VCHRISTMAS DAY

The Unbroken Song

IHEARD the bells on Christmas Day,Their old, familiar carols play,And wild and sweetThe words repeatOf peace on earth, good-will to men!And thought how, as the day had come,The belfries of all ChristendomHad rolled alongThe unbroken songOf peace on earth, good-will to men!Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

IHEARD the bells on Christmas Day,Their old, familiar carols play,And wild and sweetThe words repeatOf peace on earth, good-will to men!

IHEARD 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 ChristendomHad rolled alongThe unbroken songOf peace on earth, good-will to men!Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

A Scene of Mediæval Christmas

LET us imagine Christmas Day in a mediæval town of Northern England. The cathedral is only partly finished. Its nave and transepts are the work of Norman architects, but the choir has been destroyed in order to be rebuilt by more graceful designers and more skillful hands. The old city is full of craftsmen assembled to complete the church. Some have come, as a religious duty, to work off their tale of sins by bodily labor. Some are animated by a love of art—simple men who might have rivalled with the Greeks in ages of more cultivation. Others, again, are well-known carvers brought for hire from distant towns and countries beyond the sea. But to-day, and for some days past, the sound of hammer and chisel has been silent in the choir. Monks have bustled about the nave, dressing it up with holly boughs and bushes of yew, and preparing a stage for the sacred play they are going to exhibit on the feast-day. Christmas is not like Corpus Christi, and now the market-place stands inches deep in snow, so that the Miracles must be enacted beneath a roof instead of in the open air. And what place so appropriate as the cathedral, where poor people may have warmth and shelter while they see the show? Besides, the gloomy old church, with its windows darkened by the falling snow, lends itself to candle-light effects that will enhance the splendor of the scene. Everything is ready. The incense of morning mass yet lingers round the altar. The voice of the friar, who told the people from the pulpit the story of Christ's birth, has hardly ceased to echo. Time has just been given for a mid-day dinner, and for the shepherds andfarm lads to troop in from the countryside. The monks are ready at the wooden stage to draw its curtain, and all the nave is full of eager faces. There you may see the smith and carpenter, the butcher's wife, the country priest, and the gray-cowled friar. Scores of workmen, whose home the cathedral for the time is made, are also here, and you may know the artists by their thoughtful foreheads and keen eyes. That young monk carved Madonna and her Son above the southern porch. Beside him stands the master-mason, whose strong arms have hewn gigantic images of prophets and apostles for the pinnacles outside the choir; and the little man with cunning eyes between the two is he who cuts such quaint hobgoblins for the gargoyles. He has a vein of satire in him, and his humor overflows into the stone. Many and many a grim beast and hideous head has he hidden among vine-leaves and trellis-work upon the porches. Those who know him well are loath to anger him, for fear their sons and sons' sons should laugh at them forever caricatured in solid stone.

Hark! there sounds the bell. The curtain is drawn, and the candles blaze brightly round the wooden stage. What is this first scene? We have God in Heaven, dressed like a pope with triple crown, and attended by his court of angels. They sing and toss up censers till he lifts his hand and speaks. In a long Latin speech he unfolds the order of creation and his will concerning man. At the end of it up leaps an ugly buffoon, in goatskin, with rams' horns upon his head. Some children begin to cry; but the older people laugh, for this is the Devil, the clown and comic character, who talks their common tongue, and has no reverence before the very throne of Heaven. He asksleave to plague men, and receives it; then, with many a curious caper, he goes down to Hell, beneath the stage. The angels sing and toss their censers as before, and the first scene closes to a sound of organs. The next is more conventional, in spite of some grotesque incidents. It represents the Fall; the monks hurry over it quickly, as a tedious but necessary prelude to the birth of Christ. That is the true Christmas part of the ceremony, and it is understood that the best actors and most beautiful dresses are to be reserved for it. The builders of the choir in particular are interested in the coming scenes, since one of their number has been chosen, for his handsome face and tenor voice, to sing the angel's part. He is a young fellow of nineteen, but his beard is not yet grown, and long hair hangs down upon his shoulders. A chorister of the cathedral, his younger brother, will act the Virgin Mary. At last the curtain is drawn.

