Set it up in the
garret, if necessary, and then we can cut a hole in the roof if
the tree chances to be too high for the room.
Tell Bridget to begin to fatten a turkey. Tell her by the
twentieth of December that turkey must not be able to stand on
its legs for fat, and then on the next three days she must allow
it to recline easily on its side, and stuff it to bursting. (One
ounce of stuffing beforehand is worth a pound afterwards.)
The pudding must be unusually huge, and darkly, deeply,
lugubriously black in color. It must be stuck so full of plums
that the pudding itself will ooze out into the pan and not be
brought on to the table at all. I expect to be there by the
twentieth, to manage these little things--remembering it is the
early Bird that catches the worm--but give you the instructions
in case I should be delayed.
And Carol must decide on the size of the tree--she knows best,
she was a Christmas child; and she must plead for the
snow-storm--the 'clerk of the weather' may pay some attention to
her; and she must look up the boy with the dimple for me--she's
likelier to find him than I am, this minute.
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