"Just so," says I; "what is this for?"

"Oh, that is her father's present--pink coral--hang it across one of the limbs," says she.

I hung the beads among the spruce leaves, and enjoyed the sight; they seemed like a string of rose-buds twisted in with the green.

"There now, we will finish in the morning," says E. E. "I wish Cecilia had invited her little friends; it will seem rather lonesome."

With this, Cousin E. E. gave a little sigh, and we went off to bed, telling me that I must be sure to get up in time for early service, which she wouldn't miss for anything.

XVII.

EARLY SERVICE.

Dear sisters:--Before daylight on Christmas morning, I went to early service at the highest church in New York city, which, after all, isn't anything to brag of in the way of steeple.

There is a brick meeting-house on Murray Hill that beats it all to nothing, for that has just the longest and pointedest steeple that I ever set eyes on. Still, everybody allows that the little Episcopal church I went to, Christmas morning, is the very highest in all America; and, though in my heart I don't believe it, having eyes in my head--there is no chance for me to take a measurement, and what can I say against the word of everybody else? Still, to you in confidence, for I don't want to get into a schismatic controversy, I dare take an oath that the brick church on Murray Hill is twice as high, to say nothing of the sharp-pointedness of the steeple and the hilly ground.

Cousin E. E. Dempster says she is high church from the crown of her head to the sole of her foot, which I didn't dispute, for she always had high notions. She gave me strict charge, when I went to bed, Christmas Eve night, not to sleep late, and be sure to be ready for an early start.

Well, I went to bed feeling as if I had got to start by some swift railway train every hour of the night, and must be ready for them all.

It was Sunday night, you know, and I woke up twice with a start, before it was next week; got up, felt for the matches I had laid handy, and went to bed again, and dreamed that I was trying to get into a steamboat with two steeples, which put off, and left me freezing on the dock.

Like one of the wise virgins, I had brought a candle upstairs, and some matches, which was an improvement on their old lamps, I dare say; but I wasn't much afraid of the dark, and didn't keep it burning, only left everything ready.

After that dream, I started up, struck a match, and found that I had been just fifteen minutes in getting that steam church under way. So I went on dreaming, starting up, and lighting matches all night, till at last I hadn't but one left, and with that I lighted the candle, and a gas-burner by the bureau, and began to dress myself.

Before I got through, Cousin E. E. was at the door, with her beehive bonnet on, and wrapped up in fur.

"Almost ready? I am so glad, for the day is just beginning to break, and I wouldn't have it broad light when we get there, for anything," says she. "Wrap up warm, for it has blown up awful cold in the night."

I did wrap up warm; put on a veil, and tied my mink-skin victorine, with three tails on each tab, close around my neck.

We went downstairs carefully, for only one burner was twinkling in the hall, and the whole house was dark and shivery.

"Come in here," says Cousin E. E., opening the dining-room door.

Under the gla.s.s globe, in which two or three chilly lights seemed longing to go out, the ghost of a table was spread, with a great deal of silver, and very little to eat.

"Just a cup of coffee and a mouthful of toast before we start," says E.

E., sitting down behind a great silver urn in her furs and her beehive; "for my own part, I could do without that."

She poured me out a cup of coffee--it was half cold and awfully riley--and asked me to help myself to a piece of toast, which had black bars across it, as if it had been striped on a gridiron.

"Things are getting cold," says E. E., "they have been standing so long.

The cook has been out an hour; but she knows I consider this my penance."

"Out where?" says I.

"Oh, to early service."

"An hour?" says I; "why I thought we were going to early service. It isn't daylight yet."

"I know," says Cousin E. E., with a sigh, "but her church is a little higher than ours."

"Higher," says I; "then there is some meeting-house a notch above yours?"

"Yes, cousin," says she, mournfully, "but we are creeping up. Every year brings us a step nearer."

"Just so," says I, wondering what she meant.

"By and by we shall have confession," says she.

"Oh," says I, "there isn't a meeting-house on Sprucehill that would take in a member till she had made a confession of religion."

Cousin E. E. shook her head, and observed that I didn't understand, which riled me a little, having been a member--well, no matter how long.

"Even now we have humiliation and penance."

I was trying to swallow a mouthful of the bitter toast and riley coffee, and couldn't in my heart contradict her.

"To that end we get up early, cast aside sleep, and, in all weather, go on foot to the altar. Each year the church is opened, and the candles lighted earlier and earlier, as souls more clearly see their way to the true faith."

"Just so," says I; "by and by they will be good enough to light up, and open the day before, I suppose."

The clock on the mantel-shelf struck. Cousin E. E. started up, and put both hands in her m.u.f.f. I followed her out of the door, and into the street.

Well, sisters, if there is a desolate spot on earth, it can be found in the streets of a great city after the lights have been put out, and while the sky is gray. To pa.s.s by houses in which thousands and thousands are sleeping, is like wandering through the lonesomeness of a graveyard. The morning was awful cold; before we got to Lexington Avenue the veil was stiff on my face. I felt the tears a-freezing on my cheeks, and my teeth chattered so that I couldn't speak. When we reached St.

Albans--that is the name of Cousin E. E.'s church--two such shivery mortals you never saw. I say, sisters, there wouldn't have been much use in warming us against a good fire in any place just then. I don't mean to be satirical or irreverent, but when you go to early service at the break of day, and in the depths of winter, I think ice-water and snow-drifts might make a solemn impression on the sinful heart.

XVIII.

HIGH CHURCH.

St. Albans may be a High Church, though I couldn't see it; but it certainly isn't very sizeable; and as for coldness, the very curls on my head shivered as if they grew there.

Cold, yes; I should think that church was cold; but you never saw anything more beautiful than the picture it made when we went in. Right before us was a white altar--not a communion table like ours at home, but a little platform with steps to it, set thick with candles, and loaded down with wreaths of white flowers. I tell you, sisters, it seemed to me as if the angels must have been down overnight, and moulded those flowers out of the drifted snow, and breathed life into them, they looked so pure.

On each side of this altar was a great, large candle, five feet high, and thick as a young tree, burning with a slow, steady fire, and some of the smaller candles twinkled like stars among the flowers.

All overhead and down the walls of this little meeting-house were great wreaths of ground pine, ivy and hemlock, crowded with lights and sprinkled with flowers, and these flung shadows on the walls more lovely than the wreaths themselves.