Christmas
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Title: Christmas
its origin, celebration and significance as related in prose and verse
Editor: Robert Haven Schauffler
Release date: July 25, 2006 [eBook #18908]
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/18908
Credits: E-text prepared by David Starner, Jeffrey Johnson, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHRISTMAS ***
E-text prepared by David Starner, Jeffrey Johnson, and the Project
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Our American Holidays
Edited by
Robert Haven Schauffler
and Others
A series of anthologies for the use of students and teachers in schools
and colleges; consisting of the best verse, plays, stories, addresses,
special articles, orations, etc. Applicable to the holidays listed as
follows:
CHRISTMAS.........................._December 25th_
DEMOCRACY DAYS....................................
EASTER............................_March or April_
GOOD WILL DAYS....................................
HALLOWE'EN.........................._October 31st_
INDEPENDENCE DAY........................_July 4th_
LINCOLN'S BIRTHDAY................._February 12th_
THE MAGIC OF BOOKS....................._Book Week_
THE MAGIC OF MUSIC...................._Music Week_
MEMORIAL DAY............................_May 30th_
MOTHER'S DAY................_Second Sunday in May_
PAN-AMERICAN DAY......................_April 14th_
PEACE DAYS........................................
ROOSEVELT DAY......................._October 27th_
THANKSGIVING..........._Last Thursday in November_
WASHINGTON'S BIRTHDAY.............._February 22nd_
* * * * *
Our American Holidays
CHRISTMAS
Its Origin, Celebration and Significance As Related in Prose and Verse
Edited by
ROBERT HAVEN SCHAUFFLER
[Illustration]
New York
Dodd, Mead and Company
1968
* * * * *
Copyright 1907 by
Dodd, Mead & Company
* * * * *
CONTENTS
Preface
Introduction
I
ORIGIN
Is There a Santa Claus?............... _F.P. Church_
O Little Town of Bethlehem............ _Phillips Brooks_
The Glad Evangel...................... _Kate Douglas Wiggin_
The Shepherds......................... _William Drummond_
A Christmas Carol..................... _James Russell Lowell_
A Christmas Hymn...................... _Alfred Domett_
Sons of the Morning................... _Reginald Heber_
God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen.......... _Dinah Maria Mulock_
The Christmas Silence................. _Margaret Deland_
A Christmas Lullaby................... _John Addington Symonds_
Hymn for the Nativity................. _Edward Thring_
Masters in this Hall................... _Anonymous_
The Adoration of the Wise Men......... _Cecil Frances Alexander_
The Shepherds in Judea................ _Mary Austin_
Christmas Carol....................... _James S. Park_
Neighbors of the Christ Night......... _Nora Archibald Smith_
Cradle Hymn........................... _Isaac Watts_
An Ode on the Birth of Our Saviour.... _Robert Herrick_
Christmas Song........................ _Edmund Hamilton Sears_
A Hymn on the Nativity of My Saviour.. _Ben Jonson_
The Shepherd's Song................... _Edmund Bolton_
A Christmas Carol..................... _Aubrey de Vere_
A Christmas Hymn...................... _Anon_
Christmas Day......................... _Charles Wesley_
Christmas............................. _Anonymous_
Christmas............................. _Nahum Tate_
"While Shepherds Watched
Their Flocks by Night"............. _Margaret Deland_
Colonial Christmases.................. _Alice Morse Earle_
The Angels............................ _William Drummond_
Hymn for Christmas.................... _Felicia Hemans_
New Prince, New Pomp.................. _Robert Southwell_
The Three Kings....................... _Henry Wadsworth Longfellow_
Hymn on the Nativity.................. _John Milton_
II
CELEBRATION
Christmas Eve at Mr. Wardle's......... _Charles Dickens_
A Visit from St. Nicholas............. _Clement C. Moore_
A Christmas Piece..................... _Fred S. Cozzens_
Wassailer's Song...................... _Robert Southwell_
Christmas Eve......................... _Hamilton Wright Mabie_
Christmas In The Olden Time........... _Walter Scott_
Sly Santa Claus....................... _Mrs. C.S. Stone_
The Waits............................. _Margaret Deland_
The Knighting of the Sirloin.......... _Anonymous_
The Christmas Goose at the Cratchits'. _Charles Dickens_
God Bless Us Every One................ _James Whitcomb Riley_
Bells Across the Snow................. _Frances Ridley Havergal_
Christmas Bells....................... _Henry Wadsworth Longfellow_
Minstrels and Maids................... _William Morris_
Inexhaustibility of the
Subject of Christmas................ _Leigh Hunt_
Song of the Holly..................... _William Shakespeare_
Under the Holly-Bough................. _Charles Mackay_
Ceremonies for Christmas.............. _Robert Herrick_
Santa Claus........................... _Anonymous_
The Ceremonies for Christmas Day...... _Robert Herrick_
December.............................. _Harriet F. Blodgett_
The Festival of St. Nicholas.......... _Mary Mapes Dodge_
The Christmas Holly................... _Eliza Cook_
To the Fir-Tree....................... _From the German_
The Mahogany-Tree..................... _William Makepeace Thackeray_
Christmas............................. _Washington Irving_
Church Decking at Christmas........... _William Wordsworth_
So, Now is Come Our Joyful'st Feast... _George Wither_
Fairy Faces........................... _Anonymous_
Merry Christmas....................... _Anonymous_
A Merry Christmas to You.............. _Theodore Ledyard Cuyler_
Christmas Bells....................... _Anonymous_
The Birth of Christ................... _Alfred Tennyson_
The Christmas Carol................... _William Wordsworth_
Christmas at Fezziwig's Warehouse..... _Charles Dickens_
Christmas Bells....................... _John Keble_
III
SIGNIFICANCE AND SPIRIT
A Christmas Carmen.................... _John G. Whittier_
The Spirit Of Christmas............... _Charles Dickens_
On Good Wishes at Christmas........... _Friswell_
A Christmas Song...................... _William Cox Bennett_
Sery.................................. _Richard Watson Gilder_
A Christmas Song...................... _Tudor Jenks_
Christmas............................. _Alexander Smith_
Christmas Carol....................... _Phillips Brooks_
The End of the Play................... _William Makepeace Thackeray_
Christ's Nativity..................... _Henry Vaughan_
Christmas Dreams...................... _Christopher North_
Keeping Christmas..................... _Henry Van Dyke_
Mark Well My Heavy, Doleful Tale...... _Anonymous_
A Christmas Carol..................... _Christina G. Rossetti_
The Glorious Song of Old.............. _Edmund H. Sears_
A Christmas Carol for Children........ _Martin Luther_
On Santa Claus........................ _George A. Baker, Jr._
A Christmas Carol..................... _Josiah Gilbert Holland_
An Offertory.......................... _Mary Mapes Dodge_
Christmas Song........................ _Lydia A.C. Ward_
A Christmas Carol..................... _Christian Burke_
A Simple Bill of Fare
for a Christmas Dinner.............. _H.H._
A Ballade of Old Loves................ _Carolyn Wells_
Ballade of Christmas Ghosts........... _Andrew Lang_
Hang Up the Baby's Stocking........... [Emily Huntington Miller]
The Newest Thing in Christmas Carols.. _Anonymous_
A Christmas Letter from Australia..... _Douglas Sladen_
Christmas............................. _Rose Terry Cooke_
IV
STORIES
The Fir Tree.......................... _Hans Christian Andersen_
Little Roger's Night in the Church.... _Susan Coolidge_
Mr. Bluff's Experiences of Holidays... _Oliver Bell Bunce_
Santa Claus at Simpson's Bar.......... _Bret Harte_
V
OLD CAROLS AND EXERCISES
God Rest You, Merry Gentlemen
Old Christmas Returned
Christmas Carol
In Excelsis Gloria
The Boar's Head Carol
Christmas Carol
ADDITIONAL PIECES
A Christmas Insurrection.............. _Anne P.L. Field_
The Night After Christmas............. _Anne P.L. Field_
When the Stars of Morning Sang........ _Anne P.L. Field_
A Prayer at Bethlehem................. _Anne P.L. Field_
The Christmas Fires................... _Anne P.L. Field_
The Mother (A Story).................. _Robert Haven Schauffler_
NOTE
The Publishers desire to acknowledge the kindness of Messrs. Charles
Scribner's Sons; Houghton, Mifflin and Company; Little, Brown and
Company; Dodd, Mead and Company; Bobbs-Merrill Company and others, who
have granted us permission to reproduce selections from works bearing
their copyright.
PREFACE
Christmas is our most important holiday, and its literature is
correspondingly rich. Yet until now no adequate bundle of Christmas
treasures in poetry and prose has found its way into the library of
Santa Claus.
While this book brings to children of all ages, in school and at home,
the best lyrics, carols, essays, plays and stories of Christmas, its
scope is yet wider. For the Introduction gives a rapid view of the
holiday's origin and development, its relation to cognate pagan
festivals, the customs and symbols of its observance in different lands,
and the significance and spirit of the day. This Introduction endeavors
to be as suggestive as possible to parents and teachers who are
personally conducted and introduced to the host of writers learned and
quaint, human and pedantic, humorous and brilliant and profound, who
have dealt technically with this fascinating subject.
INTRODUCTION
It was the habit of him whose birthday we celebrate to take what was
good in men and remould it to higher uses. And so it is peculiarly
fitting that the anniversary of Christmas, when it was first celebrated
in the second century of our era should have taken from heathen
mythology and customs the more beautiful parts for its own use.
"Christmas," says Dean Stanley, "brings before us the relations of the
Christian religion to the religions which went before; for the birth at
Bethlehem was itself a link with the past."
The pagan nations of antiquity[A] always had a tendency to worship the
sun, under different names, as the giver of light and life. And their
festivals in its honor took place near the winter solstice, the shortest
day in the year, when the sun in December begins its upward course,
thrilling men with the first distant promise of spring. This holiday was
called _Saturnalia_ among the Romans and was marked by great merriment
and licence which extended even to the slaves. There were feasting and
gifts and the houses were hung with evergreens. A more barbarous form of
these rejoicings took place among the rude peoples of the north where
great blocks of wood blazed in honor of Odin and Thor, and sacrifices of
men and cattle were made to them. Mistletoe was cut then from the sacred
oaks with a golden sickle by the Prince of the Druids, between whom and
the Fire-Worshippers of Persia there was an affinity both in character
and customs.
[Footnote A: An account of the early history of Christmas may be found
in Chamber's Book of Days.]
The ancient Goths and Saxons called this festival Yule, which is
preserved to us in the Scottish word for Christmas and also in the name
of the Yule Log. The ancient Teutons celebrated the season by decking a
fir tree, for they thought of the sun, riding higher and higher in the
heavens, as the spreading and blossoming of a great tree. Thus our own
Christmas fir was decked as a symbol of the celestial sun tree. The
lights, according to Professor Schwartz, represent the flashes of
lightning overhead, the golden apples, nuts and balls symbolize the sun,
the moon and the stars, while the little animals hung in the branches
betoken sacrifices made in gratitude to the sun god.[B]
[Footnote B: A delightful account of the origin of the Christmas tree
may be found in Elise Traut's Christmas in Heart and Home.]
As Christianity replaced paganism, the Christians, in the tolerant
spirit of their Master, adopted these beautiful old usages, merely
changing their spirit. So that the Lord of Misrule who long presided
over the Christmas games of Christian England was the direct descendant
of the ruler who was appointed, with considerable prerogatives, to
preside over the sports of the Saturnalia. In this connection the narrow
Puritan author of the "Histrio-Mastix" laments: "If we compare our
Bacchanalian Christmasses with these Saturnalia, we shall find such a
near affinitye between them, both in regard to time and in manner of
solemnizing, that we must needs conclude the one to be but the very
issue of the other."
"Merrie old England," writes Walsh,[C] "was the soil in which Merrie
Christmas took its firmest root." Even in Anglo-Saxon days we hear of
Alfred holding high revelry in December, 878, so that he allowed the
Danes to surprise him, cut his army to pieces and send him a fugitive.
The court revelries increased in splendor after the conquest. Christmas,
it must be remembered was not then a single day of sport. It had the
preliminary novena which began December 16, and it ended on January 6,
or Twelfth Night. All this period was devoted to holiday making.
[Footnote C: Curiosities of Popular Customs.]
It was a democratic festival. All classes mixed in its merry-makings.
Hospitality was universal. An English country gentleman of the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries held open house. With daybreak on Christmas
morning the tenants and neighbors thronged into the hall. The ale was
broached. Blackjacks and Cheshire cheese, with toast and sugar and
nutmeg, went plentifully round. The Hackin, or great sausage, must be
boiled at daybreak, and if it failed to be ready two young men took the
cook by the arm and ran her around the market-place till she was ashamed
of her laziness.
With the rise of Puritanism the very existence of Christmas was
threatened. Even the harmless good cheer of that season was looked upon
as pagan, or, what was worse, Popish. 'Into what a stupendous _height_
of more than pagan impiety,' cried Prynne (...) 'have we not now
_degenerated!_' Prynne's rhetoric, it will be seen, is not without an
unconscious charm of humor. He complained that the England of his day
could not celebrate Christmas or any other festival 'without drinking,
roaring, healthing, dicing, carding, dancing, masques and stage-plays
(...) which Turkes and Infidels would abhor to practise.'
Puritanism brought over with it in the Mayflower the anti-Christmas
feeling to New England. So early as 1621 Governor Bradford was called
upon to administer a rebuke to 'certain lusty yonge men' who had just
come over in the little ship Fortune. 'On ye day called Christmas day,'
says William Bradford, 'ye Gov^r caled them out to worke (as was used),
but ye most of this new company excused themselves and said it went
against their consciences to worke on ye day. So ye Gov^r tould them
that if they made it matter of conscience, he would spare them till they
were better informed. So he led away ye rest, and left them; but when
they came home at noone from their worke, he found them in ye streete at
play, openly: some pitching ye barr, and some at stoole-ball and such
like sports. So he went to them and tooke away their implements, and
tould them that it was against his conscience that they should play and
others worke. If they made ye keeping of it matter of devotion, let them
kepe their houses, but ther should be no gameing or revelling in ye
streets. Since which time nothing hath been attempted that way, at least
openly.'
In England the feeling culminated in 1643, when the Roundhead Parliament
abolished the observance of saints' days and "the three grand festivals"
of Christmas, Easter, and Whitsuntide, "any law, statute, custom,
constitution, or canon to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding." The
king protested. But he was answered. In London, nevertheless, there was
an alarming disposition to observe Christmas. The mob attacked those who
by opening their shops flouted the holiday. In several counties the
disorder was threatening. But Parliament adopted strong measures, and
during the twelve years in which the great festivals were
discountenanced there was no further tumult, and the observance of
Christmas as a general holiday ceased.
The General Court of Massachusetts followed the example of the English
Parliament in 1659 when it enacted that 'anybody who is found observing,
by abstinence from labor, feasting, or any other way, any such day as
Christmas day, shall pay for every such offense five shillings.'
The restoration of English royalty brought about the restoration of the
English Christmas. It was not till 1681, however, that Massachusetts
repealed the ordinance of 1659. But the repeal was bitter to old
Puritanism, which kept up an ever attenuating protest even down to the
early part of the present century.
There are many superstitions connected with the coming of Christmas
itself. The bees are said to sing, the cattle to kneel, in honor of the
manger, and the sheep to go in procession in commemoration of the visit
of the angel to the shepherds.
Howison in his "Sketches of Upper Canada" relates that on one moonlit
Christmas Eve he saw an Indian creeping cautiously through the woods. In
response to an inquiry, he said. 'Me watch to see deer kneel. Christmas
night all deer kneel and look up to Great Spirit.'
In the German Alps it is believed that the cattle have the gift of
language on Christmas Eve. But it is a sin to attempt to play the
eavesdropper upon them. An Alpine story is told of a farmer's servant
who did not believe that the cattle could speak, and, to make sure, he
hid in his master's stable on Christmas Eve and listened. When the clock
struck twelve he was surprised at what he heard. 'We shall have hard
work to do this day week,' said one horse. 'Yes; the farmer's servant is
heavy,' answered the other horse. 'And the way to the churchyard is long
and steep,' said the first. The servant was buried that day week.
There is a beautiful superstition about the cock that Shakespeare put
into the mouth of Marcellus, in _Hamlet_--
"Some say, that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated,
The bird of dawning singeth all night long:
And then, they say, no spirit can walk abroad;
The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm;
So hallow'd and so gracious is the time."
No other holiday has so rich an heritage of old customs and observances
as Christmas. The Yule Log has from time immemorial been haled to the
open fire-place on Christmas Eve, and lighted with the embers of its
predecessor to sanctify the roof-tree and protect it against those evil
spirits over whom the season is in everyway a triumph. Then the wassail
bowl full of swimming roasted apples, goes its merry round. Then the
gift-shadowing Christmas tree sheds its divine brilliance down the path
of the coming year; or stockings are hung for Santa Claus (St. Nicholas)
to fill during the night. Then the mistletoe becomes a precarious
shelter for maids, and the Waits--descendants of the minstrels of
old--go through the snow from door to door, singing their mellow old
carols, while masquerades and the merry Christmas game of Snapdragon are
not forgotten.[D]
[Footnote D: An exhaustive study of the history and customs of Christmas
has been made by W.F. Dawson in "Christmas and its Associations."]
Even the Christmas dinner has its special observances. In many an
English hall the stately custom still survives of bearing in a boar's
head to inaugurate the meal, as a reminder of the student of Queens
College, Oxford, who, attacked by a boar on Christmas day, choked him
with a copy of Aristotle and took his head back for dinner. The mince
pie, sacred to the occasion, is supposed to commemorate in its mixture
of oriental ingredients the offerings made by the wise men of the East.
As for turkey and plum pudding, they have a deep significance, but it is
clearer to the palate than to the brain.
Elise Traut relates the legend that on every Christmas eve the little
Christ-child wanders all over the world bearing on its shoulders a
bundle of evergreens. Through city streets and country lanes, up and
down hill, to proudest castle and lowliest hovel, through cold and storm
and sleet and ice, this holy child travels, to be welcomed or rejected
at the doors at which he pleads for succor. Those who would invite him
and long for his coming set a lighted candle in the window to guide him
on his way hither. They also believe that he comes to them in the guise
of any alms-craving, wandering person who knocks humbly at their doors
for sustenance, thus testing their benevolence. In many places the aid
rendered the beggar is looked upon as hospitality shown to Christ.
This legend embodies the true Christmas spirit which realizes, with a
rush of love to the heart, the divinity in every one of "the least of
these" our brethren. Selfishness is rebuked, the feeling of universal
brotherhood is fostered, while the length of this holiday season by
encouraging the reunion of families and of friends, provides a wonderful
rallying place for early affections. A wholesome and joyous current of
religious feeling flows through the entire season to temper its
extravagance and regulate its mirth.
"Under the sanctions of religion," writes Hervey,[E] "the covenants of
the heart are renewed.... The lovers of Earth seem to have met
together."
[Footnote E: For a beautiful and extended discussion of the significance
of the day, see Hervey's "The Book of Christmas."]
Christmas is the birthday of one whose chief contribution to the human
heart and mind was his message of boundless, universal love, He brought
to the world the greatest thing in the world and that is why the season
of his birth has won such an intimate place in our hearts and why its
jubilant bells find this echo there:
"Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow;
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.
"Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.
"Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.
"Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.
"Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.
"Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.
"Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be."
R.H.S.
I
ORIGIN
IS THERE A SANTA CLAUS?
_The following, reprinted from the editorial page of the New York Sun,
was written by the late Mr. Frank P. Church:_
We take pleasure in answering at once and thus prominently the
communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification
that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of _The Sun_:
Dear Editor: I am 8 years old.
Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.
Papa says "If you see it in _The Sun_ it's so."
Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?
Virginia O'Hanlon.
Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the
scepticism of a sceptical age. They do not believe except they see. They
think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little
minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are
little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in
his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as
measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and
knowledge.
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love
and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and
give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be
the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if
there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no
poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no
enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which
childhood fills the world would be extinguished.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies!
You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on
Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa
Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but
that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in
the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever
see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that
they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there
are unseen and unseeable in the world.
You may tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise
inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the
strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men
that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love,
romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal
beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world
there is nothing else real and abiding.
No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand
years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he
will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.
* * * * *
O LITTLE TOWN OF BETHLEHEM
PHILLIPS BROOKS
O little town of Bethlehem,
How still we see thee lie!
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep
The silent stars go by;
Yet in thy dark streets shineth
The everlasting Light;
The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee to-night.
For Christ is born of Mary,
And, gathered all above,
While mortals sleep, the angels keep
Their watch of wondering love.
O morning stars, together
Proclaim the holy birth!
And praises sing to God the King,
And peace to men on earth.
How silently, how silently,
The wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of His heaven.
No ear may hear His coming,
But in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive Him still,
The dear Christ enters in.
O holy Child of Bethlehem!
Descend to us, we pray;
Cast out our sin, and enter in,
Be born in us to-day.
We hear the Christmas angels
The great glad tidings tell;
Oh, come to us, abide with us,
Our Lord Emmanuel!
* * * * *
THE GLAD EVANGEL
KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN
When the Child of Nazareth was born, the sun, according to the Bosnian
legend, "leaped in the heavens, and the stars around it danced. A peace
came over mountain and forest. Even the rotten stump stood straight and
healthy on the green hill-side. The grass was beflowered with open
blossoms, incense sweet as myrrh pervaded upland and forest, birds sang
on the mountain top, and all gave thanks to the great God."
It is naught but an old folk-tale, but it has truth hidden at its heart,
for a strange, subtle force, a spirit of genial good-will, a new-born
kindness, seem to animate child and man alike when the world pays its
tribute to the "heaven-sent youngling," as the poet Drummond calls the
infant Christ.
When the Three Wise Men rode from the East into the West on that "first,
best Christmas night," they bore on their saddle-bows three caskets
filled with gold and frankincense and myrrh, to be laid at the feet of
the manger-cradled babe of Bethlehem. Beginning with this old, old
journey, the spirit of giving crept into the world's heart. As the Magi
came bearing gifts, so do we also; gifts that relieve want, gifts that
are sweet and fragrant with friendship, gifts that breathe love, gifts
that mean service, gifts inspired still by the star that shone over the
City of David nearly two thousand years ago.
Then hang the green coronet of the Christmas-tree with glittering
baubles and jewels of flame; heap offerings on its emerald branches;
bring the Yule log to the firing; deck the house with holly and
mistletoe,
"And all the bells on earth shall ring
On Christmas day in the morning."
* * * * *
THE SHEPHERDS
WILLIAM DRUMMOND, OF HAWTHORNDEN
O than the fairest day, thrice fairer night!
Night to blest days in which a sun doth rise
Of which that golden eye which clears the skies
Is but a sparkling ray, a shadow-light!
And blessed ye, in silly pastor's sight,
Mild creatures, in whose warm crib now lies
That heaven-sent youngling, holy-maid-born wight,
Midst, end, beginning of our prophecies!
Blest cottage that hath flowers in winter spread,
Though withered--blessed grass that hath the grace
To deck and be a carpet to that place!
Thus sang, unto the sounds of oaten reed,
Before the Babe, the shepherds bowed on knees;
And springs ran nectar, honey dropped from trees.
* * * * *
A CHRISTMAS CAROL
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL
"What means this glory round our feet,"
The Magi mused, "more bright than morn?"
And voices chanted clear and sweet,
"To-day the Prince of Peace is born!"
"What means that star," the Shepherds said,
"That brightens through the rocky glen?"
And angels, answering overhead,
Sang, "Peace on earth, good-will to men!"
'Tis eighteen hundred years and more
Since those sweet oracles were dumb;
We wait for Him, like them of yore;
Alas, He seems so slow to come!
But it was said, in words of gold,
No time or sorrow e'er shall dim,
That little children might be bold
In perfect trust to come to Him.
All round about our feet shall shine
A light like that the wise men saw,
If we our loving wills incline
To that sweet Life which is the Law.
So shall we learn to understand
The simple faith of shepherds then,
And, clasping kindly hand in hand,
Sing, "Peace on earth, good-will to men!"
But they who do their souls no wrong,
But keep at eve the faith of morn,
Shall daily hear the angel-song,
"To-day the Prince of Peace is born!"
* * * * *
A CHRISTMAS HYMN
ALFRED DOMETT
It was the calm and silent night!
Seven hundred years and fifty-three
Had Rome been growing up to might,
And now was Queen of land and sea.
No sound was heard of clashing wars;
Peace brooded o'er the hush'd domain;
Apollo, Pallas, Jove and Mars,
Held undisturb'd their ancient reign,
In the solemn midnight
Centuries ago.
'T was in the calm and silent night!
The senator of haughty Rome
Impatient urged his chariot's flight,
From lordly revel rolling home.
Triumphal arches gleaming swell
His breast with thoughts of boundless sway;
What reck'd the Roman what befell
A paltry province far away,
In the solemn midnight
Centuries ago!
Within that province far away
Went plodding home a weary boor:
A streak of light before him lay,
Fall'n through a half-shut stable door
Across his path. He pass'd--for nought
Told what was going on within;
How keen the stars! his only thought;
The air how calm and cold and thin,
In the solemn midnight
Centuries ago!
O strange indifference!--low and high
Drows'd over common joys and cares:
The earth was still--but knew not why;
The world was listening--unawares.
How calm a moment may precede
One that shall thrill the world for ever!
To that still moment none would heed,
Man's doom was link'd, no more to sever,
In the solemn midnight
Centuries ago.
It _is_ the calm and solemn night
A thousand bells ring out, and throw
Their joyous peals abroad, and smite
The darkness, charm'd and holy now.
The night that erst no name had worn,
To it a happy name is given;
For in that stable lay new-born
The peaceful Prince of Earth and Heaven,
In the solemn midnight
Centuries ago.
* * * * *
BRIGHTEST AND BEST OF THE SONS OF THE MORNING
REGINALD HEBER
Brightest and best of the Sons of the morning!
Dawn on our darkness and lend us thine aid!
Star of the East, the horizon adorning,
Guide where our Infant Redeemer is laid!
Cold on His cradle the dewdrops are shining,
Low lies His head with the beasts of the stall;
Angels adore Him in slumber reclining,
Maker and Monarch and Saviour of all!
Say, shall we yield Him, in costly devotion,
Odors of Edom and offerings divine?
Gems of the mountain and pearls of the ocean,
Myrrh from the forest, or gold from the mine?
Vainly we offer each ample oblation;
Vainly with gifts would His favor secure:
Richer by far is the heart's adoration;
Dearer to God are the prayers of the poor.
Brightest and best of the Sons of the morning!
Dawn on our darkness and lend us thine aid!
Star of the East, the horizon adorning,
Guide where our Infant Redeemer is laid!
* * * * *
GOD REST YE, MERRY GENTLEMEN
DINAH MARIA MULOCK
God rest ye, merry gentlemen; let nothing you dismay,
For Jesus Christ, our Saviour, was born on Christmas-day.
The dawn rose red o'er Bethlehem, the stars shone through the gray,
When Jesus Christ, our Saviour, was born on Christmas-day.
God rest ye, little children; let nothing you affright,
For Jesus Christ, your Saviour, was born this happy night;
Along the hills of Galilee the white flocks sleeping lay,
When Christ, the child of Nazareth, was born on Christmas-day.
God rest ye, all good Christians; upon this blessed morn
The Lord of all good Christians was of a woman born:
Now all your sorrows He doth heal, your sins He takes away;
For Jesus Christ, our Saviour, was born on Christmas-day.
* * * * *
THE CHRISTMAS SILENCE
MARGARET DELAND
Hushed are the pigeons cooing low
On dusty rafters of the loft;
And mild-eyed oxen, breathing soft,
Sleep on the fragrant hay below.
Dim shadows in the corner hide;
The glimmering lantern's rays are shed
Where one young lamb just lifts his head,
Then huddles 'gainst his mother's side.
Strange silence tingles in the air;
Through the half-open door a bar
Of light from one low-hanging star
Touches a baby's radiant hair.
No sound: the mother, kneeling, lays
Her cheek against the little face.
Oh human love! Oh heavenly grace!
'Tis yet in silence that she prays!
Ages of silence end to-night;
Then to the long-expectant earth
Glad angels come to greet His birth
In burst of music, love, and light!
* * * * *
A CHRISTMAS LULLABY
JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS
Sleep, baby, sleep! The Mother sings:
Heaven's angels kneel and fold their wings.
Sleep, baby, sleep!
With swathes of scented hay Thy bed
By Mary's hand at eve was spread.
Sleep, baby, sleep!
At midnight came the shepherds, they
Whom seraphs wakened by the way.
Sleep, baby, sleep!
And three kings from the East afar,
Ere dawn came, guided by the star.
Sleep, baby, sleep!
They brought Thee gifts of gold and gems,
Pure orient pearls, rich diadems.
Sleep, baby, sleep!
Thou who liest slumbering there,
Art King of Kings, earth, ocean, air.
Sleep, baby, sleep!
Sleep, baby, sleep! The shepherds sing:
Through heaven, through earth, hosannas ring.
Sleep, baby, sleep!
* * * * *
HYMN FOR THE NATIVITY
EDWARD THRING
Happy night and happy silence downward softly stealing,
Softly stealing over land and sea,
Stars from golden censors swing a silent eager feeling
Down on Judah, down on Galilee;
And all the wistful air, and earth, and sky,
Listened, listened for the gladness of a cry.
Holy night, a sudden flash of light its way is winging:
Angels, angels, all above, around;
Hark, the angel voices, hark, the angel voices singing;
And the sheep are lying on the ground.
Lo, all the wistful air, and earth, and sky,
Listen, listen to the gladness of the cry.
Happy night at Bethlehem; soft little hands are feeling,
Feeling in the manger with the kine:
Little hands, and eyelids closed in sleep, while angels kneeling,
Mary mother, hymn the Babe Divine.
Lo, all the wistful air, and earth, and sky,
Listen, listen to the gladness of the cry.
Wide, as if the light were music, flashes adoration:
"Glory be to God, nor ever cease,"
All the silence thrills, and speeds the message of salvation:
"Peace on earth, good-will to men of peace."
Lo, all the wistful air, and earth, and sky,
Listen, listen to the gladness of the cry.
Holy night, thy solemn silence evermore enfoldeth
Angels songs and peace from God on high:
Holy night, thy watcher still with faithful eye beholdeth
Wings that wave, and angel glory nigh,
Lo, hushed is strife in air, and earth, and sky,
Still thy watchers hear the gladness of the cry.
Praise Him, ye who watch the night, the silent night of ages:
Praise Him, shepherds, praise the Holy Child;
Praise Him, ye who hear the light, O praise Him, all ye sages;
Praise Him, children, praise Him meek and mild.
Lo, peace on Earth, glory to God on high,
Listen, listen to the gladness of the cry.
* * * * *
MASTERS IN THIS HALL
ANONYMOUS
"To Bethlem did they go, the shepherds three;
To Bethlem did they go to see whe'r it were so or no,
Whether Christ were born or no
To set men free."
Masters, in this hall,
Hear ye news to-day
Brought over sea,
And ever I you pray.
_Nowell! Nowell! Nowell! Nowell!
Sing we clear!
Holpen are all folk on earth,
Born is God's Son so dear._
Going over the hills,
Through the milk-white snow,
Heard I ewes bleat
While the wind did blow.
Nowell, &c.
Shepherds many an one
Sat among the sheep;
No man spake more word
Than they had been asleep.
Nowell, &c.
Quoth I 'Fellows mine,
Why this guise sit ye?
Making but dull cheer,
Shepherds though ye be?
Nowell, &c.
'Shepherds should of right
Leap and dance and sing;
Thus to see ye sit
Is a right strange thing.'
Nowell, &c.
Quoth these fellows then
'To Bethlem town we go,
To see a Mighty Lord
Lie in manger low.'
Nowell, &c.
'How name ye this Lord,
Shepherds?' then said I.
'Very God' they said,
'Come from Heaven high.'
Nowell, &c.
Then to Bethlem town
We went two and two,
And in a sorry place
Heard the oxen low.
Nowell, &c.
Therein did we see
A sweet and goodly May,
And a fair old man;
Upon the straw she lay.
Nowell, &c.
And a little CHILD
On her arm had she;
'Wot ye who this is?'
Said the hinds to me.
Nowell, &c.
Ox and ass him know,
Kneeling on their knee:
Wondrous joy had I
This little BABE to see.
Nowell, &c.
This is CHRIST the Lord,
Masters, be ye glad!
Christmas is come in,
And no folk should be sad.
Nowell, &c.
* * * * *
THE ADORATION OF THE WISE MEN
CECIL FRANCES ALEXANDER
Saw you never in the twilight,
When the sun had left the skies,
Up in heaven the clear stars shining,
Through the gloom like silver eyes?
So of old the wise men watching,
Saw a little stranger star,
And they knew the King was given,
And they follow'd it from far.
Heard you never of the story,
How they cross'd the desert wild,
Journey'd on by plain and mountain,
Till they found the Holy Child?
How they open'd all their treasure,
Kneeling to that Infant King,
Gave the gold and fragrant incense,
Gave the myrrh in offering?
Know ye not that lowly Baby
Was the bright and morning star,
He who came to light the Gentiles,
And the darken'd isles afar?
And we too may seek his cradle,
There our heart's best treasures bring,
Love, and Faith, and true devotion,
For our Saviour, God, and King.
* * * * *
THE SHEPHERDS IN JUDEA
MARY AUSTIN
Oh, the Shepherds in Judea,
They are pacing to and fro,
For the air grows chill at twilight
And the weanling lambs are slow!
Leave, O lambs, the dripping sedges, quit the bramble and the brier,
Leave the fields of barley stubble, for we light the watching fire;
Twinkling fires across the twilight, and a bitter watch to keep,
Lest the prowlers come a-thieving where the flocks unguarded sleep.
Oh, the Shepherds in Judea,
They are singing soft and low--
Song the blessed angels taught them
All the centuries ago!
There was never roof to hide them, there were never walls to bind;
Stark they lie beneath the star-beams, whom the blessed angels find,
With the huddled flocks upstarting, wondering if they hear aright,
While the Kings come riding, riding, solemn shadows in the night.
Oh, the Shepherds in Judea,
They are thinking, as they go,
Of the light that broke their watching
On the hillside in the snow!--
Scattered snow along the hillside, white as springtime fleeces are,
With the whiter wings above them and the glory-streaming star--
Guiding-star across the housetops; never fear the Shepherds felt
Till they found the Babe in manger where the kindly cattle knelt.
Oh, the Shepherds in Judea!--
Do you think the Shepherds know
How the whole round earth is brightened
In the ruddy Christmas glow?
How the sighs are lost in laughter, and the laughter brings the tears,
As the thoughts of men go seeking back across the darkling years
Till they find the wayside stable that the star-led Wise Men found,
With the Shepherds, mute, adoring, and the glory shining round!
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS CAROL
JAMES S. PARK
So crowded was the little town
On the first Christmas day,
Tired Mary Mother laid her down
To rest upon the hay.
(Ah, would my door might have been thrown
Wide open on her way!)
But when the Holy Babe was born
In the deep hush of night,
It seemed as if a Sabbath morn
Had come with sacred light.
Child Jesus made the place forlorn
With his own beauty bright.
The manger rough was all his rest;
The cattle, having fed,
Stood silent by, or closer pressed,
And gravely wonderèd.
(Ah, Lord, if only that my breast
Had cradled Thee instead!)
* * * * *
NEIGHBORS OF THE CHRIST NIGHT
NORA ARCHIBALD SMITH
Deep in the shelter of the cave,
The ass with drooping head
Stood weary in the shadow, where
His master's hand had led.
About the manger oxen lay,
Bending a wide-eyed gaze
Upon the little new-born Babe,
Half worship, half amaze.
High in the roof the doves were set,
And cooed there, soft and mild,
Yet not so sweet as, in the hay,
The Mother to her Child.
The gentle cows breathed fragrant breath
To keep Babe Jesus warm,
While loud and clear, o'er hill and dale,
The cocks crowed, "Christ is born!"
Out in the fields, beneath the stars,
The young lambs sleeping lay,
And dreamed that in the manger slept
Another white as they.
- - - - -
These were Thy neighbors, Christmas Child;
To Thee their love was given,
For in Thy baby face there shone
The wonder-light of Heaven.
* * * * *
CRADLE HYMN
ISAAC WATTS
Hush, my dear, lie still and slumber;
Holy angels guard thy bed;
Heavenly blessings without number
Gently falling on thy head.
Sleep, my babe, thy food and raiment,
House and home, thy friends provide;
All without thy care, or payment,
All thy wants are well supplied.
How much better thou'rt attended
Than the Son of God could be,
When from heaven He descended,
And became a child like thee!
Soft and easy is thy cradle;
Coarse and hard thy Saviour lay,
When His birthplace was a stable,
And His softest bed was hay.
See the kindly shepherds round him,
Telling wonders from the sky!
When they sought Him, there they found Him,
With his Virgin-Mother by.
See the lovely babe a-dressing;
Lovely infant, how He smiled!
When He wept, the mother's blessing
Soothed and hushed the holy child.
Lo, He slumbers in His manger,
Where the honest oxen fed;
--Peace, my darling! here's no danger!
Here's no ox a-near thy bed!
Mayst thou live to know and fear Him,
Trust and love Him all thy days;
Then go dwell forever near Him,
See His face, and sing His praise!
I could give thee thousand kisses,
Hoping what I most desire;
Not a mother's fondest wishes
Can to greater joys aspire.
* * * * *
AN ODE ON THE BIRTH OF OUR
SAVIOUR
ROBERT HERRICK
In numbers, and but these few,
I sing thy birth, O Jesu!
Thou pretty baby, born here
With sup'rabundant scorn here;
Who for thy princely port here,
Hadst for thy place
Of birth, a base
Out-stable for thy court here.
Instead of neat enclosures
Of interwoven osiers,
Instead of fragrant posies
Of daffodils and roses,
Thy cradle, kingly stranger,
As gospel tells,
Was nothing else
But here a homely manger.
But we with silks, not crewels,
With sundry precious jewels,
And lily work will dress thee,
And, as we dispossess thee
Of clouts, we'll make a chamber,
Sweet babe, for thee
Of ivory,
And plaster'd round with amber.
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS SONG
EDMUND HAMILTON SEARS
Calm on the listening ear of night
Come heaven's melodious strains,
Where wild Judea stretches far
Her silver-mantled plains;
Celestial choirs from courts above
Shed sacred glories there;
And angels with their sparkling lyres
Make music on the air.
The answering hills of Palestine
Send back the glad reply,
And greet from all their holy heights
The day-spring from on high:
O'er the blue depths of Galilee
There comes a holier calm,
And Sharon waves, in solemn praise,
Her silent groves of palm.
"Glory to God!" The lofty strain
The realm of ether fills:
How sweeps the song of solemn joy
O'er Judah's sacred hills!
"Glory to God!" The sounding skies
Loud with their anthems ring;
"Peace on the earth; good-will to men,
From heaven's eternal King!"
Light on thy hills, Jerusalem!
The Saviour now is born:
More bright on Bethlehem's joyous plains
Breaks the first Christmas morn;
And brighter on Moriah's brow,
Crowned with her temple-spires,
Which first proclaim the new-born light,
Clothed with its Orient fires.
This day shall Christian lips be mute,
And Christian hearts be cold?
Oh, catch the anthem that from heaven
O'er Judah's mountains rolled!
