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Christmas

For a long time it seemed that Christmas would never come On Christmas, Uncle Andrew and Aunt Delia, Uncle Wesley and Aunt Lind

y, and all the cousins were co to dinner It would be the best dinner of the whole year And a good boybut switches in their stockings on Christ that he could hardly stand the strain

But at last it was the day before Christirls were cleaning the whole house, and Mother was baking Royal helped Father with the threshing, but Almanzo had to help in the house He re and cheerful

He had to scour the steel knives and forks, and polish the silver He had to wear an apron around his neck He took the scouring-brick and scraped a pile of red dust off it, and then with a wet cloth he rubbed the dust up and down on the knives and forks

The kitchen was full of delicious s, frosted cakes and cookies and mince pies and pumpkin pies filled the pantry shelves, cranberries bubbled on the stove Mother was oose

Outdoors, the sun was shining on the snow The icicles twinkled all along the eaves Far away sleigh-bells faintly jingled, and from the barns came the joyful thud-thud! thud-thud! of the flails But when all the steel knives and forks were done, Almanzo soberly polished the silver

Then he had to run to the attic for sage; he had to run down cellar for apples, and upstairs again for onions He filled the woodbox He hurried in the cold to fetch water froh, then, anyway for a -room side of the stove

“Do the parlor side yourself, Eliza Jane,” Mother said “Al”

Almanzo’s insides quaked He kneould happen if Mother knew about that black splotch, hidden on the parlor wall He didn’t want to get a switch in his Christ, but he would far rather find a switch there than have Father take him to the woodshed

That night everyone was tired, and the house was so clean and neat that nobody dared touch anything After supper Mother put the stuffed, fat goose and the little pig into the heater’s oven to roast slowly all night Father set the da clean socks on the back of a chair, and Alice and Eliza Jane hung stockings on the back of another chair Then they all took candles and went to bed It was still dark when Almanzo woke up He felt excited, and then he re He jerked back the covers and ju alive that squirotten that Royal was there, but he scra:

“Christmas! Christhtshirt Royal jurabbed the candle, and Royal shouted: “Hi! Leave that be! Where’sdownstairs Alice and Eliza Jane were flying fro all lurabbed his sock The first thing he pulled out was a cap, a boughten cap!

The plaid cloth waswasAnd the ear-muffs were buttoned over the top

Almanzo yelled He had not even hoped for such a cap He looked at it, inside and out; he felt the cloth and the sleek lining He put the cap on his head It was a little large, because he was growing So he could wear it a long time

Eliza Jane and Alice were digging into their stockings and squealing, and Royal had a silk ain, and pulled out a nickel’s worth of horehound candy He bit off the end of one stick The outside ar, but the inside was hard and could be sucked for hours