Literary Lapses

This time the thing seemed like a little round box. Hoodoo tore the paper off it with a feverish hand. He shook it; something rattled inside. "It's a watch and chain! It's a watch and chain!" he shouted. Then he pulled the lid off. And was it a watch and chain? No. It was a box of nice, brand-new celluloid collars, a dozen of them all alike and all his own size. The boy was so pleased that you could see his face crack up with pleasure. He waited a few minutes until his intense joy subsided. Then he tried again. This time the packet was long and hard. It resisted the touch and had a sort of funnel shape. "It's a toy pistol!" said the boy, trembling with excitement. "Gee! I hope there are lots of caps with it! I'll fire some off now and wake up father." No, my poor child, you will not wake your father with that. It is a useful thing, but it needs not caps and it fires no bullets, and you cannot wake a sleeping man with a tooth-brush. Yes, it was a tooth-brush--a regular beauty, pure bone all through, and ticketed with a little paper, "Hoodoo, from Santa Claus." Again the expression of intense joy passed over the boy's face, and the tears of gratitude started from his eyes. He wiped them away with his tooth-brush and passed on. The next packet was much larger and evidently contained something soft and bulky. It had been too long to go into the stocking and was tied outside.