Love came down at Christmas,
Love all lovely, Love Divine;
Love was born at Christmas,
Star and Angels gave the sign.
Worship we the Godhead,
Love Incarnate, Love Divine;
Worship we our Jesus:
But wherewith for sacred sign?
Love shall be our token,
Love be yours and love be mine,
Love to God and all men,
Love for plea and gift and sign.
The Babe was laid in the Manger
Between the gentle kine—
All safe from cold and danger—
“But it was not so with mine,
(With mine! With mine!)
“Is it well with the child, is it well?”
The waiting mother prayed.
“For I know not how he fell,
And I know not where he is laid.”
A Star stood forth in Heaven;
The Watchers ran to see
The Sign of the Promise given—
“But there comes no sign to me.
(To me! To me!)
“My child died in the dark.
Is it well with the child, is it well?
There was none to tend him or mark,
And I know not how he fell.”
The Cross was raised on high;
The Mother grieved beside—
“But the Mother saw Him die
And took Him when He died.
(He died! He died!)
“Seemly and undefiled
His burial-place was made—
Is it well, is it well with the child?
For I know not where he is laid.”
On the dawning of Easter Day
Comes Mary Magdalene;
But the Stone was rolled away,
And the Body was not within—
(Within! Within!)
“Ah, who will answer my word?”
The broken mother prayed.
“They have taken away my Lord,
And I know not where He is Laid.”
“The Star stands forth in Heaven.
The watchers watch in vain
For Sign of the Promise given
Of peace on Earth again—
(Again! Again!)
“But I know for Whom he fell”—
The steadfast mother smiled,
“Is it well with the child—is it well?
It is well—it is well with the child!”
Led by a star, a golden star,
The youngest star, an olden star,
Here the kings and the shepherds are,
Akneeling on the ground.
What did they come to the inn to see?
God in the Highest, and this is He,
A baby asleep on His mother’s knee
And with her kisses crowned.
Now is the earth a dreary place,
A troubled place, a weary place.
Peace has hidden her lovely face
And turned in tears away.
Yet the sun, through the war-cloud, sees
Babies asleep on their mother’s knees.
While there are love and home—and these—
There shall be Christmas Day.
Recursos Educativos en Inglés - Stories in English
“I don't s'pose you air goin' to do much Christmas over to your house.”
Mrs. Luther Ely stood looking over her gate. There was a sweet, hypocritical smile on her little thin red mouth. Her old china blue eyes stared as innocently as a baby's, although there was a certain hardness in them. Her soft wrinkled cheeks were pink and white with the true blond tints of her youth, which she had never lost. She was now an old woman, but people still looked at her with admiring eyes, and probably would until she died. All her life long her morsel of the world had had in it a sweet savor of admiration, and she had smacked her little feminine lips over it greedily. She expected every one to contribute toward it, even this squat, shabby, defiant old body standing squarely out in the middle of the road. Marg'ret Poole had stopped unwillingly to exchange courtesies with Mrs. Luther Ely. She looked aggressive. She eyed with a sidewise glance the other woman's pink, smirking face.
“'Tain't likely we be,” she said, in a voice which age had made gruff instead of piping. Then she took a step forward.
“Well, we ain't goin' to do much,” continued Mrs. Ely, with an air of subdued loftiness. “We air jest goin' to hev a little Christmas tree for the children. Flora's goin' to git a few things. She says there's a very nice 'sortment up to White's.”
Marg'ret gave a kind of affirmative grunt; then she tried to move on, but Mrs. Ely would not let her.
“I dun know as you have noticed our new curtains,” said she.
Had she not! Poor Marg'ret Poole, who had only green paper shades in her own windows, had peeped slyly around the corner of one, and watched mournfully, though not enviously, her opposite neighbor tacking up those elegant Nottingham lace draperies, and finally tying them back with bows of red ribbon.
Marg'ret would have given much to have scouted scornfully the idea, but she was an honest old woman, if not a sweet one.
“Yes, I see 'em,” said she, shortly.
“Don't you think they're pretty?”
“Well 'nough,” replied Marg'ret, with another honest rigor.
“They cost consider'ble. I told Flora I thought she was kind of extravagant; but then Sam's airnin' pretty good wages. I dun know but they may jest as well have things. Them white cotton curtains looked dreadful kind of gone by.”
Marg'ret thought of her green paper ones. She did not hate this other old woman; she at once admired and despised her; and this admiration of one whom she despised made her angry with herself and ashamed. She was never at her ease with Mrs. Luther Ely.
Mrs. Ely had run out of her house on purpose to intercept her and impress her with her latest grandeur — the curtains and the Christmas tree. She was sure of it. Still she looked with fine appreciation at the other's delicate pinky face, her lace cap adorned with purple ribbons, her black gown with a flounce around the bottom. The gown was rusty, but Marg'ret did not notice that; her own was only a chocolate calico. Black wool of an afternoon was sumptuous to her. She thought how genteel she looked in it. Mrs. Ely still retained her slim, long-waisted effect. Marg'ret had lost every sign of youthful grace; she was solidly square and stout.
Mrs. Ely had run out, in her haste, without a shawl; indeed, the weather was almost warm enough to go without one. It was only a week before Christmas, but there was no snow, and the grass was quite bright in places. There were green lights over in the field, and also in the house yards. There was a soft dampness in the air, which brought spring to mind. It almost seemed as if one by listening intently might hear frogs or bluebirds.
Now Marg'ret stepped resolutely across the street to her little house, which was shingled, but not painted, except on the front. Some one had painted that red many years before.
Mrs. Ely, standing before her glossy white cottage, which had even a neat little hood over its front door, cried, patronizingly, after her once again:
“I'm comin' over to see you as soon as I kin,” said she, “arter Christmas. We air dretful busy now.”
“Well, come when ye kin,” Marg'ret responded, shortly. Then she entered between the dry lilac bushes, and shut the door with a bang.
Even out in the yard she had heard a shrill clamor of children's voices from the house; when she stood in the little entry it was deafening.
