and have wondered if you've been having an apathetic time as usual. I
think we often spend Christmas in a most shocking fashion in America,
and I mean to revolutionize all that when I get back. So long a time
in Germany has taught me better. Here it is a season of universal joy,
and everybody enters into it. Last night we had a Christmas tree at the
S.'s, as we always do. We went there at half past six, and it was the
prettiest thing to see in every house, nearly, a tree just lighted,
or in process of being so. As a separate family lives on each floor,
often in one house would be three trees, one above the other, in the
front rooms. The curtains are always drawn up, to give the passers-by
the benefit of it. They don't make a fearful undertaking of having a
Christmas tree here, as we do in America, and so they are attainable
by everybody. The tree is small, to begin with, and nothing is put on
it except the tapers and bonbons. It is fixed on a small stand in the
centre of a large square table covered with a white cloth, and each
person's presents are arranged in a separate pile around it. The tree
is only lighted for the sake of beauty, and for the air of festivity
it throws over the thing.--After a crisp walk in the moonlight (which
I performed in the style of "Johnny-look-up-in-the-air," for I was
engaged in staring into house-windows, so far as it was practicable),
we sat down to enjoy a cup of tea and a piece of cake. I had just
begun my second cup, when, Presto! the parlour doors flew open, and
there stood the little green tree, blossoming out into lights, and
throwing its gleams over the well-laden table. There was a general
scramble and a search for one's own pile, succeeded by deep silence and
suspense while we opened the papers. Such a hand shaking and embracing
and thanking as followed! concluding with the satisfactory conviction
that we each had "just what we wanted." Germans do not despise the
utilitarian in their Christmas gifts, as we do, but, between these and
their birthday offerings, expect to be set up for the rest of the year
in the necessaries of life as well as in its superfluities. Presents of
stockings, underclothes, dresses, handkerchiefs, soaps--nothing comes
amiss. And every one must give to every one else. That is LAW.
AMY FAY in _Music-Study in Germany_.
Christmas Dinner in a Clipper's Fo'c'sle
Christmas Day we were running before a fine westerly gale for the mouth
of the channel. We had been hove to for forty-eight hours; for, though
we had sighted Fayal in the Azores, the Scotchman was afraid to run
because the sun was obscured and he couldn't get an observation. So he
lay under lower main topsail and fore topmast staysail, and let the
fine fair wind blow away while he waited for the sun to come out so he
could find out where he was. Not much like Captain Hurlburt in the old
Tanjore. Early Christmas morning, a little topsail schooner--one of the
fleet of clippers known as "Western Island Fruiters"--came flying along
before the wind like a little butterfly, and, seeing the big ship hove
to, I suppose they thought there must be something the matter with her;
so they kindly ran under our stern and hailed. After finding out where
we were from, and where bound, the skipper asked us what was the matter.
"Nothing," said Russell.
"Well," said the schooner skipper, "what are ye hove to for?"
Russell told him he wanted to get a "sight" to find his position.
"Foller me, you blahsted fool," said the skipper, and putting up his
helm he left us. It must have been the sight of that little schooner
running so confidently that shamed him, for he squared away and made
sail at once. The cook had killed the pig the day before, so we were
to have fresh meat, that is, baked pork and plum duff, with sauce, for
our Christmas dinner. Although I could not eat much of anything, I
looked forward with great anticipations to the fresh meat which I was
anxious to taste. When the watch was called at half-past eleven, she
was running dead before, and rolling both rails under; for iron ships
are proverbially wet. Some call them "diving bells." Three men went to
the galley: one for the duff, one for the pork, and the other for the
duff sauce.
They got their grub and started forward. Just as they got nicely clear
of the deck-house, where there was nothing to protect them, she gave a
heavy roll to port, scooping up several tons of water over the rail;
then she rolled as far to starboard, doing the same trick again. And
now the decks being full of water level with both rails, a big sea
raised her stern high in air. The fellow who had the pork yelled for
somebody to open the door, and somebody did, with the result that as
her stern went up the three men with the grub and a tidal wave of salt
water all came into the forecastle together.
Oh, what a merry Christmas that was! The whole watch were sitting
on their chests waiting for their dinner, or perhaps some were not
entirely dressed when that green sea came in. It washed all the men and
chests up into the eyes of her, and drowned out all the lower bunks.
