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TO
THE GREATEST LOVER OF CHILDREN
THE AUTHOR HAS EVER KNOWN
AND TO THE CHILDREN SHE LOVES
BEST IN ALL THE WORLD

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ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

As wide awake as a boy could be who had made up his mind
to keep awake until midnight. Frontispiece

Tommy had never before had any real coasting like this. 10

They flew on, over fields of white snow. 43

"Look, Look! The captain has lent that little boy his
'Seven Leaguers.'" 54

What was their horror to find that they both had forgotten
to load their guns. 84

Santa Claus said to him, "I want to put Johnny in bed
without waking him up." 93

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[Illustration]

TOMMY TROT'S VISIT TO SANTA CLAUS

I

The little boy whose story is told here lived in the beautiful country
of "Once upon a Time." His name, as I heard it, was Tommy Trot; but I
think that, maybe, this was only a nick-name. When he was about your
age, he had, on Christmas Eve, the wonderful adventure of seeing Santa
Claus in his own country, where he lives and makes all the beautiful
things that boys and girls get at Christmas. In fact, he not only went
to see him in his own wonderful city away up toward the North Pole,
where the snow never melts and the Aurora lightens up the sky; but he
and his friend, Johnny Stout, went with dogs and guns to hunt the
great polar bear whose skin afterwards always lay in front of the big
library fireplace in Tommy's home.

This is the way it all happened.

Tommy lived in a big house on top of quite a high hill, not far from a
town which could be seen clearly from the front portico and windows.
Around the house was a large lawn with trees and shrubbery in it, and
at the back was a big lot, in one corner of which stood the stables
and barns, while on the other side sloped down a long steep