“Them children is raisin' Cain,” muttered she. Then she threw open the door of the room where they were. There were three of them in a little group near the window. Their round yellow heads bobbed, their fat little legs and arms swung wildly. “Granny! granny!” shouted they.
“For the land sake, don't make such a racket! Mis' Ely kin hear you over to her house,” said Marg'ret.
“Untie us. Ain't ye goin' to untie us now? Say, Granny.”
“I'll untie ye jest as soon as I kin get my things off. Stop hollerin'.”
In the ceiling were fixed three stout hooks. A strong rope was tied around each child's waist, and the two ends fastened securely around a hook. The ropes were long enough to allow the children free range of the room, but they kept them just short of one dangerous point — the stove. The stove was the fiery dragon which haunted Marg'ret's life. Many a night did she dream that one of these little cotton petticoats had whisked too near it, and the flames were roaring up around a little yellow head. Many a day, when away from home, the same dreadful pictures had loomed out before her eyes; her lively fancy had untied these stout knots, and she had hurried home in a panic.
Marg'ret took off her hood and shawl, hung them carefully in the entry, and dragged a wooden chair under a hook. She was a short woman, and she had to stretch up on her tiptoes to untie those hard knots. Her face turned a purplish-red.
This method of restriction was the result of long thought and study on her part. She had tried many others, which had proved ineffectual. Willy, the eldest, could master knots like a sailor. Many a time the grandmother had returned to find the house empty. Willy had unfastened his own knot and liberated his little sisters, and then all three had made the most of their freedom. But even Willy, with his sharp five-year-old brain and his nimble little fingers, could not untie a knot whose two ends brushed the ceiling. Now Marg'ret was sure to find them all where she left them.
After the children were set at liberty she got their supper, arranging it neatly on the table between the windows. There was a nice white table cover, and the six silver teaspoons shone. The teaspoons were the mark of a flood-tide of Marg'ret's aspirations, and she had had aspirations all her life. She had given them to her daughter, the children's mother, on her marriage. She herself had never owned a bit of silver, but she determined to present her daughter with some.
“I'm goin' to have you have things like other folks,” she had said.
Now the daughter was dead, and she had the spoons. She regarded the daily use of them as an almost sinful luxury, but she brought them out in their heavy glass tumbler every meal.
“I'm goin' to have them children learn to eat off silver spoons,” she said, defiantly, to their father; “they'll think more of themselves.”
The father, Joseph Snow, was trying to earn a living in the city, a hundred miles distant. He was himself very young, and had not hitherto displayed much business capacity, although he was good and willing. They had been very poor before his wife died; ever since he had not been able to do much more than feed and clothe himself. He had sent a few dollars to Marg'ret from time to time — dollars which he had saved and scrimped pitifully to accumulate — but the burden of their support had come upon her.
She had sewed carpets and assisted in spring cleanings — everything to which she could turn a hand. Marg'ret was a tailoress, but she could now get no employment at her trade. The boys all wore “store clothes” in these days. She could only pick up a few cents at a time; still she managed to keep the children in comfort, with a roof over their heads and something to eat. Their cheeks were fat and pink; they were noisy and happy, and also pretty.
After the children were in bed that night she stood in her kitchen window and gazed across at Mrs. Luther Ely's house. She had left the candle in the children's room — the little things were afraid without it — and she had not yet lighted one for herself; so she could see out quite plainly, although the night was dark. There was a light in the parlor of the opposite house; the Nottingham lace curtains showed finely their pattern of leaves and flowers. Marg'ret eyed them. “'Tain't no use my tryin' to git up a notch,” she muttered. “'Tain't no use for some folks. They 'ain't worked no harder than I have; Louisa Ely 'ain't never begun to work so hard; but they kin have lace curtains an' Christmas trees.”
The words sounded envious. Still she was hardly that; subsequent events proved it. Her “tryin' to git up a notch” explained everything. Mrs. Luther Ely, the lace curtains, and the Christmas tree were as three stars set on that higher “notch” which she wished to gain. If the other woman had dressed in silk instead of rusty wool, if the lace draperies had been real, Marg'ret would hardly have wasted one wistful glance on them. But Mrs. Luther Ely had been all her life the one notch higher, which had seemed almost attainable. In that opposite house there was only one carpet; Marg'ret might have hoped for one carpet. Mrs. Ely's son-in-law earned only a comfortable living for his family; Marg'ret's might have done that. Worst of all, each woman had one daughter, and Marg'ret's had died.
Marg'ret had been ambitious all her life. She had made struggle after struggle. The tailoress trade was one of them. She made up her mind that she would have things like other people. Then she married, and her husband spent her money. One failure came after another. She slipped back again and again on the step to that higher notch. And here she was to-night, old and poor, with these three helpless children dependent upon her.
But she felt something besides disappointed ambition as she stood gazing out to-night.
“Thar's the children,” she went on; “can't have nothin' for Christmas. I 'ain't got a cent I kin spare. If I git 'em enough to eat, I'm lucky.”
Presently she turned away and lighted a lamp. She had some sewing to do for the children, and was just sitting down with it, when she paused suddenly and stood reflecting.
“I've got a good mind to go down to White's an' see what he's got in for Christmas,” said she. “Mebbe Joseph 'll send some money 'long next week, an' if he does, mebbe I kin git 'em some little thing. It would be a good plan for me to kind of price 'em.”
Marg'ret laid her work down, got her hood and shawl, and went out, fastening the house securely, and also the door of the room where the stove was.
To her eyes the village store which she presently entered was a very emporium of beauty and richness. She stared at the festoons of evergreens, the dangling trumpets and drums, the counters heaped with cheap toys, with awe and longing. She asked respectfully the price of this and that, some things less pretentious than the others. But it was all beyond her. She might as well have priced diamonds and bronzes. As she stood looking, sniffing in the odor of evergreen and new varnish, which was to her a very perfume of Christmas arising from its fulness of peace and merriment, Flora Trask, Mrs. Ely's daughter, entered. Marg'ret went out quickly. “She'll see I ain't buyin' anything,” she thought to herself.
