C hristmas brought no Uncle Ruthven, but Christmas week brought Miss Elizabeth Rush, the sweet "Aunt Bessie" whom all the children loved so dearly. And it was no wonder they were fond of her, for she was almost as gentle and patient with them as mamma herself; and, like her brother, the colonel, had a most wonderful gift of story-telling, which she was always ready to put in use for them. Maggie and Bessie were more than ever sure that there were never such delightful people as their own, or two such happy children as themselves.

"I think we're the completest family that ever lived," said Maggie, looking around the room with great satisfaction, one evening when Colonel and Mrs. Rush were present.

"Yes," said Bessie; "I wonder somebody don't write a book about us."

"And call it 'The Happy Family,'" said Fred, mischievously, "after those celebrated bears and dogs and cats and mice who live together in the most peaceable manner so long as they have no teeth and claws, but who immediately fall to and eat one another up as soon as these are allowed to grow."

"If there is a bear among us, it must be yourself, sir," said the colonel, playfully pinching Fred's ear.

"I don't know," said Fred, rubbing the ear; "judging from your claws, I should say you were playing that character, colonel; while I shall have to take that of the unlucky puppy who has fallen into your clutches."

"I am glad you understand yourself so well, any way," returned Colonel Rush, drily.

Fred and the colonel were very fond of joking and sparring in this fashion, but Bessie always looked very sober while it was going on; for she could not bear anything that sounded like disputing, even in play; and perhaps she was about right.

But all this had put a new idea into that busy little brain of Maggie's. "Bessie," she said, the next morning, "I have a secret to tell you, and you must not tell any one else."

"Not mamma?" asked Bessie.

"No, we'll tell mamma we have a secret, and we'll let her know by and by; but I want her to be very much surprised as well as the rest of the people. Bessie, I'm going to write a book, and you may help me, if you like."

"Oh!" said Bessie. "And what will it be about, Maggie?"

"About ourselves. You put it in my head to do it, Bessie. But then I sha'n't put in our real names, 'cause I don't want people to know it is us. I made up a name last night. I shall call my people the Happys."

"And shall you call the book 'The Happy Family'?" asked Bessie.

"No; I think we will call it 'The Complete Family,'" said Maggie. "That sounds nicer and more booky; don't you think so?"

"Yes," said Bessie, looking at her sister with great admiration. "And when are you going to begin it?"

"To-day," said Maggie. "I'll ask mamma for some paper, and I'll write some every day till it's done; and then I'll ask papa to take it to the bookmaker; and when the book is made, we'll sell it, and give the money to the poor. I'll tell you what, Bessie, if Policeman Richards' blind boy is not cured by then, we'll give it to him to pay his doctor."

"You dear Maggie!" said Bessie. "Will you yite a piece that I make up about yourself?"

"I don't know," said Maggie; "I'll see what you say. I wouldn't like people to know it was me."

The book was begun that very day, but it had gone little farther than the title and chapter first, before they found they should be obliged to take mamma into the secret at once. There were so many long words which they wished to use, but which they did not know how to spell, that they saw they would have to be running to her all the time. To their great delight, mamma gave Maggie a new copy-book to write in, and they began again. As this was a stormy day, they could not go out, so they were busy a long while over their book. When, at last, Maggie's fingers were tired, and it was put away, it contained this satisfactory beginning:—

This was all that was done the first day; and that evening a very wonderful and delightful thing occurred, which Maggie thought would make her book more interesting than ever.

There had been quite a family party at dinner, for it was Aunt Bessie's birthday, and the colonel and Mrs. Rush were always considered as belonging to the family now. Besides these, there were grandmamma and Aunt Annie, Grandpapa Duncan, Uncle John, and Aunt Helen, all assembled to do honor to Aunt Bessie.

