Speaker 1: Christmas. There is nothing in England that exercises a more
delightful spell over my imagination than the lingerings of the
holiday customs and rural games of former times. They recall
the pictures my fancy used to draw in the May
morning of life, when as yet I only knew the
world through books and believed it to be all that
poets had painted it. And they bring with them the
flavor of those honest days of yore, in which, perhaps
with equal fallacy, I am apt to think the world
was more home bred, social and joyous than at present.
I regret to say that they are daily growing more
and more faint, being gradually worn away by time, but
still more obliterated by modern fashion. They resemble those picturesque
morsels of Gothic architecture which we see crumbling in various
parts of the country, partly dilapidated by the waste of
ages and partly lost in the additions and alterations of
latter days. Poetry, however, clings with cherishing fondness about the
rural game and holiday revel from which it has derived
so many of its themes. As the Ivy winds its
rich foliage about the Gothic arch and moldering tower, gratefully
repaying their support by clasping together their tottering remains, and,
as it were, embalming them in verdure. Of all the
old festivals, however, that of Christmas awakens the strongest and
most heartfelt associations. There is a tone of solemn and
sacred feeling that blends with our conviviality and lifts the
spirit to a state of hallowed and elevated enjoyment. The
services of the Church about this season are extremely tender
and inspiring. They dwell on the beautiful story of the
origin of our faith in the pastoral scenes that accompanied
its announcement. They gradually increase in fervor and pathos during
the season of Advent, until they break forth in full
jubilee on the morning that brought peace and good will
to men. I do not know a grander effect of
music on the moral feelings than to hear the full
choir in the appealing organ performing a Christmas anthem in
a cathedral and filling every part of the vast pile
with triumphant harmony. It is a beautiful arrangement, also derived
from days of yore, that this festival, which commemorates the
announcement of the religion of Peace and Love has been
made the season for gathering together of family connections and
drawing closer again those bands of kindred hearts which the
cares and pleasures and sorrows of the world are tinually
operating to cast loose, of calling back the children of
a family, who have launched forth in life and wandered
widely asunder once more to assemble about the paternal hearth,
that rallying place of the affections, there to grow young
and loving again among the endearing mementoes of childhood. There
is something in the very season of the year that
gives a charm to the festivity of Christmas. At other
times we derive a great portion of our pleasures from
the mere beauties of nature. Our feelings sally forth and
dissipate themselves over the sunny landscape, and we live abroad
and everywhere. The song of the bird, the murmur of
the stream, the breathing fragrance of spring, the soft voluptuousness
of summer, the golden pomp of autumn, Earth with its
mantil of refreshing green, and heaven with its deep, delicious blue,
and as cloudy magnificence all fill us with mute but
exquisite delight, and we revel in the luxury of mere sensation.
But in the depth of winter, when nature lies despoiled
of every charm, and wrapped in her shroud if she
did snow, we turn for our gratifications to moral sources.
The dreariness and desolation of the landscape, the short, gloomy
days and darksome nights, while they circumscribe our wanderings, should
in our feelings also from rambling abroad, and make us
more keenly disposed for the pleasures of the social circle.
Our thoughts are more concentrated, our friendly sympathies more aroused.
We feel more sensibly the charm of each other's society,
and are brought more closely together by dependence on each
other for enjoyment. Heart calleth unto heart, and we draw
our pleasures from the deep wells of living kindness, which
lie in the quiet recesses of our bosoms, and which,
when resorted to furnish forth the pure element of domestic felicity.
The pitchy gloom without makes the heart dilate on entering
the room filled with the glow and warmth of the
evening fire. The ruddy blaze diffuses and artificial summer and
sunshine through the room and lights up each countenance into
a kindlier welcome. Where does the honest face of hospitality
expand into a broader and more cordial smile. Where is
the shy glance of love more sweetly eloquent than by
the winter fire side. And as the hollow blast of
wintry wind rushes through the hall, claps the distant door,
whistles about the casement, and rumbles down the chimney, what
can be more grateful than that feeling of sober and
sheltered security with which we look around upon the comfortable
chamber and the scene of domestic hilarity. The English, from
the great prevalence of rural habits throughout every class of society,
have always been fond of those festivals and holidays which
agreeably interrupt the stillness of country life, and they were
in former days particularly observant of the religious and social
rites of Christmas. Is inspiring to read even the dry
details which some antiquarians have given of the quaint humors,
the burlesque pageants, the complete abandonments to mirth and good
fellowship with which this festival was celebrated. It seemed to
throw open every door, resounded with the harp and the
Christmas carol, and their ample boards grown under the weight
of hospitality. Even the poorest cottage welcomed the festive season
with green decorations of bay and holly. The cheerful fire
glanced its rage through the lattice, inviting the passenger to
raise the latch and join the gossip knot huddled round
the hearth, beguiling the long evening the legendary jokes and
oft told Christmas tales. One of the least pleasing effects
of modern refinement is the havoc it has made among
the hearty old holiday customs. It has completely taken off
the sharp touchings and spirited reliefs of these embellishments of life.
