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SCENE III.

The little ones went gayly into the yard. They had been scared by their mother’s tears; but she had smiled again, and that had made all right with them. The sun was shining brightly, and they were on the sunny side of the old church, and they laughed and chirped and chittered to each other as merrily as the little birds in the ivy boughs.

The old sexton came to the side door and threw out an armful of refuse greens, and then stopped a moment and nodded kindly at them.

“May we play with them, please, sir?” said the little Elsie, looking up with great reverence.

“Oh, yes, to be sure; these are done with–they are no good now.”

“Oh, Tottie!” cried Elsie, rapturously, “just think, he says we may play with all these. Why, here’s ever and ever so much green, enough to play house. Let’s play build a house for father and mother.”

“I’m going to build a big house for ’em when I grow up,” said Tottie, “and I mean to have glass bead windows in it.”

Tottie had once had presented to him a box of colored glass beads to string, and he could think of nothing finer in the future than unlimited glass beads.

Meanwhile, his sister began planting pine branches upright in the snow, to make her house.

“You see we can make believe there are windows and doors and a roof,” she said, “and it’s just as good. Now, let’s make believe there is a bed in this corner, and we will lie down to sleep.”

And Tottie obediently couched himself in the allotted corner and shut his eyes very hard, though after a moment he remarked that the snow got into his neck.

“You must play it isn’t snow–play it’s feathers,” said Elsie.

“But I don’t like it,” persisted Tottie, “it don’t feel a bit like feathers.”

“Oh, well, then,” said Elsie, accommodating herself to circumstances, “let’s play get up now and I’ll get breakfast.”

Just now the door opened again, and the sexton began sweeping the refuse out of the church. There were bits of ivy and holly, and ruffles of ground-pine, and lots of bright red berries that came flying forth into the yard, and the children screamed for joy. “O Tottie!” “O Elsie!” “Only see how many pretty things–lots and lots!”

The sexton stood and looked and laughed as he saw the little ones so eager for the scraps and remnants.

“Don’t you want to come in and see the church?” he said. “It’s all done now, and a brave sight it is. You may come in.”

They tipped in softly, with large bright, wondering eyes. The light through the stained glass windows fell blue and crimson and yellow on the pillars all ruffled with ground-pine and brightened with scarlet bitter- sweet berries, and there were stars and crosses and mottoes in green all through the bowery aisles, while the organist, hid in a thicket of verdure, was practicing softly, and sweet voices sung:

“Hark! the herald angels sing
Glory to the new-born King.”

The little ones wandered up and down the long aisles in a dream of awe and wonder. “Hush, Tottie!” said Elsie when he broke into an eager exclamation, “don’t make a noise. I do believe it’s something like heaven,” she said, under her breath.

They made the course of the church and came round by the door again, where the sexton stood smiling on them.

“You can find lots of pretty Christmas greens out there,” he said, pointing to the door; “perhaps your folks would like to have some.”

“Oh, thank you, sir,” exclaimed. Elsie, rapturously. “Oh, Tottie, only think! Let’s gather a good lot and go home and dress our room for Christmas. Oh, won’t mother be astonished when she comes home, we’ll make it so pretty!”

And forthwith the children began gathering into their little aprons wreaths of ground-pine, sprigs of holly, and twigs of crimson bitter- sweet. The sexton, seeing their zeal, brought out to them a little cross, fancifully made of red alder-berries and pine.