Dinner was over, and all, from grandpapa to baby, were gathered in the parlor, when there came a quick, hard pull at the door-bell. Two moments later, the parlor door was thrown open, and there stood a tall, broad figure in a great fur overcoat, which, as well as his long, curly beard, was thickly powdered with snow. At the first glance, he looked, except in size, not unlike the figure which a few weeks since had crowned their Christmas-tree; and in the moment of astonished silence which followed, Franky, throwing back his head and clapping his hands, shouted, "Santy Caus, Santy Caus!"

But it was no Santa Claus, and in spite of the muffling furs and the heavy beard, in spite of all the changes which ten long years of absence had made, the mother's heart, and the mother's eye knew her son, and rising from her seat with a low cry of joy, Mrs. Stanton stretched her hands towards the stranger, exclaiming, "My boy! Ruthven, my boy!" and the next moment she was sobbing in his arms. Then his sisters were clinging about him, and afterwards followed such a kissing and hand-shaking!

It was an evening of great joy and excitement, and although it was long past the usual time when Maggie and Bessie went to bed, they could not go to sleep. At another time nurse would have ordered them to shut their eyes and not speak another word; but to-night she seemed to think it quite right and natural that they should be so very wide awake, and not only gave them an extra amount of petting and kissing, but told them stories of Uncle Ruthven's pranks when he was a boy, and of his wonderful sayings and doings, till mamma, coming up and finding this going on, was half inclined to find fault with the old woman herself. Nurse had quite forgotten that, in those days, she told Uncle Ruthven, as she now told Fred, that he was "the plague of her life," and that he "worried her heart out." Perhaps she did not really mean it with the one more than with the other.

"And to think of him," she said, wiping the tears of joy from her eyes,—"to think of him asking for his old mammy 'most before he had done with his greetings to the gentlefolks! And him putting his arm about me and giving me a kiss as hearty as he used when he was a boy; and him been all over the world seein' all sorts of sights and doin's. The Lord bless him! He's got just the same noble, loving heart, if he has got all that hair about his face."

Uncle Ruthven's tremendous beard was a subject of great astonishment to all the children. Fred saucily asked him if he had come home to set up an upholsterer's shop, knowing he could himself furnish plenty of stuffing for mattresses and sofas. To which his uncle replied that when he did have his beard cut, it should be to furnish a rope to bind Fred's hands and feet with.

Maggie was very eager to write down the account of Uncle Ruthven's home-coming in her history of "The Complete Family," and as mamma's time was more taken up than usual just now, she could not run to her so often for help in her spelling. So the next two days a few mistakes went down, and the story ran after this fashion:—

"The Happys had a very happy thing happen to them witch delited them very much. They had a travelling uncle who came home to them at last; but he staid away ten years and did not come home even to see his mother, and I think he ort to don't you? But now he is come and has brought so many trunks and boxes with such lots and lots of things and kurositys in them that he is 'most like a Norz' Ark only better, and his gret coat and cap are made of the bears' skins he shot and he tells us about the tigers and lions and I don't like it and Fred and Harry do and Bessie don't too. And he is so nice and he brought presents for every boddy and nurse a shawl that she's going to keep in her will till she dies for Harry's wife, and he has not any and says he won't because Uncle Ruthven has no wife. That is all to-day my fingers are krampd."

Strange to say, Maggie was at home with the new uncle much sooner than Bessie. Little Bessie was not quite sure that she altogether approved of Uncle Ruthven, or that it was quite proper for this stranger to come walking into the house and up-stairs at all hours of the day, kissing mamma, teasing nurse, and playing and joking with the children, just as if he had been at home there all his life. Neither would she romp with him as the other children did, looking gravely on from some quiet corner at their merry frolics, as if she half-disapproved of it all. So Uncle Ruthven nicknamed her the "Princess," and always called her "your highness" and "your grace," at which Bessie did not know whether to be pleased or displeased. She even looked half-doubtfully at the wonderful stories he told, though she never lost a chance of hearing one. Uncle Ruthven was very fond of children, though he was not much accustomed to them, and he greatly enjoyed having them with him, telling Mrs. Bradford that he did not know which he liked best,—Bessie with her dainty, quiet, ladylike little ways, or Maggie with her half-shy, half-roguish manner, and love of fun and mischief. Maggie and all the boys were half wild about him, and as for baby, if she could have spoken, she would have said that never was there such an uncle for jumping and tossing. The moment she heard his voice, her hands and feet began to dance, and took no rest till he had her in his arms; while mamma sometimes feared the soft little head and the ceiling might come to too close an acquaintance.