The pork and duff went somewhere. The sauce, of course, disappeared
entirely. Every man was soaked, and so was every rag of clothing
belonging to the whole watch, except the bedding in the upper bunks,
and that was pretty well wet from the splashing. Fortunately, I had the
upper bunk next the door, so that it all went by me, and I expected the
splashing caused by the sudden stoppage of the water by the bows. After
the flood had subsided, there came a jawing match.
"Who hollered to open that door?" "No." "But what bloody fool opened
it?"
So and so.
"You're a liar!"
I thought there would be a general row, but they were too wet and too
cold and disheartened to fight about anything. They pulled their chests
out from under each other, satisfied themselves that they didn't own a
dry stitch for a change, and then, fishing out the pork and duff from
under the bunks, threw the latter overboard, and made a sorry Christmas
dinner on semi-saturated fresh pork and hardtack.
HERBERT ELLIOTT HAMBLEN in _On Many Seas_
Christmas in Jail
"Richard Marston, I charge you with unlawfully taking, stealing, and
carrying away, in company with others, one thousand head of mixed
cattle, more or less, the property of one Walter Hood, of Outer Back,
Momberah, in or about the month of June last."
"All right; why don't you make it a few more while you're about it?"
"That'll do," he said, nodding his head; "you decline to say anything.
Well, I can't exactly wish you a merry Christmas--fancy this being
Christmas Eve, by Jove!--but you'll be cool enough this deuced hot
weather till the sessions in February, which is more than some of us
can say. Good-night." He went out and locked the door. I sat down on my
blanket on the floor and hid my head in my hands. I wonder it didn't
burst with what I felt then. Strange that I shouldn't have felt half as
bad when the judge, the other day, sentenced me to be a dead man in a
couple of months. But I was young then.
* * * * *
Christmas Day! Christmas Day! So this is how I was to spend it after
all, I thought, as I woke up at dawn, and saw the gray light just
beginning to get through the bars of the window of the cell.
Here was I locked up, caged, ironed, disgraced, a felon and an outcast
for the rest of my life. Jim, flying for his life, hiding from every
honest man, every policeman in the country looking after him, and
authorized to catch him or shoot him down like a sheep-killing dog.
Father living in the Hollow, like a black-fellow in a cave, afraid
to spend the blessed Christmas with his wife and daughter, like the
poorest man in the land could do if he was only honest. Mother half
dead with grief, and Aileen ashamed to speak to the man that loved and
respected her from her childhood. Gracey Storefield not daring to think
of me or say my name, after seeing me carried off a prisoner before
her eyes. Here was a load of misery and disgrace heaped up together,
to be borne by the whole family, now and for the time to come--by the
innocent as well as the guilty. And for what? Because we had been too
idle and careless to work regularly and save our money, though well
able to do it, like honest men. Because, little by little, we had let
bad dishonest ways and flash manners grow upon us, all running up an
account that had to be paid some day.
And now the day of reckoning had come--sharp and sudden with a
vengeance! Well, what call had we to look for anything else? We had
been working for it; now we had got it, and had to bear it. Not for
want of warning, neither. What had mother and Aileen been saying ever
since we could remember? Warning upon warning. Now the end had come
just as they said. Of course I knew in a general way that I couldn't be
punished or be done anything to right off. I knew law enough for that.
The next thing would be that I should have to be brought up before
the magistrates and committed for trial as soon as they could get any
evidence.
After breakfast, flour and water or hominy, I forget which, the warder
told me that there wasn't much chance of my being brought up before
Christmas was over. The police magistrate was away on a month's leave,
and the other magistrates would not be likely to attend before the end
of the week, anyway. So I must make myself comfortable where I was.
Comfortable!
ROLF BOLDREWOOD in _Robbery under Arms_
Colonel Carter's Christmas Tree
Soon there stole over every one in the room that sense of peace and
contentment which always comes when one is at ease in an atmosphere
where love and kindness reign. The soft light of the candles, the low,
rich color of the simple room with its festoons of cedar and pine, the
aroma of the rare wine, and especially the spicy smell of the hemlock
warmed by the burning tapers--that rare, unmistakable smell which only
Christmas greens give out and which few of us know but once a year, and
often not then; all had their effect on host and guests. Katy became
so happy that she lost all fear of her father and prattled on to Fitz
and me (we had pinned to her frock the rose the Colonel had bought for
the "grown-up daughter," and she was wearing it just as Aunt Nancy
wore hers), and Aunt Nancy in her gentle voice talked finance to Mr.
