Chapter III: Part 3

“The boys thought Mr. Eagle was great fun, and they made him enlist, by putting the colors around his neck and a shield on his breast so that he was really a living United States Emblem. Then they christened him ‘Old Abe’ in honor of the president, and made a standard for him, and after that wherever his regiment, the 8th Wisconsin, went, there was Old Abe in all his glory, so that the regiment became known as the Eagle Regiment.

“After the war he was taken back to Madison where he had started from three long years before, and was given a perch in the Capitol where he held a reception every day. P. T. Barnum wanted to buy him and so did many others, but he could not be purchased. There wasn’t money enough in the world to buy him.

“In the winter of 1864-5 he was taken to the big fair at Chicago where his photographs were sold for the benefit of sick and wounded soldiers, and he earned in that way 16,000 dollars. In 1876 he was taken to the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia where he was greatly admired, and when that was over he was taken home again to his perch in the State Capitol at Madison.

“In 1881 the bird died of old age and the people of Madison had his skin stuffed and mounted on his old perch. There Old Abe stood, looking every inch a war eagle and a hero, until the State House burned.”

“That is a very interesting story,” said Somebody.

“It is in a book called ‘The Great Seal’ by a Mr. J. Cigrand,” said the boy named Billy. “I’m going to read it all when I can read a little better.”

About Clocks

“Look at my new wrist-watch! Mom gave it to me for my birthday--isn’t it a beauty?” said the boy named Billy. “Radium dial ’n all; I can see what time it is in the dark. Handy when I’m on hikes, no more stopping to scratch matches. Stem winder ’n everything.”

“Goodness, Billy,” said Big Sister. “Anyone would think to hear you that there never was a watch like that of yours. We all have watches.”

Billy grinned. “Well,” he said, “I’ve wanted it so long. A fellow _needs_ something to tell time by. Who discovered how to tell time anyhow?”

“The first Caveman, probably,” said Somebody. “He needed to let the ladies of the family know when he was coming home to dinner, so he very likely pointed to the sun, and drew a line in the sand, to tell them that when the sunshine reached that spot he would be home and that dinner better be forthcoming pronto! That was the sundial idea, which was the only way of time-telling for ages. Cleopatra’s needle is supposed to have been one of the big sun dials. But as it was certainly inconvenient not to be able to tell the time on dark days, it was only a matter of time when some more convenient method of recording the hours would be found. When it did appear it was in the shape of the clepsydra, or water thief, a brass bowl with a hole in the bottom, which was floated on top of another bowl full of water, the principle being that when the bowl had filled itself with water an hour had passed, then a slave would empty the bowl, and hit it with a rod to announce the hour.”

“But someone must have sat up all night to watch the bowl and strike the hours,” said the boy named Billy.

“Precisely,” said Somebody, “so they consulted the stars, and discovered that they could divide the night into ‘watches’ of so many hours duration, and then they had different watchmen to sit up with the clepsydra, and announce the hours.

“The Priests of Babylon were very wise men indeed, and it was not long until they had figured out how to divide the years into months and weeks and days and hours and minutes and seconds.

“But it was not until 1581 that a young Spaniard, standing in the Cathedral of Pisa discovered, by watching a swinging lamp, the principle of the pendulum. He noticed that when it moved a short distance, it moved slowly, and that the farther it moved, the faster became the motion, making the long swing in the same time as it did the shorter one. And in this way was the pendulum applied to the making of time-telling machines.

“In the 12th Century there were clocks which struck the hours, but which had no dials or hands, but after the idea of time-telling machines started it traveled fast, and in the 14th Century real clocks began to appear.

“We have not time to go through the whole fascinating story of how the idea progressed, but we know that in Shakespeare’s time there were watches that could be carried in the pocket.”

“Why were they called ‘watches’ instead of clocks,” asked the boy named Billy.

“The clock, or orloge, as they were then called, struck the hours, and the watch was very probably so named from the silent ‘watches of the night’,” said Somebody. “That last is just a guess, but it’s as good as anybody’s guess at that.”

“Who made the first clock in America?” asked the boy named Billy.

“Eli Terry did, in the year 1809,” said Somebody, “and after a time he got Seth Thomas to help him. As soon as people realized what a very great convenience it was to be able to keep accurate time, nobody wanted to be without a clock. And then people began to travel more and needed to have something portable with which to tell time, and so the convenient watches came to be made.