"Princess," said Mr. Stanton, one evening, when he had been home about a fortnight, catching up Bessie, as she ran past him, and seating her upon the table, "what is that name your highness calls me?"

"I don't call you anything but Uncle Yuthven," answered Bessie, gravely.

"That is it," said her uncle. "What becomes of all your r's? Say Ruthven."

"Er—er—er—Yuthven," said Bessie, trying very hard at the r.

Mr. Stanton shook his head and laughed.

"I can talk plainer than I used to," said Bessie. "I used to call Aunt Bessie's name very crooked, but I don't now."

"What did you use to call it?"

"I used to say Libasus; but now I can say it plain, Lisabus."

"A vast improvement, certainly," said Mr. Stanton, "but you can't manage the R's yet, hey? Well, they will come one of these days, I suppose."

"They'd better," said Fred, who was hanging over his uncle's shoulder, "or it will be a nice thing when she is a young lady for her to go turning all her R's into Y's. People will call her crooked-tongued Miss Bradford."

"You don't make a very pleasant prospect for me to be in," said Bessie, looking from brother to uncle with grave displeasure, "and if a little boy like you, Fred, says that to me when I am a big lady, I shall say, 'My dear, you are very impertinent.'"

"And quite right, too," said Uncle Ruthven. "If all the little boys do not treat you with proper respect, Princess, just bring them to me, and I will teach them good manners."

Bessie made no answer, for she felt rather angry, and, fearing she might say something naughty, she wisely held her tongue; and slipping from her uncle's hold, she slid to his knee, and from that to the floor, running away to Aunt Bessie for refuge.

After the children had gone to bed, Uncle Ruthven went up to Mrs. Bradford's room, that he might have a quiet talk with this his favorite sister. Mrs. Bradford was rocking her baby to sleep, which business was rather a serious one, for not the least talking or moving about could go on in the room but this very young lady must have a share in it. The long lashes were just drooping upon the round, dimpled cheek when Uncle Ruthven's step was heard.

"Ah-oo-oo," said the little wide-awake, starting up with a crow of welcome to the playfellow she liked so well.

Mamma laid the little head down again, and held up a warning finger to Uncle Ruthven, who stole softly to a corner, where he was out of Miss Baby's sight and hearing, to wait till she should be fairly off to dreamland. This brought him near the door of Maggie's and Bessie's room, where, without intending it, he heard them talking. Not hearing his voice, they thought he had gone away again, and presently Maggie said in a low tone, that she might not rouse baby, "Bessie, have you objections to Uncle Ruthven?"

"Yes," answered Bessie, slowly,—"yes, Maggie, I think I have. I try not to, but I'm 'fraid I do have a little objections to him."

"But why?" asked Maggie. "I think he is lovely."

"I don't know," said Bessie. "But, Maggie, don't you think he makes pretty intimate?"

"Why, yes," said Maggie; "but then he's our uncle, you know. I guess he has a right if he has a mind to."

"But he makes more intimate than Uncle John, and we've known him ever so long, and Uncle Yuthven only a little while. Why, Maggie, he kisses mamma!"

"Well, he is her own brother," said Maggie, "and Uncle John is only her step-brother,—no, that's not it—her brother-of-law—that's it."

"What does that mean, Maggie?"

"It means when somebody goes and marries your sister. If somebody married me, he'd be your brother-of-law."

"He sha'n't!" said Bessie, quite excited. "He's a horrid old thing, and he sha'n't do it!"

"Who sha'n't do what?" asked Maggie, rather puzzled.