We see a cottage room, dimly lighted by a lamp, and Mary spinning near her bedside. She sings a country air, and goes on working, till a rustling noise is heard, more light is thrown upon the stage, and a glorious creature, in white raiment, with broad golden wings, appears. He bears a lily, and cries, "Ave Maria, Gratia Plena!" She does not answer, but stands confused, with down-dropped eyes and timid mien. Gabriel rises from the ground and comforts her, and sings aloud his message of glad tidings. Then Mary gathers courage, and, kneeling in her turn, thanks God; and when the angel and his radiance disappears, she sings the song of the Magnificat, clearly and simply, in the darkened room. Very soft and silver sounds this hymn through the great church. The women kneel, and children are hushed as by a lullaby. But some ofthe hinds and 'prentice-lads begin to think it rather dull. They are not sorry when the next scene opens with a sheep-fold and a little camp-fire. Unmistakable bleatings issue from the fold, and five or six common fellows are sitting round the blazing wood. One might fancy they had stepped straight from the church floor to the stage, so natural do they look. Besides, they call themselves by common names—Colin and Tom Lie-a-bed and Nimble Dick. Many a round laugh wakes echoes in the church when these shepherds stand up, and hold debate about a stolen sheep. Tom Lie-a-bed has nothing to remark but that he is very sleepy, and does not want to go in search of it to-night; Colin cuts jokes, and throws out shrewd suspicions that Dick knows something of the matter; but Dick is sly, and keeps them off the scent, although a few of his asides reveal to the audience that he is the real thief. While they are thus talking, silence falls upon the shepherds. Soft music from the church organ breathes, and they appear to fall asleep.

The stage is now quite dark, and for a few moments the aisles echo only to the dying melody. When, behold, a ray of light is seen, and splendor grows around the stage from hidden candles, and in the glory Gabriel appears upon a higher platform made to look like clouds. The shepherds wake in confusion, striving to shelter their eyes from this unwonted brilliancy. But Gabriel waves his lily, spreads his great gold wings, and bids good cheer with clarion voice. The shepherds fall to worship, and suddenly round Gabriel there gathers a choir of angels, and a song of "Gloria in Excelsis" to the sound of a deep organ is heard far off. From distant aisles it swells, and seems to come from heaven. Through a long resonant fugue theglory flies, and as it ceases with complex conclusion, the lights die out, the angels disappear, and Gabriel fades into the darkness. Still the shepherds kneel, rustically chanting a carol half in Latin, half in English, which begins "In dulci Jubilo." The people know it well, and when the chorus rises with "Ubi sunt gaudia?" its wild melody is caught by voices up and down the nave. This scene makes deep impression upon many hearts; for the beauty of Gabriel is rare, and few who see him in his angel's dress would know him for the lad who daily carves his lilies and broad water-flags about the pillars of the choir. To that simple audience he interprets Heaven, and little children will see him in their dreams. Dark winter nights and awful forests will be trodden by his feet, made musical by his melodious voice, and parted by the rustling of his wings. The youth himself may return to-morrow to the workman's blouse and chisel, but his memory lives in many minds and may form a part of Christmas for the fancy of men as yet unborn.

The next drawing of the curtain shows us the stable of Bethlehem crowned by its star. There kneels Mary, and Joseph leans upon his staff. The ox and the ass are close at hand, and Jesus lies in jeweled robes on straw within the manger. To right and left bow the shepherds, worshiping in dumb show, while voices from behind chant a solemn hymn. In the midst of the melody is heard the flourish of trumpets, and heralds step upon the stage, followed by the three crowned kings. They have come from the far East, led by the star. The song ceases, while drums and fifes and trumpets play a stately march. The kings pass by, and do obeisance one by one. Each gives some costly gift; each doffs his crown and leaves it at theSaviour's feet. Then they retire to a distance and worship in silence like the shepherds. Again the angels' song is heard, and while it dies away the curtain closes and the lights are put out.

The play is over, and the evening has come. The people must go from the warm church into the frozen snow, and crunch their homeward way beneath the moon. But in their minds they carry a sense of light and music and unearthly loveliness. Not a scene of this day's pageant will be lost. It grows within them and creates the poetry of Christmas. Nor must we forget the sculptors who listen to the play. We spoke of them minutely, because these mysteries sank deep into their souls and found a way into their carvings on the cathedral walls. The monk who made Madonna by the southern porch will remember Gabriel and place him bending low in lordly salutation by her side. The painted glass of the chapter-house will glow with fiery choirs of angels learned by heart that night. And who does not know the mocking devils and quaint satyrs that the humorous sculptor carved among his fruits and flowers? Some of the misereres of the stalls still bear portraits of the shepherd thief, and of the ox and ass who blinked so blindly when the kings, by torchlight, brought their dazzling gifts. Truly these old miracle-plays and the carved work of cunning hands that they inspired are worth to us more than all the delicate creations of Italian pencils. Our homely Northern churches still retain, for the child who reads their bosses and their sculptured fronts, more Christmas poetry than we can find in Fra Angelico's devoutness or the liveliness of Giotto. Not that Southern artists have done nothing for our Christmas. Cimabue's gigantic angels at Assisi, and the radiant seraphs of Raphaelor of Signorelli, were seen by Milton in his Italian journey. He gazed in Romish churches on graceful Nativities, into which Angelico and Credi threw their simple souls. How much they tinged his fancy we cannot say. But what we know of heavenly hierarchies we later men have learned from Milton; and what he saw he spoke, and what he spoke in sounding verse lives for us now and sways our reason, and controls our fancy, and makes fine art of high theology.

