When poor Jimmy Scarecrow saw Santa Claus his heart gave a great leap.
"Santa Claus! Here I am!" he cried out, but Santa Claus did not hear
him.

"Santa Claus, please give me a little present. I was good all summer
and kept the crows out of the corn," pleaded the poor Scarecrow in his
choking voice, but Santa Claus passed by with a merry halloo and a great
clamour of bells.

Then Jimmy Scarecrow stood in the corn-stubble and shook with sobs until
his joints creaked. "I am of no use in the world, and everybody has
forgotten me," he moaned. But he was mistaken.

The next morning Betsey sat at the window holding her Christmas
doll-baby, and she looked out at Jimmy Scarecrow standing alone in the
field amidst the corn-stubble.

"Aunt Hannah?" said she. Aunt Hannah was making a crazy patchwork quilt,
and she frowned hard at a triangular piece of red silk and circular
piece of pink, wondering how to fit them together. "Well?" said she.

"Did Santa Claus bring the Scarecrow any Christmas present?"

"No, of course he didn't."

"Why not?"

"Because he's a Scarecrow. Don't ask silly questions."

"I wouldn't like to be treated so, if I was a Scarecrow," said Betsey,
but her Aunt Hannah did not hear her. She was busy cutting a triangular
snip out of the round piece of pink silk so the piece of red silk could
be feather-stitched into it.

It was snowing hard out of doors, and the north wind blew. The
Scarecrow's poor old coat got whiter and whiter with snow. Sometimes he
almost vanished in the thick white storm. Aunt Hannah worked until the
middle of the afternoon on her crazy quilt. Then she got up and spread
it out over the sofa with an air of pride.

"There," said she, "that's done, and that makes the eighth. I've got one
for every bed in the house, and I've given four away. I'd give this away
if I knew of anybody that wanted it."

Aunt Hannah put on her hood and shawl, and drew some blue yarn stockings
on over her shoes, and set out through the snow to carry a slice of
plum-pudding to her sister Susan, who lived down the road. Half an hour
after Aunt Hannah had gone Betsey put her little red plaid shawl over
her head, and ran across the field to Jimmy Scarecrow. She carried her
new doll-baby smuggled up under her shawl.

"Wish you Merry Christmas!" she said to Jimmy Scarecrow.

"Wish you the same," said Jimmy, but his voice was choked with sobs, and
was also muffled, for his old hat had slipped down to his chin.