“‘What time is it?’ you ask. Centuries of scientific progress, with vast labor and years of patient study, have been necessary to answer that question. You’ll find that men had to delve into mathematics, the mysteries of astronomy, the wonders of physics and chemistry, before they could force the hands on the dial to tell you when to start for school or to catch your train. As you look at a clock, remember that every time the minute-hand passes from one of its marks to the next, it shows that this huge globe on which we live has covered more than 1,000 miles of its headlong journey.

“And then along came Madame Curie, the brilliant French scientist, and discovered radium, the merest shadow of which makes the dial of your watch luminous for as long as it lasts.

“There is a very famous clock in Strasbourg which not only tells the time of day, but also the day of week, the month, and the position of the moon and the planets. At various times processions of tiny figures cross a stage, including a cock that crows. The day of week is indicated by a separate little figure which takes its place on a tiny platform.

“A watch is perhaps the most wonderful little machine in the world. Packed in a case sometimes no bigger than a twenty-five cent piece and less than a quarter of an inch thick are from one hundred and fifty to eight hundred separate parts. And there you are, Billy Boy!”

“Time for bed,” said Mother. “And don’t linger too long admiring your new watch or it will be time to get up.”

“Goodnight everybody, and Somebody,” said the boy named Billy, “and thanks again, Mom, for the watch. I’ve never before had such a jimdandy birthday gift.”

About Cotton

“Away down South in the land of cotton
Cinnamon seed and sandy bottom
Look away, look away, look away down South in Dixie,”

sang the boy named Billy.

“Wherever did you dig up that old Dixie song?” Somebody asked, smiling. “I haven’t heard it in years.”

“Bob White’s Grandfather is always singing it,” said the boy named Billy, “and we play soldier to it--it has such a dandy swing to it--listen:

“‘In Dixie Land I’ll take my stand
To live and die for Dixie--Look away--
Look away--look away down South in Dixie’

--it’s an old war song, isn’t it?”

“It is one of the old negro melodies which the boys adopted as a marching song in the Civil War,” said Somebody, “and very dear to the hearts of everyone from the ‘land of cotton’.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask something about cotton--Teacher says that if coal is king in America cotton is easily queen. I did not know before that it was so important--I thought you just made house dresses and aprons of it. Bob White says that when he was down South with his folks last winter the fields were all blossomed out white and the people were picking the flowers.”

“Bob should have asked questions about it,” said Somebody, “and in that way he would have found out that the white ‘blooms’ were in reality the ripened cotton, or boll, as it is called. When the cotton has gone to seed it is ready to be picked, and if left to itself would in time blow away in the winds, scattering its seeds just as old Grandfather dandelion does his.

“But it is far too valuable to be left to do that, so it is carefully picked and prepared for market; but valuable as the fibre, the seed, which is deeply embedded in the cotton, is almost more so. But the seed is very hard to get at, and before the cotton gin was invented by Eli Whitney it was a year’s work for one person to clean the seeds from enough cotton to make one bale, but now with the machinery they have it is easy to prepare many bales in one day.”

“Where did it come from?” asked Billy.

“Most of it,” said Somebody, “came from our own Southern States, but it has been grown in Asia and Egypt for centuries, being one of the oldest plants on record.”

“What are some of the uses of cotton?” asked Billy.

“They are so many I couldn’t begin to tell you,” said Somebody, “but all our bed linen is made from it, as well as most of our curtains, and underwear and the dainty things Little Sister wears, as well as the lovely voile dresses that make Mother look like a bunch of posies. It is indispensable for bandages and pads to dress wounds with and for many other things.”

“I think it’s wonderful,” said the boy named Billy, “how many of the things that we use every day just grow.”

“Yes, indeed,” said Somebody, “Mother Nature has put everything we could possibly need, in this good old world of ours, and expects us to use our brains to find out just how to use them.”

“Thanks, Somebody,” said the boy named Billy, “I’m going over to tell Bob White all about those wonderful cotton flowers he thinks he saw!”

About Coral

“Uncle Bob has just returned from California,” said the boy named Billy, “and has brought Big Sister a necklace of very beautiful coral beads; not a bit like the dark red branchy looking ones that she has had since she was a baby! These are rose pink with little hand-carved roses all over them. What sort of a stone is coral, and where is it found? It’s lovely!”

