e storm and, as he said, the
abandoned coach must be near his claim, he asked to be taken along
because he was afraid his children would be freezing to death.

The men stopped and surveyed the sleeping boys and girl. Their glances
ranged from the children to the bulging stockings and the pile of
Christmas presents in the racks.

"Well, can you beat that?" said the conductor.

"By George!" exclaimed Rancher Ives, "a regular Christmas layout!"

"These are my children safe and well, thank God!" cried Mr. Wright.

"Boy," said the conductor, laying his hand on Henry's shoulder, "we came
to wish you a Merry Christmas."

"Father!" cried Mary Wright, awakened by the voice, and the next minute
she was in his arms, while she told him rapidly what Henry had done for
them all.

The boys were awake, too, but humanity had no attraction for them.

"Santa has come!" shouted Philip making a dive for his stocking.

"This is your uncle, Jim Ives," said the conductor to Henry.

"And this is my father," said Mary in turn.

"I am awfully sorry," said Henry to the conductor, "but we had to eat
your dinner. And I had to chop up your kitchen table," he added, turning
to Mr. Wright.

"I am glad there was something to eat in the pail," said one.

"You could have chopped the cabin down," said the other.

"By George!" said the ranchman proudly. "I wrote to your father to send
you out here and we'd make a man of you, but it seems to me you are a
man already," he continued as Mary Wright poured forth the story of
their rescue.

"No, I am not a man," said Henry to his uncle, as he flushed with pride
at the hearty praise of these men. "I am just a--"

"Just a what?" asked the conductor as the boy hesitated.

"Why, just a Boy Scout," answered Henry.

LOOKING INTO THE MANGER

_A Christmas Meditation_

Christmas morning, the day we celebrate as the anniversary of the birth
of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, in the obscure, little hill town
of Bethlehem in the far-off Judaean land, over nineteen hundred years
ago!

It is said:

"When beggars die, there are no comets seen:
The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes."

What is true of the passing of kings is perhaps more true of their
coming; yet in this birth are singular contradictions. The Child was
born a beggar. There lacks no touch which even imagination could supply
to indicate the meanness of His earthly condition. Homeless, His
mother, save