Klutchem in a way that made him open his eyes, and Fitz laughingly
joined in, giving a wide berth to anything bearing on "corners" or
"combinations" or "shorts" and "longs," while I, to spare Aunt Nancy,
kept one eye on Jim,[1] winking at him with it once or twice when he
was about to commit some foolishness, and so the happy feast went on.
[1] "Jim" is the pickaninny in buttons, who, as Chad says, "looks like
he's busted out with brass measles."
As to the Colonel, he was never in better form. To him the occasion was
the revival of the old Days of Plenty--the days his soul coveted and
loved: his to enjoy, his to dispense.
But if it had been delightful before, what was it when Chad, after
certain mysterious movements in the next room, bore aloft the crowning
glory of the evening, and placed it with all its candles in the centre
of the table, the Colonel leaning far back in his chair to give him
room, his coat thrown wide, his face aglow, his eyes sparkling with the
laughter that always kept him young!
Then it was that the Colonel, gathering under his hand a little sheaf
of paper lamplighters which Chad had twisted, rose from his seat,
picked up a slender glass that had once served his father ("only seben
o' dat kind left," Chad told me) and which that faithful servitor had
just filled from the flow of the old decanter of like period, and with
a wave of his hand as if to command attention, said, in a clear, firm
voice that indicated the dignity of the occasion: "My friends,--my
vehy dear friends, I should say, for I can omit none of you--certainly
not this little angel who has captured our hearts, and surely not
our distinguished guest, Mr. Klutchem, who has honored us with his
presence,--befo' I kindle with the torch of my love these little
beacons which are to light each one of us on our way until another
Christmas season overtakes us; befo', I say, these sparks burst into
life, I want you fill yo' glasses (Chad had done that to the brim--even
little Katy's) and drink to the health and happiness of the lady on my
right, whose presence is always a benediction and whose loyal affection
is one of the sweetest treasures of my life!"
Everybody except the dear lady stood up--even little Katy--and
Aunt Nancy's health was drunk amid her blushes, she remarking to
Mr. Klutchem that George would always embarrass her with these too
flattering speeches of his, which was literally true, this being the
fourth time I had heard similar sentiments expressed in the dear lady's
honor.
This formal toast over, the Colonel's whole manner changed. He was no
longer the dignified host conducting the feast with measured grace.
With a spring in his voice and a certain unrestrained joyousness, he
called to Chad to bring him a light for his first lamplighter. Then,
with the paper wisp balanced in his hand, he began counting the several
candles, peeping into the branches with the manner of a boy.
"One--two--three--fo'--yes, plenty of them, but we are goin' to begin
with the top one. This is yours, Nancy--this little white one on the
vehy tip-top. Gentlemen, this top candle is always reserved for Miss
Caarter," and the lighted taper kindled it into a blaze. "Just like yo'
eyes, my dear, burnin' steadily and warmin' everybody," and he tapped
her hand caressingly with his fingers. "And now, where is that darlin'
little Katy's--she must have a white one, too--here it is. Oh, what a
brave little candle! Not a bit of sputterin' or smoke. See, dearie,
what a beautiful blaze! May all your life be as bright and happy. And
here is Mr. Klutchem's right alongside of Katy's--a fine red one. There
he goes, steady and clear and strong--And Fitz--dear old Fitz. Let's
see what kind of a candle Fitz should have. Do you know, Fitz, if I
had my way, I'd light the whole tree for you. One candle is absurd for
Fitz! There, Fitz, it's off--another red one! All you millionnaires
must have red candles! And the Major! Ah, the Major!"--and he held out
his hand to me--"Let's see--yaller? No, that will never do for you,
Major. Pink? That's better. There now, see how fine you look and how
evenly you burn--just like yo' love, my dear boy, that never fails me."
The circle of the table was now complete; each guest had a candle
alight, and each owner was studying the several wicks as if the future
could be read in their blaze: Aunt Nancy with a certain seriousness. To
her the custom was not new; the memories of her life were interwoven
with many just such top candles,--one I knew of myself, that went out
long, long ago, and has never been rekindled since.
