It was December, ten years later. Carol had seen nine Christmas
trees lighted on her birthdays, one after another; nine times she
had assisted in the holiday festivities of the household, though
in her babyhood her share of the gayeties was somewhat limited.

For five years, certainly, she had hidden presents for Mama and
Papa in their own bureau drawers, and harbored a number of
secrets sufficiently large to burst a baby's brain, had it not
been for the relief gained by whispering them all to Mama, at
night, when she was in her crib, a proceeding which did not in
the least lessen the value of a secret in her innocent mind.

For five years she had heard "'Twas the night before Christmas,"
and hung up a scarlet stocking many sizes too large for her, and
pinned a sprig of holly on her little white night gown, to show
Santa Claus that she was a "truly" Christmas child, and dreamed
of fur-coated saints and toy-packs and reindeer, and wished
everybody a "Merry Christmas" before it was light in the morning,
and lent every one of her new toys to the neighbors' children
before noon, and eaten turkey and plum pudding, and gone to bed
at night in a trance of happiness at the day's pleasures.

Donald was away at college now. Paul and Hugh were great manly
fellows, taller than their mother. Papa Bird had grey hairs in
his whiskers; and Grandma, God bless her, had been four
Christmases in heaven. But Christmas in the Birds' Nest was
scarcely as merry now as it used to be in the bygone years, for
the little child that once brought such an added blessing to the
day, lay, month after month, a patient, helpless invalid, in the
room where she was born.