e. I wonder how Mrs. Grinnell happened to give me a hair-ribbon
when she knows that my hair ain't long enough to tie back."

"How do you know Mrs. Grinnell gave it to you?" demanded Gail, too
astonished to reprove her.

"I was in there one day when she had been to Martindale, and the ribbons
happened to be on the table all unwrapped. This was one of them. Now,
Gail, see what Santa Claus has brought you. There's at least one thing,
'cause--"

Cherry clapped her hand over her younger sister's mouth, and began to
giggle. So did Gail, when she drew forth from her stocking a bulky
potato pig with toothpicks for legs, match-heads for eyes and a dry
woodbine tendril for a tail.

"Who in the world made that?" she laughed, tears close to the surface,
for she had expected nothing this Christmas day.

"Mr. Strong," gulped Peace, dancing with delight at her sister's evident
surprise. "Look at his back! We put a saddle on the old porker. Isn't
that cute? It's a spandy new dollar with this year's date on it. See?"

Gail turned the curious animal over, and sure enough, there was a
bright, shining Goddess of Liberty, skilfully sunk in the pig's potato
back.

Swallowing back the lump in her throat, which threatened to choke her,
Gail whispered, "Where did you get it, dear? The money, I mean."

"We took up a c'lection," was the startling answer.

"A collection!" echoed Gail.

"Yes. You know last Sunday was Home Mission day, and the money was to be
sent to poor ministers' families on the pioneer--"

"You mean frontier," corrected Hope.

"Well, whatever ear it was," continued Peace, serenely; "and that made
me wonder why folks never took up c'lections for poor ministers'
families right here among them. I asked Mr. Strong about it, and he said
we would take up another c'lection straight away, and buy a Christmas
present for a 'hero minister's hero mother-daughter.' He made me learn
those words; and we got a dollar in ten cent pieces without half trying.
I 'spect we could have raised a fortune if we'd had more time, but this
was on our way home from school yesterday. We couldn't find anything
pretty enough to buy here at the village, and it was too late to go to
Martindale for it, so we changed the dimes into a dollar and put it in
the potato pig. He said it ought to be a shining white angel, but I told
him right away that we had angels enough in this family already, and he
better make a horse. That is what he tried to do, but