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SOME PLACE FOR ME.

WHAT if a little ray of light,

Just starting from the sun,
Should linger in its downward flight,
Who'd miss the tiny one?
Perhaps the rose would be less bright
'Twas sent to shine upon.

What if the rain-drop in the sky,
In listless ease should say,
'I'll not be missed on earth, so I
Contented here will stay?'

Would not some lily, parched and dry,
Less fragrant be to-day?

What if the acorn on the ground
Refused its shell to burst?

Where would the stately tree be found?
Or if the humble dust

Refused the germ to nestle round,

What could the sailor trust?

I am a child. It will not do
An idle life to lead,

Because I'm small, with talents few;
Of me the Lord has need,
Some work or calling to pursue,

Or do some humble deed.

I must be active every hour,
And do my Master's will;
If but a ray can paint the flower,
A rain-drop swell the rill,
I know in me there is a power
Some humble place to fill.

Congregationalist.

TINY'S SLIPPERS.

A CHRISTMAS STORY.

[graphic]

NE sweet, spring morning, long before sunrise, though there was a yellow flush in the east, some one ran along the quiet road in Cedarbrook, shouting 'Fire fire!' The farmers hurried out of their beds, and ran out in the first grey light, and sure enough, just over the clump of hickories on the hill, a dense cloud of smoke, streaked with flame, was rising. Then away rushed the farmers and their sons in that direction, while their excited wives and daughters stood at their gates, shivering in the chill morning air, watching the smoke and listening to the shouts.

By and by the flame all died down, and by sunrise the men came home, and said that old John Peters was burned out of house and home. How it happened no one ever knew, and no one thought much about it long; for old John was only the village shoemaker, and his house not much of a house. But for the two inmates of the old, rough, weather-beaten abode which the fire had eaten, I can assure you it was a great event. In the first place, they were left without a shelter in the wide world, and how could another be built without money? That was a very puzzling question indeed, and I will make haste to tell you how they answered it.

Old John sold the strip of land on which his house had stood, for a small sum of money, with which he bought boards and hired a carpenter, and then he set about building again. And where do you think he put his house? Why, right in the edge of Farmer Hall's huckleberry pas

ture! on land that could not be used for anything except bushes; and when the wee bit of a dwelling was quite finished, he moved his family, consisting of himself and Tiny, into the new abode, which everybody except the owner laughed at.

But for all that, they were just the two happiest people you ever saw. There were only two little rooms; but Tiny, who was rightly named, hugged her old father, and declared that she wouldn't change for even Farmer Hall's great house. For, could not any one see how much pleasanter this was, with the cozy rooms and the two windows, where the huckleberries grew right up to the very ledges! And if she were hungry in the night, she had but to turn on her little bed, thrust her hand out of the window, and take a luncheon of the jetty berries. Then Tiny had to hug and kiss her father again, while both laughed at the little conceit, and old John declared that she was the dearest, darlingest little daughter that ever a poor shoemaker had; which made Tiny suddenly remember that the fire wasn't kindled in the little old stove, nor the tea-kettle filled for boiling. Then, while her father was bringing in his tools and work-bench, she kindled a fire of the blocks which the carpenter had left, and ran out, as of old, to fill the tea-kettle; but, lo! and behold! there was no well there. Tiny ran in with a very blank face, thinking that the new house was not quite perfect after all; but when old John took her a little way along a path that ran through the huckleberries, and showed her the little spring that nestled like a drop of crystal under the bank, and then wasted its sweet life among the greenest of feins and mosses, she was fain to cry out that it was better than all the wells in Cedarbrook! So you see it was, after all, one of the most perfect habitations in the world, for, in the eyes of its inmates, the little abode was faultless.

If you could have looked in, of a fair summer evening, and seen the old shoemaker and his little daughter eating their supper from the little, old, round table, you would

have said that Peace and Content had taken up their abode in the quaint bit of a dwelling. True, there was not much, generally, but bread and butter and water-cress for supper; but, then, what did it matter? No one says that Peace and Content are very particular what they have to eat.

But when the midst of the huckleberry season came, that was the happiest time of all. Everybody in Cedarbrook seemed to find it a great deal pleasanter to go huckleberrying, now that the little house stood at the bar-way. There, when one entered the pasture, was old John, pounding away at his soles, and humming to himself as blithely as a bird. There, on the knoll, where the blackest berries grew, sat Tiny, picking away as if for dear life, while every now and then she raised her little curly head to catch her old father's smile, that was sure to be ready for her, and to hear the old, flat-headed hammer echo, as it drove the pegs-one, two! one, two! one, two! And when the fruit-gatherers were tired and thirsty, there hung the brightest of tin dippers on the old bar-post, with which they might dip water that was as cold and pure as if born in the heart of an iceberg. And last, but not least by any means, if one was so unfortunate as to tear shoe or gaiter, in rambling the old pasture over, the shoemaker and a remedy lay in the very path homeward, so that everybody was accommodated, and the contents of old John's purse somewhat multiplied thereby. And before huckleberries were half gone, everybody in Cedarbrook that went huckleberrying were wondering how they ever managed before that droll, funny, but accommodating little house was built. So, in course of time, both shoemaker and little daughter grew into everybody's affections, which I am sure would never have happened at all if they had not been burnt out of house and home, and compelled to take up their abode in a huckleberry pasture.

Now the shoemaker had burned his foot somewhat, in his anxiety to save his bench and tools from the devour

ing flames, and though he wore a leather slipper, the material was too harsh and stiff to be very acceptable to his lame foot. Little Tiny regarded this as the only drawback to their happiness, and often puzzled her childish brain to devise some way to mend the matter. One morning, as she sat stripping the jetty berries from their twigs, her sun-bonnet thrown back, that the wind might fan her brow, the right plan popped into her head all at once, just as if the morning zephyrs had brought it to her on their wings; and, clapping her hands, she exclaimed, 'Oh goody! why didn't I think of it before, I wonder?' And then she went on picking huckleberries harder than ever, if that were possible. When noon

came, and the factory bell, over in the village, rang, there was her little pail quite full. Never before had she had such good success. It must have been because she was working to accomplish a great object which she had in view.

After her dinner of bread and milk was finished, she put on her neat little gingham sun-bonnet, asked her father for an hour's absence, which the shoemaker readily granted, for he trusted his little daughter, and then both huckleberries and Miss Tiny disappeared down the yellow, glowing road that led village-wards.

'How much are huckleberries, please?' said an anxious little voice, over the top of Mr. Phipps' grocery counter, not long after.

Mr. Phipps, who was proprietor, clerk, and boy-of-allwork, stopped his occupation of ladling sugar from a barrel, to see where this tiny query came from. He saw only a neat little girl, with a gingham sun-bonnet, standing there, so he asked

'Did you speak to me, ma'am ?'

'Yes, sir.

How much are huckleberries, please?'

Wall,' said Mr. Phipps, 'huckleberries are ten cents. 'Do you buy them, sir?'

'Wall, yes, I do. But when we buy 'em we only give eight cents. I thought you wanted to buy, miss.'

'No, I want to sell. Will you buy mine, sir?' said

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