Review 452: The Christmas Hirelings

The Christmas Hirelings by Mary Elizabeth Braddon
My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Short Christmas related read.

A novella for the holidays. This is a classic, published originally in 1894 taking place in England. Sir John Penlyon decides that this Christmas some children should be around his lonely huge manor house. So a friend brings three children that were hired to have Christmas for a fortnight on the estate. 

Sir John Penlyon had casted his only daughter out to never accept her as his daughter and definitely not give her any money. She had the audacity to elope and marry beneath her station, which her father would not forgive. Thus, this many years later he is an old man missing children at Christmas.

His friend then brings three children in for the holiday. The youngest which was nicknamed Poppet is so smart and advanced for her young years of four and Sir John and her grow very close in no time. All the children enjoy their time, and gifts at the estate. They go out one day a few days after Christmas to enjoy and play in the snow. The next day Poppet had developed a cold. It gets worse, then even worse, to where they must call in the mother. Of course, the mother is the daughter that was cast out.  At this point Poppet was starting to recover, with her mother there, so Sir John leaves for London for a while. He still does not want to see his daughter, and realized by this point who the children were.