s
at home, and two tickets were desirable.

"Let us buy three tickets to the lyceum now," said Margaret.

"Same money would buy three turkeys," answered Helen, "and we're close
on Thanksgiving and Christmas."

"Yes, Nelly," cried Tommy, who was thoroughly tired of bread and
molasses, "buy the turkeys."

"Be quiet, child," said the mother; "you can't go to the lyceum, you
know; so don't be selfish."

"Well, which would be best," meditated Margaret, who had a way of
spending other people's money as well as her own,--"turkeys or tickets?"

"The turkeys will feast the whole family, the tickets only us three,"
said Helen.

"And then our bonnets are so shabby," said Margaret.

"Buy the turkeys, mother," pleaded Tommy, piteously.

"Hush now, Tommy! You've no voice in the debate," declared Margaret.
"You're not a member of the Lyceum Society."

"But I'm a member of the Turkey Society," urged Tommy, as a finishing
argument.

The result of the conference was, that, as Frederick's shoes were fast
approaching the character of sandals with leathern thongs, they were
surreptitiously subtracted from his bedside at night, and their place
filled by a pair of stout boots, which would carry him well into the
winter. That was yesterday. Meanwhile, to-day, no coals; no kindlings,
if there had been; last year's bill due, and dunned for; winter upon
their heels; the night growing chilly. Helen wrapped a cloak round
little Sarah, and gave her her precious black rosary to play with, and
bade Tommy take excellent care of her, and for reward he need recite
only half his usual spelling-lesson when she came back. Then she ran up
the hill behind the house,--she had reached that pass that she did not
care whether the neighbors saw or not,--and fell to gathering sticks.
Once the spot had been a wood-lot, now long since dispeopled of its
dryads; a young sapling or two had sprung up in place of the old growth,
and boughs and twigs were blown there in the storms. Helen came down
with her arms full, and trailing a couple of great branches behind her.
These, at the back door, she broke up, reserving larger pieces for the
parlor blaze, and the small bits for a good kitchen fire; and, that
done, decided to catch a couple of her choice chickens, and decapitate
them, although she shut her eyes and cut her own thumb in the course of
the procedure; these chickens, which were her special property, had been
reserved by her for some occasion, and when