When she had washed the dishes, she turned the big chair round so that I could look out of the window, and Hal and John came out on the lawn and made a snow-man for me to look at.
It was a fine man, with two legs and two arms, and they kept playing he was the British, and knocking his head off.
Mamma told me I mustn’t turn round till she said I might, but I didn’t want to, anyhow, the man was so funny.
I heard Papa whispering at the door, and I did want to see him, but I knew I couldn’t, ’cause the other children haven’t had the fever: and then I heard things rustle, paper and something soft, like brushing clothes.
They went on rustling, oh, a long time! and there was jingling, too, and I began to want to turn round very much indeed; but I didn’t, of course, ’cause I said I wouldn’t.
At last Mamma came up softly and tied something over my eyes, and told me to wait just a minute; and it really did not seem as if I could.
Then she turned the chair round, and took the thing off my eyes, and—what do you think was there?
A Christmas tree! A dear little ducky tree, just about as big as I am, and all lighted with red and blue candles, and silver stuff hanging like fringe from the branches, and real icicles. (No! Mamma says they are glass, but they look real. They are in a box now, and I can play with them.)
And everything on the tree was for me. That makes a rhyme. I often make them.
There was a lovely doll, all china, with clothes to take off and put on, and buttons and buttonholes in everything. I have named her Christine, because that is the most like Christmas of any name I know.