children were kissing the snow-image on its frozen mouth. But, as this
did not seem to make the lips quite red enough, Violet next proposed
that the snow-child should be invited to kiss Peony's scarlet cheek.

"Come, 'ittle snow-sister, kiss me!" cried Peony.

"There! she has kissed you," added Violet, "and her lips are very red.
And she blushed a little, too!"

"O, what a cold kiss!" cried Peony.

Just then, there came a breeze of the pure west-wind, sweeping
through the garden and rattling the parlour-windows. It sounded so
wintry cold, that the mother was about to tap on the window-pane with
her thimbled finger, to summon the two children in, when they both
cried out to her with one voice. The tone was not a tone of surprise,
although they were evidently a good deal excited; it appeared rather
as if they were very much rejoiced at some event that had now
happened, but which they had been looking for, and had reckoned upon
all along.

"Mamma! mamma! We have finished our little snow-sister, and she is
running about the garden with us!"

"What imaginative little beings my children are!" thought the mother,
putting the last few stitches into Peony's frock. "And it is strange,
too, that they make me almost as much a child as they themselves are!
I can hardly help believing, now, that the snow-image has really come
to life!"