The Colonel stopped, and for a moment we thought he was about to take
his seat, although some wicks were still unlighted--his own among them.
Instantly a chorus of voices went up: "You have forgotten your own,
Colonel--let me light one for you," etc., etc. Even little Katy had
noticed the omission, and was pulling at my sleeve to call attention
to the fact: the Colonel's candle was the only one she really cared
for. "One minute," cried the Colonel. "Time enough; the absent ones
fust"--and he stooped down and peered among the branches--"yes,--that's
just the very one. This candle, Mr. Klutchem, is for our old Mammy
Henny, who is at Caarter Hall, carin' for my property, and who must be
pretty lonely to-day--ah, there you go, Mammy!--blazin' away like one
o' yo' own fires!"
Three candles now were all that were left unlighted; two of them side
by side on the same branch, a brown one and a white one, and below
these a yellow one standing all alone.
The Colonel selected a fresh taper, kindled it in the flame of Aunt
Nancy's top candle, and turning to Chad, who was standing behind his
chair, said:--
"I'm goin' to put you, Chad, where you belong,--right alongside of me.
Here, Katy, darlin', take this taper and light this white candle for
me, and I'll light the brown one for Chad," and he picked up another
taper, lighted it, and handed it to the child.
"Now!"
As the two candles flashed into flame, the Colonel leaned over, and
holding out his hand to the old servant--boys together, these two, said
in a voice full of tenderness:--
"Many years together, Chad,--many years, old man."
Chad's face broke into a smile as he pressed the Colonel's hand.
"Thank ye, marster," was all he trusted himself to say--a title the
days of freedom had never robbed him of--and then he turned his head to
hide the tears.
During the whole scene little Jim had stood on tiptoe, his eyes growing
brighter and brighter as each candle flashed into a blaze. Up to the
time of the lighting of the last guest candle his face had expressed
nothing but increasing delight. When, however, Mammy Henny's candle,
and then Chad's were kindled, I saw an expression of wonderment
cross his features which gradually settled into one of profound
disappointment.
But the Colonel had not yet taken his seat. He had re-lighted the
taper--this time from Mammy Henny's candle--and stood with it in his
hand, peering into the branches as if looking for something he had lost.
"Ah, here's another. I
wonder--who--this--little--yaller--candle--can--be--for," he said
slowly, looking around the room and accentuating each word. "I reckon
they're all here. Let me see--Aunt Nancy, Mr. Klutchem, Katy, Fitz,
the Major, Mammy Henny, Chad, and me. Yes--all here. Oh!"--and he
looked at the boy with a quizzical smile on his face--"I came vehy near
forgettin'.
"This little yaller candle is Jim's."
F. HOPKINSON SMITH in _Colonel Carter's Christmas_
_Copyright, 1903, by Charles Scribner's Sons_
IX
CHRISTMAS STORIES
[Illustration: CHRISTMAS STORIES]
Christmas Roses
The Fir Tree
The Christmas Banquet
A Christmas Eve in Exile
The Rehearsal of the Mummers' Play
[Illustration]
"It was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if
any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us,
and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed,
GOD BLESS US,
EVERY ONE."
CHARLES DICKENS
Christmas Roses
When our guests were gone Pelleas and I sat for some while beside the
drawing-room fire. They had brought us a box of Christmas roses and
these made sweet the room as if with a secret Spring--a Little Spring,
such as comes to us all, now and then, through the year. And it was the
enchanted hour, when Christmas eve has just passed and no one is yet
awakened by the universal note of Get-Your-Stocking-Before-Breakfast.
"For that matter," Pelleas said, "every day is a loving cup, only some
of us see only one of its handles: Our own."
And after a time:--
"Isn't there a legend," he wanted to know, "or if there isn't one there
ought to be one, that the first flowers were Christmas roses and that
you can detect their odour in all other flowers? I'm not sure," he
warmed to the subject, "but that they say if you look steadily, with
clear eyes, you can see all about every flower many little lines, in
the shape of a Christmas rose!"
Of course nothing beautiful is difficult to believe. Even in the
windows of the great florists, where the dear flowers pose as if for
their portraits, we think that one looking closely through the glass
may see in their faces the spirit of the Christmas roses. And when the
flowers are made a gift of love the spirit is set free. Who knows?