When nightly burst from seraph-harps
The high and solemn lay,--
"Glory to God! on earth be peace;
Salvation comes to-day!"
* * * * *
A HYMN ON THE NATIVITY OF MY
SAVIOUR
BEN JONSON
I sing the birth was born to-night
The author both of life and light;
The angels so did sound it.
And like the ravished shepherds said,
Who saw the light, and were afraid,
Yet searched, and true they found it.
The Son of God, th' eternal king,
That did us all salvation bring,
And freed the soul from danger;
He whom the whole world could not take,
The Word, which heaven and earth did make,
Was now laid in a manger.
The Father's wisdom willed it so,
The Son's obedience knew no No,
Both wills were in one stature;
And as that wisdom had decreed,
The Word was now made flesh indeed,
And took on him our nature.
What comfort by him do we win,
Who made himself the price of sin,
To make us heirs of glory!
To see this babe all innocence;
A martyr born in our defence:
Can man forget the story?
* * * * *
THE SHEPHERD'S SONG
EDMUND BOLTON
Sweet music, sweeter far
Than any song is sweet:
Sweet music, heavenly rare,
Mine ears, O peers, doth greet.
You gentle flocks, whose fleeces pearled with dew,
Resemble heaven, whom golden drops make bright,
Listen, O listen, now, O not to you
Our pipes make sport to shorten weary night:
But voices most divine
Make blissful harmony:
Voices that seem to shine,
For what else clears the sky?
Tunes can we hear, but not the singers see,
The tunes divine, and so the singers be.
Lo, how the firmament
Within an azure fold
The flock of stars hath pent,
That we might them behold,
Yet from their beams proceedeth not this light,
Nor can their crystals such reflection give.
What then doth make the element so bright?
The heavens are come down upon earth to live
But hearken to the song,
Glory to glory's King,
And peace all men among,
These quiristers do sing.
Angels they are, as also (shepherds) He
Whom in our fear we do admire to see.
Let not amazement blind
Your souls, said he, annoy:
To you and all mankind
My message bringeth joy.
For lo! the world's great Shepherd now is born,
A blessed Babe, an Infant full of power:
After long night uprisen is the morn,
Renowning Bethlem in the Saviour.
Sprung is the perfect day,
By prophets seen afar:
Sprung is the mirthful May,
Which winter cannot mar.
In David's city doth this Sun appear
Clouded in flesh, yet, shepherds, sit we here!
* * * * *
A CHRISTMAS CAROL
AUBREY DE VERE
They leave the land of gems and gold,
The shining portals of the East;
For Him, the woman's Seed foretold,
They leave the revel and the feast.
To earth their sceptres they have cast,
And crowns by kings ancestral worn;
They track the lonely Syrian waste;
They kneel before the Babe new born.
O happy eyes that saw Him first;
O happy lips that kissed His feet:
Earth slakes at last her ancient thirst;
With Eden's joy her pulses beat.
True kings are those who thus forsake
Their kingdoms for the Eternal King;
Serpent, her foot is on thy neck;
Herod, thou writhest, but canst not sting.
He, He is King, and He alone
Who lifts that infant hand to bless;
Who makes His mother's knee His throne,
Yet rules the starry wilderness.
* * * * *
A CHRISTMAS HYMN
ANON
Written in the Chapel of the Manger, in the Convent Church of Bethlehem,
Palestine:
In the fields where, long ago,
Dropping tears, amid the leaves,
Ruth's young feet went to and fro,
Binding up the scattered sheaves,
In the field that heard the voice
Of Judea's shepherd King,
Still the gleaners may rejoice,
Still the reapers shout and sing.
For each mount and vale and plain
Felt the touch of holier feet.
Then the gleaners of the grain
Heard, in voices full and sweet,
"Peace on earth, good will to men,"
Ring from angel lips afar,
While, o'er every glade and glen,
Broke the light of Bethlehem's star.
Star of hope to souls in night,
Star of peace above our strife,
Guiding, where the gates of death
Ope to fields of endless life.
Wanderer from the nightly throng
Which the eastern heavens gem;
Guided, by an angel's song,
To the Babe of Bethlehem.
Not Judea's hills alone
Have earth's weary gleaners trod,
Not to heirs of David's throne
Is it given to "reign with God."
But where'er on His green earth
Heavenly faith and longing are,
Heavenly hope and life have birth,
'Neath the smile of Bethlehem's star.
In each lowly heart or home,
By each love-watched cradle-bed,
Where we rest, or where we roam,
Still its changeless light is shed.
In its beams each quickened heart,
Howe'er saddened or denied,
Keeps one little place apart
For the Hebrew mother's Child.
And that inner temple fair
May be holier ground than this,
Hallowed by the pilgrim's prayer,
Warmed by many a pilgrim's kiss.
In its shadow still and dim,
Where our holiest longings are,
Rings forever Bethlehem's hymn,
Shines forever Bethlehem's star.
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS DAY
CHARLES WESLEY
Hark! the herald angels sing
Glory to the new-born King!
Peace on earth and mercy mild,
God and sinners reconciled.
Joyful all ye nations rise,
Join the triumph of the skies,
With the angelic host proclaim
Christ is born in Bethlehem!
Hail the heaven-born Prince of Peace!
Hail the Sun of Righteousness!
Light and life to all he brings,
Risen with healing in his wings.
Mild, he lays his glory by;
Born, that man no more may die,
Born to raise the sons of earth,
Born to give them second birth.
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS
ANON
Once in Royal David's city
Stood a lowly cattle shed,
Where a mother laid her baby
In a manger for His bed.
Mary was that mother mild,
Jesus Christ that little child.
He came down to earth from Heaven,
Who is God and Lord of all.
And his shelter was a stable,
And his cradle was a stall.
With the poor and mean and lowly,
Lived on earth our Saviour Holy.
And our eyes at last shall see Him
Through His own redeeming love,
For that child so dear and gentle
Is our Lord in Heaven above;
And He leads His children on
To the place where He is gone.
Not in that poor, lowly stable,
With the oxen standing by,
We shall see Him; but in Heaven,
Set at God's right hand on high,
When, like stars, His children crowned
All in white, shall wait around.
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS
NAHUM TATE
While shepherds watch'd their flocks by night,
All seated on the ground,
The angel of the Lord came down,
And glory shone around.
"Fear not," said he (for mighty dread
Had seized their troubled mind);
"Glad tidings of great joy I bring
To you and all mankind.
"To you, in David's town, this day
Is born of David's line
The Saviour who is Christ the Lord;
And this shall be the sign:
"The heavenly Babe you there shall find
To human view display'd,
All meanly wrapt in swathing bands,
And in a manger laid."
Thus spake the Seraph; and forthwith
Appear'd a shining throng
Of angels, praising God, and thus
Address'd their joyful song:
"All glory be to God on high,
And to the earth be peace;
Good-will henceforth from heaven to men
Begin, and never cease!"
* * * * *
"WHILE SHEPHERDS WATCHED THEIR FLOCKS BY NIGHT"
MARGARET DELAND
Like small curled feathers, white and soft,
The little clouds went by,
Across the moon, and past the stars,
And down the western sky:
In upland pastures, where the grass
With frosted dew was white,
Like snowy clouds the young sheep lay,
That first, best Christmas night.
The shepherds slept; and, glimmering faint,
With twist of thin, blue smoke,
Only their fire's crackling flames
The tender silence broke--
Save when a young lamb raised his head,
Or, when the night wind blew,
A nesting bird would softly stir,
Where dusky olives grew--
With finger on her solemn lip,
Night hushed the shadowy earth,
And only stars and angels saw
The little Saviour's birth;
Then came such flash of silver light
Across the bending skies,
The wondering shepherds woke, and hid
Their frightened, dazzled eyes!
And all their gentle sleepy flock
Looked up, then slept again,
Nor knew the light that dimmed the stars
Brought endless Peace to men--
Nor even heard the gracious words
That down the ages ring--
The Christ is born! the Lord has come,
Good-will on earth to bring!
Then o'er the moonlit, misty fields,
Dumb with the world's great joy,
The shepherds sought the white-walled town,
Where lay the baby boy--
And oh, the gladness of the world,
The glory of the skies,
Because the longed-for Christ looked up
In Mary's happy eyes!
* * * * *
COLONIAL CHRISTMASES
ALICE MORSE EARLE
[From "Customs and Fashions in Old New England."]
The first century of colonial life saw few set times and days for
pleasure. The holy days of the English Church were as a stench to the
Puritan nostrils, and their public celebration was at once rigidly
forbidden by the laws of New England. New holidays were not quickly
evolved, and the sober gatherings for matters of Church and State for a
time took their place. The hatred of "wanton Bacchanallian Christmasses"
spent throughout England, as Cotton said, in "revelling, dicing,
carding, masking, mumming, consumed in compotations, in interludes, in
excess of wine, in mad mirth," was the natural reaction of intelligent
and thoughtful minds against the excesses of a festival which had ceased
to be a Christian holiday, but was dominated by a lord of misrule who
did not hesitate to invade the churches in time of service, in his noisy
revels and sports. English Churchmen long ago revolted also against such
Christmas observance.
Of the first Pilgrim Christmas we know but little, save that it was
spent, as was many a later one, in work....
By 1659 the Puritans had grown to hate Christmas more and more; it was,
to use Shakespeare's words, "the bug that feared them all." The very
name smacked to them of incense, stole, and monkish jargon; any person
who observed it as a holiday by forbearing of labor, feasting, or any
other way was to pay five shillings fine, so desirous were they to
"beate down every sprout of Episcopacie." Judge Sewall watched jealously
the feeling of the people with regard to Christmas, and noted with
pleasure on each succeeding year the continuance of common traffic
throughout the day. Such entries as this show his attitude: "Dec. 25,
1685. Carts come to town and shops open as usual. Some somehow observe
the day, but are vexed I believe that the Body of people profane it, and
blessed be God no authority yet to compel them to keep it." When the
Church of England established Christmas services in Boston a few years
later, we find the Judge waging hopeless war against Governor Belcher
over it, and hear him praising his son for not going with other boy
friends to hear the novel and attractive services. He says: "I dehort
mine from Christmas keeping and charge them to forbear."
Christmas could not be regarded till this century as a New England
holiday, though in certain localities, such as old Narragansett--an
opulent community which was settled by Episcopalians--two weeks of
Christmas visiting and feasting were entered into with zest by both
planters and slaves for many years previous to the revolution.
* * * * *
THE ANGELS
WILLIAM DRUMMOND
Run, shepherds, run where Bethlehem blest appears.
We bring the best of news; be not dismayed:
A Saviour there is born more old than years,
Amidst heaven's rolling height this earth who stayed.
In a poor cottage inned, a virgin maid,
A weakling did him bear, who all upbears;
There is he poorly swaddled, in manger laid,
To whom too narrow swaddlings are our spheres:
Run, shepherds, run, and solemnize his birth.
This is that night--no, day, grown great with bliss,
In which the power of Satan broken is:
In heaven be glory, peace unto the earth!
Thus singing, through the air the angels swarm,
And cope of stars re-echoèd the same.
Or say, if this new Birth of ours
Sleeps, laid within some ark of flowers,
Spangled with dew-light; thou canst clear
All doubts, and manifest the where.
Declare to us, bright star, if we shall seek
Him in the morning's blushing cheek,
Or search the beds of spices through,
To find him out?
_Star_.--No, this ye need not do;
But only come and see Him rest,
A princely babe, in's mother's breast.
* * * * *
HYMN FOR CHRISTMAS
FELICIA HEMANS
Oh! lovely voices of the sky
Which hymned the Saviour's birth,
Are ye not singing still on high,
Ye that sang, "Peace on earth"?
To us yet speak the strains
Wherewith, in time gone by,
Ye blessed the Syrian swains,
Oh! voices of the sky!
Oh! clear and shining light, whose beams
That hour Heaven's glory shed,
Around the palms, and o'er the streams,
And on the shepherd's head.
Be near, through life and death,
As in that holiest night
Of hope, and joy, and faith--
Oh! clear and shining light!
* * * * *
NEW PRINCE, NEW POMP
ROBERT SOUTHWELL
Behold a simple, tender Babe,
In freezing winter night,
In homely manger trembling lies;
Alas! a piteous sight.
The inns are full; no man will yield
This little Pilgrim bed;
But forced he is with silly beasts
In crib to shroud his head.
Despise him not for lying there;
First what he is inquire:
An Orient pearl is often found
In depth of dirty mire.
Weigh not his crib, his wooden dish,
Nor beasts that by him feed;
Weigh not his mother's poor attire,
Nor Joseph's simple weed.
This stable is a Prince's court,
The crib his chair of state;
The beasts are parcel of his pomp,
The wooden dish his plate.
The persons in that poor attire
His royal liveries wear;
The Prince himself is come from heaven:
This pomp is praisèd there.
With joy approach, O Christian wight!
Do homage to thy King;
And highly praise this humble pomp,
Which he from heaven doth bring.
* * * * *
THE THREE KINGS
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
Three Kings came riding from far away,
Melchior and Gaspar and Baltasar;
Three Wise Men out of the East were they,
And they traveled by night and they slept by day,
For their guide was a beautiful, wonderful star.
The star was so beautiful, large and clear,
That all the other stars of the sky
Became a white mist in the atmosphere;
And by this they knew that the coming was near
Of the Prince foretold in the prophecy.
Three caskets they bore on their saddle-bows,
Three caskets of gold with golden keys;
Their robes were of crimson silk, with rows
Of bells and pomegranates and furbelows,
Their turbans like blossoming almond-trees.
And so the Three Kings rode into the West,
Through the dusk of night over hill and dell,
And sometimes they nodded with beard on breast,
And sometimes talked, as they paused to rest,
With the people they met at some wayside well.
"Of the child that is born," said Baltasar,
"Good people, I pray you, tell us the news;
For we in the East have seen his star,
And have ridden fast, and have ridden far,
To find and worship the King of the Jews."
And the people answered, "You ask in vain;
We know of no king but Herod the Great!"
They thought the Wise Men were men insane,
As they spurred their horses across the plain
Like riders in haste who cannot wait.
And when they came to Jerusalem,
Herod the Great, who had heard this thing,
Sent for the Wise Men and questioned them;
And said, "Go down unto Bethlehem,
And bring me tidings of this new king."
So they rode away, and the star stood still,
The only one in the gray of morn;
Yes, it stopped, it stood still of its own free will,
Right over Bethlehem on the hill,
The city of David where Christ was born.
And the Three Kings rode through the gate and the guard,
Through the silent street, till their horses turned
And neighed as they entered the great inn-yard;
But the windows were closed, and the doors were barred,
And only a light in the stable burned.
And cradled there in the scented hay,
In the air made sweet by the breath of kine,
The little child in the manger lay,
The Child that would be King one day
Of a kingdom not human, but divine.
His mother, Mary of Nazareth,
Sat watching beside his place of rest,
Watching the even flow of his breath,
For the joy of life and the terror of death
Were mingled together in her breast.
They laid their offerings at his feet:
The gold was their tribute to a King;
The frankincense, with its odor sweet,
Was for the Priest, the Paraclete;
The myrrh for the body's burying.
And the mother wondered and bowed her head,
And sat as still as a statue of stone;
Her heart was troubled yet comforted,
Remembering what the angel had said
Of an endless reign and of David's throne.
Then the Kings rode out of the city gate,
With a clatter of hoofs in proud array;
But they went not back to Herod the Great,
For they knew his malice and feared his hate,
And returned to their homes by another way.
* * * * *
HYMN ON THE NATIVITY
JOHN MILTON
It was the winter wild,
While the heaven-born child
All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;
Nature, in awe of him,
Had doffed her gaudy trim,
With her great Master so to sympathize:
It was no season then for her
To wanton with the sun, her lusty paramour.
Only with speeches fair
She wooes the gentle air,
To hide her guilty front with innocent snow;
And on her naked shame,
Pollute with sinful blame,
The saintly veil of maiden-white to throw;
Confounded, that her Maker's eyes
Should look so near upon her foul deformities.
But he, her fears to cease,
Sent down the meek-eyed Peace:
She, crowned with olive green, came softly sliding
Down through the turning sphere,
His ready harbinger,
With turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing;
And, waving wide her myrtle wand,
She strikes a universal peace through sea and land.
No war or battle's sound
Was heard the world around:
The idle spear and shield were high uphung;
The hookèd chariot stood
Unstained with hostile blood;
The trumpet spake not to the armèd throng;
And kings sat still with awful eye,
As if they surely knew their sovereign lord was by.
But peaceful was the night,
Wherein the Prince of Light
His reign of peace upon the earth began:
The winds, with wonder whist,
Smoothly the waters kissed,
Whispering new joys to the mild ocean,
Who now hath quite forgot to rave,
While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmèd wave.
The stars, with deep amaze,
Stand fixed in steadfast gaze,
Bending one way their precious influence;
And will not take their flight,
For all the morning light,
Or Lucifer had often warned them thence:
But in their glimmering orbs did glow,
Until their Lord himself bespake, and bid them go.
And, though the shady gloom
Had given day her room,
The sun himself withheld his wonted speed,
And hid his head for shame.
As his inferior flame
The new-enlightened world no more should need;
He saw a greater sun appear
Than his bright throne, or burning axletree, could bear.
The shepherds on the lawn,
Or ere the point of dawn,
Sat simply chatting in a rustic row;
Full little thought they then
That the mighty Pan
Was kindly come to live with them below;
Perhaps their loves, or else their sheep,
Was all that did their silly thoughts so busy keep.
When such music sweet
Their hearts and ears did greet,
As never was by mortal fingers strook,
Divinely warbled voice
Answering the stringèd noise,
As all their souls in blissful rapture took:
The air, such pleasure loath to lose,
With thousand echoes still prolongs each heavenly close.
Nature, that heard such sound,
Beneath the hollow round
Of Cynthia's seat, the airy region thrilling,
Now was almost won,
To think her part was done,
And that her reign had here its last fulfilling;
She knew such harmony alone
Could hold all heaven and earth in happier union.
At last surrounds their sight
A globe of circular light,
That with long beams the shame-faced night arrayed;
The helmèd cherubim,
And sworded seraphim,
Are seen in glittering ranks with wings displayed,
Harping in loud and solemn quire,
With unexpressive notes, to Heaven's new-born heir.
Such music as 'tis said
Before was never made,
But when of old the sons of morning sung,
While the Creator great
His constellations set,
And the well-balanced world on hinges hung,
And cast the dark foundations deep,
And bid the weltering waves their oozy channel keep.
Ring out, ye crystal spheres,
Once bless our human ears,
If ye have power to touch our senses so;
And let your silver chime
Move in melodious time;
And let the bass of Heaven's deep organ blow;
And, with your ninefold harmony,
Make up full concert to the angelic symphony.
For, if such holy song
Enwrap our fancy long,
Time will run back, and fetch the age of gold;
And speckled Vanity
Will sicken soon and die,
And leprous Sin will melt from earthly mould;
And Hell itself will pass away,
And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day.
Yea, Truth and Justice then
Will down return to men,
Orbed in a rainbow; and, like glories wearing,
Mercy will sit between,
Throned in celestial sheen,
With radiant feet the tissued clouds down steering;
And Heaven, as at some festival,
Will open wide the gates of her high palace hall.
But wisest Fate says no,
This must not yet be so;
The babe yet lies in smiling infancy,
That on the bitter cross
Must redeem our loss,
So both himself and us to glorify:
Yet first, to those chained in sleep,
The wakeful trump of doom must thunder through the deep,
With such a horrid clang
As on Mount Sinai rang,
While the red fire and smouldering clouds outbrake;
The aged earth aghast,
With terror of that blast,
Shall from the surface to the centre shake;
When, at the world's last session,
The dreadful Judge in middle air shall spread his throne.
