side her. He heard her saying the words he did not know. He only said
softly: "Light, light for them all!"

An old woman knelt near him; not far off a lame boy and a mother with a
sleeping child in her arms knelt also, and there beyond, a woman. Ah, he
knew what "beautiful" was now! He looked to see if she wore lace like
cobwebs and frost. She did not pray; she only knelt there. Tears were in
her eyes. "Light for her and all," whispered Hansei over and over.

Then it was as if a dream came true. Some one that had stood near
stepped back, and there, there beyond, appeared the little Christ-child,
just as his mother had told him. There was the beautiful mother, the
wise men and angels, the youth, the maiden, and the light shining from
the child and touching them all, all, even the poor little beasts off
there!

Hansei cried: "Look, look, Mother! the Christ-child!"

His mother said, "Hush-hsh! It is not the real Christ-child, but a
picture."

Hansei looked back. "Not the real Christ-child? But, Mother, the star
stopped here! Then the real Christ-child is here somewhere, I know."

He looked about, but he saw only the old woman, the lame boy, the mother
with her child, and the beautiful woman who could not pray. He turned
back to the painted child and the light, and looked, and looked; he
stared his eyes blind; at last he could not see; all seemed to fade, to
go. The tired eyelids fell; his head drooped down on his mother's arm,
and he slept.

But his eyes still held the light, and he dreamed.

It seemed to him that the beautiful pictured light grew and broadened
into a great shining. "Surely," thought the little boy, "the real
Christ-child is near! but where? not here; here is only the old woman
and the lame boy and the others praying. But the great light--shining
over all, above every head, in shining rings! how beautiful!"

And he thought he cried out, "See, you have the light, all of you! Do
not pray, but be glad!" They did not hear, and prayed on.

"But the Christ-child--where is the real Christ-child?" he wondered. He
thought he stood up and strained his eyes over the bent heads of the
praying people, and while he looked he saw myriad circles of light begin
to glow; and lo! there, near--so near--was the real Christ-child,--only
it was the old woman. Dreams are strange!

Her bent, trembling body seemed going, fading, and there knelt a shining
being,--the real Christ-child; yet it was the old woman. And the l