“Strictly speaking,” said Somebody, “although coral has all the appearance of stone it isn’t that at all, although it is just as dangerous to a ship to run aground on a reef of it as it would be to run on the rocks--it’s so jagged and sharp. It is really the bones you might say of living creatures which made their homes in that particular spot for ages and dying have left their skeletons behind them for a monument.

“These little sea animals are called polyps and the coral grows inside their soft outer structure just as your bones do inside your flesh. Among the greatest architects in the world are the little coral-making animals, creatures of shallow water in the warmer seas. Some kinds live all alone, but the commoner ones live in colonies of many individuals united by a stalk with many branches--sort of a family tree you might say--indeed they were once called plant animals. They have a very helpful and economical way of living,” went on Somebody, “for when something good to eat swims or floats within reach of one little polyp’s mouth he sucks it in, swallows it, and all his hungry relatives get the benefit of it.”

“That’s what I’d call being real chummy,” said the boy named Billy. “How do they manage that?”

“They have a sort of family stomach,” said Somebody, “or reservoir into which all food absorbed by the colony goes.”

“I don’t believe I’d like that very well,” said Billy. “One fellow might have to eat all the things he didn’t care about and another would get all the pie.”

“I do not suppose the polyp has much to boast of in the way of the sense of taste,” laughed Somebody, “but you’ve got to admit that he does his duty as he sees it without shirking.”

“I should say he does,” said Billy. “What else does he do besides working for the good of his family?”

“He has a quite important hand in making the ‘beauteous land,’” said Somebody. “The Great Barrier Reef of Australia, extending a thousand miles along the coast and in some places from one to three miles wide, was made entirely by the Polyps. Also the keys of Florida, as well as the Everglades, are made entirely upon coral foundation.”

“That is very interesting,” said the boy named Billy. “But if there is so much of it why is it so expensive?”

“There’s only one kind that is precious,” said Somebody. “That is the _corallium rubrum_ of the Mediterranean Sea. It was once supposed to be endowed with sacred properties of a mysterious nature; the Mandarins of China wear coral buttons made from it as their badge of office. There is also a very rare black coral which makes its home in the warm water of the Great Australian Barrier Reef. The Italians are the greatest coral workers, making a most valuable industry of making jewelry and buttons and other small articles.

“There’s a lot more to learn about this subject, but that’s all I am able to tell you just now,” said Somebody.

“Thanks,” said the boy named Billy. “I’ll read up on it.”

The Star-spangled Banner

The boy named Billy came running into the house one morning, full of the joy of living and singing at the top of his voice, “O, long may the star-spangled banner still wave, o’er the land of the free-ee and the home of the brave.”

“Get a step-ladder, Billy. You’ll never reach that ‘land of the free’ any other way,” advised Big Sister.

“Well, say,” said Billy grinning, “I’m not a prima donna; it takes a real voice to climb up there. I love it, but I wish there were not so many high places in it. Francis Scott Key never thought of me when he wrote it, that’s sure.”

“Francis Scott Key hadn’t a thing to do with it, silly-Billy,” said Big Sister. “How do you learn your history anyhow?”

“Well, Somebody, please tell me who did write it then?” asked Billy. “That’s what teacher said anyway.”

“Perhaps it was not made quite clear to you, Billy Boy, that the words only were written by Francis Scott Key. You’re not alone in wishing that it was not quite so difficult; when I come to that high note I always stand on tiptoe and I’ve never struck it yet, and nine out of ten people have the same difficulty; yet I love it, as we all do.

“As to who really wrote it there seems to be no clear record, some crediting it to Dr. Samuel Arnold, an Englishman, but others claim it for John Stafford Smith, who made it over from an old French composition. Anyway, it was used as a popular song in England for some years and was used in other ways also.

“In 1798 it was used by Robert Treat Paine in a political way, for a song called ‘Adams and Liberty.’

“Everyone knows how the words came to be written. It was in the Summer of 1814 when we were at war with England; the British under General Ross appeared in the vicinity of Washington and after overcoming feeble resistance took the capital and set fire to the White House and some other public buildings. The President and the Cabinet fled, while pretty Dolly Madison bundled up the most precious White House treasures, including Washington’s picture and the original draft of the Declaration of Independence and carried them to safety. Then the British prepared to bombard Baltimore from the sea and attack it from the land side. Francis Scott Key was sent with a friend to the British Fleet to get a prisoner of war. As the British were about to attack the town and the Fort he was not allowed to return, and you may imagine how anxiously he watched for the dawn to come and with what joy, when the mists rolled away that he beheld the starry banner still flying from the fort. With the tears of thankfulness streaming down his cheeks he wrote the first stanza of his now world-famous song and later in the day, when he had returned to the city, he finished the poem.

