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The orphan's dream of Christmas. It
was Christmas Eve, and lonely by a

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garret window, high where the city
chimneys barely spared a hand's breadth of the

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sky, sat a child in age, but weeping, with a face so

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small and thin that it seemed too
scant a record to have eight years traced

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therein Oh, grief looks most distorted
when his hideous shadow lies on the clear

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and sunny life stream that doth fill
a child's blue eyes. But her eye

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was dull and sunken, and the
whiteened cheek was gaunt, and the blue

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veins on the forehead were the penciling
of want. And she wept for years

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like jewels, till the last year's
bitter gall like the acid of the story

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in itself, had melted all but
the Christmas time returned as an old friend

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for whose eyes she would take down
all the pictures sketched by faithful memory of

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those brilliant Christmas seasons, when the
joyous laugh went round, and sweet words

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of love and kindness were no unfamiliar
sound. When lit by the log's red

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luster, she her mother's face could
see, and she rocked the cradle sitting

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on her own twin brother's knee,
of her father's pleasant stories, of the

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riddles and the rhymes, all the
kisses and the presents that had marked those

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Christmas times. Twas as well that
there was no one, for it were

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a mocking strain to wish her a
merry Christmas, for that could not come

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again. How there came a time
of struggling, when, in spite of

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love and faith grinding poverty would only
in the end give place to death.

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How her mother grew heart broken when
her toil worn father died, took her

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baby in her bosom, and was
buried by his side. How she clung

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unto her brother as the last spar
from the wreck, But stern death had

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come between them. While her arms
were round his neck. There were now

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no loving voices, And if a
few hands offered bread, they were none

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to rest in blessing on the little
homeless head. Or if any gave her

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shelter, it was less of joy
than fear. For they welcomed crime more

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warmly to the self same room with
her. But at length they all grew

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weary of their sick and useless guest. She must try a workhouse, welcome

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for the helpless and distressed. But
she prayed, and the unsleeping in his

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ear, that whisper caught, so
he sent down Sleep, who gave her

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such a respite as she sought,
drew the fair head to her bosom,

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pressed the wedded eyelid's close, and
with softly falling kisses, lulled her gently

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to repose. Then she dreamed the
angels sweeping with their wings the sky aside

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raised her swiftly to the country where
the blessed ones abide, to a bower

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all flushed with beauty by a shadowy
arcade, where a mellowness like moonlight by

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the tree of life was made,
where the rich free it sparkled starlike,

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and pure flowers of fadeless eye poured
their fragrance on the waters that in crystal

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beds went by, where bright hills
of pearl and amber closed, the fair

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green valleys round and with rainbow light
but lasting, where their glistening summits crowned.

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Then that distant burning glory mid a
gorgeousness of light, the long vista

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of archangels could scarce chasten to her
sight. There sat one, and her

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heart told her twas the same who
for our sin was once born a little

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baby in the stable of an inn. There was music, Oh, such

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music. They were trying the old
strains that a certain group of shepherds heard

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on Old Judea's plains. But when
that divinest chorus, to a softened trembling,

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fell, Love's true ear discerned the
voices that on earth she loved so

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well. At a tiny grotto's entrance, a fair child her eyes behold,

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with his ivory shoes hidden neath his
curls of living gold, And he asks

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them is she coming? But ere
anyone can speak. The white arms of

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her twin brother are once more about
her neck. Then they all come round

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her greeting. But she might have
well denied that her beautiful young sister is

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the poor pale child that died,
and the careful look hath vanished from her

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father's tearless face. And she does
not know her mother till she feels the

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old embrace. Oh, from that
ecstatic dreaming, must she ever wake again

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to the cold and cheerless contrast to
a life of lonely pain. But her

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maker's sternest servant to her side on
tiptoe steps, told his message in a

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whisper, and she stirred not as
she slept. Now the Christmas morn was

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breaking with a dim, uncertain hue, and the chilling breeze of morning came

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the broken window through, and the
hair upon her forehead was it lifted by

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the blast or the brushing wings of
Sarah with their burden as they passed.

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All the festive bells were chiming to
the myriad hearts below, But that deep

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sleep still hung heavy on the sleeper's
thoughtful brow. To her quiet face,

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the dream light had a lingering glory
given, but the child herself was keeping

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her Christmas Day in heaven. And
of the Orphan's Dream of Christmas by Anonymous