help to make this Home just the very best Home that ever was. Will you?"
And then she smiled down into their faces while she waited for her
answer.

"Oh, yes, yes," screamed the children, every one. The little black
creature got off from her cricket at Phronsie's feet to look into her
face. "And I will too," she cried.

"And now you all want to thank Miss Phronsie for her kind words, we
know," Jasper cried at this point, hurrying into the middle of the
aisle, "and so, children, you may all stand up and say 'Thank you,' and
wave your handkerchiefs."

Up flew all the rows of children to their feet, and a cloud of tiny
white squares of cambric fluttered in the air, and the children kept
piping out, "Thank you--Thank you." And old Mr. King began a cheer for
Phronsie, and another for the children; and then somebody down at the
end of the long hall set up another for Mr. King, and somebody else
started one for Mr. Henderson, and another for Mrs. Henderson, and there
was plenty of noise, and high above it all rang the peals of happy,
childish laughter. And when it was all done, everybody pausing to take
breath, then Amy Loughead sent out the finest march ever heard, from the
grand piano, and Polly and Jasper and all the rest marshaled the
children into a procession, and Phronsie clinging to old Mr. King's hand
on the one side, and holding fast to the small black palm on the other,
away they all went, the visitors falling into line, around and around
the big hall, till at last--oh! at last, they turned into the Enchanted
Land that held the wonderful Christmas Tree. And when they were all
before it, and Phronsie in the center, she lifted her hand, and the room
became so still one could hear a pin drop. And then the little children