ets in the race and beats Katrinka Flack, after
all."

"Hush! not so loud!" returned Carl, rather sneeringly. "That little lady
in rags is the special pet of Hilda van Gleck. Those shining skates are
her gift, if I make no mistake."

"So! so!" exclaimed Peter with a radiant smile, for Hilda was his best
friend. "She has been at her good work there too!" And Mynheer van Holp,
after cutting a double figure eight on the ice, to say nothing of a huge
P, then a jump and an H, glided onward until he found himself beside
Hilda.

Hand in hand, they skated together, laughingly at first, then staidly
talking in a low tone.

Strange to say, Peter van Holp soon arrived at a sudden conviction that
his little sister needed a wooden chain just like Hilda's.

Two days afterwards, on Saint Nicholas's Eve, Hans, having burned three
candle ends and cut his thumb into the bargain, stood in the marketplace
at Amsterdam, buying another pair of skates.

Shadows in the Home

Good Dame Brinker! As soon as the scanty dinner had been cleared away
that noon, she had arrayed herself in her holiday attire in honor of
Saint Nicholas. It will brighten the children, she thought to herself,
and she was not mistaken. This festival dress had been worn very seldom
during the past ten years; before that time it had done good service and
had flourished at many a dance and kermis, when she was known, far
and wide, as the pretty Meitje Klenck. The children had sometimes been
granted rare glimpses of it as it lay in state in the old oaken chest.
Faded and threadbare as it was, it was gorgeous in their eyes, with
its white linen tucker, now gathered to her plump throat and vanishing
beneath the trim bodice of blue homespun, and its reddish-brown skirt
bordered with black. The knitted woolen mitts and the dainty cap showing
her hair, which generally was hidden, made her seem almost like a
princess to Gretel, while Master Hans grew staid and well-behaved as he
gazed.

Soon the little maid, while braiding her own golden tresses, fairly
danced around her mother in an ecstasy of admiration.

"Oh, Mother, Mother, Mother, how pretty you are! Look, Hans! Isn't it
just like a picture?"

"Just like a picture," assented Hans cheerfully. "JUST like a
picture--only I don't like those stocking things on the hands."

"Not like the mitts, brother Hans! Why, they're very important. See,
they cover up all the red. Oh, Mother, how white your arm is where th