Produced by Emmy, Juliet Sutherland and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net THE NURSERY _A Monthly Magazine_ FOR YOUNGEST READERS. VOLUME XIII. BOSTON: JOHN L. SHOREY, No. 36 BROMFIELD STREET. 1873. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, BY JOHN L. SHOREY, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. BOSTON: RAND, AVERY, & CO., STEREOTYPERS AND PRINTERS. [Illustration: Contents] IN PROSE. PAGE. The Story of the Sparrow 1 The Little Teacher 3 Katy's Christmas-Presents 6 Little Mischief 9 Becky 13 Robert's Promise to Santa Claus 16 Piggy's Visit 18 Stopping the Express 22 How Smart managed the Sheep 25 How Two Boys passed Christmas Morning 27 Why the Horses jumped Overboard 30 IN VERSE. Christmas Morning 5 Santa Claus 12 The Johnny-Cake 20 What the Ship brought 24 The Lady-Bird (_with music_) 32 [Illustration] [Illustration: THE STORY OF THE SPARROWS.] THE STORY OF THE SPARROWS. [Illustration W]E are little English sparrows. We have been two years in America. We were brought over by Mr. Wakefield's gardener. He let us loose in the grove; and there we have been ever since. Mr. Wakefield has built little houses for us, and put them on the boughs of the trees. We go into these houses when it rains hard or blows. Once the doors of our houses were all blocked up with snow. The winters here are much colder than in England, where we were born. More snow falls, and thicker ice forms here. But we like our new home very well. Many young sparrows have been born to us. They are proud of being Americans. They think they are cleverer than their parents, because their parents, you see, are English. Pride is not right, is it? There is a bird called the butcher-bird,--a very savage bird,--that tries to kill us. We have to look out for these butcher-birds. But they cannot get into our houses: the doors are too small for them. There is a little bird called the snow-bird, that comes in winter. We are not afraid of him. He is afraid of us. We drive him away when Emily feeds us all. Emily calls us naughty when we do this: she threatens to punish us for it.