John Addington Symonds

Christmas in Dreamthorp

THIS, then, is Christmas. 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 so much 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. Thedevout 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, or 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 connection—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 the 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 gatheringsaround cheerful fires, to half-pleasant, half-sad remembrances of the dead and absent.

Alexander Smith

By the Christmas Fire

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 reread 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 up the well-worn volume it 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 andthe "whole place shines like a congregation of glow-worms." 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.

Hamilton W. MabieinMy Study FireBy permission of Dodd, Mead & Co.

Ode on the Morning of Christ's Nativity

THIS is the month, and this the happy mornWherein the Son of Heaven's Eternal King,Of wedded maid and virgin mother born,Our great redemption from above did bring;For so the holy sages once did singThat He our deadly forfeit should release,And with His Father work us a perpetual peace.That glorious Form, that Light unsufferable,And that far-beaming blaze of MajestyWherewith He, wont at Heaven's high council-tableTo sit the midst of Trinal Unity,He laid aside; and, here with us to be,Forsook the courts of everlasting day,And chose with us a darksome house of mortal clay.Say, heavenly Muse, shall not thy sacred veinAfford a present to the Infant God?Hast thou no verse, no hymn, or solemn strainTo welcome Him to this His new abodeNow while the heaven, by the sun's team untrod,Hath took no print of the approaching light,And all the spangled host keep watch in squadrons bright?See how from far, upon the eastern road,The star-led wizards haste with odours sweet:O run, prevent them with thy humble odeAnd lay it lowly at His blessed feet;Have thou the honour first thy Lord to greet,And join thy voice unto the Angel quireFrom out His secret altar touched with hallow'd fire.

THIS is the month, and this the happy morn

Wherein the Son of Heaven's Eternal King,

Of wedded maid and virgin mother born,

Our great redemption from above did bring;

For so the holy sages once did sing

That He our deadly forfeit should release,

And with His Father work us a perpetual peace.

That glorious Form, that Light unsufferable,And that far-beaming blaze of MajestyWherewith He, wont at Heaven's high council-tableTo sit the midst of Trinal Unity,He laid aside; and, here with us to be,Forsook the courts of everlasting day,And chose with us a darksome house of mortal clay.

That glorious Form, that Light unsufferable,

And that far-beaming blaze of Majesty

Wherewith He, wont at Heaven's high council-table

To sit the midst of Trinal Unity,

He laid aside; and, here with us to be,

Forsook the courts of everlasting day,

And chose with us a darksome house of mortal clay.

Say, heavenly Muse, shall not thy sacred veinAfford a present to the Infant God?Hast thou no verse, no hymn, or solemn strainTo welcome Him to this His new abodeNow while the heaven, by the sun's team untrod,Hath took no print of the approaching light,And all the spangled host keep watch in squadrons bright?

Say, heavenly Muse, shall not thy sacred vein

Afford a present to the Infant God?

Hast thou no verse, no hymn, or solemn strain

To welcome Him to this His new abode

Now while the heaven, by the sun's team untrod,

Hath took no print of the approaching light,

And all the spangled host keep watch in squadrons bright?

See how from far, upon the eastern road,The star-led wizards haste with odours sweet:O run, prevent them with thy humble odeAnd lay it lowly at His blessed feet;Have thou the honour first thy Lord to greet,And join thy voice unto the Angel quireFrom out His secret altar touched with hallow'd fire.

See how from far, upon the eastern road,

The star-led wizards haste with odours sweet:

O run, prevent them with thy humble ode

And lay it lowly at His blessed feet;

Have thou the honour first thy Lord to greet,

And join thy voice unto the Angel quire

From out His secret altar touched with hallow'd fire.

