house, and through the garden into the orchard, and
there in the orchard, under an apple-tree, there was a little girl
lying fast asleep among the buttercups and daisies. The little story
looked all around to see that no one else was there, and then it
cuddled down beside the sleeping child and whispered itself into her
ear. It was so exciting, so charming, that the little girl awoke, and
thought she had dreamed it all, and ran to tell her mother the
beautiful dream. When she saw her mother, she cried out, "Mother!
mother!" and was just about to tell the little story, when suddenly she
forgot it all, and now the little story can never be told, but it still
comes to good children in their dreams.

* * * * *

A little girl, eleven years old, sends these verses of her own
composition to the "Letter-Box":

VALENTINE.

I am a little Cupid,
And I come to visit thee,
To tell you that I love you,
And to know if you love me.

And if you'll be my little wife,
And come along with me,
I'll take you to a lovely place,
And pretty flowers you'll see.

And when you have been there a day,
You'll be a little Cupid,
With no hard lesson-books to learn,
That are so dull and stupid.

But, if you will not come and be
My pretty little wife,
You'll go straight back to school again,
With lessons all your life.

K. UNIACKE.

* * * * *

Two Rivers, Wis.

DEAR ST. NICHOLAS: I am not quite ten years old, but I am one of
your oldest subscribers. We have every number from the very first.
I have a brother Fred, two years older than I. We have always lived
on the shores of Lake Michigan.

During the summer months, the steamer comes in from Chicago every
morning. Fred and I like to get up early in the morning, and go
down to the beach, before breakfast, to see the steamer go out;
and, afterward, the morning train, for the station is near the
beach. It is lovely down there early in the morning; we dig wells,
sail boats, and wade out after the waves that chase us back again.

We love the lake, and spend many happy hours down there. But
sometimes it's a very wicked lake. Three weeks ago it blew very
hard all night, and in the morning the waves were rolling up like
mountains, and near the harbor pier there lay a wreck. Although
they were so close to the