"I will, mother dear," answered Nimble Jim. And he is mending shoes there to this day, as happy as happy can be. * * * * * [Illustration] "Oh! I'm my mamma's lady-girl And I must sit quite still; It would not do to jump and whirl, And get my hair all out of curl, And rumple up my frill. No, I'm my mamma's lady-girl, So I must sit quite still." * * * * * A BUDGET OF HOME-MADE CHRISTMAS GIFTS. HINTS FOR GIRLS AND BOYS, LITTLE AND BIG.[1] [Footnote 1: The present paper will enable our young friends to make over seventy different articles for Christmas gifts. While a few familiar things may be found among them, a great majority of the objects are entirely novel, and are here described for the first time. All who may wish for still further hints in regard to home-made Christmas presents will find very many useful suggestions in the paper "One Hundred Christmas Presents, and How to Make Them," published in ST. NICHOLAS for December, 1875--Vol. III.] [Illustration: W] Who is it that every year invents the thousand-and-one new and pretty things which hang on Christmas-trees, and stuff the toes of Christmas stockings? Who is it that has so wise and watchful an eye for the capacities of little people, and the tastes of bigger ones, providing for each, planning for tiny purses with almost nothing in them, as well as for fat wallets stuffed with bank-bills, and suggesting something which can be made, accepted and enjoyed by everybody, large and small, all the wide world over? Who can it be that possesses this inexhaustible fertility of invention and kindness of heart? No ordinary human being, you may be sure. Not Father Santa Claus! He has enough to do with distributing the presents after they are made; besides, fancy-work is not in a man's line,--not even a saint's! But what so likely as that he should have a mate, and that it is to her we are indebted for all this? What an immense work-basket Mother Santa Claus's must be! What a glancing thimble and swift needle and thread! Can't you imagine her throwing aside her scissors and spool-bag to help the dear saint "tackle up" and load the sledge? And who knows but she sits behind as he drives over the roofs of the universe on the blessed eve, and holds the reins while Santa Claus dispenses to favored chimneys the innumerable pretty things which he and she have chuckled over together months and months before the rest of us knew anything about them?