The Hymn

It was the winter wildWhile the heaven-born ChildAll meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;Nature in awe to HimHad doff'd her gaudy trim,With her great Master so to sympathize:It was no season then for herTo wanton with the sun, her lusty paramour.Only with speeches fairShe woos the gentle airTo 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 eyesShould look so near upon her foul deformities.But He, her fears to cease,Sent down the meek-eyed Peace;She, crown'd with olive green, came softly slidingDown 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 soundWas heard the world around:The idle spear and shield were high uphung;The hooked chariot stoodUnstain'd with hostile blood;The trumpet spake not to the armed throng;And kings sat still with awful eye,As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by.But peaceful was the nightWherein the Prince of LightHis reign of peace upon the earth began;The winds, with wonder whist,Smoothly, the waters kist,Whispering new joys to the mild ocean—Who now hath quite forgot to rave,While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed wave.The stars, with deep amaze,Stand fix'd in steadfast gaze,Bending one way their precious influence;And will not take their flightFor all the morning light,Or Lucifer that often warn'd them thence;But in their glimmering orbs did glowUntil their Lord Himself bespake, and bid them go.And though the shady gloomHad given day her room,The sun himself withheld his wonted speed,And hid his head for shame,As his inferior flameThe new-enlightened world no more should need;He saw a greater Sun appearThan his bright throne, or burning axletree could bear.The shepherds on the lawnOr ere the point of dawnSate simply chatting in a rustic row;Full little thought they thanThat the mighty PanWas kindly come to live with them below;Perhaps their loves, or else their sheepWas all that did their silly thoughts so busy keep:—When such music sweetTheir hearts and ears did greetAs never was by mortal finger strook—Divinely-warbled voiceAnswering the stringed noise,As all their souls in blissful rapture took:The air, such pleasure loth to lose,With thousand echoes still prolongs each heavenly close.*******Such music (as 'tis said)Before was never madeBut when of old the Sons of Morning sung,While the Creator greatHis constellations setAnd 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 chimeMove in melodious time;And let the bass of heaven's deep organ blow;And with your ninefold harmonyMake up full consort to the angelic symphony.For if such holy songEnwrap our fancy long,Time will run back, and fetch the age of gold;And speckled VanityWill 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 thenWill down return to men,Orb'd in a rainbow; and, like glories wearing,Mercy will sit betweenThroned 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 see! the Virgin blestHath laid her Babe to rest;Time is, our tedious song should here have ending:Heaven's youngest-teemed starHath fix'd her polish'd car,Her sleeping Lord with hand-maid lamp attending:And all about the courtly stableBright-harnessed Angels sit in order serviceable.John Milton

It was the winter wild

While the heaven-born Child

All meanly wrapt in the rude manger lies;

Nature in awe to Him

Had doff'd 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 fairShe woos the gentle airTo 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 eyesShould look so near upon her foul deformities.

Only with speeches fair

She woos 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, crown'd with olive green, came softly slidingDown 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.

But He, her fears to cease,

Sent down the meek-eyed Peace;

She, crown'd 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 soundWas heard the world around:The idle spear and shield were high uphung;The hooked chariot stoodUnstain'd with hostile blood;The trumpet spake not to the armed throng;And kings sat still with awful eye,As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by.

No war, or battle's sound

Was heard the world around:

The idle spear and shield were high uphung;

The hooked chariot stood

Unstain'd with hostile blood;

The trumpet spake not to the armed throng;

And kings sat still with awful eye,

As if they surely knew their sovran Lord was by.

But peaceful was the nightWherein the Prince of LightHis reign of peace upon the earth began;The winds, with wonder whist,Smoothly, the waters kist,Whispering new joys to the mild ocean—Who now hath quite forgot to rave,While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed wave.

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 kist,

Whispering new joys to the mild ocean—

Who now hath quite forgot to rave,

While birds of calm sit brooding on the charmed wave.

The stars, with deep amaze,Stand fix'd in steadfast gaze,Bending one way their precious influence;And will not take their flightFor all the morning light,Or Lucifer that often warn'd them thence;But in their glimmering orbs did glowUntil their Lord Himself bespake, and bid them go.

The stars, with deep amaze,

Stand fix'd in steadfast gaze,

Bending one way their precious influence;

And will not take their flight

For all the morning light,

Or Lucifer that often warn'd them thence;

But in their glimmering orbs did glow

Until their Lord Himself bespake, and bid them go.

And though the shady gloomHad given day her room,The sun himself withheld his wonted speed,And hid his head for shame,As his inferior flameThe new-enlightened world no more should need;He saw a greater Sun appearThan his bright throne, or burning axletree could bear.

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 lawnOr ere the point of dawnSate simply chatting in a rustic row;Full little thought they thanThat the mighty PanWas kindly come to live with them below;Perhaps their loves, or else their sheepWas all that did their silly thoughts so busy keep:—

The shepherds on the lawn

Or ere the point of dawn

Sate simply chatting in a rustic row;

Full little thought they than

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 sweetTheir hearts and ears did greetAs never was by mortal finger strook—Divinely-warbled voiceAnswering the stringed noise,As all their souls in blissful rapture took:The air, such pleasure loth to lose,With thousand echoes still prolongs each heavenly close.

When such music sweet

Their hearts and ears did greet

As never was by mortal finger strook—

Divinely-warbled voice

Answering the stringed noise,

As all their souls in blissful rapture took:

The air, such pleasure loth to lose,

With thousand echoes still prolongs each heavenly close.

