d not exactly the zest of burglary, although it was of
kin: nor was it quite like the search for buried treasure which we
played on common days: yet to slink along the hallway on a pitch-black
Christmas morning, with shoes dangling by the strings, was to realize
a height of happiness unequaled.

Quietly we tiptoed down the stairs on whose steep rail we had so often
slid in the common light of day, now so strangely altered by the
shadows. Below in the hall the great clock ticked, loudly and with
satisfaction that its careful count was done and its seconds all
despatched. There was a gurgle in its throat before it struck the
hour, as some folk clear their throats before they sing.

As yet there was not a blink of day. The house was as black as if it
practiced to be a cave, yet an instinct instructed us that now at
least darkness was safe. There were frosty patterns on the windows of
the sitting-room, familiar before only on our bedroom windows. Here in
the sitting-room arose dim shapes which probably were its accustomed
furniture, but which to our excited fancy might be sleds and
velocipedes.

We groped for a match. There was a splutter that showed red in the
hollow of my brother's hand.

After the first glad shock, it was our habit to rummage in the general
midden outside our stockings. If there was a drum upon the heap,
should not first a tune be played--softly lest it rouse the house? Or
if a velocipede stood beside the fender, surely the restless creature
chafed for exercise and must be ridden a few times around the room. Or
perhaps a sled leaned against the chair (it but rested against the
rigors of the coming day) and one should feel its runners to learn
whether they are whole and round, for if flat and fixed with screws it
is no better than a sled for girls with feet tucked up in front. On
such a sled, no one trained to the fashions of the slide would deign
to take a belly-slammer, for the larger boys would cry out with scorn
and point their sneering mittens.

The stocking was explored last. It was like a grab-bag, but glorified
and raised to a more generous level. On meaner days shriveled
grab-bags could be got at the corner for a penny--if such mild fortune
fell your way--mere starvelings by comparison--and to this shop you
had often trotted after school when learning sat heaviest on your
soul. If a nickel had accrued to you from the sale of tintags, it was
better, of course, to lay it out in pop; but with