And through all the prayer and the praise, and the glad Christmas singing, my soul has greatly hungered for Roger.

Yes, even though all the boys are round me--Bobby on this side, the Brat on that--Algy directly in front; all behaving nicely, too; for are not they right under father's eyes?
Yes, and, for the matter of that, under the rector's too, as he towers straight above us, under his ivy-bush--the ivy-bush into which Bobby was so anxious yesterday to insert some misletoe.
Church is over now, and the short afternoon has also slipped by.

We are at dinner; we are dining early to-night--at half-past six o'clock, and we are to have a dance for the servants afterward.

Any hospitality to my equals I have steadily and stoutly declined, but it seems a shame to visit my own loneliness on the heads of the servants, to whom it is nothing.

They have always had a Christmas-dance in Roger's reign, and so a dance they are to have now.