ears of happiness ran
down her face, and as each gift was placed in her lap, she could only
grasp the hand of the giver,--she could not speak.

And what of Ethel! No one would have known her for the unhappy-faced
maiden who had so lamented their plight. All this time she had been
the moving spirit in the whole matter. She had worked hard herself,
and inspired others to work, too. She was rosy and happy on this
evening, her eyes bright and shining; and when her mother placed in
her hand her own Christmas gift, which she had been secretly carrying
to grace the tree at Grandma's, her happiness overflowed, and she
exclaimed:--

"Why! I almost forgot the party to-night at Grandma's!"

At the close of the evening, as the party were about to return to
their car, the conductor rapped for silence, and announced--as the
best gift of the evening--that help had come from outside and cut
through the drifts, so that before morning they would be able to take
up their journey.

It was a very happy-faced Ethel who, the next morning, jumped out of
the sleigh which had brought them up from the station, and ran to kiss
her grandmother and aunts and cousins, brought together from great
distances for the happy Christmas time. And after all, she didn't miss
the tree, either, for, although Christmas had passed, all the party
begged to defer the tree till the Jervis family arrived; and there it
stood at that moment, all ready for lighting.

Nothing of this was told to the Jervis children, however, till after
supper was over, when Grandmother invited the whole company to go into
the room where it stood, lighted from the top twig to the pedestal it
stood on, and hung full of beautiful gifts.

* * * * *

"That's a nice story," said Kristy; "it was lovely of them to save the
tree for Ethel. It isn't bedtime yet," she went on suggestively, as
her mother busied herself with her work.

"No; it isn't bedtime; but you must have had enough stories for one
day, Kristy."

"No, indeed! I never have enough!" said Kristy warmly.

"Well, here's another, then, and it's true, too." And Mrs. Crawford
began.

CHAPTER XIV

HOW A BEAR CAME TO SCHOOL

One warm spring morning, near the town of A----, away off in the edge
of the deep woods, a bear awoke from his long winter sleep, came out
of his den under the roots of a great fallen tree, stretched his
half-asleep limbs, opened wide his great mouth in a long, lo