stockings; for her own view of the matter, however subtle and
delicate, had given way, as it always did, to the stubborn
materialism of her husband. Without heeding the remonstrances of
his two children, who still kept murmuring that their little
snow-sister did not love the warmth, good Mr. Lindsey took his
departure, shutting the parlor-door carefully behind him. Turning
up the collar of his sack over his ears, he emerged from the
house, and had barely reached the street-gate, when he was
recalled by the screams of Violet and Peony, and the rapping of a
thimbled finger against the parlor window.

"Husband! husband!" cried his wife, showing her horror-stricken
face through the window-panes. "There is no need of going for the
child's parents!"

"We told you so, father!" screamed Violet and Peony, as he
re-entered the parlor. "You would bring her in; and now our
poor--dear-beau-ti-ful little snow-sister is thawed!"

And their own sweet little faces were already dissolved in tears;
so that their father, seeing what strange things occasionally
happen in this every-day world, felt not a little anxious lest
his children might be going to thaw too! In the utmost
perplexity, he demanded an explanation of his wife. She could
only reply, that, being summoned to the parlor by the cries of
Violet and Peony, she found no trace of the little white maiden,
unless it were the remains of a heap of snow, which, while she
was gazing at it, melted quite away upon the hearth-rug.

"And there you see all that is left of it!" added she, pointing