But Marg'ret Poole came again the next day, and the next, and the next — morning, afternoon, and evening. “I dun know but I may want to buy some things by-an'-by,” she told the proprietor, extenuatingly, “an' I thought I'd kind of like to price 'em.”
She stood about, eying, questioning, and fingering tenderly. No money-letter came from Joseph. She inquired anxiously at the post-office many times a day. She tried to get work to raise a little extra money, but she could get none at this time of the year. She visited Mrs. White, the store-keeper's wife, and asked with forlorn hope if she had no tailor-work for her. There were four boys in that family. But Mrs. White shook her head. She was a good woman. “I'm sorry,” said she, “but I haven't got a mite. The boys wouldn't wear home-made clothes.”
She looked pitifully at Marg'ret's set, disappointed face when she went out.
Finally those animals of sugar and wood, those pink-faced, straight-bodied dolls, those tin trumpets and express wagons, were to Marg'ret as the fair apples hanging over the garden wall were to Christiana's sons in the Pilgrim's Progress. She gazed and gazed, until at last the sight and the smell of them were too much for her.
The evening before Christmas she went up to the post-office. The last mail was in, and there was no letter for her. Then she kept on to the store. It was rather early, and there were not as yet many customers. Marg'ret began looking about as usual. She might have been in the store ten minutes when she suddenly noticed a parcel on the corner of a counter. It was nicely tied. It belonged evidently either to one of the persons who were then trading in the store or was to be delivered outside later. Mr. White was not in; two of his sons and a boy clerk were waiting upon the customers.
Marg'ret, once attracted by this parcel, could not take her eyes from it long. She pored over the other wares with many sidelong glances at it. Her thoughts centred upon it, and her imagination. What could be in it? To whom could it belong?
Marg'ret Poole had always been an honest woman. She had never taken a thing which did not belong to her in her whole life. She suddenly experienced a complete moral revulsion. It was as if her principles, where weights were made shifty by her long watching and longing, had suddenly gyrated in a wild somersault. While they were reversed, Marg'ret, warily glancing around, slipped that parcel under her arm, opened the door, and sped home.
It was better Christmas weather than it had been a week ago. There was now a fine level of snow, and the air was clear and cold. Marg'ret panted as she walked. The snow creaked under her feet. She met many people hurrying along in chattering groups. She wondered if they could see the parcel under her shawl. It was quite a large one.
When she got into her own house she hastened to strike a light. Then she untied the parcel. There were in it some pink sugar cats and birds, two tin horses and a little wagon, a cheap doll, and some bright picture-books, besides a paper of candy.
“My land!” said Marg'ret, “won't they be tickled!”
There was a violent nervous shivering all over her stout frame. “Why can't I keep still?” said she.
She got out three of the children's stockings, filled them, and hung them up beside the chimney. Then she drew a chair before the stove, and went over to the bureau to get her Bible: she always read a chapter before she went to bed. Marg'ret was not a church member, she never said anything about it, but she had a persistent, reticent sort of religion. She took up the Bible; then laid it down; then she took it up again with a clutch.
“I don't keer,” said she, “I 'ain't done nothin' so terrible out of the way. What can't be airned, when anybody's willin' to work, ought to be took. I'm goin' to wait till arter Christmas; then I'm jest goin' up to Mis' White's some arternoon, an' I'm goin' to say, ‘Mis' White,’ says I, ‘the day before Christmas I went into your husband's store, an' I see a bundle a-layin' on the counter, an' I took it, an' said nothin' to nobody. I shouldn't ha' done such a thing if you'd give me work, the way I asked you to, instead of goin' outside an' buyin' things for your boys, an' robbin' honest folks of the chance to airn. Now, Mis' White, I'll tell you jest what I'm willin' to do: you give me somethin' to do, an' I'll work out twice the price of them things I took, an' we'll call it even. If you don't, all is, your husband will have to lose it.’ I wonder what she'll say to that.”
Marg'ret said all this with her head thrown back, in a tone of indescribable defiance. Then she sat down with her Bible and read a chapter.
The next day she watched the children's delight over their presents with a sort of grim pleasure.
She charged them to say nothing about them, although there was little need of it. Marg'ret had few visitors, and the children were never allowed to run into the neighbors'.
Two days after Christmas the postmaster stopped at Marg'ret's house: his own was just beyond.
He handed a letter to her. “This came Christmas morning,” said he. “I thought I'd bring it along on my way home. I knew you hadn't been in for two or three days, and I thought you were expecting a letter.”
“Thank ye,” said Marg'ret. She pulled the letter open, and saw there was some money in it. She turned very white.
“Hope you 'ain't got any bad news,” said the postmaster.
“No, I 'ain't.” After he had gone she sat down and read her letter with her knees shaking.
Joseph Snow had at last got a good situation. He was earning fifty dollars a month. There were twenty dollars in the letter. He promised to send her that sum regularly every month.
“Five dollars a week!” gasped Marg'ret. “My land! An' I've — stole!”
She sat there looking at the money in her lap. It was quite late; the children had been in bed a long time. Finally she put away the money, and went herself. She did not read in her Bible that night.
She could not go to sleep. It was bitterly cold. The old timbers of the house cracked. Now and then there was a sharp report like a pistol. There was a pond near by, and great crashes came from that. Marg'ret might have been, from the noise, in the midst of a cannonade, to which her own guilt had exposed her.
“'Tain't nothin' but the frost,” she kept saying to herself.
About three o'clock she saw a red glow on the wall opposite the window.
“I'm 'maginin' it,” muttered she. She would not turn over to look at the window. Finally she did. Then she sprang, and rushed toward it. The house where Mrs. Luther Ely lived was on fire.
Marg'ret threw a quilt over her head, unbolted her front door, and flew. “Fire! fire!” she yelled. “Fire! fire! Oh, Mis' Ely, where be you? Fire! fire! Sam — Sam Trask, you're all burnin' up! Flora! Oh! fire! fire!”
