A Doll's Christmas by C. N. Lurie

Santa over 120 years ago.

        One Christmas eve a wax doll sat on a chair In a pretty room In which a number of children were in bed. A fire was burning on the hearth. Stockings were hanging on the mantel to be filled with toys for the children who were sleeping soundly, doubtless dreaming of what they were to receive in the morning. The face of one of them, a delicate, fair haired boy, was turned toward the doll, and she did not tire looking at it, for the face, though pale and thin, was very delicately molded. On the mantel were two figures in porcelain. One was a boy in an old fashioned coat and knee breeches, with; a sash around his waist and a cocked hat and feather. His right hand was thrust into his coat in front, and he looked like a figure of Napoleon. The other was a girl, with a short dress and a sailor hat. Her head was poised one side, and she looked very well satisfied with herself. Indeed, she was very pretty.

        "How do you do?" said the girl china figurine to the doll. Don't you think this a pleasant room?
       ''Indeed it is, but I've not see many. I was only born‚" She paused to think again when she was born, but couldn't remember, so she said instead, "Isn't it a beautiful world?"
       "Do you think so?" said the boy. "My sister and I have had a hard time getting into it. We were baked in a furnace, and it was so hot!
       "Well, don"t tell me about it," interrupted the doll. "I'd rather hear about pleasant places."
       The figures told her a great many things, but the girl was very vain of her beauty, and the boy was taken up with what he knew about the world, of which the doll knew nothing at all, so she didn't listen long, but fell asleep while they were talking.
       Suddenly she awoke with a start. What was that noise in the chimney? She had scarcely time to think about it when out on the hearth popped a little figure in fur. He unstrapped a pack he carried and filled all the stockings with toys. Then he jumped back into the chimney and was gone in a twinkling. This set the doll to wondering more than ever. Everything was again silent except the clock, which ticked very loud. There were the children asleep in bed, the little pale faced boy with his head resting on his arm, the girl figurine on the mantel with her head on one side thinking how pretty she was and the boy thinking how much he knew about the world. The doll soon went to sleep again.
       In the morning she was awakened by a shouting. The children were running about in their night clothes, taking their toys from thier stockings and chattering like monkeys. The fair haired boy sat up in bed and looked on, for he was to delicate to get up like the other children. The doll noticed that he had great blue eyes, which seemed ever so large as he looked wonderingly at all that was going on. Then there came a knocking on the wall, and the children knew that it was a signal for them to get back to bed and not take cold, and back they scrambled, laughing and tumbling over one another, and covered themselves up. Presently the father and mother came in and distributed the toys. The doll was for one of the girls, but the boy insisted on having it himself. Then when all were loaded with presents they carried them down to the breakfast room.
       What a day it was! The children were racing about, playing with their toys, and people were coming in continually to see the presents, and the sun shone brightly on the snow outside, and the fire shone brightly with in on the brass andirons and fender, and after dinner stories were told the children till they were all astonished by the number of wonderful things that happened. The boy with the light hair and blue eyes lay in his mother's arms, hugging the doll with her breast pressed against his, so that she could
hear his heart bent, and site wondered why there was no such beating in her own heart. This was the happiest moment she had ever known. She was only a day old, but something told her that nothing in the world could ever make her happier.
       When the children went upstairs the boy insisted on keeping the doll by him till he got into bed, when his mother persuaded him to part with it till morning. She placed It on a chair before the fire where he could see it till he should go to sleep and the first thing on awakening In the morning. When the children were all asleep the doll looked up from the chair at the images on the mantel. She was too happy to go to sleep.
      "What a lovely day I have had.'' she said.
       Just wait," replied the boy china figure until you have been knocked about the world awhile and you'll see." He looked as wise as an owl.
       I think it very nice.'' said the girl figurine "so long as you are young and pretty, but I don't like the idea of getting old and cracked, perhaps having my arms or legs broken off.''
       The wind was rising outside, and suddenly they were blazed with a cheerful warmth. It was very pleasant for awhile, but presently it seemed to be too hot. The doll thought she began to feel a softening In her feet. She didn't know what it meant, but it frightened her. It extended to her legs; then she felt it in her arms and at last in her face and neck. A log of wood fell down on the coals, and they were burning higher and hotter than ever. The doll felt herself melting away.
       "You're going,"  said the boy figurine from the mantel. "It's Just as well; the world isn't all like this household."
       It's just as well," echoed the girl figurine. Your beauty will not have to fade."
       I don' t want to go," cried the doll mournfully. I want to stay with my blue eyed boy. The world may be full of sadness, but there must be pleasure as well, for it is here."
       There was something so plaintive In her voice that even the china figures refrained from any further remarks. The fire blazed hotter, and the wax, which had only yet only softened, began to melt. Something spattered on the floor. It was a drop of melted wax. Oh, that her little boy would get up and move her back from the fire! But he slept on peacefully, and as she had no voice for real children she couldn't call to him.
       So the doll felt that she was melting away. Drip, drop she fell on the floor. The room, with Its rich hangings, the children sleeping, the firelight flickering, the shadows and, above all, the memory of her brief existence‚ for, after all, a doll can only exist‚ seemed to be gradually fading away. She sighed to think that she couldn't have been born with it soul, to be loved and go on loving forever; that she could not grow up like a real child to see the unfolding of all the wonderful things in the world, passing from one existence to another instead of going out altogether. Then she thought that she might never have been born at all. never have had the one glimpse of the happy household, the one Christmas, the blue eyed boy and her single day of love. So she said: "I can't understand it. I will try not to murmur, but trust that it is all for the best."
       And then‚ she awoke! The horror of melting had only been a dream. She had fallen asleep before the hot fire, but some kind hand had drawn the chair back, and in a few moments she was again clasped in the fond arms of her blue eyed boy.