of water
on its top to fume and bubble with excitement. A warm, sultry smell
was diffused throughout the room. A thermometer on the wall furthest
from the stove stood at eighty degrees. The parlor was hung with
red curtains, and covered with a red carpet, and looked just as warm
as it felt. The difference betwixt the atmosphere here and the cold,
wintry twilight out of doors, was like stepping at once from Nova
Zembla to the hottest part of India, or from the North Pole into an
oven. O, this was a fine place for the little white stranger!

The common-sensible man placed the