Perhaps the gracious little spirit is in us all, waiting for its
liberty in our best gifts.
And at thought of gifts I said, on Christmas eve of all times, what had
been for some time in my heart:--
"Pelleas, we ought--we really ought, you know, to make a new will."
The word casts a veritable shadow on the page as I write it. Pelleas,
conscious of the same shadow, moved and frowned.
"But why, Etarre?" he asked; "I had an uncle who lived to be ninety."
"So will you," I said, "and still--"
"He began translating Theocritus at ninety," Pelleas continued
convincingly.
"I'll venture he had made his will by then, though," said I.
"Is that any reason why I should make mine?" Pelleas demanded. "I
_never_ did the things my family did."
"Like living until ninety?" I murmured.
O, I could not love Pelleas if he was never unreasonable. It seems to
me that the privilege of unreason is one of the gifts of marriage; and
when I hear The Married chiding each other for the exercise of this
gift I long to cry: Is it not tiresome enough in all conscience to have
to keep up a brave show of reason for one's friends, without wearing a
uniform of logic in private? Laugh at each other's unreason for your
pastime, and Heaven bless you!
Pelleas can do more than this: He can laugh at his own unreason. And
when he has done so:--
"Ah, well, I know we ought," he admitted, "but I do so object to the
literary style of wills."
It has long been a sadness of ours that the law makes all the poor
dead talk alike in this last office of the human pleasure, so that
cartman and potentate and philosopher give away their chattels to the
same dreary choice of forms. No matter with what charming propriety
they have in life written little letters to accompany gifts, most
sensitively shading the temper of bestowal, yet in the majesty of
their passing they are forced into a very strait-jacket of phrasing so
that verily, to bequeath a thing to one's friend is well-nigh to throw
it at him. Yes, one of the drawbacks to dying is the diction of wills.
Pelleas meditated for a moment and then laughed out.
"Telegrams," said he, "are such a social convenience in life that I
don't see why they don't extend their function. Then all we should need
would be two witnesses, ready for anything, and some yellow telegraph
blanks, and a lawyer to file the messages whenever we should die,
telling all our friends what we wish them to have."
At once we fell to planning the telegrams, quite as if the Eye of the
Law knew what it is to wrinkle at the corners.
As,
MRS. LAWRENCE KNIGHT,
Little Rosemont,
L. I.
I wish you to have my mother's pearls and her mahogany and my Samarcand
rug and my Langhorne Plutarch and a kiss.
AUNT ETARRE
and
MR. ERIC CHARTERS,
To His Club.
Come to the house and get the Royal Sevres tea-service on which you
and Lisa had your first tea together and a check made out to you in my
check book in the library table drawer.
UNCLE PELLEAS
And so on, with the witnesses' names properly in the corners.
"Perfect," said I with enthusiasm. "O Pelleas, let us get a bill
through to this effect."
"But we may live to be only ninety, you know," he reminded me.
We went to the window, presently, and threw it open to the chance of
hearing the bird of dawning singing all night long in the Park, which
is of course, in New York, where it sings on Star of Bethlehem night.
We did not hear it, but it is something to have been certain that it
was there. And as we closed the casement,
"After all," Pelleas said seriously, "the Telegraph Will Bill would
have to do only with property. And a will ought to be concerned with
soberer matters."
So it ought, in spite of its dress of diction, rather like the motley.
"A man," Pelleas continued, "ought to have something more important to
will away than his house and his watch and his best bed. A man's poor
soul, now--unless he is an artist, which he probably is not--has no
chance verbally to leave anybody anything."
"It makes its will every day," said I.
"Even so," Pelleas contended, "it ought to die rich if it's anything of
a soul."
And that is true enough.
"Suppose," Pelleas suggested, "the telegrams were to contain something
like this: 'And from my spirit to yours I bequeath the hard-won
knowledge that you must be true from the beginning. But if by any
chance you have not been so, then you must be true from the moment that
you know.' Why not?"
Why not, indeed?
"I think that would be mine to give," Pelleas said reflectively; "and
what would yours be, Etarre?" he asked.
At that I fell in sudden abashment. What could I say? What would I
will my poor life to mean to any one who chances to know that I have
lived at all? O, I dare say I should have been able to formulate many a
fine-sounding phrase about the passion for perfection, but confronted
with the necessity I could think of nothing save a few straggling
truths.