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"O, two great hairy faces, like the giants in our picturebook!"

"Where? What do you mean, Bobby?"

"Here, at the window. They frightened Maggie so." "O yes, that they did," said Maggie, holding on to her "You ain't afraid, Mabel?"

sister's gown.

"No, dear; come along." So she went to the window, which looked out on the garden, and which she had opened a few minutes before to freshen the room.

"Why, Bobby, you must have fancied it all."

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No, no; did n't we see two great hairy faces, such big ones, looking in?"

"O yes, Mabel."

Mabel looked out carefully amongst the shrubs. The moon and snow made it almost as light as day, except just in the shadow of the house; but she could see nothing.

"Well, Bobby, you see they 've run away. They could n't get through these bars at any rate; so we're quite safe. Hark! there are the school-children, singing a carol at papa's window. Come along; you can go and hear them, and say good-night to papa." And so Mabel and the children left the kitchen.

"Nearly caught, eh, Johnny?" whispered the elder of our travellers, as the two drew themselves up in the shadow of the house, behind a laurel. "Who was the pretty little bright-eyed girl?"

"My little sister, Maggie."

"And the boy?"

"My youngest brother, Bob."

"And the tall girl they ran up to?"

"My eldest sister, Mabel."

"You're a lucky dog. Hark! what's that?"

"The school-children, singing a carol before the house." They listened while the young voices sang the grand old carol,

"While shepherds kept their flocks by night."

Neither spoke for some seconds after the voices ceased. "What are you going to do, Johnny," Herbert said, gently, at last.

"O, I don't quite know yet; I am so confused still. You don't mind waiting a little?"

"Not a bit. As long as you please, so that we get housed by bedtime."

6

"Here come the people to Ashen Fagot,' stand back."

*

"Now, papa. They have done supper, and Dick and I have put the Ashen Fagot on, and it's just blazing up. You'll come in and wish them a merry Christmas, won't you?"

Mr. Kendrick rose from his chair in the parlor, where he was sitting with his wife and Mabel, and prepared to go with Willie.

"But the vicar is n't come," he said; "he would like to go in with me and say a few words to them."

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"O John, I'll wait for the vicar and Nelly, and bring them in for a few minutes when they come."

So Mr. Kendrick and Mabel went with Willie back to the kitchen, where the Ashen Fagot was already crackling and roaring away merrily on the dogs. The women, who had supped with their husbands and brothers, were seated in the chimney-corner, and round one side of the fire on benches, leaving the space clear between the fire and the long table. At the upper end of the table, the bailiff, the carpenter, the parish clerk, and the wheelwright were seated, and the farm-laborers, men and boys, below. Mabel joined the women, while her father took the top of the table; the men all rising till he had taken his seat, with Willie by his side. Dick was seated at his ease next to the bailiff, on the opposite side from Moses, the carpenter.

There were several large copper jugs on the table, out of one of which Mr. Kendrick filled a horn of beer.

"Here's a merry Christmas to you all," he said, drinking, " and I hope you've enjoyed yourselves to-night?”

"Ees, ees, that us hev'," chorused the men, and, at a sign from the bailiff, Moses, the carpenter, cleared his throat and sang: :

"Here's a health unto our maester,

Th' vounder ov this veast;

I haups to God wi' aal my heart,
His sowl in heav'n may rest,
And ael his works med prawsper,
Wutever he teks in hand,
Vor we are ael his zarvents,
And ael at his command.

CHORUS.

"Then drenk, bwoys, drenk,
And mind you do not spill;

Vor, ef you do, you must drenk two,

Vor 't is our maester's will.”

"Your health, zur, and missus's, and ael th' fam'ly, and a merry Christmas to ee ael, and many ov 'em!" followed this poetical greeting, which was sung vociferously, the words being those of an old harvest-home song, well known for generations to all the inhabitants of Avenly.

"Now you can light your pipes, and make the most of your time; the Ashen Fagot waits for nobody."

The lighting up of pipes soon followed this permission; and Mr. Kendrick, after chatting for a minute or two to the men nearest him, was just getting up to speak, when the lowest of the hazel bonds of the Ashen Fagot burst.

"A bond! a bond! drenk to th' bond!" said several voices. The bailiff looked at his master, who seated himself at once. "No, no, I can wait," he said; "keep to your custom. A sip and a song for every bond.”

This saying was received with enthusiasm, and a call on Muster Hockle followed. The carpenter seemed the favorite performer. "Gie's th' howl's disaster, Maester Hockle," suggested the bailiff.

"I've often heard my gram 'mer tell

Of a peart young owl, as ael the day
In a nook ov the paason's barn did dwell,
In hidlock blinkin' the time away.

"But, zo zoon as ever the zun were zet,
A poachin' away like mad went he,
And once his desarvings he did get,

As aal o' you shall presently zee.

"A vlod vor miles auver hill and dale,

And a caddled the mice in many a vield;
For ael o' you as heers this tale

Do know as the weakest must allus yield.

"At last a hunted zo vur away

That the zun cum peeping auver the hills,
And the birds waked up and did un espy,

And wur ael in a churm az um whetted their bills.

"Gwo at un, my bwoys,' the missel-dresh cries;
'A vrightened my mate, and her eggs be ael addled';
And the yuckle did scraam,' Let us peck out his eyes;
Zich a girt mouchin' wosbird deserves to be caddled.'

"Thaay dreshed un long, and thaay dreshed un zore;
Thaay dreshed un and tar ael the dowl vrom his yead,
And thaay vollured un whoam unto the barn dwoor,
And ther' thaay left un purty nigh dead.

MORAL.

"Now, ael you young men as loves ramblin' o' night,
Be plazed from this story to take timely warnin',
Vor ther' med be them as ud not thenk it right

If you chances to get auvertuk by the marnin'."

Any one who had thought of looking at the garden window during Moses's song would have been able to confirm the story of little Maggie on all points, except as to the size of the two faces which peered through the windowbars. They might easily have fancied that the fleshy embodiments of some two antagonist Christmas principles were watching the Ashen Fagot supper from without; so marked was the contrast between the merry, curious look of

the lighter, and the painful tension of muscles and hungering anxiety of the darker face.

"Lawk! do 'ec look, Miss Mabel. Zhure as vate I zeed zummat at th' winder," whispered Goody Ockle, the carpenter's wife, to Miss Kendrick.

Mabel glanced at the window a little nervously, and thought she detected figures disappearing; but her father. had now risen to speak to his men, and she turned to listen.

remem

"You all know," he said, with his homely Wiltshire manner, which gave him such a hold over the people who lived round him,-"you know well, after all these years we have lived side by side as good neighbors, how much I enjoy meeting you here at such times as this. For five and twenty years now we have met here, and had our merrymakings, our harvest-homes, and Ashen Fagot nights, through bad times and good times. Well, we've had good times lately in field and fold, and I hope we 're all thankful for them, and laying by something against hard times, which will be sure to come back again, sooner or later, ber that. When they come, I hope we shall all pull together as we have done before; but there's nothing like being a little before the world. The only one of all those twentyfive Ashen Fagots which I have n't seen burnt with you was the last one. You all know why I was n't with you. It had pleased God to send me a very fearful trial last year, and I had n't the heart to come among you as usual. I know how pleased you will all be to hear that I have had good news to-day from the other side of the world, — good news of Master John." Here his voice faltered; and when the rough murmurs of sympathy had subsided a little, he changed the subject abruptly, and went on: "It has always been a source of great pride to me, and to our good vicar, whom we all love as an old friend, though he has only been with us four years or so," (the vicar, who had just entered, with Mrs. Kendrick on his arm, followed by his daughter,

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