It is New Year's eve. Frank and Harry are sitting with their mother by the pleasant fireside. The boys were full of chat, but their mother was looking fixedly into the fire, and had been silent for a long time. She was thinking of the past; they, of what was to come.
"Mother," said Harry, "will you tell me tonight what my new year's gift will be?"
"Don't speak to mother now," said Frank.
"Why not?
"O, because mother looks as if she did not want to talk."
"But mother told me that, if I would be silent till she had done reading, I might talk as much as I pleased to her."
"So I did, Harry," said his mother; "and now I am ready to hear you. What did you ask me?"
"Only, Mother, whether you meant I should know what my new year's gift is, before tomorrow morning."
"No, dear; I think you had better have it all new and fresh to-morrow; the surprise is a part of the pleasure of a new year's gift."
"What can it be? I know what I hope it is."