One by one the shepherds entered.  One by one they fell on their knees.  Away in the shadow stood the little girl, her hand on Melampo’s head.  In wonder she gazed while the shepherds presented their gifts, and were permitted each to hold for a moment the newborn Saviour.

Melampo, the shepherd dog, crouched on the ground, as if he too, like the ox and the ass within, would worship the Child.  Madelon turned toward the darkness weeping.  Then, lifting her face to heaven, she prayed that God would bless Mother and Baby.  Melampo moved closer to her, dumbly offering his companionship, and, raising his head, seemed to join in her petition.  Once more she looked at the worshipping circle.

“Alas,” she grieved, “no gift have I for the infant Saviour.  Would that I had but a flower to place in His hand.”

Suddenly Melampo stirred by her side, and as she turned again from the manger she saw before her an angel, the light from whose face illumined the darkness, and whose look of tenderness rested on her tear-stained eyes.

“Why grievest thou, maiden?” asked the angel.

“That I come empty-handed to the cradle of the Saviour, that I bring no gift to greet Him,” she murmured.

“The gift of thine heart, that is the best of all,” answered the angel.  “But that thou mayst carry something to the manger, see, I will strike with my staff upon the ground.”

Wonderingly Madelon waited.  From the dry earth wherever the angel’s staff had touched sprang fair, white roses.  Timidly she stretched out her hand toward the nearest ones.  In the light of the angel’s smile she gathered them, until her arms were filled with flowers.  Again she turned toward the manger, and quietly slipped to the circle of kneeling shepherds.

Closer she crept to the Child, longing, yet fearing, to offer her gift.

“How shall I know,” she pondered, “whether He will receive this my gift as His own?”

Berachah gazed in amazement at Madelon and the roses which she held.  How came his child there, his child whom he had left safe on the hillside?  And whence came such flowers!  Truly this was a wonder night.

Step by step she neared the manger, knelt, and placed a rose in the Baby’s hand.  As the shepherds watched in silence, Mary bent over her Child, and Madelon waited for a sign.  “Will He accept them?” she questioned.  “How, oh, how shall I know?” As she prayed in humble silence, the Baby’s eyes opened slowly, and over His face spread a smile.

THE LITTLE GRAY LAMB

ARCHIBALD BERESFORD SULLIVAN

Out on the endless purple hills, deep in the
  clasp of somber night,
The shepherds guarded their weary ones—­
  guarded their flocks of cloudy white,
That like a snowdrift in silence lay,
Save one little lamb with its fleece of gray.

Out on the hillside all alone, gazing afar with
  sleepless eyes,
The little gray lamb prayed soft and low, its
  weary face to the starry skies: 
“O moon of the heavens so fair, so bright,
Give me—­oh, give me—­a fleece of white!”