As gifts were passed, many began to realize what the extra meetings at the schoolhouse had meant. The children had been making things, and had made them well. They had been engaged in manual training, though the teacher had not called it that. She was in advance of the age, and was doing practical work in manual training years before the pedagogues of the land had wakened to the necessity of training the hand.
The Gila children had made gingham aprons for mothers and sisters; they had crocheted lace and mats; they had made articles for domestic use, and so on.
When a new blouse waist and a pair of suspenders were given to Wathemah, his delight knew no bounds. Kenneth and Jack Harding stood watching him. The child was a favorite with both.
"Do you like your waist, little chap?" asked Kenneth.
"Yes!—Me!—Pretty!" said the child, patting and smoothing his waist as if it were an object of affection. Then he held his suspenders up for his two friends to see.
"Do you like 'em, sonny?" asked Jack Harding.
"Mine! Mine!—S'penders!—Wathemah's s'penders!"
The grown-ups smiled. The day had unlocked many a heart long barred and bolted against human sympathy.
"Two dolls, one for Nora and one for Kathleen Murphy," called out the superintendent.
"Did yez iver?" said Patrick, smiling with good humor, from the crown of his bristly head to the extremity of his bristly chin.