"
"Well, what ails her then?" persisted Uncle Jed.
"I bet I know!" said Mrs. Snawdor darkly. "It's that there vaccination.
Las' time I hid the other childern from the inspector she had to come out
an' argue with him fer herself. She got paid up proper fer givin' in to
him. Her arm was a plumb sight."
"Do you suppose it's the poison still workin' on her?" Uncle Jed asked,
watching Nance in the next room as she lifted a boiler filled with the
washing water from the stove.
"Why, of course, it is! Talk to me about yer State rules an'
regerlations! It does look like us poor people has got troubles enough
already, without rich folks layin' awake nights studyin' up what they can
do to us next."
CHAPTER X
THE PRINCESS COMES TO GRIEF
And bring her rose-winged fancies,
From shadowy shoals of dream
To clothe her in the wistful hour
When girlhood steals from bud to flower;
Bring her the tunes of elfin dances,
Bring her the faery Gleam.--BURKE.
Christmas fell on a Saturday and a payday, and this, together with Mr.
Demry's party, accounts for the fact that the holiday spirit, which
sometimes limps a trifle languidly past tenement doors, swaggered with
unusual gaiety this year in Calvary Alley. You could hear it in the
cathedral chimes which began at dawn, in the explosion of fire-crackers,
in the bursts of noisy laughter from behind swinging doors. You could
smell it in the whiffs of things frying, broiling, burning. You could
feel it in the crisp air, in the crunch of the snow under your feet, and
most of all you could see it in the happy, expectant faces of the
children, who rushed in and out in a fever of excitement.
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