And then at last our bliss,
Full and perfect is,
But now begins; for, from this happy day,
The old dragon, underground,
In straiter limits bound,
Not half so far casts his usurpèd sway;
And, wroth to see his kingdom fail,
Swinges the scaly horror of his folded tail.
The oracles are dumb;
No voice or hideous hum
Runs through the archèd roof in words deceiving.
Apollo from his shrine
Can no more divine,
With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving.
No nightly trance, or breathèd spell,
Inspires the pale-eyed priest from the prophetic cell.
The lonely mountains o'er,
And the resounding shore,
A voice of weeping heard and loud lament;
From haunted spring and dale,
Edged with poplar pale,
The parting Genius is with sighing sent;
With flower-inwoven tresses torn,
The nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets mourn.
In consecrated earth,
And on the holy hearth,
The Lars and Lemures mourn with midnight plaint.
In urns and altars round,
A drear and dying sound
Affrights the Flamens at their service quaint;
And the chill marble seems to sweat,
While each peculiar power foregoes his wonted seat.
Peor and Baälim
Forsake their temples dim
With that twice-battered God of Palestine;
And moonèd Ashtaroth
Heaven's queen and mother both,
Now sits not girt with tapers' holy shine;
The Libyac Hammon shrinks his horn;
In vain the Tyrian maids their wounded Thammuz mourn.
And sullen Moloch, fled,
Hath left in shadows dread
His burning idol all of blackest hue:
In vain with cymbals' ring
They call the grisly king,
In dismal dance about the furnace blue:
The brutish gods of Nile as fast,
Isis, and Orus, and the dog Anubis, haste.
Nor is Osiris seen
In Memphian grove or green,
Trampling the unshowered grass with lowings loud;
Nor can he be at rest
Within his sacred chest,
Naught but profoundest hell can be his shroud;
In vain with timbrelled anthems dark
The sable-stolèd sorcerers bear his worshipped ark.
He feels from Judah's land
The dreaded infant's hand,
The rays of Bethlehem blind his dusky eyne;
Nor all the gods beside
Longer dare abide,
Not Typhon huge ending in snaky twine;
Our babe, to show his Godhead true,
Can in his swaddling bands control the damnèd crew.
So, when the sun in bed,
Curtained with cloudy red,
Pillows his chin upon an orient wave,
The flocking shadows pale
Troop to the infernal jail,
Each fettered ghost slips to his several grave;
And the yellow-skirted fays
Fly after the night-steeds, leaving their moon-loved maze.
But see, the Virgin blest
Hath laid her babe to rest;
Time is our tedious song should here have ending:
Heaven's youngest-teèmed star
Hath fixed her polished car,
Her sleeping Lord with handmaid lamp attending;
And all about the courtly stable
Bright-harnessed angels sit in order serviceable.
* * * * *
II
CELEBRATION
CHRISTMAS EVE AT MR. WARDLE'S
From "Pickwick Papers"
CHARLES DICKENS
From the center of the ceiling of this kitchen, old Wardle had just
suspended with his own hands a huge branch of mistletoe, and this same
branch of mistletoe instantaneously gave rise to a scene of general and
most delightful struggling and confusion; in the midst of which Mr.
Pickwick with a gallantry which would have done honour to a descendant
of Lady Trollimglower herself, took the old lady by the hand, led her
beneath the mystic branch, and saluted her in all courtesy and decorum.
The old lady submitted to this piece of practical politeness with all
the dignity which befitted so important and serious a solemnity, but the
younger ladies not being so thoroughly imbued with a superstitious
veneration of the custom, or imagining that the value of a salute is
very much enhanced if it cost a little trouble to obtain it, screamed
and struggled, and ran into corners, and threatened and remonstrated,
and did everything but leave the room, until some of the less
adventurous gentlemen were on the point of desisting, when they all at
once found it useless to resist any longer, and submitted to be kissed
with a good grace. Mr. Winkle kissed the young lady with the black eyes,
and Mr. Snodgrass kissed Emily; and Mr. Weller, not being particular
about the form of being under the mistletoe, kissed Emma and the other
female servants, just as he caught them. As to the poor relations, they
kissed everybody, not even excepting the plainer portion of the
young-lady visitors, who, in their excessive confusion, ran right under
the mistletoe, directly it was hung up, without knowing it! Wardle stood
with his back to the fire, surveying the whole scene, with the utmost
satisfaction; and the fat boy took the opportunity of appropriating to
his own use, and summarily devouring, a particularly fine mince-pie,
that had been carefully put by for somebody else.
Now the screaming had subsided, and faces were in a glow and curls in a
tangle, and Mr. Pickwick, after kissing the old lady as before
mentioned, was standing under the mistletoe, looking with a very pleased
countenance on all that was passing around him, when the young lady with
the black eyes, after a little whispering with the other young ladies,
made a sudden dart forward, and, putting her arm around Mr. Pickwick's
neck, saluted him affectionately on the left cheek; and before Mr.
Pickwick distinctly knew what was the matter, he was surrounded by the
whole body, and kissed by every one of them.
It was a pleasant thing to see Mr. Pickwick in the centre of the group,
now pulled this way, and then that, and first kissed on the chin and
then on the nose, and then on the spectacles, and to hear the peals of
laughter which were raised on every side; but it was a still more
pleasant thing to see Mr. Pickwick, blinded shortly afterwards with a
silk-handkerchief, falling up against the wall, and scrambling into
corners, and going through all the mysteries of blind-man's buff, with
the utmost relish of the game, until at last he caught one of the poor
relations; and then had to evade the blind-man himself, which he did
with a nimbleness and agility that elicited the admiration and applause
of all beholders. The poor relations caught just the people whom they
thought would like it; and when the game flagged, got caught themselves.
When they were all tired of blind-man's buff, there was a great game at
snapdragon, and when fingers enough were burned with that, and all the
raisons gone, they sat down by the huge fire of blazing logs to a
substantial supper, and a mighty bowl of wassail, something smaller than
an ordinary washhouse copper, in which the hot apples were hissing and
bubbling with a rich look, and a jolly sound, that were perfectly
irresistible.
"This," said Mr. Pickwick, looking round him, "this is, indeed,
comfort."
"Our invariable custom," replied Mr. Wardle. "Everybody sits down with
us on Christmas eve, as you see them now--servants and all; and here we
wait till the clock strikes twelve, to usher Christmas in, and wile away
the time with forfeits and old stories. Trundle, my boy, rake up the
fire."
Up flew the bright sparks in myriads as the logs were stirred, and the
deep red blaze sent forth a rich glow, that penetrated into the furthest
corner of the room, and cast its cheerful tint on every face.
"Come," said Wardle, "a song--a Christmas song. I'll give you one, in
default of a better."
"Bravo," said Mr. Pickwick.
"Fill up," cried Wardle. "It will be two hours good, before you see the
bottom of the bowl through the deep rich colour of the wassail; fill up
all round, and now for the song."
Thus saying, the merry old gentleman, in a good, round, sturdy voice,
commenced without more ado--
A CHRISTMAS CAROL
I care not for Spring; on his fickle wing
Let the blossoms and buds be borne:
He woos them amain with his treacherous rain,
And he scatters them ere the morn.
An inconstant elf, he knows not himself,
Or his own changing mind an hour,
He'll smile in your face, and, with wry grimace,
He'll wither your youngest flower.
Let the summer sun to his bright home run,
He shall never be sought by me;
When he's dimmed by a cloud I can laugh aloud,
And care not how sulky he be;
For his darling child is the madness wild
That sports in fierce fever's train;
And when love is too strong, it don't last long,
As many have found to their pain.
A mild harvest night, by the tranquil light
Of the modest and gentle moon,
Has a far sweeter sheen for me, I ween,
Than the broad and unblushing noon,
But every leaf awakens my grief,
As it lieth beneath the tree;
So let Autumn air be never so fair,
It by no means agrees with me.
But my song I troll out, for Christmas stout,
The hearty, the true, and the bold;
A bumper I drain, and with might and main
Give three cheers for this Christmas old.
We'll usher him in with a merry din
That shall gladden his joyous heart,
And we'll keep him up while there's bite or sup,
And in fellowship good, we'll part.
In his fine honest pride, he scorns to hide
One jot of his hard-weather scars;
They're no disgrace, for there's much the same trace
On the cheeks of our bravest tars.
Then again I sing 'till the roof doth ring,
And it echoes from wall to wall--
To the stout old wight, fair welcome to-night,
As the King of the Seasons all!
* * * * *
A VISIT FROM ST. NICHOLAS
CLEMENT C. MOORE
'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;
The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar-plums danced through their heads;
And mamma in her kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled our brains for a long winter's nap,--
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.
The moon, on the breast of the new-fallen snow,
Gave a lustre of midday to objects below;
When what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer,
With a little old driver, so lively and quick
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled and shouted and called them by name:
"Now, Dasher! now, Dancer! now, Prancer and Vixen!
On, Comet! on, Cupid! on, Donder and Blitzen!
To the top of the porch, to the top of the wall!
Now, dash away, dash away, dash away all!"
As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky,
So, up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With a sleigh full of toys,--and St. Nicholas too.
And then in a twinkling I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof,
As I drew in my head and was turning around,
Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound.
He was dressed all in fur from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot;
A bundle of toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a pedler just opening his pack.
His eyes how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry;
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard on his chin was as white as the snow.
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath.
He had a broad face, and a little round belly
That shook, when he laughed, like a bowl full of jelly.
He was chubby and plump,--a right jolly old elf--
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself.
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings; then turned with a jerk,
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose.
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle;
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight:
"Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night!"
* * * * *
A CHRISTMAS PIECE
Of garnered rhyme, from hidden stores of olden time that since the
language did begin, have welcomed merry Christmas in, and made the
winter nights so long, fleet by on wings of wine and song; for when the
snow is on the roof, the house within is sorrow proof, if yule log
blazes on the hearth, and cups and hearts o'er-brim with mirth. Then
bring the wassail to the board, with nuts and fruit--the winter's hoard;
and bid the children take off shoe, to hang their stockings by the flue;
and let the clear and frosty sky, set out its brightest jewelry, to show
old Santa Claus the road, so he may ease his gimcrack load. And with the
coming of these times, we'll add some old and lusty rhymes, that suit
the festive season well, and sound as sweet as Christmas bell.
Now just bethink of castle gate, where humble midnight mummers wait, to
try if voices, one and all, can rouse the tipsy seneschal, to give them
bread and beer and brawn, for tidings of the Christmas morn; or bid each
yelper clear his throat, with water of the castle moat, for thus they
used, by snow and torch, to rear their voices at the porch:
_Fred S. Cozzens._
* * * * *
WASSAILER'S SONG
ROBERT SOUTHWELL
Wassail! wassail! all over the town,
Our toast it is white, and our ale it is brown;
Our bowl is made of a maplin tree;
We be good fellows all;--I drink to thee.
Here's to our horse, and to his right ear,
God send master a happy new year;
A happy new year as e'er he did see,--
With my wassailing bowl I drink to thee.
Here's to our mare, and to her right eye,
God send our mistress a good Christmas pie;
A good Christmas pie as e'er I did see,--
With my wassailing bowl I drink to thee.
Here's to our cow, and to her long tail,
God send our measter us never may fail
Of a cup of good beer: I pray you draw near,
And our jolly wassail it's then you shall hear.
Be here any maids? I suppose here be some;
Sure they will not let young men stand on the cold stone!
Sing hey O, maids! come trole back the pin,
And the fairest maid in the house let us all in.
Come, butler, come, bring us a bowl of the best;
I hope your soul in heaven will rest;
But if you do bring us a bowl of the small,
Then down fall butler, and bowl and all.
- - - - -
And here's a Christmas carol meant for children, and most excellent, and
though the monk that wrote it was hung, yet still his verses may be
sung.
A CAROL
As I in a hoarie winter's night
Stood shivering in the snow,
Surpriz'd I was with sudden heat,
Which made my heart to glow;
And lifting up a fearefull eye
To view what fire was neere,
A prettie babe, all burning bright,
Did in the aire appeare;
Who, scorchèd with excessive heat,
Such flouds of teares did shed,
As though his flouds should quench his flames,
Which with his teares were bred:
Alas! (quoth he) but newly borne,
In fierie heats I frie,
Yet none approach to warm their hearts,
Or feele my fire, but I;
My faultless brest the furnace is,
The fuell, wounding thornes:
Love is the fire, and sighs the smoke,
The ashes, shames and scornes;
The fuell justice layeth on,
And mercy blows the coales,
The metalls in this furnace wrought,
Are Men's defiled soules:
For which, as now on fire I am,
To work them to their good,
So will I melt into a bath,
To wash them in my blood.
With this he vanisht out of sight,
And swiftly shrunke away,
And straight I called unto minde
That it was Christmasse Day.
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS EVE
HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE
[From "My Study Fire."]
The world has been full of mysteries to-day; everybody has gone about
weighted with secrets. The children's faces have fairly shone with
expectancy, and I enter easily into the universal dream which at this
moment holds all the children of Christendom under its spell. Was there
ever a wider or more loving conspiracy than that which keeps the
venerable figure of Santa Claus from slipping away, with all the other
oldtime myths, into the forsaken wonderland of the past? Of all the
personages whose marvelous doings once filled the minds of men, he alone
survives. He has outlived all the great gods, and all the impressive and
poetic conceptions which once flitted between heaven and earth; these
have gone, but Santa Claus remains by virtue of a common understanding
that childhood shall not be despoiled of one of its most cherished
beliefs, either by the mythologist, with his sun myth theory, or the
scientist, with his heartless diatribe against superstition. There is a
good deal more to be said on this subject, if this were the place to say
it; even superstition has its uses, and sometimes, its sound heart of
truth. He who does not see in the legend of Santa Claus a beautiful
faith on one side, and the naive embodiment of a divine fact on the
other, is not fit to have a place at the Christmas board. For him there
should be neither carol, nor holly, nor mistletoe; they only shall keep
the feast to whom all these things are but the outward and visible signs
of an inward and spiritual grace.
Rosalind and myself are thoroughly orthodox when it comes to the keeping
of holidays; here at least the ways of our fathers are our ways also.
Orthodoxy generally consists in retaining and emphasizing the
disagreeable ways of the fathers, and as we are both inclined to
heterodoxy on these points, we make the more prominent our observance of
the best of the old-time habits. I might preach a pleasant little sermon
just here, taking as my text the "survival of the fittest," and
illustrating the truth from our own domestic ritual; but the season
preaches its own sermon, and I should only follow the example of some
ministers and get between the text and my congregation if I made the
attempt. For weeks we have all been looking forward to this eventful
evening, and the still more eventful morrow. There have been hurried and
whispered conferences hastily suspended at the sound of a familiar step
on the stair; packages of every imaginable size and shape have been
surreptitiously introduced into the house, and have immediately
disappeared in all manner of out-of-the-way places; and for several
weeks past one room has been constantly under lock and key, visited only
when certain sharp-sighted eyes were occupied in other directions.
Through all this scene of mystery Rosalind has moved sedately and with
sealed lips, the common confidant of all the conspirators, and herself
the greatest conspirator of all. Blessed is the season which engages the
whole world in a conspiracy of love!
After dinner, eaten, let it be confessed, with more haste and less
accompaniment of talk than usual, the parlor doors were opened, and
there stood the Christmas tree in a glow of light, its wonderful
branches laden with all manner of strange fruits not to be found in the
botanies. The wild shouts, the merry laughter, the cries of delight as
one coveted fruit after another dropped into long-expectant arms still
linger in my ears now that the little tapers are burnt out, the boughs
left bare, and the actors in the perennial drama are fast asleep, with
new and strange bedfellows selected from the spoils of the night.
Cradled between a delightful memory and a blissful anticipation, who
does not envy them?
After this charming prelude is over, Rosalind comes into the study, and
studies for the fortieth time the effect of the new design of decoration
which she had this year worked out, and which gives these rather somber
rows of books a homelike and festive aspect. It pleases me to note the
spray of holly that obscures the title of Bacon's solemn and weighty
"Essays," and I get half a page of suggestions for my notebook from the
fact that a sprig of mistletoe has fallen on old Burton's "Anatomy of
Melancholy." Rosalind has reason to be satisfied, and if I read her face
aright she has succeeded even in her own eyes in bringing Christmas,
with its fragrant memories and its heavenly visions, into the study. I
cannot help thinking, as I watch her piling up the fire for a blaze of
unusual splendor, that if more studies had their Rosalinds to bring in
the genial currents of life there would be more cheer and hope and
large-hearted wisdom in the books which the world is reading to-day.
When the fire has reached a degree of intensity and magnitude which
Rosalind thinks adequate to the occasion, I take down a well-worn volume
which opens of itself at a well-worn page. It is a book which I have
read and re-read many times, and always with a kindling sympathy and
affection for the man who wrote it; in whatever mood I take it up there
is something in it which touches me with a sense of kinship. It is not a
great book, but it is a book of the heart, and books of the heart have
passed beyond the outer court of criticism before we bestow upon them
that phrase of supreme regard. There are other books of the heart around
me, but on Christmas Eve it is Alexander Smith's "Dreamthorp" which
always seems to lie at my hand, and when I take it up the well-worn
volume falls open at the essay on "Christmas." It is a good many years
since Rosalind and I began to read together on Christmas Eve this
beautiful meditation on the season, and now it has gathered about itself
such a host of memories that it has become part of our common past. It
is, indeed, a veritable palimpsest, overlaid with tender and gracious
recollections out of which the original thought gains a new and subtle
sweetness. As I read it aloud I know that she sees once more the
familiar landscape about Dreamthorp, with the low, dark hill in the
background, and over it "the tender radiance that precedes the moon";
the village windows are all lighted, and the "whole place shines like a
congregation of glowworms." There are the skaters still "leaning against
the frosty wind"; there is the "gray church tower amid the leafless
elms," around which the echoes of the morning peal of Christmas bells
still hover; the village folk have gathered, "in their best dresses and
their best faces"; the beautiful service of the church has been read and
answered with heartfelt responses, the familiar story has been told
again simply and urgently, with applications for every thankful soul,
and then the congregation has gone to its homes and its festivities.
All these things, I am sure, lie within Rosalind's vision, although she
seems to see nothing but the ruddy blaze of the fire; all these things I
see, as I have seen them these many Christmas Eves agone; but with this
familiar landscape there are mingled all the sweet and sorrowful
memories of our common life, recalled at this hour that the light of the
highest truth may interpret them anew in the divine language of hope. I
read on until I come to the quotation from the "Hymn to the Nativity,"
and then I close the book, and take up a copy of Milton close at hand.
We have had our commemoration service of love, and now there comes into
our thought, with the organ roll of this sublime hymn, the universal
truth which lies at the heart of the season. I am hardly conscious that
it is my voice which makes these words audible: I am conscious only of
this mighty-voiced anthem, fit for the choral song of the morning stars:
"Ring out, ye crystal spheres,
And bless our human ears,
If ye have power to touch our senses so;
And let your silver chime
Move in melodious time;
And let the bass of heaven's deep organ blow;
And, with your ninefold harmony,
Make up full concert to the angelic symphony.
"For, if such holy song
Enwrap our fancy long,
Time will run back and fetch the age of gold;
And speckled vanity
Will sicken soon and die,
And leprous sin will melt from earthly mold;
And hell itself will pass away,
And leave her dolorous mansions to the peering day.
- - - - -
"The oracles are dumb,
No voice or hideous hum
Runs through the archéd roof in words deceiving;
Apollo from his shrine
Can no more divine
With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving,
No nightly trance or breathed spell
Inspires the pale-eyed priest from the prophetic cell.
"The lonely mountains o'er,
And the resounding shore,
A voice of weeping heard and loud lament;
From haunted spring, and dale
Edgéd with poplars pale,
The parting genius is with sighing sent;
With flower-enwoven tresses torn,
The nymphs in twilight shades of tangled thickets mourn."