By the time she got out in the road she saw black groups moving in the distance. Hoarse shouts followed her cries. Then the church bell clanged out.
Flora was standing in the road, holding on to her children. They were all crying. “Oh, Mis' Poole!” sobbed she, “ain't it dreadful? ain't it awful?”
“Have you got the children all out?” asked Marg'ret.
“Yes; Sam told me to stand here with 'em.”
“Where's your mother?”
“I don't know. She's safe. She waked up first.” The young woman rolled her wild eyes toward the burning house. “There she is!” cried she.
Mrs. Ely was running out of the front door with a box in her hand. Her son-in-law staggered after her with a table on his shoulder.
“Don't you go in again, mother,” said he.
There were other men helping to carry out the goods, and they chimed in. “No,” cried they; “'tain't safe. Don't you go in again, Mis' Ely!”
Marg'ret ran up to her. “Them curtains,” gasped she, “an' the parlor carpet, have they got them out?”
“Oh, I dun know — I dun know! I'm afraid they 'ain't. Oh, they 'ain't got nothin' out! Everything all burnin' up! Oh, dear me! oh dear! Where be you goin'?”
Marg'ret had rushed past her into the house. She was going into the parlor, when a man caught hold of her. “Where are you going?” he shouted. “Clear out of this.”
“I'm a-goin' to git out them lace curtains an' the carpet.”
“It ain't any use. We staid in there just as long as we could, trying to get the carpet up; but we couldn't stand it any longer; it's chock full of smoke.” The man shouted it out, and pulled her along with him at the same time. “There!” said he, when they were out in the road; “look at that.” There was a flicker of golden fire in one of the parlor windows. Then those lace curtains blazed. “There!” said the man again: “I told you it wasn't any use.”
Marg'ret turned on him. There were many other men within hearing. “Well, I wouldn't tell of it,” said she, in a loud voice. “If I was a pack of stout, able-bodied men, and couldn't ha' got out them curtains an' that carpet afore they burnt up, I wouldn't tell of it.”
Flora and the children had been taken into one of the neighboring houses. Mrs. Ely still stood out in the freezing air clutching her box and wailing. Her son-in-law was trying hard to persuade her to go into the house where her daughter was.
Marg'ret joined them. “I would go if I was you, Mis' Ely,” said she.
“No, I ain't goin'. I don't care where I be. I'll stay right here in the road. Oh, dear me!”
“Don't take on so.”
“I 'ain't got a thing left but jest my best cap here. I did git that out. Oh dear! oh dear! everything's burnt up but jest this cap. It's all I've got left. I'll jest put it on an' set right down here in the road an' freeze to death. Nobody 'll care. Oh dear! dear! dear!”
“Oh, don't, Mis' Ely.” Marg'ret, almost rigid herself with the cold, put her hand on the other woman's arm. Just then the roof of the burning house fell in. There was a shrill wail from the spectators.
“Do come, mother,” Sam begged, when they stood staring for a moment.
“Yes, do go, Mis' Ely,” said Marg'ret. “You mustn't feel so.”
“It's easy 'nough to talk,” said Mrs. Ely. “'Tain't your house; an' if 'twas, you wouldn't had much to lose — nothin' but a passel of old wooden cheers an' tables.”
“I know it,” said Marg'ret.
Finally Mrs. Ely was started, and Marg'ret hurried home. She thought suddenly of the children and the money. But the children had not waked in all the tumult, and the money was where she had left it. She did not go to bed again, but sat over the kitchen stove thinking, with her elbows on her knees, until morning. When morning came she had laid out one plan of action.
That afternoon she took some of her money, went up to Mr. White's store, and bought some Nottingham lace curtains like the ones her neighbors had lost. They were off the same piece.
That evening she went to call on Mrs. Ely, and presented them. She had tried to think that she might send the parcel anonymously — leave it on the door-step; but she could not.
“'Twon't mortify me so much as 'twill the other way,” said she, “an' I'd ought to be mortified.”
So she carried the curtains, and met with a semblance of gratitude and a reality of amazement and incredulity which shamed her beyond measure.
After she got home that night she took up the Bible, then laid it down. “Here I've been talkin' and worryin' about gettin' up a higher notch,” said she, “an' kind of despisin' Mis' Ely when I see her on one. Mis' Ely wouldn't have stole. I ain't nothin' 'side of her now, an' I never kin be.”
The scheme which Marg'ret had laid to confront Mrs. White was never carried out. Her defiant spirit had failed her.
One day she went there and begged for work again. “I'm willin' to do 'most anything,” said she. “I'll come an' do your washin', or anything, an' I don't want no pay.”
Mrs. White was going away the next day, and she had no work to give the old woman; but she offered her some fuel and some money.
Marg'ret looked at her scornfully. “I've got money enough, thank ye,” said she. “My son sends me five dollars a week.”
The other woman stared at her with amazement. She told her husband that night that she believed Marg'ret Poole was getting a little unsettled. She did not know what to make of her.
Not long after that Marg'ret went into Mr. White's store, and slyly laid some money on the counter. She knew it to be enough to cover the cost of the articles she had stolen. Then she went away and left it there.
That night she went after her Bible. “I declare I will read it to-night,” muttered she. “I've paid fur 'em.” She stood eying it. Suddenly she began to cry. “Oh dear!” she groaned; “I can't. There don't anything do any good — the lace curtains, nor payin' fur 'em, nor nothin'. I dun know what I shell do.”
She looked at the clock. It was about nine. “He won't be gone yet,” said she. She stood motionless, thinking. “If I'm goin' to-night, I've got to,” she muttered. Still she did not start for a while longer. When she did, there was no more hesitation. No argument could have stopped Marg'ret Poole, in her old hood and shawl, pushing up the road, fairly started on her line of duty. When she got to the store she went in directly. The heavy door slammed to, and the glass panels clattered. Mr. White was alone in the store. He was packing up some goods preparatory to closing. Marg'ret went straight up to him, and laid a package before him on the counter.