“It was first printed under the name of ‘The Bombardment of Fort McHenry,’ in the Baltimore American and immediately became very popular.”

“It’s a great song,” said the boy named Billy, “but I think almost anyone could have written a great song under those conditions--if he could write at all.”

“Yes indeed,” agreed Somebody.

About Umbrellas

“It’s raining, Billy,” called Mother from upstairs, “take your umbrella when you go to school.”

“O Mother, _please_” said the boy named Billy, “I just _hate_ to carry an umbrella--_whoever_ invented the old things anyway?”

“I guess old Mr. Toad invented the idea when he hunched under the first toadstool; and next after him was an honorable Chinese gentleman who got his idea from the branches of the umbrella tree.

“In olden times no one but those of royal family were allowed to use the umbrella, and then only as a protection from the sun, as they were made only of the daintiest silks and brocades, and even of rice paper,” said Somebody.

“It did not seem to occur to anyone that it could be used as a protection against the rain until early in the eighteenth century, when it was introduced in England. Even then people hesitated to use it on account of the ridicule it called forth.”

“So you see,” said the boy named Billy, “I’ve got a good right not to like to carry one.”

“M-m--yes,” said Somebody. “Only you will observe, that as soon as people began to really realize what a very sensible article it was and how much it saved them in the way of spoiled clothes, not to mention damp shoulders, of course they didn’t mind at all what a few foolish ones thought who did not know a good thing when they saw it.”

“Time for school, Billy,” called Mother, “and never mind taking your umbrella--the rain is over.”

“Oh, goody!” exclaimed the boy named Billy.

Hallowe’en

“What are you going to do with that monstrous pumpkin, Billy Boy,” asked Big Sister, one crisp autumn day.

“Going to make a Jack O’Lantern of it,” said the boy named Billy.

“Somebody, why do we dress up and make believe we’re a lot of witches on Hallowe’en when we know there is nothing like that in the world?”

“All Hallow Eve,” said Somebody, “is the name given to the vigil of Hallowmas, which falls on the night before the Feast of All Saints Day. The Ancients lighted bonfires on that night to scare away ghosts and witches.

“The Romans had a festival in honor of Pomona, the goddess of fruits, in which apples featured, which accounts for the custom of bobbing for apples in tubs of water, which to this day the young folks think is so much fun.”

“That’s all right for girls,” said the boy named Billy, “but regular fellows can find something better to do.”

“What, for instance?” asked Big Sister.

“Oh, making Jack O’ Lanterns, and playing tricks on other fellows,” said Billy.

“I know a fine trick that a lot of husky chaps like you and Bob White and your gang could play on another fellow,” said Somebody.

“What is it?” asked Billy. “We’re game for almost anything that you could suggest.”

“Old Grandsire Johnson, who lives all alone in that little house at the edge of town, has just had his winter’s coal delivered,” said Somebody. “I think it would be fine if the Hallowe’en spirits would go up there while he is at prayer meeting tonight and put it all in the shed for him.”

“Oh, fine,” said the boy named Billy. “I know a bunch of healthy spooks that would just love a little job like that.”

About Wolves

“Look at this funny old pair of curly-toed skates that I found in that funny old horse-hair trunk in the attic,” said the boy named Billy. “They look like toys, and seem about big enough for little sister. Nobody ever could have really used them to skate with, could they?”

“Those skates were your great-grandmother Ellen’s racing skates,” said Somebody, “and if they had not been rather practical and not at all the toys they look, in comparison with the ones in use now, you would not be here this afternoon.”

“Why?” demanded the boy named Billy, sensing a story.

“Your great-grandmother Ellen,” said Somebody, “was considered to have been the most expert skater, the most fearless rider, and the most popular young lady in the section of the country where she grew up, and on the day of which I am speaking, she had one of the most thrilling adventures ever staged anywhere, not excepting the movies.”

“A _really-so story_!” exclaimed the boy named Billy, “and in the family, too!”

“It was many, many years ago,” said Somebody, “and happened away up in the wilds of Maine, where your great-great-grandfather lived with his family on the farm which he had taken away from the forest.