*******Such music (as 'tis said)Before was never madeBut when of old the Sons of Morning sung,While the Creator greatHis constellations setAnd the well-balanced world on hinges hung;And cast the dark foundations deep,And bid the weltering waves their oozy channel keep.

*******

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 chimeMove in melodious time;And let the bass of heaven's deep organ blow;And with your ninefold harmonyMake up full consort to the angelic symphony.

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 consort to the angelic symphony.

For if such holy songEnwrap our fancy long,Time will run back, and fetch the age of gold;And speckled VanityWill 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.

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 thenWill down return to men,Orb'd in a rainbow; and, like glories wearing,Mercy will sit betweenThroned 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.

Yea, Truth and Justice then

Will down return to men,

Orb'd 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 see! the Virgin blestHath laid her Babe to rest;Time is, our tedious song should here have ending:Heaven's youngest-teemed starHath fix'd her polish'd car,Her sleeping Lord with hand-maid lamp attending:And all about the courtly stableBright-harnessed Angels sit in order serviceable.John Milton

*******

But see! the Virgin blest

Hath laid her Babe to rest;

Time is, our tedious song should here have ending:

Heaven's youngest-teemed star

Hath fix'd her polish'd car,

Her sleeping Lord with hand-maid lamp attending:

And all about the courtly stable

Bright-harnessed Angels sit in order serviceable.

John Milton

Christmas Church

WHEN I awoke on Christmas morning, while I lay musing on my pillow, I heard the sound of little feet pattering outside of the door, and a whispering consultation. Presently a choir of small voices chanted forth an old Christmas carol, the burden of which was,

Rejoice, our Saviour he was bornOn Christmas Day in the morning.

Rejoice, our Saviour he was born

On Christmas Day in the morning.

I rose softly, slipped on my clothes, opened the door suddenly, and beheld one of the most beautiful little fairy groups that a painter could imagine. It consisted of a boy and two girls, the eldest not more than six, and lovely as seraphs. They were going the rounds of the house, and singing at every chamber-door; but my sudden appearance frightened them into mute bashfulness. They remained for a moment playing on their lips with their fingers, and now and then stealing a shy glance from under their eyebrows, until, as if by one impulse, they scampered away, and as they turned an angle of the gallery, I heard them laughing in triumph at their escape.

Everything conspired to produce kind and happy feelings in this stronghold of old-fashioned hospitality. The window of my chamber looked out upon what in summer would have been a beautiful landscape. There was a sloping lawn, a fine stream winding at the foot of it, and a tract of park beyond, with noble clumps of trees, and herds of deer. At a distance was a neat hamlet, with the smoke from the cottage chimneys hanging over it; and a church with its dark spire in strong relief against the clear cold sky. The house was surrounded with evergreens, according to the English custom, which would have given almost an appearance of summer; but the morning was extremely frosty; the light vapour of the preceding evening had been precipitated by the cold, and covered all the trees and every blade of grass with its fine crystallizations. The rays of a bright morning sun had a dazzling effect among the glittering foliage. A robin, perched upon the top of a mountain-ash that hung its clusters of red berries just before my window, was basking himself in the sunshine, and piping a few querulous notes;and a peacock was displaying all the glories of his train, and strutting with the pride and gravity of a Spanish grandee on the terrace-walk below.

THE VIRGIN ADORING THE INFANT CHILD.Correggio.

I had scarcely dressed myself, when a servant appeared to invite me to family prayers. I afterwards understood that early morning service was read on every Sunday and saint's day throughout the year, either by Mr. Bracebridge or by some member of the family. It was once almost universally the case at the seats of the nobility and gentry of England, and it is much to be regretted that the custom is fallen into neglect; for the dullest observer must be sensible of the order and serenity prevalent in those households, where the occasional exercise of a beautiful form of worship in the morning gives, as it were, the keynote to every temper for the day, and attunes every spirit to harmony.

"If you are disposed to go to church," said Frank Bracebridge, "I can promise you a specimen of my cousin Simon's musical achievements. As the church is destitute of an organ, he has formed a band from the village amateurs, and established a musical club for their improvement; he has also sorted a choir, as he sorted my father's pack of hounds, according to the directions of Jervaise Markham, in his Country Contentments; for the bass he has sought out all the 'deep solemn mouths,' and for the tenor the 'loud ringing mouths,' among the country bumpkins; and for 'sweet mouths,' he has culled with curious taste among the prettiest lasses in the neighbourhood; though these last, he affirms, are the most difficult to keep in tune; your pretty female singer being exceedingly wayward and capricious, and very liable to accident."

