What your father is to give you (a dressing-case made of leather)
had hair, but it has none now, except on some portion of its interior
(brushes), and that is false. Your mamma's present (a fur muff) still
has some hair. What your aunt is to give you (a lamp) will help you to
see the hair on the others better; but, let me see, yes, I am sure that
that has none.

In the December twilights, in that hour between daylight and darkness,
we would sit upon our low stools before the wood-fire, and continue our
series of questions from day to day. We grew ever more eager and excited
until the 31st, and in the evening of that momentous day the mysteries
were revealed.

That day the presents for the two families, wrapped, tied and labeled,
were piled upon tables in a room closed against Lucette and me. At eight
o'clock the doors were thrown open and we filed in, the elders going
first, and each one of us sought for his own gift among the heap of
white parcels. For me the moment of entry was an exceedingly joyous one,
and until I was twelve or thirteen years of age, I could not refrain
from jumping and leaping like a kid long before it came time for us to
cross the threshold.

We had supper at eleven, and when the clock in the dining room struck
the midnight hour, tranquilly, in harmony with the sound of its calm
stroke, we separated in the first moments of those New Years that
are now buried under the ashes of many succeeding ones. And on those
evenings I fell asleep with all my gifts in my room near me. I even
kept the favorite ones upon my bed. The following morning I always waked
earlier than usual so that I might re-examine them; they cast a spell of