“Nobody lived at the head of the lake, which was long and narrow and more like a river in appearance, except your great-great-grandfather and his sons and daughters; but half way down, about ten miles, there was a small village, where the post-office was and where the young people of the surrounding country used to gather for their dances and good times. So one day in winter, when great-grandmother Ellen was about seventeen years old, she started out early to skate down to the settlement to a party. The party proved entertaining, and also the farewells detained her, and she was dismayed to see that just as she was getting her last skate-strap firmly fastened, the sun was going down behind the tall hemlock trees.

“Ten of the thirty minutes it would take her to skate home had gone and all was well, then far behind her she heard the long-drawn hunting call of the timber wolf.

“A few moments later, almost parallel with her, there broke from the forest a pack of the hunger-stricken beasts. Instantly the girl swerved in a skilful zigzag--and instantly the wolves swerved in the same direction--their long claws slipping on the ice as they swerved. On they came again and again. Sometimes they were so near that their snapping jaws almost caught her skirts, and to gain time she managed to unwind her long wool scarf, which she allowed to float behind her, to be seized and torn to pieces, which gave her a moment’s advantage. Then, just as she was wondering how much longer she could go on there were shots, and the pack scattered, leaving behind several of their number.”

“What happened?” asked the boy named Billy.

“The men, coming in from work, discovered Ellen was late, and one remembered he heard wolves down the lake. He picked up his rifle and skated down to meet his sister.”

“May I have these skates?” asked Billy. “I like to look at them and remember that they belonged to a real girl. I’ll hang them on my wall.”

“I’m sure that great-grandmother Ellen would be very happy to have them belong to you, Billy. You’re just the kind of boy that she would have approved of,” said Somebody.

How Thanksgiving came

“Gobble, gobble, gobble,” said Mr. Turkey Cock proudly spreading his wonderful turkey tail fan and looking as pompous as no one but he can look.

“Oh, you funny, conceited bird,” said the boy named Billy, “you won’t be so noisy next Thursday when we have you for Thanksgiving dinner. But that reminds me--won’t somebody please tell me why the turkey is called our National bird? I thought it was the eagle. And why do we always have Thanksgiving Day on Thursday?”

“Well, you see, Son,” said Somebody, “it started this way. As you of course know, our Pilgrim Fathers and Mothers came over in the Mayflower and landed on Plymouth Rock on November 21st, 1620; just one hundred and two brave souls in a strange land, full of strange people who might well resent their being there. Although it was late in the year and cold weather, they managed to build themselves houses of a sort; but with the best that they could do more than half of them perished that first terrible winter.

“When Spring came, those who were left, with the help of the Indians, bravely planted the crops and started to make a home in the wilderness. The Indians gave them corn for seed and taught them how to plow the land and fertilize it, and with the seed that they had brought with them they managed so well that when harvest time came they had a bountiful yield. To express their gratitude to God who had so marvelously prospered them, as well as to show their friendliness to the Indians, Governor Bradford issued a proclamation to the effect that they would have a Thanksgiving feast to which Chief Massasoit and his braves were to be invited, which should last from Thursday morning until Saturday night. That was in October, 1621.

“But the Pilgrim Mothers, remembering the harvest festivals of England, with the barbecued sheep and oxen which they used to have, said ‘How can we make a feast? We have no meat.’ ‘Meat,’ said Governor Bradford, ‘why the woods are full of it.’ So he sent four of his very best riflemen out into the forest for wild turkeys, and they brought back so many that there was enough meat for the three days feasting for the colonists and their guests, the Indians. And ever since then no Thanksgiving feast could be really right without a nice plump turkey.”

“Did the Indians like the feast?” asked the boy named Billy. “Indeed they did,” said Somebody; “they liked it so well that Chief Massasoit sent his young men back with a gift of nice fat deer which they had shot especially for the colonists. Chief Massasoit wanted to show Governor Bradford that the Indians knew how to play fairly.”

“So that’s how Thanksgiving became,” said the boy named Billy.

“Yes,” answered Somebody, “but it was a long time after that before it became the good old holiday that we know now.

“In the first year of his office, President George Washington issued a proclamation recommending that November 26, 1789, be kept as a day of “national thanksgiving” for the establishment of a form of government that made for safety and happiness. After that, it was only held at odd times, but in 1863 it became a National holiday and the last Thursday in November is always proclaimed by the President as a day of prayer and thanksgiving.”