As the morning, though frosty, was remarkably fineand clear, the most of the family walked to the church, which was a very old building of gray stone, and stood near a village, about half-a-mile from the park gate. Adjoining it was a low snug parsonage, which seemed coeval with the church. The front of it was perfectly matted with a yew-tree that had been trained against its walls, through the dense foliage of which apertures had been formed to admit light into the small antique lattices. As we passed this sheltered nest, the parson issued forth and preceded us.

*******

The usual services of the choir were managed tolerably well, the vocal parts generally lagging a little behind the instrumental, and some loitering fiddler now and then making up for lost time by travelling over a passage with prodigious celerity, and clearing more bars than the keenest fox-hunter to be in at the death. But the great trial was an anthem that had been prepared and arranged by Master Simon, and on which he had founded great expectation. Unluckily there was a blunder at the very outset; the musicians became flurried; Master Simon was in a fever, everything went on lamely and irregularly until they came to a chorus beginning "Now let us sing with one accord," which seemed to be a signal for parting company: all became discord and confusion; each shifted for himself, and got to the end as well, or rather as soon, as he could, excepting one old chorister in a pair of horn spectacles bestriding and pinching a long sonorous nose; who, happening to stand a little apart, and being wrapped up in his own melody, kept on a quavering course, wriggling his head, ogling his book, and winding all up by a nasal solo of at least three bars' duration.

The parson gave us a most erudite sermon on the rites and ceremonies of Christmas, and the propriety of observing it not merely as a day of thanksgiving, but of rejoicing; supporting the correctness of his opinions by the earliest usages of the Church, and enforcing them by the authorities of Theophilus of Cesarea, St. Cyprian, St. Chrysostom, St. Augustine and a cloud more of Saints and Fathers, from whom he made copious quotations. I was a little at a loss to perceive the necessity of such a mighty array of forces to maintain a point which no one present seemed inclined to dispute; but I soon found that the good man had a legion of ideal adversaries to contend with; having, in the course of his researches on the subject of Christmas, got completely embroiled in the sectarian controversies of the Revolution, when the Puritans made such a fierce assault upon the ceremonies of the Church, and poor old Christmas was driven out of the land by proclamation of parliament. The worthy parson lived but with times past, and knew but a little of the present.

Shut up among worm-eaten tomes in the retirement of his antiquated little study, the pages of old times were to him as the gazettes of the day; while the era of the Revolution was mere modern history. He forgot that nearly two centuries had elapsed since the fiery persecution of poor mince-pie throughout the land; when plum-porridge was denounced as "mere popery," and roast beef as anti-christian; and that Christmas has been brought in again triumphantly with the merry court of King Charles at the Restoration. He kindled into warmth with the ardour of his contest, and the host of imaginary foes with whom he had to combat; had a stubborn conflict with old Prynne and two or three other forgotten champions of the Roundheads,on the subject of Christmas festivity; and concluded by urging his hearers, in the most solemn and affecting manner, to stand to the traditionary customs of their fathers, and feast and make merry on this joyful anniversary of the Church.

I have seldom known a sermon attended apparently with more immediate effects; for on leaving the church the congregation seemed one and all possessed with the gaiety of spirit so earnestly enjoined by their pastor. The elder folks gathered in knots in the churchyard, greeting and shaking hands; and the children ran about crying Ule! Ule! and repeating some uncouth rhymes, which the parson, who had joined us, informed me had been handed down from days of yore. The villagers doffed their hats to the Squire as he passed, giving him the good wishes of the season with every appearance of heartfelt sincerity, and were invited by him to the Hall, to take something to keep out the cold of the weather; and I heard blessings uttered by several of the poor, which convinced me that, in the midst of his enjoyments, the worthy old cavalier had not forgotten the true Christmas virtue of charity.

Washington Irving

Dolly urges Silas Marner to go to Church onChristmas Day

"THERE'S the bakehus if you could make up your mind to spend a twopence on the oven now and then,—not every week, in course—I shouldn't like to do that myself,—you might carry your bit o' dinner there, for it's nothing but right to have a bit o' summat hot of a Sunday,and not to make it as you can't know your dinner from Saturday. But now, upo' Christmas-day, this blessed Christmas as is ever coming, if you was to take your dinner to the bakehus, and go to church, and see the holly and the yew, and hear the anthim, and then take the sacramen', you'd be a deal the better, and you'd know which end you stood on, and you could put your trust i' Them as knows better nor we do, seein' you'd ha' done what it lies on us all to do."

Dolly's exhortation, which was an unusually long effort of speech for her, was uttered in the soothing persuasive tone with which she would have tried to prevail on a sick man to take his medicine, or a basin of gruel for which he had no appetite.

