The Birds' Christmas Carol

THE BIRDS’ CHRISTMAS CAROL BY KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1886, BY KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN COPYRIGHT, 1888, BY HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY COPYRIGHT, 1914 AND 1916, BY KATE DOUGLAS RIGGS ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO REPRODUCE THIS BOOK OR PARTS THEREOF IN ANY FORM EIGHT HUNDREDTH THOUSAND
TO THE THREE DEAREST CHILDREN IN THE WORLD BERTHA, LUCY, AND HORATIO

t was very early Christmas morning, and in the stillness of the dawn, with the soft snow falling on the house-tops, a little child was born in the Bird household.
They had intended to name the baby Lucy, if it were a girl; but they had not expected her on Christmas morning, and a real Christmas baby was not to be lightly named—the whole family agreed in that.
They were consulting about it in the nursery. Mr. Bird said that he had assisted in naming the three boys, and that he should leave this matter entirely to Mrs. Bird; Donald wanted the child called Dorothy, after a pretty, curly-haired girl who sat next him in school; Paul choose Luella, for Luella was the nurse who had been with him during his whole babyhood, up to the time of his first trousers, and the name suggested all sorts of comfortable things. Uncle Jack said that the first girl should always be named for her mother, no matter how hideous the name happened to be.
Grandma said that she would prefer not to take any part in the discussion, and everybody suddenly remembered that Mrs. Bird had thought of naming the baby Lucy, for Grandma herself; and, while it would be indelicate for her to favor that name, it would be against human nature for her to suggest any other, under the circumstances.
Hugh, the hitherto baby, if that is a possible term, sat in one corner and said nothing, but felt, in some mysterious way, that his nose was out of joint; for there was a newer baby now, a possibility he had never taken into consideration; and the first girl, too,—a still higher development of treason, which made him actually green with jealousy.