* * * * *

It was enough to have killed him, all his friends said; but it did not.  He lived to be a man, and—­what is rarer—­to keep the faith, the simplicity, the tender-heartedness, the vivid fancy of his childhood.  He lived to see many Christmas trees “at home,” in that old country where the robins are redbreasts, and sing in winter.  There a heart as good and gentle as his own became one with his; and once he brought his young wife across the sea to visit the place where he was born.  They stood near the little white house, and he told her the story of the Christmas trees.

“This was when I was a child,” he added.

“But that you are still,” said she; and she plucked a bit of the fir-tree and kissed it, and carried it away.

He lived to tell the story to his children, and even to his grandchildren; but he never was able to decide which of the two was the more beautiful—­the Christmas Tree of his dream, or the Spruce Fir as it stood in the loveliness of that winter night.

This is told, not that it has anything to do with any of the Three Christmas Trees, but to show that the story is a happy one, as is right and proper; that the hero lived, and married, and had children, and was as prosperous as good people, in books, should always be.

Of course he died at last.  The best and happiest of men must die; and it is only because some stories stop short in their history, that every hero is not duly buried before we lay down the book.

When death came for our hero he was an old man.  The beloved wife, some of his children, and many of his friends had died before him, and of those whom he had loved there were fewer to leave than to rejoin.  He had had a short illness, with little pain, and was now lying on his deathbed in one of the big towns in the North of England.  His youngest son, a clergy-man, was with him, and one or two others of his children, and by the fire sat the doctor.

The doctor had been sitting by the patient, but now that he could do no more for him he had moved to the fire; and they had taken the ghastly, half-emptied medicine bottles from the table by the bedside, and had spread it with a fair linen cloth, and had set out the silver vessels of the Supper of the Lord.  The old man had been “wandering” somewhat during the day.  He had talked much of going home to the old country, and with the wide range of dying thoughts he had seemed to mingle memories of childhood with his hopes of Paradise.  At intervals he was clear and collected—­one of those moments had been chosen for his last sacrament—­and he had fallen asleep with the blessing in his ears.

He slept so long and so peacefully that the son almost began to hope that there might be a change, and looked towards the doctor, who still sat by the fire with his right leg crossed over his left.  The doctor’s eyes were also on the bed, but at that moment he drew out his watch and looked at it with an air of professional conviction, which said, “It’s only a question of time.”  Then he crossed his left leg over his right, and turned to the fire again.  Before the right leg should be tired, all would be over.  The son saw it as clearly as if it had been spoken, and he too turned away and sighed.