- - - - -
Like a psalm the great Hymn fills the air, and like a psalm it remains
in the memory. The fire has burned low, and a soft and solemn light
fills the room. Neither of us speaks while the clock strikes twelve. I
look out of the window. The heavens are ablaze with light, and somewhere
amid those circling constellations I know that a new star has found its
place, and is shining with such a ray as never before fell from heaven
to earth.
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS IN THE OLDEN TIME
WALTER SCOTT
On Christmas-eve the bells were rung;
The damsel donned her kirtle sheen;
The hall was dressed with holly green;
Forth to the wood did merry men go,
To gather in the mistletoe.
Thus opened wide the baron's hall
To vassal, tenant, serf and all;
Power laid his rod of rule aside
And ceremony doffed his pride.
The heir, with roses in his shoes,
That night might village partner choose;
The lord, underogating, share
The vulgar game of "Post and Pair."
All hailed, with uncontrolled delight,
And general voice, the happy night
That to the cottage, as the crown,
Brought tidings of salvation down.
The fire, with well-dried logs supplied,
Went roaring up the chimney wide;
The huge hall-table's oaken face,
Scrubbed till it shone, the day to grace,
Bore then upon its massive board
No mark to part the squire and lord.
Then was brought in the lusty brawn
By old blue-coated serving man;
Then the grim boar's head frowned on high,
Crested with bays and rosemary.
Well can the green-garbed ranger tell
How, when and where the monster fell;
What dogs before his death he tore,
And all the baitings of the boar.
The wassal round, in good brown bowls,
Garnished with ribbons, blithely trowls.
There the huge sirloin reeked: hard by
Plum-porridge stood, and Christmas pye;
Nor failed old Scotland to produce,
At such high-tide, her savory goose.
Then came the merry maskers in,
And carols roared with blithesome din.
If unmelodious was the song,
It was a hearty note, and strong;
Who lists may in their murmuring see
Traces of ancient mystery;
White shirts supplied the masquerade,
And smutted cheeks the visors made;
But O, what maskers richly dight,
Can boast of bosoms half so light!
England was "merry England" when
Old Christmas brought his sports again;
'Twas Christmas broached the mightiest ale,
'Twas Christmas told the merriest tale;
A Christmas gambol oft would cheer
The poor man's heart through half the year.
* * * * *
SLY SANTA CLAUS
MRS. C.S. STONE
All the house was asleep,
And the fire burning low,
When, from far up the chimney,
Came down a "Ho! ho!"
And a little, round man,
With a terrible scratching,
Dropped into the room
With a wink that was catching.
Yes, down he came, bumping,
And thumping, and jumping,
And picking himself up without sign
of a bruise!
"Ho! ho!" he kept on,
As if bursting with cheer.
"Good children, gay children,
Glad children, see here!
I have brought you fine dolls,
And gay trumpets, and rings,
Noah's arks, and bright skates,
And a host of good things!
I have brought a whole sackful,
A packful, a hackful!
Come hither, come hither, come hither
and choose!
"Ho! ho! What is this?
Why, they all are asleep!
But their stockings are up,
And my presents will keep!
So, in with the candies,
The books, and the toys;
All the goodies I have
For the good girls and boys.
I'll ram them, and jam them,
And slam them, and cram them;
All the stockings will hold while the
tired youngsters snooze."
All the while his round shoulders
Kept ducking and ducking;
And his little, fat fingers
Kept tucking and tucking;
Until every stocking
Bulged out, on the wall,
As if it were bursting,
And ready to fall.
And then, all at once,
With a whisk and a whistle,
And twisting himself
Like a tough bit of gristle,
He bounced up again,
Like the down of a thistle,
And nothing was left but the prints of his shoes.
* * * * *
THE WAITS
MARGARET DELAND
At the break of Christmas Day,
Through the frosty starlight ringing,
Faint and sweet and far away,
Comes the sound of children, singing,
Chanting, singing,
_"Cease to mourn,
For Christ is born,
Peace and joy to all men bringing!"_
Careless that the chill winds blow,
Growing stronger, sweeter, clearer,
Noiseless footfalls in the snow
Bring the happy voices nearer;
Hear them singing,
_"Winter's drear,
But Christ is here,
Mirth and gladness with Him bringing!"_
"Merry Christmas!" hear them say,
As the East is growing lighter;
"May the joy of Christmas Day
Make your whole year gladder, brighter!"
Join their singing,
_"To each home
Our Christ has come,
All Love's treasures with Him bringing!"_
* * * * *
THE KNIGHTING OF THE SIRLOIN OF BEEF BY CHARLES THE SECOND
ANON
The Second Charles of England
Rode forth one Christmas tide,
To hunt a gallant stag of ten,
Of Chingford woods the pride.
The winds blew keen, the snow fell fast,
And made for earth a pall,
As tired steeds and wearied men
Returned to Friday Hall.
The blazing logs, piled on the dogs,
Were pleasant to behold!
And grateful was the steaming feast
To hungry men and cold.
With right good-will all took their fill,
And soon each found relief;
Whilst Charles his royal trencher piled
From one huge loin of beef.
Quoth Charles, "Odd's fish! a noble dish!
Ay, noble made by me!
By kingly right, I dub thee knight--
Sir Loin henceforward be!"
And never was a royal jest
Received with such acclaim:
And never knight than good Sir Loin
More worthy of the name.
* * * * *
THE CHRISTMAS GOOSE AT THE CRATCHITS'
CHARLES DICKENS
You might have thought a goose the rarest of all birds; a feathered
phenomenon, to which a black swan was a matter of course; and in truth,
it was something like it in that house. Mrs. Cratchit made the gravy
(ready before-hand in a little saucepan) hissing hot; Master Peter
mashed the potatoes with incredible vigor; Miss Belinda sweetened up the
apple-sauce; Martha dusted the hot plates; Bob took Tiny Tim beside him
in a tiny corner, at the table; the two young Cratchits set chairs for
everybody, not forgetting themselves, and mounting guard upon their
posts, crammed spoons into their mouths, lest they should shriek for
goose before their turn came to be helped. At last the dishes were set
on, and grace was said. It was succeeded by a breathless pause, as Mrs.
Cratchit, looking slowly all along the carving knife, prepared to plunge
it in the breast; but when she did, and when the long-expected gush of
stuffing issued forth, one murmur of delight arose all around the board,
and even Tiny Tim, excited by the two young Cratchits, beat on the table
with the handle of his knife, and feebly cried hurrah!
There never was such a goose. Bob said he didn't believe there ever was
such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and flavor, size and cheapness, were
the themes of universal admiration. Eked out by the apple-sauce and
mashed potatoes, it was a sufficient dinner for the whole family;
indeed, as Mrs. Cratchit said with great delight (surveying one small
atom of a bone on the dish), they hadn't ate it all at last! Yet every
one had had enough, and the youngest Cratchits in particular were
steeped in sage and onion to the eye-brows! But now, the plates being
changed by Miss Belinda, Mrs. Cratchit left the room alone--too nervous
to bear witnesses--to take the pudding up, and bring it in.
Suppose it should not be done enough! Suppose it should break in turning
out! Suppose somebody should have got over the wall of the backyard, and
stolen it, while they were merry with the goose; a supposition at which
the two young Cratchits became livid! All sorts of horrors were
supposed.
Hallo! A great deal of steam! The pudding was out of the copper. A smell
like a washing-day! That was the cloth. A smell like an eating-house and
a pastry cook's next door to each other, with a laundress next door to
that! That was the pudding. In half a minute Mrs. Cratchit entered,
flushed, but smiling proudly, with the pudding like a speckled
cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern of
ignited brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top.
Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchit said, and calmly too, that he
regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs. Cratchit since
their marriage. Mrs. Cratchit said that now the weight was off her mind,
she would confess she had had her doubts about the quantity of flour.
Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it
was at all a small pudding for so large a family. It would have been
flat heresy to do so. Any Cratchit would have blushed to hint at such a
thing.
At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the hearth
swept, and the fire made up. The compound in the jug being tasted and
considered perfect, apples and oranges were put upon the table, and a
shovelful of chestnuts on the fire. Then all the Cratchit family drew
round the hearth, in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a
one; and at Bob Cratchit's elbow stood the family display of glass--two
tumblers, and a custard-cup without a handle.
These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden
goblets would have done; and Bob served it out with beaming looks, while
the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and cracked noisily. Then Bob
proposed:
"A merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us!"
Which all the family re-echoed.
"God bless us every one!" said Tiny Tim, the last of all.
* * * * *
GOD BLESS US EVERY ONE
JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY
[From "Sketches in Prose."]
"God bless us every one!" prayed Tiny Tim,
Crippled, and dwarfed of body, yet so tall
Of soul, we tiptoe earth to look on him,
High towering over all.
He loved the loveless world, nor dreamed, indeed,
That it, at best, could give to him, the while,
But pitying glances, when his only need
Was but a cheery smile.
And thus he prayed, "God bless us every one!"
Enfolding all the creeds within the span
Of his child-heart; and so, despising none,
Was nearer saint than man.
I like to fancy God, in Paradise,
Lifting a finger o'er the rhythmic swing
Of chiming harp and song, with eager eyes
Turned earthward, listening--
The Anthem stilled--the angels leaning there
Above the golden walls--the morning sun
Of Christmas bursting flower-like with the prayer,
"God bless us Every One!"
* * * * *
BELLS ACROSS THE SNOWS
FRANCES RIDLEY HAVERGAL
O Christmas, merry Christmas!
Is it really come again,
With its memories and greetings,
With its joy and with its pain?
There's a minor in the carol,
And a shadow in the light,
And a spray of cypress twining
With the holly wreath to-night.
And the hush is never broken
By laughter light and low,
As we listen in the starlight
To the "bells across the snow."
O Christmas, merry Christmas!
'Tis not so very long
Since other voices blended
With the carol and the song!
If we could but hear them singing
As they are singing now,
If we could but see the radiance
Of the crown on each dear brow;
There would be no sigh to smother,
No hidden tear to flow,
As we listen in the starlight
To the "bells across the snow."
O Christmas, merry Christmas!
This never more can be;
We cannot bring again the days
Of our unshadowed glee.
But Christmas, happy Christmas,
Sweet herald of good-will,
With holy songs of glory
Brings holy gladness still.
For peace and hope may brighten,
And patient love may glow,
As we listen in the starlight
To the "bells across the snow."
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS BELLS
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old, familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet
The words repeat
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along
The unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
Till, ringing, swinging on its way,
The world revolved from night to day
A voice, a chime,
A chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
Then from each black, accursèd mouth
The cannon thundered in the South
And with the sound
The carols drowned
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
It was as if an earthquake rent
The hearth-stones of a continent,
And made forlorn
The households born
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!
And in despair I bowed my head;
"There is no peace on earth," I said;
"For hate is strong
And mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!"
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep.
"God is not dead; nor doth He sleep!
The Wrong shall fail,
The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men!"
* * * * *
MINSTRELS AND MAIDS
WILLIAM MORRIS
Outlanders, whence come ye last?
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
Through what green seas and great have ye past?
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
From far away, O masters mine,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
We come to bear you goodly wine,
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
From far away we come to you,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
To tell of great tidings strange and true,
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
News, news of the Trinity,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
And Mary and Joseph from over the sea!
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
For as we wandered far and wide,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
What hap do you deem there should us betide!
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
Under a bent when the night was deep,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
There lay three shepherds tending their sheep.
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
"O ye shepherds, what have ye seen,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
To slay your sorrow, and heal your teen?"
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
"In an ox-stall this night we saw,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
A babe and a maid without a flaw.
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
"There was an old man there beside,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
His hair was white and his hood was wide.
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
"And as we gazed this thing upon,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
Those twain knelt down to the Little One,
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
"And a marvellous song we straight did hear,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
That slew our sorrow and healed our care."
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
News of a fair and marvellous thing,
_The snow in the street and the wind on the door._
Nowell, nowell, nowell, we sing!
_Minstrels and maids, stand forth on the floor._
* * * * *
INEXHAUSTIBILITY OF THE SUBJECT OF CHRISTMAS
LEIGH HUNT
So many things have been said of late years about Christmas, that it is
supposed by some there is no saying more. O they of little faith! What!
do they suppose that every thing has been said that _can_ be said about
any one Christmas thing?
About beef, for instance?
About plum-pudding?
About mince-pie?
About holly?
About ivy?
About rosemary?
About mistletoe? (Good Heavens! what an immense number of things
remain to be said about mistletoe!)
About Christmas Eve?
About hunt-the-slipper?
About hot cockles?
About blind-man's-buff?
About shoeing the wild-mare?
About thread-the-needle?
About he-can-do-little-that-can't-do-this?
About puss-in-the-corner?
About snap-dragon?
About forfeits?
About Miss Smith?
About the bell-man?
About the waits?
About chilblains?
About carols?
About the fire?
About the block on it?
About school-boys?
About their mothers?
About Christmas-boxes?
About turkeys?
About Hogmany?
About goose-pie?
About mumming?
About saluting the apple-trees?
About brawn?
About plum-porridge?
About hobby-horse?
About hoppings?
About wakes?
About "feed-the-dove"?
About hackins?
About yule-doughs?
About going-a-gooding?
About loaf-stealing?
About _Julklaps_? (Who has exhausted that subject,
we should like to know?)
About wad-shooting?
About elder-wine?
About pantomimes?
About cards?
About New-Year's Day?
About gifts?
About wassail?
About Twelfth-cake?
About king and queen?
About characters?
About eating too much?
About aldermen?
About the doctor?
About all being in the wrong?
About charity?
About all being in the right?
About faith, hope, and endeavor?
About the greatest plum-pudding for the greatest number?
_Esto perpetua_,--that is, faith, hope and charity, and endeavor; and
plum-pudding enough by and by, all the year round, for everybody that
likes it. Why that should not be the case, we cannot see,--seeing that
the earth is big, and human kind teachable, and God very good, and
inciting us to do it. Meantime, gravity apart, we ask anybody whether
any of the above subjects are exhausted; and we inform everybody, that
all the above customs still exist in some parts of our beloved country,
however unintelligible they may have become in others. But to give a
specimen of the non-exhaustion of any one of their topics.
Beef, for example. Now, we should like to know who has exhausted the
subject of the fine old roast Christmas piece of beef, from its original
appearance in the meadows as part of the noble sultan of the herd,
glorious old Taurus,--the lord of the sturdy brow and ponderous agility,
a sort of thunderbolt of a beast, well chosen by Jove to disguise in,
one of Nature's most striking compounds of apparent heaviness and
unencumbered activity,--up to its contribution to the noble
Christmas-dinner, smoking from the spit, and flanked by the outposts of
Bacchus. John Bull (cannibalism apart) hails it like a sort of relation.
He makes it part of his flesh and blood; glories in it; was named after
it; has it served up, on solemn occasions, with music and a hymn, as it
was the other day at the royal city dinner:--
"Oh the roast beef of old England!
And oh the old English roast beef!"
"_And_ oh!" observe, not merely "oh!" again; but "and" with it; as if,
though the same piece of beef, it were also another,--another and the
same,--cut, and come again; making two of one, in order to express
intensity and reduplication of satisfaction:--
"Oh the roast beef of old England!
_And_ oh the old English roast beef!"
We beg to assure the reader, that a whole _Seer_ might be written on
this single point of the Christmas-dinner; and "shall we be told" (as
orators exclaim), "and this, too, in a British land," that the subject
is "_exhausted_"!
Then plum-pudding! What a word is that! how plump and plump again! How
round and repeated and plenipotential! (There are two p's, observe, in
plenipotential; and so there are in plum-pudding. We love an exquisite
fitness,--a might and wealth of adaptation). Why, the whole round cheek
of universal childhood is in the idea of plum-pudding; ay, and the
weight of manhood, and the plenitude of the majesty of city dames.
Wealth itself is symbolized by the least of its fruity particles. "A
plum" is a city fortune,--a million of money. He (the old boy, who has
earned it)--
"Puts in his thumb,
_videlicet_, into his pocket,
And pulls out a plum,
And says, What a _good man_ am I!"
Observe a little boy at a Christmas-dinner, and his grandfather opposite
him. What a world of secret similarity there is between them! How hope
in one, and retrospection in the other, and appetite in both, meet over
the same ground of pudding, and understand it to a nicety! How the
senior banters the little boy on his third slice! and how the little boy
thinks within himself that he dines that day as well as the senior! How
both look hot and red and smiling, and juvenile. How the little boy is
conscious of the Christmas-box in his pocket! (of which, indeed, the
grandfather jocosely puts him in mind); and how the grandfather is quite
as conscious of the plum, or part of a plum, or whatever fraction it may
be, in his own! How he incites the little boy to love money and good
dinners all his life! and how determined the little boy is to abide by
his advice,--with a secret addition in favor of holidays and
marbles,--to which there is an analogy, in the senior's mind, on the
side of trips to Hastings, and a game at whist! Finally, the old
gentleman sees his own face in the pretty smooth one of the child; and
if the child is not best pleased at his proclamation of the likeness (in
truth, is horrified at it, and thinks it a sort of madness), yet nice
observers, who have lived long enough to see the wonderful changes in
people's faces from youth to age, probably discern the thing well
enough, and feel a movement of pathos at their hearts in considering the
world of trouble and emotion that is the causer of the changes. _That_
old man's face was once like that little boy's! _That_ little boy's will
be one day like that old man's! What a thought to make us all love and
respect one another, if not for our fine qualities, let at least for the
trouble and sorrow which we all go through!
Ay, and joy too; for all people have their joys as well as troubles, at
one time or another,--most likely both together, or in constant
alternation: and the greater part of troubles are not the worst things
in the world, but only graver forms of the requisite motion of the
universe, or workings towards a better condition of things, the greater
or less violent according as we give them violence, or respect them like
awful but not ill-meaning gods, and entertain them with a rewarded
patience. Grave thoughts, you will say, for Christmas. But no season has
a greater right to grave thoughts, in passing; and, for that very
reason, no season has a greater right to let them pass, and recur to
more light ones.
So a noble and merry season to you, my masters; and may we meet, thick
and three-fold, many a time and oft, in blithe yet most thoughtful
pages! Fail not to call to mind, in the course of the 25th of this
month, that the divinest Heart that ever walked the earth was born on
that day: and then smile and enjoy yourselves for the rest of it; for
mirth is also of Heaven's making, and wondrous was the wine-drinking at
Galilee.
* * * * *
SONG OF THE HOLLY
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Blow, blow thou winter wind--
Thou art not so unkind
As man's ingratitude!
Thy tooth is not so keen,
Because thou art not seen,
Although thy breath be rude.
Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly:
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly.
Then heigh ho! the holly!
This life is most jolly!
Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky--
Thou dost not bite so nigh
As benefits forgot!
Though thou the waters warp,
Thy sting is not so sharp
As friend remembered not.
Heigh ho! sing heigh ho! unto the green holly,
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly.
Then heigh ho, the holly!
This life is most jolly!
* * * * *
UNDER THE HOLLY-BOUGH
CHARLES MACKAY
Ye who have scorned each other,
Or injured friend or brother,
In this fast-fading year;
Ye who, by word or deed,
Have made a kind heart bleed,
Come gather here!
Let sinned against and sinning
Forget their strife's beginning,
And join in friendship now.
Be links no longer broken,
Be sweet forgiveness spoken
Under the Holly-Bough.
Ye who have loved each other,
Sister and friend and brother,
In this fast-fading year:
Mother and sire and child,
Young man and maiden mild,
Come gather here;
And let your heart grow fonder,
As memory shall ponder
Each past unbroken vow;
Old loves and younger wooing
Are sweet in the renewing
Under the Holly-Bough.
Ye who have nourished sadness,
Estranged from hope and gladness
In this fast-fading year;
Ye with o'erburdened mind,
Made aliens from your kind,
Come gather here.
