something to eat Christmas!"

"O, sometimes I had a little saucer-pie, sweetened with molasses, and the
crust made of raised dough."

"Poor, dear grandma!"

"I remember my father used to put a great backlog on the fire Christmas
morning, as large as the fireplace would hold; and that was all the
celebration we ever had."

"Didn't you have Christmas presents?"

"No, Alice; not so much as a brass thimble."

"Poor grandma! I shouldn't think you would have wanted to live! Didn't
anybody love you?" said Dotty, putting her fingers under Mrs. Read's cap,
and smoothing her soft gray hair; "why, I love every hair of your head."

"I am glad thee does, child; but that doesn't take much love, for thee
knows I haven't a great deal of hair."

"But, grandma, how could you live without Christmas trees and things?"

"I was happy enough, Alice."

"But you'd have been a great deal happier, grandma, if you'd had a Santa
Claus! It's so nice to believe what isn't true!"

"Ah! does thee think so? There was one thing I believed when I was a very