o be shared with Donald,
Paul, or Hugh; and when they made believe nibble the morsel with
affected enjoyment, she would clap her hands and crow with delight.

"Why does she do it?" asked Donald thoughtfully. "None of us boys ever
did."

"I hardly know," said Mamma, catching her darling to her heart, "except
that she is a little Christmas child, and so she has a tiny share of the
blessedest birthday the world ever knew!"

II

DROOPING WINGS

It was December, ten years later.

Carol had seen nine Christmas trees lighted on her birthdays, one after
another; nine times she had assisted in the holiday festivities of the
household, though in her babyhood her share of the gayeties was
somewhat limited.

For five years, certainly, she had hidden presents for Mamma and Papa in
their own bureau drawers, and harbored a number of secrets sufficiently
large to burst a baby brain, had it not been for the relief gained by
whispering them all to Mamma, at night, when she was in her crib, a
proceeding which did not in the least lessen the value of a secret in
her innocent mind.

For five years she had heard "'Twas the night before Christmas," and
hung up a scarlet stocking many sizes too large for her, and pinned a
sprig of holly on her little white nightgown, to show Santa Claus that
she was a "truly" Christmas child, and dreamed of fur-coated saints and
toy-packs and reindeer, and wished everybody a "Merry Christmas" before
it was light in the morning, and lent every one of her new toys to the
neighbors' children before noon, and eaten turkey and plum-pudding, and
gone to bed at night in a trance of happiness at the day's pleasures.

Donald was away at college now. Paul and Hugh were great manly fellows,
taller than their mother. Papa Bird had gray hairs in his whiskers; and
Grandma, God bless her, had been four Christmases in heaven.

But Christmas in the Birds' Nest was scarcely as merry now as it used to
be in the bygone years, for the little child, that once brought such an
added blessing to the day, lay month after month a patient, helpless
invalid, in the room where she was born. She had never been very strong
in body, and it was with a pang of terror her mother and father noticed,
soon after she was five years old, that she began to limp, ever so
slightly; to complain too often of weariness, and to nestle close to her
mother, saying she "would rather not go out to play, please." The
illness was slight at fi