“I brought these things back,” said she; “they belong to you.”
“Why, what is it?” said Mr. White, wonderingly.
“Some things I stole last Christmas for the children.”
“What!”
“I stole 'em.”
She untied the parcel, and began taking out the things one by one. “They're all here but the candy,” said she; “the children ate that up; an' Aggie bit the head off this pink cat the other day. Then they've jammed this little horse consider'ble. But I brought 'em all back.”
Mr. White was an elderly, kind-faced man. He seemed slowly paling with amazement as he stared at her and the articles she was displaying.
“You say you stole them?” said he.
“Yes; I stole 'em.”
“When?”
“The night afore Christmas.”
“Didn't Henry give 'em to you?”
“No.”
“Why, I told him to,” said Mr. White, slowly. “I did the things up for you myself that afternoon. I'd seen you looking kind of wishful, you know, and I thought I'd make you a present of them. I left the bundle on the counter when I went to supper, and told Henry to tell you to take it, and I supposed he did.”
Marg'ret stood staring. Her mouth was open, her hands were clinched. “I dun know — what you mean,” she gasped out at length.
“I mean you 'ain't been stealing as much as you thought you had,” said Mr. White. “You just took your own bundle.”
Recursos Educativos en Inglés - Stories in English
"My dear Young Friend," said Father Time, as he laid his hand gently upon my shoulder, "you are entirely wrong."
Then I looked up over my shoulder from the table at which I was sitting and I saw him.
But I had known, or felt, for at least the last half-hour that he as standing somewhere near me.
You have had, I do not doubt, good reader, more than once that strange uncanny feeling that there is some one unseen standing beside you, in a darkened room, let us say, with a dying fire, when the night has grown late, and the October wind sounds low outside, and when, through the thin curtain that we call Reality, the Unseen World starts for a moment clear upon our dreaming sense.
You have had it? Yes, I know you have. Never mind telling me about it. Stop. I don't want to hear about that strange presentiment you had the night your Aunt Eliza broke her leg. Don't let's bother with your experience. I want to tell mine.
"You are quite mistaken, my dear young friend," repeated Father Time, "quite wrong."
"Young friend?" I said, my mind, as one's mind is apt to in such a case, running to an unimportant detail. "Why do you call me young?"
"Your pardon," he answered gently — he had a gentle way with him, had Father Time. "The fault is in my failing eyes. I took you at first sight for something under a hundred."
"Under a hundred?" I expostulated. "Well, I should think so!"
"Your pardon again," said Time, "the fault is in my failing memory. I forgot. You seldom pass that nowadays, do you? Your life is very short of late."
I heard him breathe a wistful hollow sigh. Very ancient and dim he seemed as he stood beside me. But I did not turn to look upon him. I had no need to. I knew his form, in the inner and clearer sight of things, as well as every human being knows by innate instinct, the Unseen face and form of Father Time.
I could hear him murmuring beside me, "Short — short, your life is short"; till the sound of it seemed to mingle with the measured ticking of a clock somewhere in the silent house.
Then I remembered what he had said.
"How do you know that I am wrong?" I asked. "And how can you tell what I was thinking?"
"You, said it out loud," answered Father Time. "But it wouldn't have mattered, anyway. You said that Christmas was all played out and done with."
"Yes," I admitted, "that's what I said."
"And what makes you think that?" he questioned, stooping, so it seemed to me, still further over my shoulder.
"Why," I answered, "the trouble is this. I've been sitting here for hours, sitting till goodness only knows how far into the night, trying to think out something to write for a Christmas story. And it won't go. It can't be done — not in these awful days."
"A Christmas Story?"
"Yes. You see, Father Time," I explained, glad with a foolish little vanity of my trade to be able to tell him something that I thought enlightening, "all the Christmas stuff — stories and jokes and pictures — is all done, you know, in October."
I thought it would have surprised him, but I was mistaken.
"Dear me," he said, "not till October! What a rush! How well I remember in Ancient Egypt — as I think you call it — seeing them getting out their Christmas things, all cut in hieroglyphics, always two or three years ahead."
"Two or three years!" I exclaimed.
"Pooh," said Time, "that was nothing. Why in Babylon they used to get their Christmas jokes ready — all baked in clay — a whole Solar eclipse ahead of Christmas. They said, I think, that the public preferred them so."
"Egypt?" I said. "Babylon? But surely, Father Time, there was no Christmas in those days. I thought ——"
"My dear boy," he interrupted gravely, "don't you know that there has always been Christmas?"
I was silent. Father Time had moved across the room and stood beside the fireplace, leaning on the mantelpiece. The little wreaths of smoke from the fading fire seemed to mingle with his shadowy outline.
"Well," he said presently, "what is it that is wrong with Christmas?"
"Why," I answered, "all the romance, the joy, the beauty of it has gone, crushed and killed by the greed of commerce and the horrors of war. I am not, as you thought I was, a hundred years old, but I can conjure up, as anybody can, a picture of Christmas in the good old days of a hundred years ago: the quaint old-fashioned houses, standing deep among the evergreens, with the light twinkling from the windows on the snow; the warmth and comfort within; the great fire roaring on the hearth; the merry guests grouped about its blaze and the little children with their eyes dancing in the Christmas fire- light, waiting for Father Christmas in his fine mummery of red and white and cotton wool to hand the presents from the yule-tide tree. I can see it," I added, "as if it were yesterday."
"It was but yesterday," said Father Time, and his voice seemed to soften with the memory of bygone years. "I remember it well."
"Ah," I continued, "that was Christmas indeed. Give me back such days as those, with the old good cheer, the old stage coaches and the gabled inns and the warm red wine, the snapdragon and the Christmas-tree, and I'll believe again in Christmas, yes, in Father Christmas himself."
"Believe in him?" said Time quietly. "You may well do that. He happens to be standing outside in the street at this moment."
"Outside?" I exclaimed. "Why don't he come in?"
