What's the use of it?

Just then their father came in tired, but jolly. "Is everything ready? It is late, I have been detained so long," he said. "Can we go in at once?"

"I haven't got a tree this year," whispered his wife in an anxious voice. "I thought we couldn't afford it. What's the use of a Christmas tree? We can spend our money in a more practical way!"

"What nonsense. No Christmas tree! but of course you are joking," said her husband. "I will slip in, and light the candles." And with these words he disappeared into the inner room, now so mysterious to the waiting children.

Poor Mrs Herzchen nearly began to cry. If only she had not been so silly! Never, never would she neglect to get a tree again! She ought to have considered other people's prejudices, and Christmas—O well, Christmas only comes once a year.

"I've got a surprise for mother," whispered Gretel, aged ten. "I am going to recite a Christmas poem." "And I am going to tell the Christmas story from the Bible," said Hansi. "I have made a letter-box for father," said Fritz.

"Hush, hush! the bells are ringing—don't you hear them across the snow?" the children whispered to one another. "But what is that other bell, so soft, so musical and clear!" "That is the summons for us all to enter," said Paul.

The door flew open, and there stood the most lovely Christmas tree they had ever seen or imagined, all dazzling with silver; silver cones, silver fish, silver nuts and acorns, and red candles, and over all an exquisitely spun cobweb of frost. "That's my surprise for you all," said Hansi, who could hardly contain herself for joy. "I found the tree, and the dear, darling Heinzelmen brought it home for me."

Mrs Herzchen was speechless with astonishment, and her husband not less so. "How very extravagant," they said, "but how elegant and beautiful! Who can have given it to us?"

But now the children began to sing the sweet German carol sung in every house on Christmas Eve: "O peaceful night, O holy night," and then, in her earnest, childish way, Hansi told the story of the birth of the Christ-child in the Manger of Bethlehem.