Dedication
TO
MY BELOVED NIECES,
WHOSE INTEREST IN THIS STORY
SUGGESTED TO THEIR AUNT
THE IDEA OF
TELLING IT TO OTHER CHILDREN.
S. E. W.
Crawfordsville, Indiana,
Christmas, 1886.
Note
Christmas stories are usually merry; and in this happy time, with its shining presents, its good things to eat and to drink, its music, lights, and visitors, all should be gay. But mine must be a sad story, because, being a true one, I cannot change it—one of the saddest of the thousands told since that first Christmas Eve when the traveling star from the East stood still in the midnight above the holy hill of Bethlehem. At Modena you may see the portrait of the lady I tell of; in Florence—rich and glorious city—you will learn her history; and at Abbotsford they show the bridal-chest where Death lay waiting in the dark to claim her as his own.