*******

But now, little Aaron, having become used to the weaver's awful presence, had advanced to his mother's side, and Silas, seeming to notice him for the first time, tried to return Dolly's signs of good-will by offering the lad a bit of lard-cake. Aaron shrank back a little, and rubbed his head against his mother's shoulder, but still thought the piece of cake worth the risk of putting his hand out for it.

"Oh, for shame, Aaron," said his mother, taking him on her lap, however; "why, you don't want cake again yet awhile. He's wonderful hearty," she went on, with a little sigh—"that he is, God knows. He's my youngest, and we spoil him sadly, for either me or the father must allays hev him in our sight—that we must."

She stroked Aaron's brown head, and thought it must do Master Marner good to see such a "pictur of a child." But Marner, on the other side of the hearth, saw theneat-featured rosy face as a mere dim round, with two dark spots in it.

"And he's got a voice like a bird—you wouldn't think," Dolly went on; "he can sing a Christmas carril as his father's taught him; and I take it for a token as he'll come to good, as he can learn the good tunes so quick. Come, Aaron, stan' up and sing the carril to Master Marner, come."

Aaron replied by rubbing his forehead against his mother's shoulder. "Oh, that's naughty," said Dolly, gently. "Stan' up, when mother tells you, and let me hold the cake till you've done."

Aaron was not indisposed to display his talents, even to an ogre, under protecting circumstances; and after a few more signs of coyness, consisting chiefly in rubbing the backs of his hands over his eyes, and then peeping between them at Master Marner, to see if he looked anxious for the "carril," he at length allowed his head to be duly adjusted, and standing behind the table, which let him appear above it only as far as his broad frill, so that he looked like a cherubic head untroubled with a body, he began with a clear chirp, and in a melody that had the rhythm of an industrious hammer,—

"God rest you merry, gentlemen,Let nothing you dismay,For Jesus Christ our SaviourWas born on Christmas-Day."

"God rest you merry, gentlemen,

Let nothing you dismay,

For Jesus Christ our Saviour

Was born on Christmas-Day."

Dolly listened with a devout look, glancing at Marner in some confidence that this strain would help to allure him to church.

"That's Christmas music," she said, when Aaron had ended, and had secured his piece of cake again. "There'sno other music equil to the Christmas music—'Hark the erol angils sing.' And you may judge what it is at church, Master Marner, with the bassoon and the voices, as you can't help thinking you've got to a better place a'ready—for I wouldn't speak ill o' this world, seeing as Them put us in it as knows best; but what wi' the drink, and the quarrelling, and the bad illnesses, and the hard dying, as I've seen times and times, one's thankful to hear of a better. The boy sings pretty, don't he, Master Marner?"

"Yes," said Silas, absently, "very pretty."

The Christmas carol, with its hammer-like rhythm, had fallen on his ears as strange music, quite unlike a hymn, and could have none of the effect Dolly contemplated. But he wanted to show her that he was grateful, and the only mode that occurred to him was to offer Aaron a bit more cake.

George Eliot.

Yule in the Old Town

A WHOLE fortnight we kept it. Real Christmas was from Little Christmas Eve, which was the night before the Holy Eve proper, till New Year's. Then there was a week of supplementary festivities before things slipped back into their wonted groove. That was the time of parties and balls. The great ball of the year was on the day after Christmas,—Second Christmas Day we called it,—when all the quality attended at the club-house, where the amtman and the burgomaster, the bishop and the rector of the Latin School, did the honors and received the people. That was the grandest of the town functions. The school ball, late in autumn, was the jolliest, for then the boysinvited each the girl he liked best, and the older people were guests and outsiders, so to speak. The Latin School—the Cathedral School, as it was still called—was the oldest institution there next to the church and the bishop, and when it took the stage it was easily first while it lasted. The Yule ball, though it was a rather more formal affair, for all that was neither stiff nor tiresome. Nothing was, in the Old Town; there was too much genuine kindness for that. And then it was the recognized occasion when matches were made by enterprising mammas, or by the young themselves, and when engagements were declared and discussed as the great news of the day. We heard all of those things afterward and thought a great fuss was being made over nothing much. For when a young couple were declared engaged, that meant that there was no more fun to be got out of them. They were given, after that, to mooning about by themselves and to chasing us children away when we ran across them; until they happily returned to their senses, got married, and became reasonable human beings once more.

When we had been sent to bed, father and mother used to go away in their Sunday very best, and we knew they would not return until two o'clock in the morning, a fact which alone invested the occasion with unwonted gravity, for the Old Town kept early hours. At ten o'clock, when the watchman droned his sleepy lay, absurdly warning the people to

"Be quick and bright,Watch fire and light,Our clock it has struck ten,"

"Be quick and bright,

Watch fire and light,

Our clock it has struck ten,"

it was ordinarily tucked in and asleep. But that night we lay awake a long time listening to the muffled sound ofheavy wheels in the snow, rolling unceasingly past, and trying to picture to ourselves the grandeur they conveyed. Every carriage in the town was then in use and doing overtime. I think there were as many as four.