"He's afraid to," said Father Time. "He's frightened and he daren't come in unless you ask him. May I call him in?"
I signified assent, and Father Time went to the window for a moment and beckoned into the darkened street. Then I heard footsteps, clumsy and hesitant they seemed, upon the stairs. And in a moment a figure stood framed in the doorway — the figure of Father Christmas. He stood shuffling his feet, a timid, apologetic look upon his face.
How changed he was!
I had known in my mind's eye, from childhood up, the face and form of Father Christmas as well as that of Old Time himself. Everybody knows, or once knew him — a jolly little rounded man, with a great muffler wound about him, a packet of toys upon his back and with such merry, twinkling eyes and rosy cheeks as are only given by the touch of the driving snow and the rude fun of the North Wind. Why, there was once a time, not yet so long ago, when the very sound of his sleigh-bells sent the blood running warm to the heart.
But now how changed.
All draggled with the mud and rain he stood, as if no house had sheltered him these three years past. His old red Jersey was tattered in a dozen places, his muffler frayed and ravelled.
The bundle of toys that he dragged with him in a net seemed wet and worn till the cardboard boxes gaped asunder. There were boxes among them, I vow, that he must have been carrying these three past years.
But most of all I noted the change that had come over the face of Father Christmas. The old brave look of cheery confidence was gone. The smile that had beamed responsive to the laughing eyes of countless children around unnumbered Christmas- trees was there no more. And in the place of it there showed a look of timid apology, of apprehensiveness, as of one who has asked in vain the warmth and shelter of a human home — such a look as the harsh cruelty of this world has stamped upon the faces of its outcasts.
So stood Father Christmas shuffling upon the threshold, fumbling his poor tattered hat in his hand.
"Shall I come in?" he said, his eyes appealingly on Father Time.
"Come," said Time. He turned to speak to me, "Your room is dark. Turn up the lights. He's used to light, bright light and plenty of it. The dark has frightened him these three years past."
I turned up the lights and the bright glare revealed all the more cruelly the tattered figure before us.
Father Christmas advanced a timid step across the floor. Then he paused, as if in sudden fear.
"Is this floor mined?" he said.
"No, no," said Time soothingly. And to me he added in a murmured whisper, "He's afraid. He was blown up in a mine in No Man's Land between the trenches at Christmas-time in 1914. It broke his nerve."
"May I put my toys on that machine gun?" asked Father Christmas timidly. "It will help to keep them dry."
"It is not a machine gun," said Time gently. "See, it is only a pile of books upon the sofa." And to me he whispered, "They turned a machine gun on him in the streets of Warsaw. He thinks he sees them everywhere since then."
"It's all right, Father Christmas," I said, speaking as cheerily as I could, while I rose and stirred the fire into a blaze.
"There are no machine guns here and there are no mines. This is but the house of a poor writer."
"Ah," said Father Christmas, lowering his tattered hat still further and attempting something of a humble bow, "a writer? Are you Hans Andersen, perhaps?"
"Not quite," I answered.
"But a great writer, I do not doubt," said the old man, with a humble courtesy that he had learned, it well may be, centuries ago in the yule-tide season of his northern home. "The world owes much to its great books. I carry some of the greatest with me always. I have them here ——"
He began fumbling among the limp and tattered packages that he carried. "Look! The House that Jack Built — a marvellous, deep thing, sir — and this, The Babes in the Wood. Will you take it, sir? A poor present, but a present still — not so long ago I gave them in thousands every Christmas-time. None seem to want them now."
He looked appealingly towards Father Time, as the weak may look towards the strong, for help and guidance.
"None want them now," he repeated, and I could see the tears start in his eyes. "Why is it so? Has the world forgotten its sympathy with the lost children wandering in the wood?"
"All the world," I heard Time murmur with a sigh, "is wandering in the wood." But out loud he spoke to Father Christmas in cheery admonition, "Tut, tut, good Christmas," he said, "you must cheer up. Here, sit in this chair the biggest one; so — beside the fire. Let us stir it to a blaze; more wood, that's better. And listen, good old Friend, to the wind outside — almost a Christmas wind, is it not? Merry and boisterous enough, for all the evil times it stirs among."
Old Christmas seated himself beside the fire, his hands outstretched towards the flames. Something of his old-time cheeriness seemed to flicker across his features as he warmed himself at the blaze.
"That's better," he murmured. "I was cold, sir, cold, chilled to the bone. Of old I never felt it so; no matter what the wind, the world seemed warm about me. Why is it not so now?"
"You see," said Time, speaking low in a whisper for my ear alone, "how sunk and broken he is? Will you not help?"
"Gladly," I answered, "if I can."
"All can," said Father Time, "every one of us."
Meantime Christmas had turned towards me a questioning eye, in which, however, there seemed to revive some little gleam of merriment.
"Have you, perhaps," he asked half timidly, "schnapps?"
"Schnapps?" I repeated.
"Ay, schnapps. A glass of it to drink your health might warm my heart again, I think."
"Ah," I said, "something to drink?"
"His one failing," whispered Time, "if it is one. Forgive it him. He was used to it for centuries. Give it him if you have it."
"I keep a little in the house," I said reluctantly perhaps, "in case of illness."
"Tut, tut," said Father Time, as something as near as could be to a smile passed over his shadowy face. "In case of illness! They used to say that in ancient Babylon. Here, let me pour it for him. Drink, Father Christmas, drink! "
Marvellous it was to see the old man smack his lips as he drank his glass of liquor neat after the fashion of old Norway.
Marvellous, too, to see the way in which, with the warmth of the fire and the generous glow of the spirits, his face changed and brightened till the old-time cheerfulness beamed again upon it. He looked about him, as it were, with a new and growing interest.
"A pleasant room," he said. "And what better, sir, than the wind without and a brave fire within!"
Then his eye fell upon the mantelpiece, where lay among the litter of books and pipes a little toy horse.
"Ah," said Father Christmas almost gayly, "children in the house!"
"One," I answered, "the sweetest boy in all the world."