Let not the useless sorrow
Pursue you night and morrow,
If e'er you hoped, hope now.
Take heart,--uncloud your faces,
And join in our embraces
Under the Holly-Bough.
* * * * *
CEREMONIES FOR CHRISTMAS
ROBERT HERRICK
Come, bring with a noise,
My merry, merry boys,
The Christmas log to the firing,
While my good dame, she
Bids ye all be free,
And drink to your heart's desiring.
With the last year's brand
Light the new block, and
For good success in his spending,
On your psalteries play,
That sweet luck may
Come while the log is a-teending.
Drink now the strong beer,
Cut the white loaf here,
The while the meat is a-shredding;
For the rare mince-pie,
And the plums stand by,
To fill the paste that's a kneading.
* * * * *
SANTA CLAUS
ANON
He comes in the night! He comes in the night!
He softly, silently comes;
While the little brown heads on the pillows so white
Are dreaming of bugles and drums.
He cuts through the snow like a ship through the foam,
While the white flakes around him whirl;
Who tells him I know not, but he findeth the home
Of each good little boy and girl.
His sleigh it is long, and deep, and wide;
It will carry a host of things,
While dozens of drums hang over the side,
With the sticks sticking under the strings:
And yet not the sound of a drum is heard,
Not a bugle blast is blown,
As he mounts to the chimney-top like a bird,
And drops to the hearth like a stone.
The little red stockings he silently fills,
Till the stockings will hold no more;
The bright little sleds for the great snow hills
Are quickly set down on the floor.
Then Santa Claus mounts to the roof like a bird,
And glides to his seat in the sleigh;
Not the sound of a bugle or drum is heard
As he noiselessly gallops away.
He rides to the East, and he rides to the West,
Of his goodies he touches not one;
He eateth the crumbs of the Christmas feast
When the dear little folks are done.
Old Santa Claus doeth all that he can;
This beautiful mission is his;
Then, children, be good to the little old man,
When you find who the little man is.
* * * * *
THE CEREMONIES FOR CHRISTMAS DAY
ROBERT HERRICK
Kindle the Christmas brand, and then
Till sunset let it burn;
Which quench'd, then lay it up again
Till Christmas next return.
Part must be kept wherewith to teend
The Christmas log next year,
And where 'tis safely kept, the fiend
Can do no mischief there.
* * * * *
DECEMBER
HARRIET F. BLODGETT
I
Oh! holly branch and mistletoe.
And Christmas chimes where'er we go.
And stockings pinned up in a row!
These are thy gifts, December!
II
And if the year has made thee old,
And silvered all thy locks of gold,
Thy heart has never been a-cold
Or known a fading ember.
III
The whole world is a Christmas tree,
And stars its many candles be.
Oh! sing a carol joyfully
The year's great feast in keeping!
IV
For once, on a December night
An angel held a candle bright.
And led three wise men by its light
To where a child was sleeping.
* * * * *
THE FESTIVAL OF ST. NICHOLAS
MARY MAPES DODGE
We all know how, before the Christmas-tree began to flourish in the
home-life of our country, a certain "right jolly old elf," with "eight
tiny reindeer," used to drive his sleigh-load of toys up to our
housetops, and then bound down the chimney to fill the stockings so
hopefully hung by the fireplace. His friends called him Santa Claus; and
those who were most intimate ventured to say, "Old Nick." It was said
that he originally came from Holland. Doubtless he did; but, if so, he
certainly, like many other foreigners, changed his ways very much after
landing upon our shores. In Holland, St. Nicholas is a veritable saint,
and often appears in full costume, with his embroidered robes glittering
with gems and gold, his mitre, his crosier, and his jewelled gloves.
_Here_ Santa Claus comes rollicking along on the 25th of December, our
Holy Christmas morn; but in Holland, St. Nicholas visits earth on the
5th, a time especially appropriated to him. Early on the morning of the
6th, which is St. Nicholas Day, he distributes his candies, toys and
treasures, and then vanishes for a year.
Christmas Day is devoted by the Hollanders to church-rites and pleasant
family visiting. It is on St. Nicholas Eve that their young people
become half wild with joy and expectation. To some of them it is a sorry
time; for the saint is very candid, and, if any of them have been bad
during the past year, he is quite sure to tell them so. Sometimes he
carries a birch-rod under his arm, and advises the parents to give them
scoldings in place of confections, and floggings instead of joys.
It was well that the boys hastened to their abodes on that bright winter
evening; for, in less than an hour afterwards, the saint made his
appearance in half the homes of Holland. He visited the king's palace,
and in the self-same moment appeared in Annie Bouman's comfortable home.
Probably one of our silver half-dollars would have purchased all that
his saintship left at the peasant Bouman's. But a half-dollar's worth
will sometimes do for the poor what hundreds of dollars may fail to do
for the rich: it makes them happy and grateful, fills them with new
peace and love.
Hilda van Gleck's little brothers and sisters were in a high state of
excitement that night. They had been admitted into the grand parlor:
they were dressed in their best, and had been given two cakes apiece at
supper. Hilda was as joyous as any. Why not? St. Nicholas would never
cross a girl of fourteen from his list, just because she was tall and
looked almost like a woman. On the contrary, he would probably exert
himself to do honor to such an august-looking damsel. Who could tell? So
she sported and laughed and danced as gayly as the youngest, and was the
soul of all their merry games. Father, mother and grandmother looked on
approvingly; so did grandfather, before he spread his large red
handkerchief over his face, leaving only the top of his skull-cap
visible. This kerchief was his ensign of sleep.
Earlier in the evening, all had joined in the fun. In the general
hilarity, there had seemed to be a difference only in bulk between
grandfather and the baby. Indeed, a shade of solemn expectation, now and
then flitting across the faces of the younger members, had made them
seem rather more thoughtful than their elders.
Now the spirit of fun reigned supreme. The very flames danced and
capered in the polished grate. A pair of prim candles, that had been
staring at the astral lamp, began to wink at other candles far away in
the mirrors. There was a long bell-rope suspended from the ceiling in
the corner, made of glass beads, netted over a cord nearly as thick as
your wrist. It generally hung in the shadow, and made no sign; but
to-night it twinkled from end to end. Its handle of crimson glass sent
reckless dashes of red at the papered wall, turning its dainty blue
stripes into purple. Passers-by halted to catch the merry laughter
floating through curtain and sash into the street, then skipped on their
way with the startled consciousness that the village was wide awake. At
last matters grew so uproarious that the grandsire's red kerchief came
down from his face with a jerk. What decent old gentleman could sleep in
such a racket! Mynheer van Gleck regarded his children with
astonishment. The baby even showed symptoms of hysterics. It was high
time to attend to business. Mevrouw suggested that, if they wished to
see the good St. Nicholas, they should sing the same loving invitation
that had brought him the year before.
The baby stared, and thrust his fist into his mouth, as Mynheer put him
down upon the floor. Soon he sat erect, and looked with a sweet scowl at
the company. With his lace and embroideries, and his crown of blue
ribbon and whalebone (for he was not quite past the tumbling age), he
looked like the king of babies.
The other children, each holding a pretty willow basket, formed at once
in a ring, and moved slowly around the little fellow, lifting their eyes
meanwhile; for the saint to whom they were about to address themselves
was yet in mysterious quarters.
Mevrouw commenced playing softly upon the piano; soon the voices
rose,--gentle, youthful voices, rendered all the sweeter for their
tremor,--
"Welcome, friend! St. Nicholas, welcome!
Bring no rod for us to-night!
While our voices bid thee welcome,
Every heart with joy is light.
"Tell us every fault and failing;
We will bear thy keenest railing
So we sing, so we sing:
Thou shalt tell us everything!
"Welcome, friend! St. Nicholas, welcome!
Welcome to this merry band!
Happy children greet thee, welcome!
Thou art gladdening all the land.
"Fill each empty hand and basket;
'T is thy little ones who ask it.
So we sing, so we sing:
Thou wilt bring us everything!"
During the chorus, sundry glances, half in eagerness, half in dread, had
been cast towards the polished folding-doors. Now a loud knocking was
heard. The circle was broken in an instant. Some of the little ones,
with a strange mixture of fear and delight, pressed against their
mother's knee. Grandfather bent forward, with his chin resting upon his
hand; grandmother lifted her spectacles; Mynheer van Gleck, seated by
the fireplace, slowly drew his meerschaum from his mouth; while Hilda
and the other children settled themselves beside him in an expectant
group.
The knocking was heard again.
"Come in," said the mevrouw, softly.
The door slowly opened; and St. Nicholas, in full array, stood before
them. You could have heard a pin drop. Soon he spoke. What a mysterious
majesty in his voice! what kindliness in his tone!
"Karel van Gleck, I am pleased to greet thee, and thy honored _vrouw_,
Kathrine, and thy son, and his good _vrouw_, Annie.
"Children, I greet ye all,--Hendrick, Hilda, Broom, Katy, Huygens and
Lucretia. And thy cousins,--Wolfert, Diedrich, Mayken, Voost and
Katrina. Good children ye have been, in the main, since I last accosted
ye. Diedrich was rude at the Haarlem fair last fall; but he has tried to
atone for it since. Mayken has failed, of late, in her lessons; and too
many sweets and trifles have gone to her lips, and too few stivers to
her charity-box. Diedrich, I trust, will be a polite, manly boy for the
future; and Mayken will endeavor to shine as a student. Let her
remember, too, that economy and thrift are needed in the foundation of a
worthy and generous life. Little Katy has been cruel to the cat more
than once. St. Nicholas can hear the cat cry when its tail is pulled. I
will forgive her, if she will remember from this hour that the smallest
dumb creatures have feeling, and must not be abused."
As Katy burst into a frightened cry, the saint graciously remained
silent until she was soothed.
"Master Broom," he resumed, "I warn thee that boys who are in the habit
of putting snuff upon the foot-stove of the school-mistress may one day
be discovered, and receive a flogging--"
(Master Broom colored, and stared in great astonishment.)
"But, thou art such an excellent scholar, I shall make thee no further
reproof.
"Thou, Hendrick, didst distinguish thyself in the archery match last
spring, and hit the _doel_,[A] though the bird was swung before it to
unsteady thine eye. I give thee credit for excelling in manly sport and
exercise; though I must not unduly countenance thy boat-racing, since it
leaves thee too little time for thy proper studies.
[Footnote A: Bull's-eye.]
"Lucretia and Hilda shall have a blessed sleep to-night. The
consciousness of kindness to the poor, devotion in their souls, and
cheerful, hearty obedience to household rule, will render them happy.
"With one and all I avow myself well content. Goodness, industry,
benevolence and thrift have prevailed in your midst. Therefore, my
blessing upon you; and may the New Year find all treading the paths of
obedience, wisdom and love! To-morrow you shall find more substantial
proofs that I have been in your home. Farewell!"
With these words came a great shower of sugar-plums upon a linen sheet
spread out in front of the doors. A general scramble followed. The
children fairly tumbled over each other in their eagerness to fill their
baskets. Mevrouw cautiously held the baby down upon the sheet till the
chubby little fists were filled. Then the bravest of the youngsters
sprang up and threw open the closed doors. In vain they searched the
mysterious apartment. St. Nicholas was nowhere to be seen.
Soon they all sped to another room, where stood a table, covered with
the whitest of linen damask. Each child, in a flutter of pleasure, laid
a shoe upon it, and each shoe held a little hay for the good saint's
horse. The door was then carefully locked, and its key hidden in the
mother's bedroom. Next followed good-night kisses, a grand family
procession to the upper floor, merry farewells at bedroom doors, and
silence, at last, reigned in the Van Gleck mansion.
Early the next morning, the door was solemnly unlocked and opened in the
presence of the assembled household; when, lo! a sight appeared, proving
good St. Nicholas to be a saint of his word.
Every shoe was filled to overflowing; and beside each stood a
many-colored pile. The table was heavy with its load of
presents,--candies, toys, trinkets, books and other articles. Every one
had gifts, from grandfather down to the baby.
* * * * *
THE CHRISTMAS HOLLY
ELIZA COOK
The holly! the holly! oh, twine it with bay--
Come give the holly a song;
For it helps to drive stern winter away,
With his garment so sombre and long;
It peeps through the trees with its berries of red,
And its leaves of burnished green,
When the flowers and fruits have long been dead,
And not even the daisy is seen.
Then sing to the holly, the Christmas holly,
That hangs over peasant and king;
While we laugh and carouse 'neath its glittering boughs,
To the Christmas holly we'll sing.
The gale may whistle, the frost may come
To fetter the gurgling rill;
The woods may be bare, and warblers dumb,
But holly is beautiful still.
In the revel and light of princely halls
The bright holly branch is found;
And its shadow falls on the lowliest walls,
While the brimming horn goes round.
The ivy lives long, but its home must be
Where graves and ruins are spread;
There's beauty about the cypress tree,
But it flourishes near the dead;
The laurel the warrior's brow may wreathe,
But it tells of tears and blood;
I sing the holly, and who can breathe
Aught of that that is not good?
Then sing to the holly, the Christmas holly,
That hangs over peasant and king;
While we laugh and carouse 'neath its glittering boughs,
To the Christmas holly we'll sing.
* * * * *
TO THE FIR-TREE
FROM THE GERMAN
O Fir-tree green! O Fir-tree green!
Your leaves are constant ever,
Not only in the summer time,
But through the winter's snow and rime
You're fresh and green forever.
O Fir-tree green! O Fir-tree green!
I still shall love you dearly!
How oft to me on Christmas night
Your laden boughs have brought delight.
O Fir-tree green! O Fir-tree green!
I still shall love you dearly.
* * * * *
THE MAHOGANY-TREE
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY
Christmas is here;
Winds whistle shrill,
Icy and chill,
Little care we;
Little we fear
Weather without,
Sheltered about
The Mahogany-Tree.
Once on the boughs
Birds of rare plume
Sang in its bloom;
Night-birds are we;
Here we carouse,
Singing, like them,
Perched round the stem
Of the jolly old tree.
Here let us sport,
Boys, as we sit--
Laughter and wit
Flashing so free.
Life is but short--
When we are gone,
Let them sing on,
Round the old tree.
Evenings we knew,
Happy as this;
Faces we miss,
Pleasant to see.
Kind hearts and true,
Gentle and just,
Peace to your dust!
We sing round the tree.
Care like a dun,
Lurks at the gate;
Let the dog wait;
Happy we'll be!
Drink, every one;
Pile up the coals;
Fill the red bowls,
Round the old tree!
Drain we the cup.--
Friend, art afraid?
Spirits are laid
In the Red Sea.
Mantle it up;
Empty it yet;
Let us forget,
Round the old tree!
Sorrows begone!
Life and its ills,
Duns and their bills,
Bid we to flee.
Come with the dawn,
Blue-devil sprite;
Leave us to-night,
Round the old tree!
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS
WASHINGTON IRVING
But is old, old, good old Christmas gone? Nothing but the hair on
his good, gray, old head and beard left? Well, I will have that,
seeing I cannot have more of him.
Hue and Cry after Christmas.
A man might then behold
At Christmas, in each hall,
Good fires to curb the cold,
And meat for great and small.
The neighbors were friendly bidden,
And all had welcome true,
The poor from the gates were not chidden,
When this old cap was new.
Old Song.
There is nothing in England that exercises a more delightful spell over
my imagination than the lingerings of the holiday customs and rural
games of former times. They recall the pictures my fancy used to draw in
the May morning of life, when as yet I only knew the world through
books, and believed it to be all that poets had painted it; and they
bring with them the flavor of those honest days of yore, in which,
perhaps with equal fallacy, I am apt to think the world was more
homebred, social, and joyous than at present. I regret to say that they
are daily growing more and more faint, being gradually worn away by
time, but still more obliterated by modern fashion. They resemble those
picturesque morsels of Gothic architecture, which we see crumbling in
various parts of the country, partly dilapidated by the waste of ages,
and partly lost in the additions and alterations of latter days. Poetry,
however, clings with cherishing fondness about the rural game and
holiday revel, from which it has derived so many of its themes--as the
ivy winds its rich foliage about the Gothic arch and mouldering tower,
gratefully repaying their support, by clasping together their tottering
remains, and, as it were, embalming them in verdure.
Of all the old festivals, however, that of Christmas awakens the
strongest and most heartfelt associations. There is a tone of solemn and
sacred feeling that blends with our conviviality, and lifts the spirit
to a state of hallowed and elevated enjoyment. The services of the
church about this season are extremely tender and inspiring: they dwell
on the beautiful story of the origin of our faith, and the pastoral
scenes that accompanied its announcement; they gradually increase in
fervor and pathos during the season of Advent, until they break forth in
full jubilee on the morning that brought peace and good-will to men. I
do not know a grander effect of music on the moral feelings than to hear
the full choir and the pealing organ performing a Christmas anthem in a
cathedral, and filling every part of the vast pile with triumphant
harmony.
It is a beautiful arrangement, also, derived from the days of yore, that
this festival, which commemorates the announcement of the religion of
peace and love, has been made the season for gathering together of
family connections, and drawing closer again those bands of kindred
hearts, which the cares and pleasures and sorrows of the world are
continually operating to cast loose; of calling back the children of a
family, who have launched forth in life, and wandered widely asunder,
once more to assemble about the paternal hearth, that rallying-place of
the affections, there to grow young and loving again among the endearing
mementos of childhood.
There is something in the very season of the year, that gives a charm to
the festivity of Christmas. At other times, we derive a great portion of
our pleasures from the mere beauties of Nature. Our feelings sally forth
and dissipate themselves over the sunny landscape, and we "live abroad
and everywhere." The song of the bird, the murmur of the stream, the
breathing fragrance of spring, the soft voluptuousness of summer, the
golden pomp of autumn; earth with its mantle of refreshing green, and
heaven with its deep, delicious blue and its cloudy magnificence,--all
fill us with mute but exquisite delight, and we revel in the luxury of
mere sensation. But in the depth of winter, when Nature lies despoiled
of every charm, and wrapped in her shroud of sheeted snow, we turn for
our gratifications to moral sources. The dreariness and desolation of
our landscape, the short gloomy days and darksome nights, while they
circumscribe our wanderings, shut in our feelings also from rambling
abroad, and make us more keenly disposed for the pleasures of the social
circle. Our thoughts are more concentrated; our friendly sympathies more
aroused. We feel more sensibly the charm of each other's society, and
are brought more closely together by dependence on each other for
enjoyment. Heart calleth unto heart, and we draw our pleasures from the
deep wells of living kindness which lie in the quiet recesses of our
bosoms; and which, when resorted to, furnish forth the pure element of
domestic felicity.
The pitchy gloom without makes the heart dilate on entering the room
filled with the glow and warmth of the evening fire. The ruddy blaze
diffuses an artificial summer and sunshine through the room, and lights
up each countenance with a kindlier welcome. Where does the honest face
of hospitality expand into a broader and more cordial smile--where is
the shy glance of love more sweetly eloquent--than by the winter
fireside? and as the hollow blast of wintry wind rushes through the
hall, claps the distant door, whistles about the casement, and rumbles
down the chimney, what can be more grateful than that feeling of sober
and sheltered security, with which we look around upon the comfortable
chamber, and the scene of domestic hilarity?
The English, from the great prevalence of rural habits throughout every
class of society, have always been fond of those festivals and holidays
which agreeably interrupt the stillness of country life; and they were
in former days particularly observant of the religious and social rights
of Christmas. It is inspiring to read even the dry details which some
antiquaries have given of the quaint humors, the burlesque pageants, the
complete abandonment to mirth and good fellowship, with which this
festival was celebrated. It seemed to throw open every door, unlock
every heart. It brought the peasant and the peer together, and blended
all ranks in one warm generous flow of joy and kindness. The old halls
of castles and manor-houses resounded with the harp and the Christmas
carol, and their ample boards groaned under the weight of hospitality.
