Little Piccola by Nora A. Smith. Piccola lived in Italy, where the
oranges grow, and where all the year the sun shines warm and bright.
I suppose you think Piccola very strange name for a little girl, but in
her country it was not strange at all, and her mother thought it the
sweetest name a little girl ever had. Piccola had no kind father, no
big brother or sister, and no sweet baby to play with in love.
She and her mother lived all alone in an old stone house that looked on
a dark, narrow street. They were very poor, and the mother was
away from home almost every day, washing clothes and scrubbing floors, and working
hard to earn money for her little girl and herself. So you see,
Piccola was alone a great deal of the time. And if she had not
been a very happy, contented little child, I hardly know what she would
have done. She had no playthings except a heap of stones in the back
yard that she used for building houses, and a very old, very ragged
doll that her mother had found in the street one day. But there was
a small round hole in the stone wall at the back of her yard,
and her greatest pleasure was to look through that into her neighbor's garden. When
she stood on a stone and put her eyes close to the hole, she
could see the green grass in the garden, and smell the sweet flowers,
and even hear the water splashing into the fountain. She had never seen any
one walking in the garden, for it belonged to an old gentleman who did
not care about grass and flowers. One day in the autumn, her mother
told her that the old gentleman had gone away and had rented his house to
a family of little American children, who who had come with their sick mother
to spend the winter in Italy. After this, Piccola was never lonely,
for all day along the children ran and played and danced and sang in the
garden. It was several weeks before they saw her at all, and I
am not sure they ever would have done so. But one day the kitten
ran away, and in chasing her, they came close to the wall and
saw Piccola's black eyes looking through the hole in the stones. They were a
little frightened at first and did not speak to her. But the next day
she was there again, and rose the oldest girl went up to the wall
and talked to her a little while. When the children found that she had
no one to play with and was very lonely, they talked to her every
day, and often brought her fruits and candies and passed them through the hole
in the wall. One day they even pushed the kitten through, but the
hole was hardly large enough for her, and she mewed and scratched and was
very much frightened. After that, the little boy said he would ask his
father if the hole might not be made larger, and then Piccola could come
in and play with them. The father had found out that Piccola's mother was
a good woman, and that the little girl herself was sweet and kind,
so that he was very glad to have some of the stones broken away and
an opening maid for Piccola to come in. How excited she was, and
how glad the children were when she first stepped into the garden. She wore
her best dress, a long, bright colored woolen skirt and a white waist.
Round her neck was a string of beads, and on her feet were
little wooden sandals. It would seem very strange to us when it not to
wear wooden shoes, but Piccola and her mother had never worn anything else,
and never had any money to buy stockings. Piccola almost always ran about barefooted
like the kittens and the chickens and the little ducks. What a good time
they had that day, And how glad Piccola's mother was that her little girl
could have such a pleasant, safe place to play in while she was away
at work. By and by December came, and the little Americans began to
talk about Christmas. One day when Piccola's curly head and bright eyes came peeping
through the hole in the wall, and they ran to her and helped her
in, And as they did so, they all asked her at once what
she thought she would have for a Christmas present? A Christmas present, said
Piccola, Why what is that? All the children looked surprised at this,
and Rose said, rather great, dear Piccola, don't you know what Christmas
is? Oh? Yes, Piccola knew. It was the happy day when
the baby Christ was born, And she had been to church on that day
and heard the beautiful singing, and had seen the picture of the Babe lying
in the manger with cattle and sheep, sleeping round about. Oh, yes,
she knew all that very well, But what was a Christmas present?
Then the children began to laugh and to answer her. Altogether there was such
a clatter of tongues that she could hear only a few words now and then,
such as chimney, Santa Claus, stockings, reindeer, Christmas Eve,
candies, and toys. Piccola put her hands over her ears and said,
oh, I can't understand one word you tell me Rose. Then Rose told
her all about jolly Santa Claus, with his red cheeks and white beard and
fur coat, and about his reindeer and sleigh full of toys. Every Christmas
Eve, said Rose, he comes down the chimney and fills the stockings of
all the good children. So Piccola, you hang up your stocking, and
who knows what a beautiful Christmas present you will find when morning comes. Of
course, Piccola thought this was a delightful plan, and was very pleased to
hear about it. Then all the children told her of every Christmas Eve they
could remember, and of the presents they had had, so that she went
home thinking of nothing but dolls and hoops and balls and ribbons and marbles.
And wagons and kites. She told her mother about Santa Claus, and her
mother seemed to think that perhaps he did not know that there was any little
girl in that house, and very likely he would not come at all.
But Piccola felt very sure Santa Claus would remember her, for her little friends
had promised to send a letter up the chimney to remind him. Christmas Eve
came at last, Piccola's mother hurried home from her work. They had their
little supper of soup and bread, and soon it was bedtime time to get
ready for Santa Claus. But oh, Piccola remembered then for the first time
that the children had told her she must hang up her stocking, and she
hadn't any, and neither had her mother. How sad, how sad it
was. Now Santa Claus would come and perhaps be angry because he couldn't find
any place to put the present. The poor little girl stood by the fireplace,
and the big tears began to run down her cheeks. Just then her
mother called to her, hurry, Piccola, come to bed. What did
she do? But she stopped crying and tried to think, and in a
moment she remembered her wooden shoes and ran off to get one of them.
She put it close to the chimney and said to herself, surely Santa Claus
will know what it's there, for he will know I haven't any stockings,
so I gave him the shoe instead. Then she went off happily to her
bed and was asleep almost as soon as she had nestled close to her mother's
side. The sun had only just begun to shine next morning when Piccola awoke.
With one jump, she was out on the floor and running toward the
chimney. The wooden shoe was lying where she had left it, but you
could never never guess what was in it. Piccola had not meant to wake
her mother, but this surprise was more than any little girl could bear and
yet be quiet. So she danced to the bed with the shoe in her
hand, calling mother, mother, look, look see the present Santa Claus
brought me. Her mother raised her head and looked into the shoe. Why,
Piccola, she said, A little chimney swallow nestling in your shoe.
What a good Santa Claus to bring you a bird? Good Santa Claus,
dear Santa Claus, cried Piccola, and she kissed her mother, and kissed
the bird, and kissed the shoe, and even threw kisses up the chimney.
She was so happy. When the birdling was taken out of the shoe,
they found that he did not try to fly, only to hop around
the room, And as they looked closer, they could see that one of
his wings was hurt a little, but the mother bounded up carefully so that
it did not seem to pain him. And he was so gentle that he
took a drink of water from a cup, and even ate crumbs and seeds
out of Piccola's hands. She was a proud little girl when she took her
Christmas present to show the children in the garden. They had had a great
many gifts, dolls that could say Mamma, bright, picture books, trains
of cars, toy pianos, but not one of them playthings was alive like
Piccola's birdling. They were as pleased as she, and Rose hunted about the
house until she found a large wicker cage that belonged to a blackbird she once
had. She gave the cage to Piccola, and the Swallows seemed to make
himself quite at home in it at once, and sat on the perch,
winking his bright eyes at the children. Rose had saved a bag of candies
for Piccola, And when she went home at last, with the cage in
her dear swallow safely inside it, I am sure there was not a happier
life little girl in the whole country of Italy. End of Little Piccola by
Nora A. Smith.