The boy who brought Christmas

								


  Transcriber’s Note
Italic text displayed as: italic

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION
INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN


COPYRIGHT, 1911, BY DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY

  COPYRIGHT, 1901, BY PERRY MASON & COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY ALICE MORGAN

  THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N. Y.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The author wishes to thank the Editors of The American Press
Association for their kind permission to reprint Chapters I and II
of this story; and the Editors of The Youth’s Companion for their
courtesy in permitting the republication of Chapters III and IV.

CONTENTS

  CHAPTER                                PAGE



    I.    THE ITINERANT CHRISTMAS TREE      3



   II.    CREEDS AND DEEDS                 41


III.    UNCONSCIOUS MENTALITY            72



   IV.    OLD-TIME RELIGION               101

The Boy
Who Brought
Christmas

I
THE ITINERANT CHRISTMAS TREE

Old Man Ledbetter came jolting along the stony mountain road in an
ox cart, the tin-tipped ends of the shoe-string that confined his
plaited beard dancing upon his breast, his hazel whipstock lying at
his feet, and a hard, stumpy hand spread out upon either knee to hold
himself steady. Without any gee-hawing on his part his yoked steeds
turned at the ford and staggered clumsily into the Junaluska. In
midstream a shallow swirl of water came circling about his feet, but,
though he may have pressed his hands harder upon his knees, the only
perceptible preparation he made for a possible submerging was the
shifting of his tobacco into the other cheek.
But from the footlog below, a call, piping but authoritative,
challenged his attention.
“Hi, gran’daddy! he didn’t cross the log; you reckon he waded the