brought us to our feet, and at the door was the sleigh with the broken cutter piled into it with all the parcels that had been picked out of the snow, and tied to the seat was Archie’s mare.  I hesitated leaving Alice on such a day, but she insisted I must go with my friend.  It was not a long drive but it was a slow one.  I turned back into Yonge street, where there would be a track broken, and kept on it until we reached the corner to turn westward.  We halted an hour at the corner-tavern to feed and rest the horses, which could not have made the headway they were making had they not been a noble team, Allan’s pride.  The way, however, was not long to us, for we had much to talk about.  Archie narrated his past life, and, curious about mine, I had to tell him my simple story.  Reserve there was none.  Once again we were boys, rejoicing in each other, and warming to one another as true friends do in exchanging their inmost confidences.  I will not relate what he told, for I will weave into his narrative what I got afterwards from his sister and his father and mother, and present it in connected form.  We were passing down a concession, which had every indication of being a prosperous settlement, when Archie pointed to a brick house in the far-distance as his.  On drawing near we found its inmates had been on the watch, for tumbling through the snow came four children, who clambered in beside us, rejoiced to see their father and anxious to know what he had brought for them.  On reaching, at last, the house there was gathered at the door the two oldest of the family, a fine-looking girl and a tall lad, with the mother, and behind them an aged couple.  A hired man took the team, but the mare, looking to the lad at the door, whinnied.  He jumped forward and led her to her stall.  ’That is his pony,’ remarked Archie.  What a scene of rejoicing on that day of joy the world over!  Mrs Craig, to give her name, told how they had waited the night before for the coming of Archie until the younger members fell asleep in their chairs, how they had kept supper warm, and how, not until two in the morning, they had gone to bed, convinced he had stayed overnight somewhere on the road, for the possibility of misadventure they would not admit The forenoon had been of more anxious waiting, for as time slipped they began to dread an accident had befallen him.  To have him back safe, and the parcels safe, was perfect joy, and the two youngest darted from the house to try the sleds Santa Claus had sent them by their father.  Mrs Craig, a tidy purpose-like woman, was profuse in thanks to me for helping her husband.  Archie’s father and mother struck me, at the first glance, as the finest old couple my eyes had ever rested upon.  He was tall and rugged in frame, as became an old shepherd, but his face was a benediction—­so calm, so composed, such a look of perfect content.  His companion recalled grannie, only more alert.  Burns might have taken them as models for his song,