hair! It is all like gold!"

"Oh certainly," said Violet, with tranquillity, as if it were
very much a matter of course. "That color, you know, comes from
the golden clouds, that we see up there in the sky. She is almost
finished now. But her lips must be made very red,--redder than
her cheeks. Perhaps, Peony, it will make them red if we both kiss
them!"

Accordingly, the mother heard two smart little smacks, as if both
her 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 now her lips are
very red. And she blushed a little, too!"

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

Just then, there came a breeze of the pure west-wind, sweeping
through the garden and rattling the parlor-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