"I'll be bound he is!" said Father Christmas and he broke now into a merry laugh that did one's heart good to hear. "They all are! Lord bless me! The number that I have seen, and each and every one — and quite right too — the sweetest child in all the world. And how old, do you say? Two and a half all but two months except a week? The very sweetest age of all, I'll bet you say, eh, what? They all do!"
And the old man broke again into such a jolly chuckling of laughter that his snow-white locks shook upon his head.
"But stop a bit," he added. "This horse is broken. Tut, tut, a hind leg nearly off. This won't do!"
He had the toy in his lap in a moment, mending it. It was wonderful to see, for all his age, how deft his fingers were.
"Time," he said, and it was amusing to note that his voice had assumed almost an authoritative tone, "reach me that piece of string. That's right. Here, hold your finger across the knot. There! Now, then, a bit of beeswax. What? No beeswax? Tut, tut, how ill-supplied your houses are to-day. How can you mend toys, sir, without beeswax? Still, it will stand up now."
I tried to murmur by best thanks.
But Father Christmas waved my gratitude aside.
"Nonsense," he said, "that's nothing. That's my life. Perhaps the little boy would like a book too. I have them here in the packet. Here, sir, Jack and the Bean Stalk, most profound thing. I read it to myself often still. How damp it is! Pray, sir, will you let me dry my books before your fire?"
"Only too willingly," I said. "How wet and torn they are!"
Father Christmas had risen from his chair and was fumbling among his tattered packages, taking from them his children's books, all limp and draggled from the rain and wind.
"All wet and torn!" he murmured, and his voice sank again into sadness. "I have carried them these three years past. Look! These were for little children in Belgium and in Serbia, Can I get them to them, think you?"
Time gently shook his head.
"But presently, perhaps," said Father Christmas, "if I dry and mend them. Look, some of them were inscribed already! This one, see you, was written 'With father's love.' Why has it never come to him? Is it rain or tears upon the page?"
He stood bowed over his little books, his hands trembling as he turned the pages. Then he looked up, the old fear upon his face again.
"That sound!" he said. "Listen I It is guns — I hear them."
"No" no," I said, "it is nothing. Only a car passing in the street below."
"Listen," he said. "Hear that again — voices crying!"
"No, no," I answered, "not voices, only the night wind among the trees."
"My children's voices!" he exclaimed. "I hear them everywhere — they come to me in every wind — and I see them as I wander in the night and storm — my children — torn and dying in the trenches — beaten into the ground — I hear them crying from the hospitals — each one to me, still as I knew him once, a little child. Time, Time," he cried, reaching out his arms in appeal, "give me back my children!"
"They do not die in vain," Time murmured gently.
But Christmas only moaned in answer:
"Give me back my children! "
Then he sank down upon his pile of books and toys, his head buried in his arms.
"You see," said Time, "his heart is breaking, and will you not help him if you can?"
"Only too gladly," I replied. "But what is there to do?"
"This," said Father Time, "listen."
He stood before me grave and solemn, a shadowy figure but half seen though he was close beside me. The fire-light had died down, and through the curtained windows there came already the first dim brightening of dawn.
"The world that once you knew," said Father Time, "seems broken and destroyed about you. You must not let them know — the children. The cruelty and the horror and the hate that racks the world to-day — keep it from them. Some day he will know" — here Time pointed to the prostrate form of Father Christmas — "that his children, that once were, have not died in vain: that from their sacrifice shall come a nobler, better world for all to live in, a world where countless happy children shall hold bright their memory for ever. But for the children of To-day, save and spare them all you can from the evil hate and horror of the war. Later they will know and understand. Not yet. Give them. back their Merry Christmas and its kind thoughts, and its Christmas charity, till later on there shall be with it again Peace upon Earth Good Will towards Men."
His voice ceased. It seemed to vanish, as it were, in the sighing of the wind.
I looked up. Father Time and Christmas had vanished from the room. The fire was low and the day was breaking visibly outside.
"Let us begin," I murmured. "I will mend this broken horse."
Recursos Educativos en Inglés - Stories in English
It was Christmas Eve and although it was still afternoon, lights had begun to appear in the shops and houses of the little Russian village, for the short winter day was nearly over. Excited children scurried indoors and now only muffled sounds of chatter and laughter escaped from closed shutters.
Old Papa Panov, the village shoemaker, stepped outside his shop to take one last look around. The sounds of happiness, the bright lights and the faint but delicious smells of Christmas cooking reminded him of past Christmas times when his wife had still been alive and his own children little. Now they had gone. His usually cheerful face, with the little laughter wrinkles behind the round steel spectacles, looked sad now. But he went back indoors with a firm step, put up the shutters and set a pot of coffee to heat on the charcoal stove. Then, with a sigh, he settled in his big armchair.
Papa Panov did not often read, but tonight he pulled down the big old family Bible and, slowly tracing the lines with one forefinger, he read again the Christmas story. He read how Mary and Joseph, tired by their journey to Bethlehem, found no room for them at the inn, so that Mary's little baby was born in the cowshed.
"Oh, dear, oh, dear!" exclaimed Papa Panov, "if only they had come here! I would have given them my bed and I could have covered the baby with my patchwork quilt to keep him warm."
He read on about the wise men who had come to see the baby Jesus, bringing him splendid gifts. Papa Panov's face fell. "I have no gift that I could give him," he thought sadly.
Then his face brightened. He put down the Bible, got up and stretched his long arms t the shelf high up in his little room. He took down a small, dusty box and opened it. Inside was a perfect pair of tiny leather shoes. Papa Panov smiled with satisfaction. Yes, they were as good as he had remembered -- the best shoes he had ever made. "I should give him those," he decided, as he gently put them away and sat down again.
He was feeling tired now, and the further he read the sleepier he became. The print began to dance before his eyes so that he closed them, just for a minute. In no time at all Papa Panov was fast asleep.
And as he slept he dreamed. He dreamed that someone was in his room and he knew at once, as one does in dreams, who the person was. It was Jesus.
