"Begin!" says old First Premium. "Do you think we're just _beginning_?
Why, when do you think it is?"

"The night after Thanksgiving."

"What year?"

"1886."

They all gave a perfect screech. "Why, it's Christmas Eve, 1900, and
every one of your friends has been eaten up long ago," says old First
Premium, and he began to cry over her, and the old hen-turkey and the
little turkey chicks began to wipe their eyes on the backs of their
wings.

"I don't think they were very neat," said the little girl.

Well, they were kind-hearted, anyway, and they felt sorry for the other
little girl. And she began to think she had made some little impression
on them, when she noticed the old hen-turkey beginning to untie her
bonnet strings, and the turkey chicks began to spread round her in a
circle, with the points of their wings touching, so that she couldn't
get out, and they commenced dancing and singing, and after a while that
little he-turkey says, "Who's _it_?" and the other little girl, she
didn't know why, says, "_I'm_ it," and old First Premium says, "Do you
promise?" and the other little girl says, "Yes, I promise," and she knew
she was promising, if they would let her go, that people should never
eat turkeys any more. And the moon began to shine brighter and brighter
through the turkeys, and pretty soon it was the sun, and then it was not
the turkeys, but the window-curtains--it was one of those old
farm-houses where they don't have blinds--and the other little girl--

"Woke up!" shouted the little girl. "There now, papa, what did I tell
you? I _knew_ it was a dream all along."

"No, she didn't," said the papa; "and it wasn't a dream."

"What was it, then?"

"It was a--trance."

The little girl turned round, and knelt in her papa's lap, so as to take
him by the shoulders and give him a good shaking. That made him promise
to be good, pretty quick, and, "Very well, then," says the little girl;
"if it wasn't a dream, you've got to prove it."

"But how can I prove it?" says the papa.

"By going on with the story," says the little girl, and she cuddled down
again.

"Oh, well, that's easy enough."

As soon as it was light in the room, the other little girl could see
that the place was full of people, crammed and jammed, and they were
all awfully excited, and kept yelling, "Down with the traitress!"
"Away with the renegade!" "Shame on the little sneak!" till it was
worse than the turk