“We’re going to have the whole family here for dinner this year,” said the boy named Billy; “and we’re going to have turkey and cranberry jelly and pumpkin pie ’n’ everything.”

“_Gobble_, gobble, gobble,” remarked Mr. Turkey Cock.

“We shall!” remarked the boy named Billy, laughing.

Christmas!

“God rest ye merry gentlemen
Let nothing you dismay,
Remember Christ our Savior
Was born on Christmas day,”

sang the boy named Billy, a bit off key. “_Billy_” begged Big Sister, “please get that correctly--you’ll throw the whole choir off if you sing it that way--come to the piano and I’ll drill you until you can _sing_ it!”

“Run along now, you’re letter perfect,” said Big Sister after a half-hour of practice, “I’m going to wrap up my gifts now, and it’s no fair peeking, either.”

“Oh, I don’t care anything about your gifts,” said Billy, “I’m going to stay right here and Somebody is going to tell me all about Christmas and why we give gifts and everything. Was it because the wise men brought gifts to the baby Jesus?”

“Perhaps,” said Somebody, “but it seems more likely that it grew out of the realization of God’s great gift to the world--the gifts of Love and Friendliness and Peace which He bestowed upon us in sending His only son to teach us how to live.”

“‘Peace on earth, good will toward men,’” quoted Billy softly. “That’s enough to make people happy.”

“Christmas was not always the happy time that it is now,” said Somebody. “The early Christians had rather a hard time of it.”

“I remember,” said the boy named Billy, “I never could understand how they had the courage to keep it up.”

“They were upholding Truth,” said Somebody, “and Truth is the strongest thing in the world.”

“Was Christ really born on December 25th?” asked Billy.

“Probably not,” said Somebody. “The Eastern church celebrated January 6th, as the date of birth, calling it Epiphania, while the Western church celebrated December 25th, calling it Natalis. The Pagans had a festival at this season of the year called THE BIRTHDAY OF THE SUN of which they were very fond. Out of this grew the idea of using that time to celebrate the birth of Christ, the spiritual Sun of the world. This gradually took the place of the old pagan festival.”

“The singing of Christmas songs is an English custom, is it not?” asked Billy.

“Yes,” said Somebody. “There are many beautiful old-world customs which were left behind when the Puritans came to the new world in search of a place in which to worship in their own way.

“In Devonshire, England, it is said that the bees sing all night long in their hives the night before Christmas, and if you are wise you will go and wish them a Merry Christmas and hang a bit of holly on each hive, else you may get no honey next year.

“And you must on no account ask to borrow a match or a bit of fire on Christmas day, because fire is the symbol of the heart of the house and of happiness, and you must always add to and not take away from the happiness of others.

“In spite of the Puritan’s striving to leave behind them all the old legends, several did survive. I remember that one Christmas Eve when I was a small child, my mother being away at a party, I was taken at midnight out to the stable to see the cattle, who were supposed to be on their knees, worshipping the child who was born in a manger.”

“And were they?” asked the boy named Billy.

“I couldn’t really say,” said Somebody, “but they all scrambled to their feet when they saw the light of the lantern, and asked for clover hay. It seemed to me that we had disturbed their slumbers!

“In Norway is a most beautiful old custom that might well be copied everywhere,” went on Somebody, “which is called ‘The Ceremony of Feeding the Birds.’ Two or three days before Christmas bunches of oats are placed on the roofs and tied to the branches of trees and shrubs, loads of grain being brought into the towns for the purpose. And no one would dream of sitting down to his own dinner without first giving every animal on the place an extra portion in the name of Christ.”

“How did the Christmas-tree custom first begin?” asked Billy. “There is a tale to the effect that St. Boniface once came upon a group of Pagans at the Thunder Oak to which a living child had to be sacrificed every year, and, holding the Cross in front of the victim told the story of the coming of Christ. The child was saved, and the Oak destroyed by lightning, and in its place was seen a young fir tree pointing with its tall green finger toward heaven. From that time on Christianity was openly professed, until it has now covered the whole world.

“Today the observance of Christmas is universal. In England and America the little folks hang up their stockings in a row before the fireplace--in France the children place wooden shoes on the hearth to receive their gifts, and Norwegian children have a lot of fun hunting their new toys which have been tucked away in unexpected places. Everywhere it is above all the children’s holiday.”

“That’s interesting,” said the boy named Billy. “Thank you and Merry Christmas, Somebody.”

“Same to you Billy Boy,” said Somebody.