University of Virginia Library

KRISS KRINGLE

(Written in a child's album)

Just as the moon was fading amid her misty rings,
And every stocking was stuffed with childhood's precious things,
Old Kriss Kringle looked round, and saw on the elm-tree bough,
High-hung, an oriole's nest, silent and empty now.
“Quite like a stocking,” he laughed, “pinned up there on the tree!

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Little I thought the birds expected a present from me!”
Then old Kriss Kringle, who loves a joke as well as the best,
Dropped a handful of flakes in the oriole's empty nest.