"Here we go round and round and round,
Here we go round the Christmas tree."
The elderly gentlemen who stood with their backs to the fire were spectators of all this fun, frolic, and jollity. But they were not the only ones.
For past the broad and open gate, as he had been creeping through the snow—oh so slowly and wearily—a tiny boy, attracted by the sound of the gladsome voices, had paused to listen. Listening or looking is such a cheap pleasure that even the very poorest can indulge in it. The snowflakes had for a time ceased falling, and from behind a mass of clouds the moon was struggling. But the red rays from the window more than rivalled its splendour, and very inviting indeed did they appear to the little wanderer. He first looked in through the gate, then he crept in through it. Nearer and nearer to the window, closer and closer to the joy within, till the lamplight shone directly on his white, pinched face, and glittered in his dark and wondering eyes, as he stood there keeping hold of a snowy branch with one hand, as if afraid of falling.
To listen and to look on while the rich enjoy themselves—oh yes, these are the privileges of the very poor! But somehow on the present occasion little Jack Mackenzie was doing more than simply listening and looking. Quite unintentionally, remember. He was associating himself with all the games and pleasure inside the room. He was no longer a thinly-clothed, bare-footed laddie, shivering in the winter's snow; he was one of that prettily-dressed crowd of beautiful children playing around the Christmas tree. Fairies he called them in his own mind; for he had once been treated to a gallery seat at a pantomime, and this was just like that, only ever so much more beautiful and natural. No wonder he felt interested and entranced, or that several times his lips parted to give utterance to the exclamation "Oh!" though he always restrained himself in time.
Was it any wonder this poor, half-starved boy was delighted with the scene before him? It was, he thought, as different from what he was used to behold in that part of the city he called his home, as the heaven his mother often spoke about must be from earth—that heaven to which his father had gone, long, long, long ago, so long ago that he couldn't remember him, and always thought of him only as a saint Up Yonder somewhere, where he himself would go one day if he was good.
So completely are Jack Mackenzie's senses enthralled, that he does not hear the sound of a manly voice singing adown the broad terrace, but coming nearer and nearer every moment,—
"'Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home.
A charm from the skies seems to hallow us there,
Which seek through the world is ne'er met with elsewhere.
Home, home, etc.
"An exile from home, splendour dazzles in vain:
O give me my lowly thatched cottage again!"
No, Jack doesn't hear the song. Nor does he see the singer, until he is suddenly caught by one shoulder and wheeled right round to confront a well-dressed and handsome man with a huge brown beard, on which melted snow-flakes sparkle like diamonds.
"Hullo! hullo! so I've caught you, have I?" The new-comer had bent down, and was gazing straight into Jack's face.