There was a strong strain of her father’s spirit of driving in Kate’s blood; but her mother was so tired of it that whenever Kate had gone just so far the older woman had merely to caution:  “Now, now, Katie!” to make Kate realized what she was doing and take a slower pace.  All of them were well, happy, and working hard; but they also played at proper times, and in convenient places.  Kate and her mother went with the children when they fished in the meadow brook, or hunted wild flowers in the woods for Polly’s bed in the shade of the pear tree beside the garden.  There were flowers in the garden now, as well as vegetables.  There was no work done on Sunday.  The children always went to Sunday-school and the full term of the District School at Bates Corners.  They were respected, they were prosperous, they were finding a joy in life they never before had known, while life had taught them how to appreciate its good things as they achieved them.

The first Christmas Mrs. Bates and Kate made a Christmas tree from a small savine in the dooryard that stood where Kate wanted to set a flowering shrub she had found in the woods.  Guided by the former year, and with a few dollars they decided to spend, these women made a real Christmas tree, with gifts and ornaments, over which Mrs. Bates was much more excited than the children.  Indeed, such is the perversity of children that Kate’s eyes widened and her mouth sagged when she heard Adam say in a half-whisper to Polly:  “This is mighty pretty, but gee, Polly, there’ll never be another tree as pretty as ours last year!”

While Polly answered:  “I was just thinking about it, Adam.  Wasn’t it the grandest thing?”

The next Christmas Mrs. Bates advanced to a tree that reached the ceiling, with many candles, real ornaments, and an orange, a stocking of candy and nuts, and a doll for each girl, and a knife for each boy of her grandchildren, all of whom she invited for dinner.  Adam, 3d, sat at the head of the table, Mrs. Bates at the foot.  The tiniest tots that could be trusted without their parents ranged on the Dictionary and the Bible, of which the Bates family possessed a fat edition for birth records; no one had ever used it for any other purpose, until it served to lift Hiram’s baby, Milly, on a level with her roast turkey and cranberry jelly.  For a year before her party Mrs. Bates planned for it.  The tree was beautiful, the gifts amazing, the dinner, as Kate cooked and served it, a revelation, with its big centre basket of red, yellow, and green apples, oranges, bananas, grapes, and flowers.  None of them ever had seen a table like that.  Then when dinner was over, Kate sat before the fire and in her clear voice, with fine inflections, she read from the Big Book the story of the guiding star and the little child in the manger.  Then she told stories, and they played games until four o’clock; and then Adam rolled all of the children into the big wagon bed mounted on the sled runners, and took them home.  Then he came back and finished the day.  Mrs. Bates could scarcely be persuaded to go to bed.  When at last Kate went to put out her mother’s light, and see that her feet were warm and her covers tucked, she found her crying.