"That person, that brother-of-law; he sha'n't marry you; you are my own Maggie."

"Well, he needn't if you don't want him to," said Maggie, quite as well contented to settle it one way as the other. "And you needn't feel so bad, and sit up in bed about it, Bessie, 'cause you'll take cold, and mamma forbid it."

"So she did," said Bessie, lying down again with a sigh. "Maggie, I'm 'fraid I'm naughty to-night. I forgot what mamma told me, and I was naughty to Uncle Yuthven."

"What did you say?"

"I didn't say anything, but I felt very passionate, and I thought naughty things,—how I'd like to give him a good slap when he teased me, and, Maggie, for a moment I 'most thought I wished he did not come home. I am going to tell him I'm sorry, the next time he comes."

"I wouldn't," said Maggie, who was never as ready as Bessie to acknowledge that she had been wrong; "not if I didn't do or say anything."

"I would," said Bessie. "It is naughty to feel so; and you know there's no 'scuse for me to be passionate like there was for Aunt Patty, 'cause my people are so very wise, and teach me better. And it grieves Jesus when we feel naughty, and he saw my naughty heart to-night."

"Then ask him to forgive you," said Maggie.

"So I did; but I think he'll know I want to be better if I ask Uncle Yuthven too."

"Well," said Maggie, "maybe he will. But, Bessie, why do you speak about yourself as if you are like Aunt Patty. You're not a bit like her."

"But I might be, if I wasn't teached better," said Bessie, "and if Jesus didn't help me. Poor Aunt Patty! Papa said she was to be pitied."

"I sha'n't pity her, I know," said Maggie.

"But, Maggie, mamma said we ought to try and feel kind to her, and to be patient and good to her when she came here, 'cause she's getting very old, and there's nobody to love her, or take care of her. I am 'fraid of her, but I am sorry for her."

"If she has nobody to take care of her, let her go to the Orphan Asylum," said Maggie. "I just hope papa will send her there, 'cause we don't want to be bothered with her."

"And don't you feel a bit sorry for her, Maggie?"

"No, not a bit; and I'm not going to, either. She is quite a disgrace to herself, and so she'd better stay at her house up in the mountains."

Maggie, in her turn, was growing quite excited, as she always did when she talked or thought of Aunt Patty. It was some time since the children had done either, for Christmas, Aunt Bessie, and Uncle Ruthven had given them so much else to think about, that they had almost forgotten there was such a person.

And now mamma, who had laid baby in her cradle, coming in to stop the talking, was sorry to hear her little girls speaking on the old, disagreeable subject. She told them they must be still, and go to sleep. The first command was obeyed at once, but Maggie did not find the second quite so easy; and she lay awake for some time imagining all kinds of possible and impossible quarrels with Aunt Patty, and inventing a chapter about her for "The Complete Family."

While little Maggie was thinking thus of Aunt Patty, the old lady, in her far-away home, was wondering how she might best contrive to gain the hearts of her young nieces and nephews, for she was not the same woman she had been four years ago. During the last few months a new knowledge and a new life had come to her, making her wish to live in peace and love with every one. But she did not know how to set about this; for the poor lady had grown old in the indulgence of a bad temper, a proud spirit, and a habit of desiring to rule all about her; and now it was not easy to change all this. She had humbled herself at the feet of her Lord and Saviour, but it was hard work to do it before her fellow-men. She could not quite resolve to say to those whom she had grieved and offended by her violence and self-will, "I have done wrong, but now I see my sin, and wish, with God's help, to lead a new life."

Still, she longed for the love and friendship she had once cast from her, and her lonely heart craved for some care and affection. She well knew that Mr. and Mrs. Bradford would be only too ready to forgive and forget all that was disagreeable in the past, and she also felt that they would do nothing to prejudice the minds of their children against her. She thought she would go to them, and try to be gentle and loving, and so perhaps she should win back their hearts, and gain those of their little ones. But old habit and the old pride were still strong within her, and so, when she wrote to Mr. Bradford to say she was coming to make them a visit, she gave no sign that she was sorry for the past, and would like to make amends.