"You have been wishing that you could see me, Papa Panov." he said kindly, "then look for me tomorrow. It will be Christmas Day and I will visit you. But look carefully, for I shall not tell you who I am."
When at last Papa Panov awoke, the bells were ringing out and a thin light was filtering through the shutters. "Bless my soul!" said Papa Panov. "It's Christmas Day!"
He stood up and stretched himself for he was rather stiff. Then his face filled with happiness as he remembered his dream. This would be a very special Christmas after all, for Jesus was coming to visit him. How would he look? Would he be a little baby, as at that first Christmas? Would he be a grown man, a carpenter -- or the great King that he is, God's Son? He must watch carefully the whole day through so that he recognized him however he came.
Papa Panov put on a special pot of coffee for his Christmas breakfast, took down the shutters and looked out of the window. The street was deserted, no one was stirring yet. No one except the road sweeper. He looked as miserable and dirty as ever, and well he might! Whoever wanted to work on Christmas Day -- and in the raw cold and bitter freezing mist of such a morning?
Papa Panov opened the shop door, letting in a thin stream of cold air. "Come in!" he shouted across the street cheerily. "Come in and have some hot coffee to keep out the cold!"
The sweeper looked up, scarcely able to believe his ears. He was only too glad to put down his broom and come into the warm room. His old clothes steamed gently in the heat of the stove and he clasped both red hands round the comforting warm mug as he drank.
Papa Panov watched him with satisfaction, but every now and them his eyes strayed to the window. It would never do to miss his special visitor.
"Expecting someone?" the sweeper asked at last. So Papa Panov told him about his dream.
"Well, I hope he comes," the sweeper said, "you've given me a bit of Christmas cheer I never expected to have. I'd say you deserve to have your dream come true." And he actually smiled.
When he had gone, Papa Panov put on cabbage soup for his dinner, then went to the door again, scanning the street. He saw no one. But he was mistaken. Someone was coming.
The girl walked so slowly and quietly, hugging the walls of shops and houses, that it was a while before he noticed her. She looked very tired and she was carrying something. As she drew nearer he could see that it was a baby, wrapped in a thin shawl. There was such sadness in her face and in the pinched little face of the baby, that Papa Panov's heart went out to them.
"Won't you come in," he called, stepping outside to meet them. "You both need a warm seat by the fire and a rest."
The young mother let him shepherd her indoors and to the comfort of the armchair. She gave a big sigh of relief.
"I'll warm some milk for the baby," Papa Panov said, "I've had children of my own -- I can feed her for you." He took the milk from the stove and carefully fed the baby from a spoon, warming her tiny feet by the stove at the same time.
"She needs shoes," the cobbler said.
But the girl replied, "I can't afford shoes, I've got no husband to bring home money. I'm on my way to the next village to get work."
A sudden thought flashed through Papa Panov's mind. He remembered the little shoes he had looked at last night. But he had been keeping those for Jesus. He looked again at the cold little feet and made up his mind.
"Try these on her," he said, handing the baby and the shoes to the mother. The beautiful little shoes were a perfect fit. The girl smiled happily and the baby gurgled with pleasure.
"You have been so kind to us," the girl said, when she got up with her baby to go. "May all your Christmas wishes come true!"
But Papa Panov was beginning to wonder if his very special Christmas wish would come true. Perhaps he had missed his visitor? He looked anxiously up and down the street. There were plenty of people about but they were all faces that he recognized. There were neighbors going to call on their families. They nodded and smiled and wished him Happy Christmas! Or beggars -- and Papa Panov hurried indoors to fetch them hot soup and a generous hunk of bread, hurrying out again in case he missed the Important Stranger.
All too soon the winter dusk fell. When Papa Panov next went to the door and strained his eyes, he could no longer make out the passers-by. Most were home and indoors by now anyway. He walked slowly back into his room at last, put up the shutters, and sat down wearily in his armchair.
So it had been just a dream after all. Jesus had not come.
Then all at once he knew that he was no longer alone in the room.
This was not dream for he was wide awake. At first he seemed to see before his eyes the long stream of people who had come to him that day. He saw again the old road sweeper, the young mother and her baby and the beggars he had fed. As they passed, each whispered, "Didn't you see me, Papa Panov?"
"Who are you?" he called out, bewildered.
Then another voice answered him. It was the voice from his dream -- the voice of Jesus.
"I was hungry and you fed me," he said. "I was naked and you clothed me. I was cold and you warmed me. I came to you today in everyone of those you helped and welcomed."
Then all was quiet and still. Only the sound of the big clock ticking. A great peace and happiness seemed to fill the room, overflowing Papa Panov's heart until he wanted to burst out singing and laughing and dancing with joy.
"So he did come after all!" was all that he said.
A recipe for shortbread flavoured with spices. A shortbread recipe to make with your child to help him discover new flavours.
Simply thread them on a pretty tie to give them as a gift or carry them around. These spicy shortbread biscuits will be perfect to accompany tea time or for the festive season. Simply use the shapes of a tree, star or Santa Claus to make them into Christmas shortbread. Recipe for children to make shortbread:
Weigh and melt the butter in the microwave.
Weigh all the ingredients and place them as you go in the bowl of the blender:
the flour,
spices
melted butter
the eggs
sugar
salt
Switch on the robot with the appropriate kneading whisk and let it work! Add a little flour if the dough is too soft, and a little water if it is too dry.
Take the dough out and work it until it no longer sticks to your fingers. Make a ball and flour the table works.
Roll out the dough with a rolling pin to a thickness of 1 cm. Just lightly flour the rolling pin so that it does not stick.
Cut out shapes with the cookie cutters or a small glass with floured edges.
Place all the Christmas shortbread on a sheet of baking paper and place in the oven. Bake for 10 to 15 minutes in a hot oven at 220 d°.
Remove the Christmas spice shortbread from the oven and place it on a rack while it cools.
The spiced Christmas shortbread can be eaten immediately or stored in a tin.