Even the poorest cottage welcomed the festive season with green
decorations of bay and holly--the cheerful fire glanced its rays through
the lattice, inviting the passenger to raise the latch, and join the
gossip knot huddled round the hearth beguiling the long evening with
legendary jokes, and oft-told Christmas tales.
One of the least pleasing effects of modern refinement is the havoc it
has made among the hearty old holiday customs. It has completely taken
off the sharp touchings and spirited reliefs of these embellishments of
life, and has worn down society into a more smooth and polished, but
certainly a less characteristic surface. Many of the games and
ceremonials of Christmas have entirely disappeared, and, like the
sherris sack of old Falstaff, are become matters of speculation and
dispute among commentators. They flourished in times full of spirit and
lustihood, when men enjoyed life roughly, but heartily and vigorously:
times wild and picturesque, which have furnished poetry with its richest
materials, and the drama with its most attractive variety of characters
and manners. The world has become more worldly. There is more of
dissipation and less enjoyment. Pleasure has expanded into a broader,
but a shallower stream, and has forsaken many of those deep and quiet
channels, where it flowed sweetly through the calm bosom of domestic
life. Society has acquired a more enlightened and elegant tone; but it
has lost many of its strong local peculiarities, its homebred feelings,
its honest fireside delights. The traditionary customs of golden-hearted
antiquity, its feudal hospitalities, and lordly wassailings, have passed
away with the baronial castles and stately manor-houses in which they
were celebrated. They comported with the shadowy hall, the great oaken
gallery, and the tapestried parlor, but are unfitted for the light showy
saloons and gay drawing-rooms of the modern villa.
Shorn, however, as it is, of its ancient and festive honors, Christmas
is still a period of delightful excitement in England. It is gratifying
to see that home feeling completely aroused which holds so powerful a
place in every English bosom. The preparations making on every side for
the social board that is again to unite friends and kindred--the
presents of good cheer passing and repassing, those tokens of regard and
quickeners of kind feelings--the evergreens distributed about houses and
churches, emblems of peace and gladness--all these have the most
pleasing effect in producing fond associations, and kindling benevolent
sympathies. Even the sound of the waits, rude as may be their
minstrelsy, breaks upon the midwatches of a winter night with the effect
of perfect harmony. As I have been awakened by them in that still and
solemn hour "when deep sleep falleth upon man," I have listened with a
hushed delight, and connecting them with the sacred and joyous occasion,
have almost fancied them into another celestial choir, announcing peace
and good-will to mankind. How delightfully the imagination, when wrought
upon by these moral influences, turns everything to melody and beauty!
The very crowing of the cock, heard sometimes in the profound repose of
the country, "telling the night-watches to his feathery dames," was
thought by the common people to announce the approach of the sacred
festival:
"Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes
Wherein our Saviour's birth was celebrated,
This bird of dawning singeth all night long:
And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad;
The nights are wholesome--then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, no witch hath power to charm,
So hallowed and so gracious is the time."
Amidst the general call to happiness, the bustle of the spirits, and
stir of the affections, which prevail at this period, what bosom can
remain insensible? It is, indeed, the season of regenerated feeling--the
season for kindling not merely the fire of hospitality in the hall, but
the genial flame of charity in the heart. The scene of early love again
rises green to memory beyond the sterile waste of years, and the idea of
home, fraught with the fragrance of home-dwelling joys, reanimates the
drooping spirit--as the Arabian breeze will sometimes waft the freshness
of the distant fields to the weary pilgrim of the desert.
Stranger and sojourner as I am in the land--though for me no social
hearth may blaze, no hospitable roof throw open its doors, nor the warm
grasp of friendship welcome me at the threshold--yet I feel the
influence of the season beaming into my soul from the happy looks of
those around me. Surely happiness is reflective, like the light of
heaven; and every countenance bright with smiles, and glowing with
innocent enjoyment, is a mirror transmitting to others the rays of a
supreme and ever-shining benevolence. He who can turn churlishly away
from contemplating the felicity of his fellow-beings, and can sit down
darkling and repining in his loneliness when all around is joyful, may
have his moments of strong excitement and selfish gratification, but he
wants the genial and social sympathies which constitute the charm of a
merry Christmas.
* * * * *
CHURCH DECKING AT CHRISTMAS
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
Would that our scrupulous sires had dared to leave
Less scanty measure of those graceful rites
And usages, whose due return invites
A stir of mind too natural to deceive;
Giving the memory help when she could weave
A crown for Hope!--I dread the boasted lights
That all too often are but fiery blights,
Killing the bud o'er which in vain we grieve.
Go, seek, when Christmas snows discomfort bring,
The counter Spirit found in some gay church
Green with fresh holly, every pew a perch
In which the linnet or the thrush might sing,
Merry and loud, and safe from prying search,
Strains offered only to the genial spring.
* * * * *
SO, NOW IS COME OUR JOYFULST FEAST
GEORGE WITHER
So, now is come our joyfulst feast,
Let every man be jolly;
Each room with ivy leaves is drest,
And every post with holly.
Though some churls at our mirth repine,
Round your foreheads garlands twine;
Drown sorrow in a cup of wine,
And let us all be merry.
Now all our neighbours' chimnies smoke,
And Christmas logs are burning;
Their ovens they with baked meats choke,
And all their spits are turning.
Without the door let sorrow lie;
And if for cold it hap to die,
We'll bury't in a Christmas pie,
And evermore be merry.
Now every lad is wondrous trim,
And no man minds his labour;
Our lasses have provided them
A bag-pipe and a tabor;
Young men and maids, and girls and boys,
Give life to one another's joys;
And you anon shall by their noise
Perceive that they are merry.
Rank misers now do sparing shun;
Their hall of music soundeth;
And dogs thence with whole shoulders run,
So all things there aboundeth.
The country folks themselves advance
For crowdy-mutton's[A] come out of France;
And Jack shall pipe, and Jill shall dance,
And all the town be merry.
[Footnote A: Fiddlers.]
* * * * *
FAIRY FACES
ANON
Out of the mists of childhood,
Steeped in a golden glory,
Come dreamy forms and faces,
Snatches of song and story;
Whispers of sweet, still faces;
Rays of ethereal glimmer,
That gleam like sunny heavens,
Ne'er to grow colder or dimmer:
Now far in the distance, now shining near,
Lighting the snows of the shivering year.
Faces there are that tremble,
Bleared with a silent weeping,
Weird in a shadowy sorrow,
As if endless vigil keeping.
Faces of dazzling brightness,
With childlike radiance lighted,
Flashing with many a beauty,
Nor care nor time had blighted.
But o'er them all there's a glamour thrown.
Bright with the dreamy distance alone.
Aglow in the Christmas halo,
Shining with heavenly lustre,
These are the fairy faces
That round the hearthstone cluster.
These the deep, tender records,
Sacred in all their meetness,
That, wakening purest fancies,
Soften us with their sweetness;
As, gathered where flickering fagots burn,
We welcome the holy season's return.
* * * * *
MERRY CHRISTMAS
ANON
In the rush of the merry morning,
When the red burns through the gray,
And the wintry world lies waiting
For the glory of the day;
Then we hear a fitful rushing
Just without upon the stair,
See two white phantoms coming,
Catch the gleam of sunny hair.
Are they Christmas fairies stealing
Rows of little socks to fill?
Are they angels floating hither
With their message of good-will?
What sweet spell are these elves weaving,
As like larks they chirp and sing?
Are these palms of peace from heaven
That these lovely spirits bring?
Rosy feet upon the threshold,
Eager faces peeping through,
With the first red ray of sunshine,
Chanting cherubs come in view;
Mistletoe and gleaming holly,
Symbols of a blessed day,
In their chubby hands they carry,
Streaming all along the way.
Well we know them, never weary
Of this innocent surprise;
Waiting, watching, listening always
With full hearts and tender eyes,
While our little household angels,
White and golden in the sun,
Greet us with the sweet old welcome,--
"Merry Christmas, every one!"
* * * * *
A MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU
THEODORE LEDYARD CUYLER
My own boyhood was spent in a delightful home on one of the most
beautiful farms in Western New York--an experience that any city-bred
boy might envy. We had no religious festivals except Thanksgiving Day
and Christmas, and the latter was especially welcome, not only on
account of the good fare but its good gifts. Christmas was sacred to
Santa Claus, the patron saint of good boys and girls. We counted the
days until its arrival. If the night before the longed-for festival was
one of eager expectation in all our houses, it was a sad time in all
barn-yards and turkey-coops and chicken-roosts; for the slaughter was
terrible, and the cry of the feathered tribes was like "the mourning of
Hadadrimmon." As to our experiences within doors, they are portrayed in
Dr. Clement C. Moore's immortal lines, "The Night Before Christmas,"
which is probably the most popular poem for children ever penned in
America. As the visits of Santa Claus in the night could only be through
the chimney, we hung our stockings where they would be in full sight.
Three score and ten years ago such modern contrivances as steam pipes,
and those unpoetical holes in the floor called "hot-air registers," were
as entirely unknown in our rural regions as gas-burners or telephones.
We had a genuine fire-place in our kitchen, big enough to contain an
enormous back-log, and broad enough for eight or ten people to form "a
circle wide" before it and enjoy the genial warmth.
The last process before going to bed was to suspend our stockings in the
chimney jambs; and then we dreamed of Santa Claus, or if we awoke in the
night, we listened for the jingling of his sleigh-bells. At the peep of
day we were aroused by the voice of my good grandfather, who planted
himself in the stairway and shouted in a stentorian tone, "I wish you
all a Merry Christmas!" The contest was as to who should give the
salutation first, and the old gentleman determined to get the start of
us by sounding his greeting to the family before we were out of our
rooms. Then came a race for the chimney corner; all the stockings came
down quicker than they had gone up. What could not be contained in them
was disposed upon the mantelpiece, or elsewhere. I remember that I once
received an autograph letter from Santa Claus, full of good counsels;
and our colored cook told me that she awoke in the night and, peeping
into the kitchen, actually saw the veritable old visitor light a candle
and sit down at the table and write it! I believed it all as implicitly
as I believed the Ten Commandments, or the story of David and Goliath.
Happy days of childish credulity, when fact and fiction were swallowed
alike without a misgiving! During my long life I have seen many a
day-dream and many an air-castle go the way of Santa Claus and the
wonderful "Lamp of Aladdin."
In after years, when I became a parent, my beloved wife and I,
determined to make the Christmastide one of the golden days of the
twelve months. In mid-winter, when all outside vegetation was bleak and
bare, the Christmas-tree in our parlor bloomed in many-colored beauty
and bounty. When the tiny candles were all lighted the children and our
domestics gathered round it and one of the youngsters rehearsed some
pretty juvenile effusion; as "they that had found great spoil." After
the happy harvesting of the magic tree in my own home, it was my custom
to spend the afternoon or evening in some mission-school and to watch
the sparkling eyes of several hundreds of children while a huge
Christmas-tree shed down its bounties. Fifty years ago, when the
degradation and miseries of the "Five-Points" were first invaded by
pioneer philanthropy, it was a thrilling sight to behold the denizens of
the slums and their children as they flocked into Mr. Pease's new "House
of Industry" and the "Brewery Mission" building. The angelic host over
the hills of Bethlehem did not make a more welcome revelation to them
"who had sat in darkness and the shadow of death." In these days the
squalid regions of our great cities are being explored and improved by
various methods of systematic beneficence. "Christian Settlements" are
established; Bureaus of Charity are formed and Associations for the
relief of the poor are organized. A noble work; but, after all, the most
effective "bureau" is one that, in a water-proof and a stout pair of
shoes, sallies off on a wintry night to some abode of poverty with not
only supplies for suffering bodies, but kind words of sympathy for
lonesome hearts. A dollar from a warm hand with a warm word is worth two
dollars sent by mail or by a messenger-boy. The secret of power in doing
good is _personal contact_. Our incarnate "Elder Brother" went in person
to the sick chamber. He anointed with His own hand the eyes of the blind
man and He touched the loathsome leper into health. The portentous chasm
between wealth and poverty must be bridged by a span of personal
kindness over which the footsteps must turn in only one direction. The
personal contact of self sacrificing benevolence with darkness, filth
and misery--that is the only remedy. Heart must touch heart. Benevolence
also cannot be confined to calendars. Those good people will exhibit the
most of the spirit of our Blessed Master who practice Christmas-giving
and cheerful, unselfish and zealous Christmas-living through all the
circling year.
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS BELLS
ANON
There are sounds in the sky when the year grows old,
And the winds of the winter blow--
When night and the moon are clear and cold,
And the stars shine on the snow,
Or wild is the blast and the bitter sleet
That beats on the window-pane;
But blest on the frosty hills are the feet
Of the Christmas time again!
Chiming sweet when the night wind swells,
Blest is the sound of the Christmas Bells!
Dear are the sounds of the Christmas chimes
In the land of the ivied towers,
And they welcome the dearest of festival times
In this Western world of ours!
Bright on the holly and mistletoe bough
The English firelight falls,
And bright are the wreathed evergreens now
That gladden our own home walls!
And hark! the first sweet note that tells,
The welcome of the Christmas Bells!
The owl that sits in the ivy's shade,
Remote from the ruined tower,
Shall start from his drowsy watch afraid
When the clock shall strike the hour;
And over the fields in their frosty rhyme
The cheery sounds shall go,
And chime shall answer unto chime
Across the moonlit snow!
How sweet the lingering music dwells,--
The music of the Christmas Bells.
It fell not thus in the East afar
Where the Babe in the manger lay;
The wise men followed their guiding star
To the dawn of a milder day;
And the fig and the sycamore gathered green,
And the palm-tree of Deborah rose;
'Twas the strange first Christmas the world had seen--
And it came not in storm and snows.
Not yet on Nazareth's hills and dells
Had floated the sound of Christmas Bells.
The cedars of Lebanon shook in the blast
Of their own cold mountain air;
But nought o'er the wintry plain had passed
To tell that the Lord was there!
The oak and the olive and almond were still,
In the night now worn and thin;
No wind of the winter-time roared from the hill
To waken the guests at the inn;
No dream to them the music tells
That is to come from the Christmas Bells!
The years that have fled like the leaves on the gale
Since the morn of the Miracle-Birth,
Have widened the fame of the marvellous tale
Till the tidings have filled the earth!
And so in the climes of the icy North,
And the lands of the cane and the palm,
By the Alpine cotter's blazing hearth,
And in tropic belts of calm,
Men list to-night the welcome swells,
Sweet and clear, of Christmas Bells!
They are ringing to-night through the Norway firs,
And across the Swedish fells,
And the Cuban palm-tree dreamily stirs
To the sound of those Christmas Bells!
They ring where the Indian Ganges rolls
Its flood through the rice-fields wide;
They swell the far hymns of the Lapps and Poles
To the praise of the Crucified.
Sweeter than tones of the ocean's shells
Mingle the chimes of the Christmas Bells!
The years come not back that have circled away
With the past of the Eastern land,
When He plucked the corn on the Sabbath day
And healed the withered hand:
But the bells shall join in a joyous chime
For the One who walked the sea,
And ring again for the better time
Of the Christ that is to be!
Then ring!--for earth's best promise dwells
In ye, O joyous Prophet Bells!
Ring out at the meeting of night and morn
For the dawn of a happier day!
Lo, the stone from our faith's great sepulchre torn
The angels have rolled away!
And they come to us here in our low abode,
With words like the sunrise gleam,--
Come down and ascend by that heavenly road
That Jacob saw in his dream.
Spirit of love, that in music dwells,
Open our hearts with the Christmas Bells!
Help us to see that the glad heart prays
As well as the bended knees;
That there are in our own as in ancient days
The Scribes and the Pharisees;
That the Mount of Transfiguration still
Looks down on these Christian lands,
And the glorified ones from that holy hill
Are reaching their helping hands.
These be the words our music tells
Of solemn joy, O Christmas Bells!
* * * * *
THE BIRTH OF CHRIST
ALFRED TENNYSON
The time draws near the birth of Christ;
The moon is hid--the night is still;
The Christmas bells from hill to hill
Answer each other in the mist.
Four voices of four hamlets round,
From far and near, on mead and moor,
Swell out and fail, as if a door
Were shut between me and the sound.
Each voice four changes on the wind,
That now dilate and now decrease,
Peace and good-will, good-will and peace,
Peace and good-will to all mankind.
Rise, happy morn! rise, holy morn!
Draw forth the cheerful day from night;
O Father! touch the east, and light
The light that shone when hope was born!
* * * * *
THE CHRISTMAS CAROL
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
The minstrels played their Christmas tune
To-night beneath my cottage eaves;
While, smitten by a lofty moon,
The encircling laurels, thick with leaves,
Gave back a rich and dazzling sheen
That overpowered their natural green.
Through hill and valley every breeze
Had sunk to rest, with folded wings:
Keen was the air, but could not freeze
Nor check the music of the strings;
So stout and hardy were the band
That scraped the chords with strenuous hand!
And who but listened--till was paid
Respect to every inmate's claim:
The greeting given, the music played,
In honor of each household name,
Duly pronounced with lusty call,
And "Merry Christmas" wished to all!
How touching, when, at midnight, sweep
Snow-muffled winds, and all is dark,
To hear, and sink again to sleep!
Or, at an earlier call, to mark
By blazing fire, the still suspense
Of self-complacent innocence;
The mutual nod,--the grave disguise
Of hearts with gladness brimming o'er;
And some unbidden tears that rise
For names once heard, and heard no more;
Tears brightened by the serenade
For infant in the cradle laid.
Hail ancient Manners! sure defence,
Where they survive, of wholesome laws;
Remnants of love whose modest sense
Thus into narrow room withdraws;
Hail, Usages of pristine mould,
And ye that guard them, Mountains old!
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS AT FEZZIWIG'S WAREHOUSE
CHARLES DICKENS
"Yo ho! my boys," said Fezziwig. "No more work to-night; Christmas Eve,
Dick! Christmas, Ebenezer! Let's have the shutters up," cried old
Fezziwig with a sharp clap of his hands, "before a man can say Jack
Robinson...."
"Hilli-ho!" cried old Fezziwig, skipping down from the high desk with
wonderful agility. "Clear away, my lads, and let's have lots of room
here! Hilli-ho, Dick! Cheer up, Ebenezer!"
Clear away! There was nothing they wouldn't have cleared away, or
couldn't have cleared away, with old Fezziwig looking on. It was done in
a minute. Every movable was packed off, as if it were dismissed from
public life forevermore; the floor was swept and watered, the lamps were
trimmed, fuel was heaped upon the fire; and the warehouse was as snug,
and warm, and dry, and bright a ball-room as you would desire to see
upon a winter's night.
In came a fiddler with a music-book, and went up to the lofty desk and
made an orchestra of it and tuned like fifty stomach-aches. In came Mrs.
Fezziwig, one vast, substantial smile. In came the three Misses
Fezziwig, beaming and lovable. In came the six followers whose hearts
they broke. In came all the young men and women employed in the business
In came the housemaid with her cousin the baker. In came the cook with
her brother's particular friend the milkman. In came the boy from over
the way, who was suspected of not having board enough from his master,
trying to hide himself behind the girl from next door but one who was
proved to have had her ears pulled by her mistress; in they all came,
anyhow and everyhow. Away they all went, twenty couple at once; hands
half round and back again the other way; down the middle and up again;
round and round in various stages of affectionate grouping, old top
couple always turning up in the wrong place; new top couple starting off
again, as soon as they got there; all top couples at last, and not a
bottom one to help them.
When this result was brought about the fiddler struck up "Sir Roger de
Coverley." Then old Fezziwig stood out to dance with Mrs. Fezziwig. Top
couple, too, with a good stiff piece of work cut out for them; three or
four and twenty pairs of partners; people who were not to be trifled
with; people who would dance and had no notion of walking.
But if they had been thrice as many--Oh, four times as many--old
Fezziwig would have been a match for them, and so would Mrs. Fezziwig.