But shortly before the time she had fixed for the visit, something happened which caused her to change her purpose, and she chose to say nothing of her reasons for this, only sending word that she could not come before spring, perhaps not then. Now, again she had altered her plans, and this time she chose to take them all by surprise, and to go to Mr. Bradford's without warning.

"Margaret," said Mr. Stanton softly, as his sister came from the bedside of her little girls, and they went to the other side of the room, "what a sensitive conscience your darling little Bessie has! It seems I vexed her to-night, though I had no thought of doing so. I saw she was displeased, but the feeling seemed to pass in a moment. Now I find that she is so penitent for indulging in even a wrong feeling that she cannot rest satisfied without asking pardon, not only of her heavenly Father, but also of me." And he told Mrs. Bradford of all he had heard the children say, with some amusement, as he repeated the conversation about himself.

"Yes," said Mrs. Bradford, "my dear little Bessie's quick temper gives her some trouble. I am often touched to see her silent struggles with herself when something tries it, how she forces back each angry word and look, and faithfully asks for the help which she knows will never fail her. But with that tender conscience, and her simple trust in Him who has redeemed her, I believe all the strength she needs will be granted. God only knows how thankful I am that he has thus early led my precious child to see the sin and evil of a passionate and unchecked temper, and so spared her and hers the misery which I have seen it cause to others."

Uncle Ruthven came in the next morning, and, as usual, "making intimate," ran up to mamma's room. She was not there; but Maggie and Bessie were, busy over "The Complete Family." But Maggie did not look at all as if she belonged to the Happys just then. She had composed, what she thought, a very interesting chapter about Aunt Patty, and commenced it in this way: "There came to the Happys a very great aflekshun." But when she had written this last word, she had her doubts about the spelling, and carried the book to mamma to see if it were right. Mamma inquired what the affliction was, and finding, as she supposed, that it was Aunt Patty, she told Maggie she did not wish her to write about her. Maggie was very much disappointed, and even pouted a little, and she had not quite recovered when her uncle came in. In his hand he carried a little basket of flowers, which the children supposed was for mamma, and which he stood upon the table. Bessie loved flowers dearly, and in a moment she was hanging over them, and enjoying their sweetness.

Uncle Ruthven asked what they were about, and to Bessie's surprise, Maggie took him at once into the secret, telling him all about "The Complete Family" and her present trouble. Uncle Ruthven quite agreed with mamma that it was not wisest and best to write anything unkind of Aunt Patty, and told Maggie of some very pleasant things she might relate, so that presently she was smiling and good-natured again.

Then Mr. Stanton took Bessie up in his arms. "Bessie," he said, "did I vex you a little last night?"

Bessie colored all over, but looking her uncle steadily in the eyes, answered, "Yes, sir; and I am sorry I felt so naughty."

"Nay," said Uncle Ruthven, smiling, "if I teased you, although I did not intend it, I am the one to beg pardon."

"But I was pretty mad, uncle, and I felt as if I wanted to be naughty. I think I ought to be sorry."

"As you please then, darling; we will forgive one another. And now would you like this little peace-offering from Uncle Ruthven?" and he took up the basket of flowers.

"Is that for me?" asked Bessie, her eyes sparkling.

"Yes. I thought perhaps I had hurt your feelings last night, and so I brought it to you that you might see I was sorry."

"But I could believe you without that."

Bessie felt reproached that she had told Maggie she had "objections to Uncle Ruthven," and now she felt as if they had all flown away.

"Perhaps you could," said Uncle Ruthven, smiling as he kissed her; "but the flowers are your own to do with as you please. And now you must remember that I am not much accustomed to little girls, and do not always know what they like and what they do not like; so you must take pity on the poor traveller, if he makes a mistake now and then, and believe he always wishes to please you and make you love him as far as he knows how."