CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY.
It was Christmas morning, and everywhere the merry bells were ringing and telling again the story, which, though more than eighteen hundred years old, is always sweet, always new—the story of Bethlehem’s babe, for whose birthday we keep the Christmas-tide. All over the northern hills the December snow was lying, and the wind was sharp and cold as it went singing past the windows of the houses where so many eager, happy children ate their Christmas cakes, or counted their Christmas toys. But far away in the south land it was like summer still, and the orange-trees were fresh, and green, and beautiful, with the yellow fruit and the white blossoms showing among the leaves. Upon the highest branch of a tall orange-tree which grew upon the bank of the river St. John,
