“It is for you,” Aunt Polly assured her small niece, kissing her.  “But, honey, you must be careful of it.  Wear it to school one day, if you want to, and then keep it for special times.  You see, you must save it for your little girl.”

“My little girl?” echoed Meg, wonderingly.  “Why?”

“Because,” explained Aunt Polly seriously, “this locket has always been handed down to the oldest daughter.  Great-great Aunt Dorothy gave it to her daughter, and she gave it to her oldest daughter and so on.  Some might say I should give it to Dot, because she is named for great Aunt Dorothy, but you are the oldest daughter.  I had it instead of your mother for that reason.  And as I have no daughter, it goes to you.”

Meg ran downstairs to show her gift, and the sleds were forgotten while the children crowded around to examine the pretty locket.

“You must be very careful of it, Daughter,” said Father Blossom.  “You know you’ve lost two or three trinkets.  This is the kind of thing you can’t replace if you lose it.”

“I’ll be careful,” promised Meg, clasping the fine gold chain around her neck again and dancing off to the kitchen to show her treasure to Norah.

The next morning it had stopped snowing, but there was, as Sam remarked, “enough and to spare” of snow for coasting.  The minute breakfast was over the four little Blossoms, warmly bundled up, were out with their sleds.

Wayne Place hill was a famous coasting hill, and all kinds of children with all kinds of sleds were on hand to enjoy the first real sledding of the winter.

“Trade with you, Bobby,” called a freckle-faced boy, dragging an old tin tray.

Bobby grinned.

“Won’t trade,” he called back.  “But you can go down with me.”

So the freckle-faced boy, whose name was Palmer Davis, took turns coasting downhill on his tray, which he managed very skilfully, and going down with Bobby on the brand-new sled.

Bobby taught Meg how to steer, and he usually pulled Twaddles up the hill, while Meg gave Dot an extra ride.  They coasted the whole morning and went back for the afternoon.

“I’d never get tired,” declared Twaddles, as they were starring home.  “I could go sledding all my life!”

“I never get tired, either,” announced Dot, from the sled where she was comfortably tucked on and being pulled along by patient Meg.

“That’s ’cause you’re too young to work,” said Meg bluntly, giving the rope such a sudden pull that Dot nearly went over backward.

“She isn’t too young,” cried Twaddles, who always disliked any allusion to age; he and Dot wanted to be thought just as old as Bobby and Meg.  “Hi, Meg, listen!  I’m telling you——­”

Twaddles twisted around to catch Meg’s attention and fell over into a snow drift that lined the edge of the walk.  When he had been fished out and brushed off, he had forgotten what he had meant to tell.