LITTLE JEAN[*]

A Christmas Story


Long ago, and far from here, in a country with a name too hard to
pronounce, there lived a little boy named Jean. In many ways, he was
just like the boys here, for there are many Johns over here, are there
not? Then too, Jean lived with his auntie, and some of our boys do
that too. His father and mother were dead, and that is true here
sometimes, isn't it? But in some ways things were quite different with
Jean. In the first place his auntie was very, very cross, and she
often made him climb up his ladder to his little garret room to go to
sleep on his pallet of straw, without any supper, save a dry crust.
His stockings had holes in the heels, and toes and knees, because his
auntie never had time to mend them, and his shoes would have been worn
out all the time if they had not been such strong wooden shoes--for in
that country the boys all wore wooden shoes. Jean did many a little
service around the place, for his auntie made him work for his daily
bread, and he chopped the wood and swept the paths and made the fires
and ran the errands, but he never heard anyone say "Thank you."

Jean's happiest days were at school, and I wonder if he was like our
boys in that? There his playmates wore much better clothes and good
stockings too, and warm top coats, but they never thought of making
fun of Jean, for they all loved to play with him. One morning Jean
started off to school (which was next to the big church), and when he
got there he found the children all so happy and gay and dressed in
their best clothes, and he heard one boy say, "Won't it be jolly