A Christmas Child (Musaicum Christmas Specials). Mary Louisa Molesworth

      "Why, I am sure you know that, Master Ted. You must have forgotten. Ask your mamma again."

      Ted took her advice. Later in the evening he went downstairs to say good-night. His mother was outside, walking about the garden, for it was a beautiful summer evening. Ted ran to her; but on his way something caught his eye, which sent a pang to his little heart. It was the bunch of flowers he had gathered for her, lying withered already, poor little things, on a bench just by the door, where she had laid them when saying good-bye to her visitors. Ted stopped short; his face grew very red, and big tears rose slowly to his eyes. He was carefully collecting them together in his little hand when his mother called to him.

      "Come, Ted, dear," she said; "what are you about?"

      More slowly than his wont Ted trotted towards her. "Muzzer doesn't care for zem," he said, holding out his neglected offering. "Poor f'owers dies when they's leaved out of water."

      "My darling," said his mother with real sorrow in her voice, "I am so sorry, so very sorry, dear little Ted," and she stooped to kiss him. "Give them to me now, and I will always keep them."

      Ted was quickly consoled.

      "Zem's not towslips," he said regretfully. "Ted would like towslips for muzzer." And then with a quick change of thought he went on, "What is praying to 'Dod?" he said, looking up eagerly with his bright blue eyes.

      "Praying to God means asking Him anything we want, and then He answers us. Just as you ask me something, and I answer you. And if what we ask is good for us, He gives it us. That is one way of answering our prayers, but there are many ways. You will understand better when you are bigger, dear little Ted."

      Ted asked no more, but a bright pleased look came into his face. He was fond of asking questions, but he did not ask silly ones, nor tease and tease as some children do, and, as I said, when he got an answer he thought it well over in his little head till he got to understand, or thought he understood. Till now his mother had thought him too little to teach him to say his prayers, but now in her own mind she began to feel he was getting old enough to say some simple prayer night and morning, and she resolved to teach him some day soon.

      So now she kissed him and bade him good-night.

      "God bless my little boy," she said, as she patted his head with its soft fair hair which hung in pretty careless curls, and was cut across the forehead in front like one of Sir Joshua Reynolds' cherubs. "God bless my little boy," she said, and Ted trotted off again, still with the bright look on his face.

      He let nurse put him to bed very "goodly," though bed-time never came very welcomely to the active little man.

      "Now go to sleep, Master Ted, dear," said nurse as she covered him up and then left the room, as she was busy about some work that evening.

      Ted's room was next to his mother's. Indeed, if the doors were left open, it was quite easy to talk one to the other. This evening his mother happened to go upstairs not long after he had been tucked into bed. She was arranging some things in her own room, moving about quietly not to waken him, if, as she hoped, he had fallen asleep, for falling asleep did not come so easily to Ted as to some children. He was too busy in his mind, he had too many things to think about and wonder about for his brain to settle itself quietly all in a minute. And if he had a strong wish, I think it was that going-to-bed time should never come at all!

      For a minute or two no sound reached Ted's mother.

      "I do hope he is asleep," she said to herself, but just then she stopped short to listen. Ted was speaking to himself softly, but clearly and distinctly. What could he be saying? His mother listened with a smile on her face, but the smile grew into a sort of sweet gravity as she distinguished the words. Little Ted was praying. He had not waited for her to teach him—his baby-spirit had found out the simple way for itself—he was just asking God for what he wanted.

      "Please, dear 'Dod," he said, "tell me why thoo won't make towslips grow in this countly. Muzzer loves zem so."

      Then came a perfect silence. Ted seemed to be holding his breath in expectation, and somehow his mother too stood as still as could be. And after a minute or two the little voice began again.

      "Please, dear 'Dod, please do tell me," and then the silence returned as before. It did not last so long, however, this time—not more than a minute at most had passed when a sound of faint crying broke upon Ted's mother's hearing—the little fellow had burst into tears.

      Then his mother could stay away no longer.

      "What is the matter, my boy?" she said; anxious, baby though he was, not to make him feel ashamed of his innocent prayers by finding that she had overheard what he had said when he thought himself alone.

      "What is my Ted crying about?"

      The tears, which had stopped for an instant, came back again.

      "Muzzer," he said, "'Dod won't 'peak to Ted. Ted p'ayed and p'ayed, and Ted was kite kite kiet, but 'Dod didn't 'amswer.' Is 'Dod a'leep, muzzer?"

      "No, my boy, but what was it that Ted wanted so much?"

      "Ted wanted towslips for muzzer, but 'Dod won't amswer," he repeated piteously.

      A shower of kisses was mother's answer, and gently and patiently she tried to make him understand the seeming silence which had caused his innocent tears. And, as was Ted's "way," he listened and believed. But "some day," he said to his mother, "some day," would she not take him to "a countly where towslips did grow?"

      Chapter II.

       In the Garden.

       Table of Contents

      "Heigh ho! daisies and buttercups,

       Sweet wagging cowslips, they bend and they bow."

      Songs of Seven

      Down below the garden of Ted's pretty home flowed, or danced rather, with a constant merry babble, a tiny stream. A busy, fussy stream it was, on its way to the beautiful little river that, in its turn, came rushing down through a mountain-gorge to the sea. I must tell you about this mountain-gorge some time, or, if you like, we shall visit it with Ted and his faithful companion, whom you have not yet heard about—his father's great big Scotch collie dog, Cheviott.

      You don't know what a dear dog he was, so brave, but so gentle and considerate. He came of a brave and patient race, for you know "collies" are the famous Scotch sheep-dogs, who to their shepherd masters are more useful than any two-legged servant could be. And though I am not sure that "Chevie" himself had ever had to do with "the keeping of sheep," like gentle Abel of old, yet, no doubt, as a baby doggie in his northern home, he must have heard a good deal about it—no doubt, if his tongue had had the power of speaking, he could have told his little master some strange stories of adventures and narrow escapes which had happened to members of his family. For up in the Border mountains where he was born, the storms sometimes come on so suddenly that shepherd and flock are all but lost, and but for their faithful collies, might never find their way home again. Often, too, in the early spring-time, the poor little lambs go astray, or meet with some accident, such as being caught in the bushes and being unable to escape. What, then, would become of them but for their four-footed guardian, who summons aid before it is too late, and guides the gentle, silly lambkins and their mothers along the right paths? I think Ted's father and mother did well when they chose for their boy a collie like Cheviott for his companion.

      Across the stream, just at the foot of the garden path which sloped down from the house, a couple of planks were placed as a bridge. A narrow bridge, and not a very firm one, it must be confessed, and perhaps for that very reason—because there was something a little risky and dangerous about it—Ted, true boy that he was, was particularly fond of crossing it. He liked to stand on it for a minute or two on the way, "jigging" up and down to feel the shaking and trembling of the planks, but that, of course, was only a kind of playing with danger. I don't think he would have much