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SCRUBBY’S BEAUTIFUL TREE.

BY J.C.  PURDY.

I.

“Papa!”

“Well, dear!”

“Wont to-morrow be Kissmuss?”

“Why, no, darling!  We had Christmas-day long ago.  Don’t you remember?”

“Yes; but you said we’d have another Kissmuss in a year, and then I’d have such a pitty tree.  I’m sure it’s a year.  It is a year, papa; and it takes so awful long to wait for some time—­it’s jess a noosance.  I fink ole Kriss was drefful mean not to let me have a tree only cos we’d got poor.  Wasn’t we ever poor before, papa?  Don’t he give trees to any poor little girls?  I do want a tree—­sech a pitty one, like I used to have!”

It was little Scrubby said all that.  She was only four years old, but she could say what she had to say in her own fashion.  When she saw her father’s sorrowful face, she thought she had said rather too much this time; so she gave him a hug and put up her mouth for a kiss.

“I dess I can wait, papa,” she said.  “But he will bring me a tree next Kissmuss, wont he?  Jess like I used to have?  And then wont that be nice!  There’s my baby waked up.  She’ll be cryin’ in a minute, I s’pose.”

Old Lucy, the dearest baby of all in this little girl’s large family, was taken up and quieted; and then something happened that was really wonderful.  Scrubby, with her poor torn and tangled doll in her arms, sat very still for at least five minutes.  The little maid was thinking all that time.  She did not think very straight, perhaps, but she thought over a great deal of ground, and settled a good many things in that busy little head of hers; then she sang them all over to good old Lucy.

“Hush, my dear!” she sang.  “Don’t stay long, for it beats my heart when the winds blow; and come back soon to your own chickabiddy, and then Kissmuss’ll be here.  S’umber on, baby dear.  Kriss is coming with such a booful tree; then wont you be s’prised?  She went to the hatter’s to get him a coffin, and when she come back he was fixin’ my Kissmuss-tree!”

The little singer grew so enthusiastic when she came to the tree that she could not wait to sing any more; so she just danced Lucy up and down and chattered to her as fast as her tongue could go.

“It’ll be for me and for you, Lucy, and for all the babies, and then wont you be glad!  And for mamma too, and for papa, cos we’s all good little chillen, if we is poor.  Yes, indeed, Ole Kriss is coming with his reindeer.  And he’ll bring me a horse with pink shoes on; and you’ll have a piano—­a really piano, ye know; and mamma, she’ll have two little glass s’ippers, and—­and—­”

Little Scrubby stopped chattering just there, and laid her head down on poor old Lucy’s kind bosom.

“Oh dear!” she sighed, “I do wish ole Kriss’d come with that pitty tree!”