Has worn down society into a more smooth and polished,
but certainly a less characteristic surface. Many of the games
and ceremonials of Christmas have entirely disappeared, and, like the
share sac of old falstaff, are become matters of speculation
and dispute among commentators. The flourished and times full of
spirit and lustihood. When men enjoyed life roughly, but heartily
and vigorously. Times wild and picturesque, which have furnished poetry
with its richest materials, and the drama with its most
attractive variety of characters and manners, the world become more worldly,
who is more dissipation and less of enjoyment. Pleasure has
expanded into a broader, but a shallower stream has forsaken
many of those deep and quiet channels where it flows
sweetly through the calm bosom of domestic life. Society has
acquired a more enlightened and elegant tone, but it has
lost many of his strong local peculiarities, his home bred feelings,
his honest fireside delights. The traditionary customs of golden hearted antiquity,
its feudal hospitalities, and lordly wasst ailings have passed away
with the baronial castles and stately manor houses in which
they were celebrated. They comported with the shadowy hall, the
great oaken gallery, and the tapestried parlor, but are unfitted
to the light, showy saloons and gay drawing rooms of
the modern villa. Shorn however, as it is of its
ancient and festive eyes. Christmas is still a period of
delightful excitement in England. Is gratifying to see that home
feeling completely aroused, which seems to hold so powerful a
place in every English bosom. The preparations making on every
side for the social board that is again to unite
friends and kindred. The presence of good cheer, passing and repassing,
those tokens of regard and quickeners of kind feelings, the
evergreens distributed about houses and churches, emblems of peace and gladness.
All these have the most pleasing effect in producing fond associations,
enkindling benevolent sympathies. Even the sound of the weights, rude,
as may be their minstrelsy, breaks upon the mid watches
of a winter night, with the effects of perfect harmony.
As I have been awakened by them in that still
and solemn hour when deep sleep falleth upon man, I
have listened with a hushed delight, and connecting them with
the sacred and joyous occasion, have almost fancied them into
another celestial choir, announcing peace and good will to mankind.
How delightfully the imagination, when wrought upon these moral influences
turns everything to melody and beauty. The very crowing of
the cock, who is sometimes heard in the profound repose
of the country, telling the night watches to his feathery Dames,
was thought by the common people to announce the approach
of the sacred festival. Some say that, ever against that
season comes wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, this bird
of dawning singeth all night long. And then they say,
no spirit dares stir abroad the knights are wholesome. Then
no planet strike, no fairy takes no which hath power
to charm. So hallowed and so gracious is the time,
amidst the general call to happiness, the bustle of the spirits,
and stir of the affections which prevail at this period,
what bosom can remain insensible. It is, indeed the season
of regenerated feeling, the season for kindling, not merely the
fire of hospitality in the hall, but the genial flame
of charity in the heart. The scene of early love
again rises green to memory, beyond the sterile waste of years,
and the idea of home fraught with the fragrance of
home dwelling joys reanimates the drooping spirit, as the Arabian
breeze will sometimes waft the freshness of the distant fields
to the weary pilgrim of the desert. Stranger and sojourner,
as I am in the land. Though for me, no
social hearth may blaze, no hospitable roof through open its doors,
nor the warm grasp of friendship welcome me at the threshold,
Yet I feel the influence of the season beaming into
my soul from the happy looks of those around me. Surely,
happiness is reflective, like the light of Heaven, and every countenance,
bright with smiles and glowing with innocent enjoyment, is a
mirror transmitting to others the rays of a supreme and
ever shining benevolence. He who can turn cheerleishly away from
contemplating the felicity of his fellow beings and sit down,
darkling and repining in his loneliness when all around is joyful,
may have his moments of strong excitement and selfish gratification.
But he wants the genial and social sympathies which constitute
the charm of a merry Christmas, and of Christmas by
Washington Irving