When we were not dancing or playing games, we literally ate our way through the two holiday weeks. Pastry by the mile did we eat, and general indigestion brooded over the town when it emerged into the white light of the new year. At any rate, it ought to have done so. It is a prime article of faith with the Danes to this day that for any one to go out of a friend's house, or of anybody's house, in the Christmas season without partaking of its cheer, is to "bear away their Yule," which no one must do on any account. Every house was a bakery from the middle of December until Christmas Eve, and, oh! the quantities of cakes we ate, and such cakes! We were sixteen normally in our home, and mother mixed the dough for her cakes in a veritable horse trough kept for that exclusive purpose. As much as a sack of flour went in, I guess, and gallons of molasses, and whatever else went to the mixing. For weeks there had been long and anxious speculations as to "what father would do," and gloomy conferences between him and mother over the state of the family pocketbook, which was never plethoric; but at last the joyful message ran through the house from attic to kitchen that the appropriation had been made, "even for citron," which meant throwing all care to the winds. The thrill of it, when we children stood by and saw the generous avalanche going into the trough! What would not come out of it! The whole family turned to and helped make the cakes and cut the "pepper nuts," which were little squares of cake dough we played cards for and stuffed our pockets with, gnashing them incessantly. Talkabout eating between meals: ours was a continuous performance for two solid weeks.

The pepper nuts were the real staple of Christmas to us children. We rolled the dough in long strings like slender eels and then cut it a little on the bias. They were good, those nuts, when baked brown. I wish I had some now.

Christmas Eve was, of course, the great and blessed time. That was the one night in the year when in the gray old Domkirke services were held by candle-light.

A myriad wax candles twinkled in the gloom, but did not dispel it. It lingered under the great arches where the voice of the venerable minister, the responses of the congregation, and above it all the boyish treble of the choir, billowed and strove, now dreamingly with the memories of ages past, now sharply, tossed from angle to corner in the stone walls, and again in long thunderous echoes sweeping all before it on the triumphant strains of the organ, like a victorious army with banners crowding through the halls of time. So it sounded to me as sleep gently tugged at my eyelids. The air grew heavy with the smell of evergreens and of burning wax, and as the thunder of war drew farther and farther away, in the shadow of the great pillars stirred the phantoms of mailed knights whose names were hewn in the gravestones there. We youngsters clung to the skirts of mother as we went out and the great doors fell to behind us. And yet those Christmas eves, with mother's gentle eyes forever inseparable from them, and with the glad cries of "Merry Christmas!" ringing all about, have left a touch of sweet peace in my heart which all the years have not effaced, nor ever will....

When Ansgarius preached the White Christ to the vikings of the North, so runs the legend of the Christmas-tree, theLord sent his three messengers, Faith, Hope, and Love, to help light the first tree. Seeking one that should be high as hope, wide as love, and that bore the sign of the cross on every bough, they chose the balsam fir, which best of all the trees in the forest met the requirements.... Wax candles are the only real thing for a Christmas-tree, candles of wax that mingle their perfume with that of the burning fir, not the by-product of some coal-oil or other abomination. What if the boughs do catch fire? They can be watched, and too many candles are tawdry, anyhow. Also, red apples, oranges, and old-fashioned cornucopias made of colored paper, and made at home, look a hundred times better and fitter in the green; and so do drums and toy trumpets and wald-horns, and a rocking-horse reined up in front that need not have cost forty dollars, or anything like it.

I am thinking of one, or rather two, a little piebald team with a wooden seat between, for which mother certainly did not give over seventy-five cents at the store, that as "Belcher and Mamie"—the name was bestowed on the beasts at sight by Kate, aged three, who bossed the play-room—gave a generation of romping children more happiness than all the expensive railroads and trolley-cars and steam engines that are considered indispensable to keeping Christmas nowadays. And the Noah's Ark with Noah and his wife and all the animals that went two by two—ah, well, I haven't set out to preach a sermon on extravagance that makes no one happier, but I wish—The legend makes me think of the holly that grew in our Danish woods. We called it "Christ-thorn," for to us it was of that the crown of thorns was made with which the cruel soldiers mocked our Saviour, and the red berries were the drops of blood that fell from hisanguished brow. Therefore the holly was a sacred tree, and to this day the woods in which I find it seem to me like the forest where the Christmas roses bloomed in the night when the Lord was born, different from all other woods, and better.

Jacob RiisinThe Old Town

The Mahogany Tree

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