O Sanna San was a little Japanese girl whose home was among the mountains of North Japan. Now because Japan is called the Flowery Kingdom we are apt to think of it as a country where the sun always shines and flowers are always in blossom. But in the northern part, where O Sanna San lived, they have winter, and cold, and in January and February the snow is three and four feet deep; the rivers and canals are frozen over, the people wear wadded clothes, and many of them go about on snowshoes.

But O Sanna San would not go about, for she had fallen and hurt her back so badly that she could not walk at all. Her father and mother were Christians, and one day when a missionary came to their house he told them about the hospital in the city, some thirty miles away, and that if they would take O Sanna San there she might be cured.

So it was that as O Sanna San looked out one snowy morning she saw her father coming over the snow with a sleigh, which was like a little house on runners, with a roof, a window and a door. Her mother told her it was to take her to the hospital to see if she could be made well again.

Then they wrapped O Sanna San warm, and laid her in the sleigh, and her father put the ropes from the runners over his shoulders, took the pole in his hand, and away they went. In many places in Japan when one travels one must be either pulled or pushed by a man.

All day he drew her over the snow, till they came to the city and hospital. Forlorn enough O Sanna San felt when her father left her among strangers, kind though they were. And when they laid her on one of the hospital beds she was dreadfully frightened, because she had never even seen a bed before, but had always slept on a mat on the floor, and she did not dare to move for fear she would fall off.

The days that came after were still worse, for the doctor put her in a plaster cast, so she had to lie straight and stiff like a wooden doll, and she was so homesick she could hardly speak, and her big black eyes were full of tears most of the time. But one day a little girl came down between the white beds and stopped at hers. O Sanna San had never seen anyone like her before; for her eyes were blue, her hair yellow, and her skin was not brown, but pink and white.

"I am Frances," she said, "my papa is the doctor. He told me about you, so I have brought you my doll and a picture book."

"I shall love the doll," said O Sanna San, "but I cannot read, there is no school in our village."

"Never mind," Frances smiled, "I am coming to see you every day, and I will teach you to read. My papa says you will soon be able to walk again, then you shall go with me to the Plum Blossom school for girls."

O Sanna San's eyes were shining. "Oh, I shall not be homesick any more."

–Written for Dew Drops by Adele E. Thompson.

SAM'S LITTLE DOG

"Mother," cried Sam, raising his tousled head up from his no less tousled pillow, "I had the funniest dream you ever heard."

"Well," said mother, drawing the comb through her long brown hair, "I'll give you just five minutes to tell it in; then you must jump up quickly and run over to the bathroom."

"It seems to me I was dreaming it all night," said Sam, "but I believe I can tell it in less than five minutes: I thought I was going along, and a little black dog was following me. As long as I kept walking on straight ahead he trotted on behind me like a lamb, but every time I got out of the path, and tried to cross the fields, he barked and snapped at me till I came back to the path.

"I got tired staying in the path, so I dashed out on one side presently, but the doggie barked so furiously that I got scared and climbed a little tree. Just as I got to the top, the tree broke off at the roots and 'down came Sammy, tree top and all.' The fall woke me, and I found I had rolled out of bed. Wasn't that a funny dream?"

"Sam," said his mother, who had been much interested in his dream, "don't you wish you had a little dog to go around with you and bark when you went out of the right way?"

"I don't know, mother," answered Sam, doubtfully; "maybe I don't."

"I hoped you would say you did," said mother, looking disappointed, "and I was going to tell you that conscience was that very little dog, and if you tried to get away from conscience's barks, either up a tree or elsewhere, you would certainly fall and come to grief. Time's up, little boy; hie off to the bathroom."

–Selected.

How Eskimo Dogs Sleep on a Journey

You have heard a great deal, very likely, about Eskimo dogs that haul the sledges over the snow in Alaska. Have you ever heard what becomes of them at night, when the traveler must stop in a snowstorm? Would you like to hear?

When the traveler with his guides must stop, the sledge is turned up, and the men get into their fur sleeping-bags, and lie down under such protection as it offers, if there is nothing better. But the dogs are all turned loose. You would think that there was danger of not finding them in the morning, but there is no danger of that at all. When it is time to get up next day, the guides look around, and see as many snow mounds as there are dogs in the train, and in each mound where a dog has burrowed, and let the snow cover him, is a hole made by his breath. It is very easy to find the dogs by these holes, and they never go far from the sledge.

–Written for Dew Drops by Julia H. Johnston.

It was very evident that Judy was in trouble. There she stood in the middle of the yard, her tiny brows drawn together in a pucker, one finger resting between her rosy lips in a way that would have been irresistibly lovely if the lips had been smiling instead of pouting, her eyes cast down on the ground at her feet.

"I sha'n't! I sha'n't!" she kept saying every now and again, with a shake of her short, sturdy self.

"Judiet, come here!" called her mother from the kitchen, where she was making a pie for dinner. "Why, what's the matter, child?" she added, as she saw the very evident traces of displeasure on her little daughter's face.

"It's Tom, and I'll never forgive him!" she cried.

"Hush! hush! you mustn't say that, Judy. What has Tom been doing?"

"He's gone off playing, and he wouldn't let me go with him, and Daisy's gone with her brother."

"But perhaps Tom has gone some place where it would be too far for you to walk," said Mrs. Tewsbury, as she sliced the apples into the dish.

"He's only gone to watch the boys fly their kites, and he said I should stay home and play with my dolls. But I sha'n't!"

"Well, Judy, I want you to go to the store for me, and then, when you come back, we'll talk about Tom. There, run along now. Get the basket and bring me two pounds of sugar."

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Dew Drops, Vol. 37, No. 09, March 1, 1914

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O SANNA SAN

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How Eskimo Dogs Sleep on a Journey

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