_"Some years since" said Thackeray in a public speech, "when I was
younger, and used to frequent jolly assemblies, I wrote a Bacchanalian
song to be chanted after dinner;" and a contemporary record has
preserved a note of "the radiant gratification of his face whilst
Horace Mayhew sang The Mahogany Tree, perhaps the finest and most
soul-stirring of Thackeray's social songs."_
_In seeking a Souvenir of this Christmas season the ballad of "The
Mahogany Tree" lends itself most felicitously to the present purpose
which is to_
"--_wish you health, and love and mirth,
As fits the solemn Christmas-tide_."
_Putting aside for an hour the affairs of a work-a-day world, let us
take our places around the convivial board, on the time-stained surface
of which we may find in fancy the initials of so many boon companions
of other days cut deep._
_It is pleasant to sport "round the stem of the jolly old tree" in
congenial company, and to renew our youth at the bidding of this
gracious Toastmaster, the centennial of whose birth we shall celebrate
presently; the anniversary of whose death was yester-e'en._
_But while remembering that we shall be none the worse tomorrow for
having been happy today, we are not permitted to forget entirely the
Blue-devil Sprite that awaits the dawn. The play-spell is over; the
lights are out in Vanity Fair; and here in Mr. Dulac's drawing is
the leader of our Christmas Chorus as he shuts up the box and the
puppets--"for our play is played out."_
_C. M. F._
_Christmas 1910._