As to her, she was worthy to be his partner in every sense of the term.
If that's not high praise, tell me higher and I'll use it. A positive
light appeared to issue from Fezziwig's calves. They shone in every part
of the dance like moons. You couldn't have predicted at any given time
what would become of them next. And when old Fezziwig and Mrs. Fezziwig
had gone all through the dance; advance and retire; both hands to your
partner, bow and courtesy, corkscrew, thread the needle, and back again
to your place; Fezziwig "cut"--cut so deftly that he appeared to wink
with his legs, and came upon his feet again without a stagger.
When the clock struck eleven the domestic ball broke up. Mr. and Mrs.
Fezziwig took their stations, one on either side of the door, and
shaking hands with every person individually, as he or she went out,
wished him or her a Merry Christmas!
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS BELLS
JOHN KEBLE
Wake me to-night, my mother dear,
That I may hear
The Christmas Bells, so soft and clear,
To high and low glad tidings tell,
How God the Father loved us well;
How God the Eternal Son
Came to undo what we had done.
* * * * *
III
SIGNIFICANCE AND SPIRIT
A CHRISTMAS CARMEN
JOHN G. WHITTIER
I
Sound over all waters, reach out from all lands,
The chorus of voices, the clasping of hands;
Sing hymns that were sung by the stars of the morn,
Sing songs of the angels when Jesus was born!
With glad jubilations
Bring hope to the nations!
The dark night is ending and dawn has begun:
Rise, hope of the ages, arise like the sun,
All speech flow to music, all hearts beat as one!
II
Sing the bridal of nations! with chorals of love
Sing out the war-vulture and sing in the dove,
Till the hearts of the peoples keep time in accord
And the voice of the world is the voice of the Lord!
Clasp hands of the nations
In strong gratulations:
The dark night is ending and dawn has begun;
Rise, hope of the ages, arise like the sun,
All speech flow to music, all hearts beat as one!
III
Blow, bugles of battle, the marches of peace;
East, west, north, and south let the long quarrel cease:
Sing the song of great joy that the angels began,
Sing of glory to God and of good-will to man!
Hark! joining in chorus
The heavens bend o'er us!
The dark night is ending and dawn has begun;
Rise, hope of the ages, arise like the sun,
All speech flow to music, all hearts beat as one!
* * * * *
THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS
From "Pickwick Papers."
CHARLES DICKENS
And numerous indeed are the hearts to which Christmas brings a brief
season of happiness and enjoyment. How many families whose members have
been dispersed and scattered far and wide, in the restless struggles of
life, are then re-united, and meet once again in that happy state of
companionship and mutual good-will, which is a source of such pure and
unalloyed delight, and one so incompatible with the cares and sorrows of
the world, that the religious belief of the most civilized nations, and
the rude traditions of the roughest savages, alike number it among the
first joys of a future state of existence, provided for the blest and
happy! How many old recollections, and how many dormant sympathies, does
Christmas time awaken!
We write these words now, many miles distant from the spot at which,
year after year, we met on that day, a merry and joyous circle. Many of
the hearts that throb so gaily then, have ceased to beat; many of the
looks that shone so brightly then, have ceased to glow; the hands we
grasped, have grown cold; the eyes we sought, have hid their lustre in
the grave; and yet the old house, the room, the merry voices and smiling
faces, the jest, the laugh, the most minute and trivial circumstance
connected with those happy meetings, crowd upon our mind at each
recurrence of the season, as if the last assemblage had been but
yesterday. Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions
of our childish days, that can recall to the old man the pleasures of
his youth, and transport the sailor and the traveller, thousands of
miles away, back to his own fireside and his quiet home!
* * * * *
ON GOOD WISHES AT CHRISTMAS
FRISWELL
At Christmas, which is a good holiday for most of us, but especially for
that larger and better half of us, the young, there is, as everybody
knows, a profusion of good things. The final cause of a great many
existences is Christmas Day. How many of that vast flock of geese, which
are now peacefully feeding over the long, cold wolds of Norfolk, or are
driven gabbling and hissing by the gozzard to their pasture--how many of
those very geese were called into being simply for Christmas Day! In the
towns, with close streets and fetid courts, where the flaring gas at the
corner of an alley marks the only bright spot, a gin-palace, there a
goose-club is held; and there, for a short time, is the resting-place,
side by side with a bottle of gin, of one of those wise-looking and
self-concentrated gobblers, whose name men have generally, and, as we
think, unjustly, applied to the silly one amongst themselves.
But it is only the profusion of good things, of cakes, puddings, spices,
oranges, and fruits, from sunny Italy and Spain, from India and from
Asia, from America, North and South, and even from distant Australia; it
is not that amongst us, as long ago with the _Franklin_ in Chaucer, that
at this time--
"It snowës in our house
Of meate and drinke;"
it is not that we have huge loads of beef chines, ribs, sirloins, legs,
necks, breasts, and shoulders of mutton, fillets of veal, whole hogs,
and pigs in various stages, from the tender suckling to the
stiff-jointed father of a family, whose "back hair" makes good
clothes-brushes, and whose head is brought in at college feasts; it is
not that the air gives up its choicest fowl, and the waters yield their
best fish: plentiful as these are with us, they are nothing in profusion
to the kindly greeting and good wishes that fly about in the cold
weather, and that circulate from land's end to land's end. The whole
coast of England is surrounded by a general "shake hands." The
coast-guard on their wintry walks do not greet each other more surely
than old friends all over England do: one clasps another, and another a
third, till from Dover to London and so on to York, from Yarmouth on the
east to Bristol on the west, from John O'Groat's house at the extreme
north to the Land's End, the very toe-nail of England on the south--a
kindly greeting, we may be sure, will pass. And a cheerful thing it is,
on this day of universal equality, on this day which--
"To the cottage and the crown,
Brought tidings of salvation down,"
to think that we can touch and hold each other with friendly hands all
over our land. We all of us shake hands on Christmas Day. Leigh Hunt had
a quaint fancy that he had, as it were, by lineal descent, shaken hands
with Milton. He would argue thus: he knew a man who had shaken hands
with Dr. Johnson, who had clasped the hand of him who had shaken
Dryden's right hand, who himself had thus greeted Andrew Marvell, who
knew Master Elwood, the Quaker friend of Milton, who knew Milton
himself; and thus, though our Sovereign has her hand kissed, not shaken,
by her subjects, yet doubtless she will clasp the hands of her children,
who, shaking those of others, will let the greeting and the good wishes
descend to the lowest on that ladder of society which we are all trying
to climb.
As for hearty good wishes, spoken in all kinds of voices, from the
deepest bass to the shrillest treble, we are sure that they circulate
throughout the little island, and are borne on the wings of the post all
over the seas. Erasmus, coming to England in Henry VIII's time, was
struck with the deep heartiness of our wishes--good, ay, and bad too;
but he most admired the good ones. Other nations ask in their greetings
how a man carries himself, or how doth he stand with the world, or how
doth he find himself; but the English greet with a pious wish that God
may give one a good morning or a good evening, good day, or "god'd'en,"
as the old writers have it; and when we part we wish that "God may be
with you," though we now clip it into "Good b'ye."
* * * * *
A CHRISTMAS SONG
WILLIAM COX BENNETT
Blow, wind, blow,
Sing through yard and shroud;
Pipe it shrilly and loud,
Aloft as well as below;
Sing in my sailor's ear
The song I sing to you,
"Come home, my sailor true,
For Christmas that comes so near."
Go, wind, go,
Hurry his home-bound sail,
Through gusts that are edged with hail,
Through winter, and sleet, and snow;
Song, in my sailor's ear,
Your shrilling and moans shall be,
For he knows they sing him to me
And Christmas that comes so near.
* * * * *
SERY
RICHARD WATSON GILDER
With wild surprise
Four great eyes
In two small heads,
From neighboring beds
Looked out--and winked--
And glittered and blinked
At a very queer sight
In the dim starlight.
As plain as can be
A fairy tree
Flashes and glimmers
And shakes and shimmers.
Red, green and blue
Meet their view;
Silver and gold
Their sharp eyes behold;
Small moon, big stars;
And jams in jars,
And cakes, and honey
And thimbles, and money,
Pink dogs, blue cats,
Little squeaking rats,
And candles, and dolls,
And crackers, and polls,
A real bird that sings,
And tokens and favors,
And all sorts of things
For the little shavers.
Four black eyes
Grow big with surprise;
And then grow bigger
When a tiny figure,
Jaunty and airy,
(Is it a fairy?)
From the tree-top cries,
"Open wide! Black Eyes!
Come, children, wake now!
Your joys you may take now!"
Quick as you can think
Twenty small toes
In four pretty rows,
Like little piggies pink,
All kick in the air--
And before you can wink
The tree stands bare!
* * * * *
A CHRISTMAS SONG
TUDOR JENKS
When mother-love makes all things bright,
When joy comes with the morning light,
When children gather round their tree,
Thou Christmas Babe,
We sing of Thee!
When manhood's brows are bent in thought,
To learn what men of old have taught,
When eager hands seek wisdom's key,
Wise Temple Child,
We learn of Thee!
When doubts assail, and perils fright,
When, groping blindly in the night,
We strive to read life's mystery,
Man of the Mount,
We turn to Thee!
When shadows of the valley fall,
When sin and death the soul appall,
One light we through the darkness see--
Christ on the Cross,
We cry to Thee!
And when the world shall pass away,
And dawns at length the perfect day,
In glory shall our souls made free,
Thou God enthroned,
Then worship Thee.
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS
(A Selection from "Dreamthorp")
ALEXANDER SMITH
Sitting here, I incontinently find myself holding a levee of departed
Christmas nights. Silently, and without special call, into my study of
imagination come these apparitions, clad in snowy mantles, brooched and
gemmed with frosts. Their numbers I do not care to count, for I know
they are the numbers of many years. The visages of two or three are sad
enough, but on the whole 'tis a congregation of jolly ghosts. The
nostrils of my memory are assailed by a faint odor of plum-pudding and
burnt brandy. I hear a sound as of light music, a whisk of women's
dresses whirled round in dance, a click as of glasses pledged by
friends. Before one of these apparitions is a mound, as of a new-made
grave, on which the snow is lying. I know, I know! Drape thyself not in
white like the others, but in mourning stole of crape; and instead of
dance music, let there haunt around thee the service for the dead! I
know that sprig of mistletoe, O Spirit in the midst! Under it I swung
the girl I loved--girl no more now than I am a boy--and kissed her spite
of blush and pretty shriek. And thee, too, with fragrant trencher in
hand, over which blue tongues of flame are playing, I do know--most
ancient apparition of them all. I remember thy reigning night. Back to
very days of childhood am I taken by the ghostly raisins simmering in a
ghostly brandy flame. Where now the merry boys and girls that thrust
their fingers in thy blaze? And now, when I think of it, thee also would
I drape in black raiment, around thee also would I make the burial
service murmur.
- - - - -
This, then, is Christmas, 1862. Everything is silent in Dreamthorp. The
smith's hammer reposes beside the anvil. The weaver's flying shuttle is
at rest. Through the clear wintry sunshine the bells this morning rang
from the gray church tower amid the leafless elms, and up the walk the
villagers trooped in their best dresses and their best faces--the latter
a little reddened by the sharp wind: mere redness in the middle aged; in
the maids, wonderful bloom to the eyes of their lovers--and took their
places decently in the ancient pews. The clerk read the beautiful
prayers of our Church, which seem more beautiful at Christmas than at
any other period. For that very feeling which breaks down at this time
the barriers which custom, birth, or wealth have erected between man and
man, strikes down the barrier of time which intervenes between the
worshipper of to-day and the great body of worshippers who are at rest
in their graves. On such a day as this, hearing these prayers, we feel a
kinship with the devout generations who heard them long ago. The devout
lips of the Christian dead murmured the responses which we now murmur;
along this road of prayer did their thoughts of our innumerable dead,
our brothers and sisters in faith and hope, approach the Maker, even as
ours at present approach Him. Prayers over, the clergyman--who is no
Boanerges, of Chrysostom, golden-mouthed, but a loving, genial-hearted,
pious man, the whole extent of his life from boyhood until now, full of
charity and kindly deeds, as autumn fields with heavy wheaten ears; the
clergyman, I say--for the sentence is becoming unwieldy on my hands, and
one must double back to secure connexion--read out in that silvery voice
of his, which is sweeter than any music to my ear, those chapters of the
New Testament that deal with the birth of the Saviour. And the red-faced
rustic congregation hung on the good man's voice as he spoke of the
Infant brought forth in a manger, of the shining angels that appeared in
the mid-air to the shepherds, of the miraculous star that took its
station in the sky, and of the wise men who came from afar and laid
their gifts of frankincense and myrrh at the feet of the child. With the
story every one was familiar, but on that day, and backed by the
persuasive melody of the reader's voice, it seemed to all quite new--at
least, they listened attentively as if it were. The discourse that
followed possessed no remarkable thoughts; it dealt simply with the
goodness of the Maker of heaven and earth, and the shortness of time,
with the duties of thankfulness and charity to the poor; and I am
persuaded that every one who heard returned to his house in a better
frame of mind. And so the service remitted us all to our own homes, to
what roast-beef and plum-pudding slender means permitted, to gatherings
around cheerful fires, to half-pleasant, half-sad remembrances of the
dead and the absent.
From sermon I have returned like the others, and it is my purpose to
hold Christmas alone. I have no one with me at table, and my own
thoughts must be my Christmas guests. Sitting here, it is pleasant to
think how much kindly feeling exists this present night in England. By
imagination I can taste of every table, pledge every toast, silently
join in every roar of merriment. I become a sort of universal guest.
With what propriety is this jovial season, placed amid dismal December
rains and snows! How one pities the unhappy Australians, with whom
everything is turned topsy-turvy, and who holds Christmas at midsummer!
The face of Christmas glows all the brighter for the cold. The heart
warms as the frost increases. Estrangements which have embittered the
whole year, melt in to-night's hospitable smile. There are warmer
handshakings on this night than during the by-past twelve months. Friend
lives in the mind of friend. There is more charity at this time than at
any other. You get up at midnight and toss your spare coppers to the
half-benumbed musicians whiffling beneath your windows, although at any
other time you would consider their performance a nuisance, and call
angrily for the police. Poverty, and scanty clothing, and fireless
grates, come home at this season to the bosoms of the rich, and they
give of their abundance. The very red-breast of the woods enjoys his
Christmas feast. Good feeling incarnates itself into plum-pudding. The
Master's words, "The poor ye have always with you," wear at this time a
deep significance. For at least one night on each year over all
Christendom there is brotherhood. And good men, sitting amongst their
families, or by a solitary fire like me, when they remember the light,
that shone over the poor clowns huddling on the Bethlehem plains
eighteen hundred years ago, the apparition of shining angels overhead,
the song "Peace on earth and good-will toward men," which for the first
hallowed the midnight air,--pray for that strain's fulfilment, that
battle and strife may vex the nations no more, that not only on
Christmas eve, but the whole year round, men shall be brethren owning
one Father in heaven.
- - - - -
Once again, for the purpose of taking away all solitariness of feeling,
and of connecting myself, albeit only in fancy, with the proper gladness
of the time, let me think of the comfortable family dinners now being
drawn to a close, of the good wishes uttered, and the presents made,
quite valueless in themselves, yet felt to be invaluable from the
feelings from which they spring; of the little children, by sweetmeats
lapped in Elysium; and of the pantomime, pleasantest Christmas sight of
all, with the pit a sea of grinning delight, the boxes a tier of beaming
juvenility, the galleries, piled up to the far-receding roof, a mass of
happy laughter which a clown's joke brings down in mighty avalanches. In
the pit, sober people relax themselves, and suck oranges, and quaff
ginger-pop; in the boxes, Miss, gazing through her curls, thinks the
Fairy Prince the prettiest creature she ever beheld, and Master, that to
be a clown must be the pinnacle of human happiness: while up in the
galleries the hard literal world is for an hour sponged out and
obliterated; the chimney-sweep forgets, in his delight when the
policeman comes to grief, the harsh call of his master, and Cinderella,
when the demons are foiled, and the long parted lovers meet and embrace
in a paradise of light and pink gauze, the grates that must be scrubbed
to-morrow. All bands and trappings of toil are for one hour loosened by
the hands of imaginative sympathy. What happiness a single theatre can
contain! And those of maturer years, or of more meditative temperament,
sitting at the pantomime, can extract out of the shifting scenes
meanings suitable to themselves; for the pantomime is a symbol or
adumbration of human life. Have we not all known Harlequin, who rules
the roast, and has the pretty Columbine to himself? Do we not all know
that rogue of a clown with his peculating fingers, who brazens out of
every scrape, and who conquers the world by good humour and ready wit?
And have we not seen Pantaloons not a few, whose fate it is to get all
the kicks and lose all the halfpence, to fall through all the trap
doors, break their shins over all the barrows, and be forever captured
by the policeman, while the true pilferer, the clown, makes his escape
with the booty in his possession? Methinks I know the realities of which
these things are but the shadows; have met with them in business, have
sat with them at dinner. But to-night no such notions as these intrude;
and when the torrent of fun, and transformation, and practical joking
which rushed out of the beautiful fairy world gathered up again, the
high-heaped happiness of the theatre will disperse itself, and the
Christmas pantomime will be a pleasant memory the whole year through.
Thousands on thousands of people are having their midriffs tickled at
this moment; in fancy I see their lighted faces, in memory I see their
mirth.
By this time I should think every Christmas dinner at Dreamthorp or
elsewhere has come to an end. Even now in the great cities the theatres
will be dispersing. The clown has wiped the paint off his face.
Harlequin has laid aside his wand, and divested himself of his
glittering raiment; Pantaloon, after refreshing himself with a pint of
porter, is rubbing his aching joints; and Columbine, wrapped up in a
shawl, and with sleepy eyelids, has gone home in a cab. Soon, in the
great theatre, the lights will be put out, and the empty stage will be
left to ghosts. Hark! midnight from the church tower vibrates through
the frosty air. I look out on the brilliant heaven, and see a milky way
of powdery splendour wandering through it, and clusters and knots of
stars and planets shining serenely in the blue frosty spaces; and the
armed apparition of Orion, his spear pointing away into immeasurable
space, gleaming overhead; and the familiar constellation of the Plough
dipping down into the west; and I think when I go in again that there is
one Christmas the less between me and my grave.
* * * * *
CHRISTMAS CAROL
PHILLIPS BROOKS
The earth has grown old with its burden of care,
But at Christmas it always is young,
The heart of the jewel burns lustrous and fair,
And its soul full of music bursts forth on the air,
When the song of the angels is sung.
It is coming, Old Earth, it is coming to-night!
On the snowflakes which cover thy sod
The feet of the Christ-child fall gentle and white,
And the voice of the Christ-child tells out with delight
That mankind are the children of God.
On the sad and the lonely, the wretched and poor,
The voice of the Christ-child shall fall;
And to every blind wanderer open the door
Of hope that he dared not to dream of before,
With a sunshine of welcome for all.
The feet of the humblest may walk in the field
Where the feet of the Holiest trod,
This, then, is the marvel to mortals revealed
When the silvery trumpets of Christmas have pealed,
That mankind are the children of God.
* * * * *
THE END OF THE PLAY
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY
The play is done--the curtain drops,
Slow-falling to the prompter's bell:
A moment yet the actor stops,
And looks around, to say farewell.
It is an irksome word and task;
And, when he's laughed and said his say,
He shows, as he removes his mask,
A face that's anything but gay.
One word, ere yet the evening ends,
Let's close it with a parting rhyme;
And pledge a hand to all young friends,
As fits the merry Christmas time.
On life's wide scene you, too, have parts
That fate erelong shall bid you play;
Good-night!--with honest, gentle hearts
A kindly greeting go alway!
Good-night!--I'd say the griefs, the joys,
J
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