CHRISTMAS IN MANY LANDS.

Auckland Star, Volume 304, Issue 304, 23 December 1926, Page 2 (Supplement)

CHRISTMAS IN MANY LANDS.

(By ANITA DAY HUBBARD.)

T heard t_p b .lis on Christmas Day Their old familiar carols play, .And wild and sweet the words repeat 0£ peace on earth, good will to men ! And thought how. as the day had come, The helfries of nil Christendom Had rolled along The unbroken song (if peace on earth, good will to men ! —Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. From one end of Christendom to the other, wherever there are homes with love and children in them, preparations for Christmas are going forward. Kitchens are giving off tantalising odours uf feasts to come, spicy and rich. Mysterious, bulky parcels are arriving at strange times, to find hiding places in odd corner. . Little folk are tiptoeing about, the very models of virtue, determined that tlie projected gift-giving shall not be diverted by any act of their own. Harassed fathers are coming home laden with all manner of bundles, and tlie shops are gay with holiday decoration. When the great day dawns, festival symbolic of the eternal hope of poor, sad-spirited humanity in the promise of tha new birth, a chorus of childish laughter will rise like a great chord of high

music from every hearthstone where Christmas has come. Hearts that have ' forgotten how to sing, as a result of too much sorrow, will find new voices in the gaiety of little children that have been made happy by their thoughtfulness. Nations may quarrel over boundaries and tariff. Chemists may invent new horrors for the destruction of war-torn humanity. Love may seem dead and hate triumphant, but at Christmastide the gentle spirit of the mother and child permeates the world, if only for a day. The great universal mystery of birth of new life for old brings the individual hearts of mankind into an understanding that nothing else might accomplish. In San Francisco, tender foster-mother of laughter-loving people from all over the earth, the customs of many lands are brought to swell the list of Christmas gaieties. From the snowfields of Northern Europe and the warm shores of the Mediterranean come quaint rituals .to make San Francisco-born youngsters happy. Christmas World Language. If ever an international tongue is born, it can be built on the vocabulary of Christmas, and everyone who has been a child will understand it. In the Scandinavian countries, and especially in Sweden, the holiday excitement starts with the Byk, Brygd and Bak—the cleaning, the brewing and the baking. Sweetbread of many kinds is prepared. The lut fisk, a kind of pickled cod, and the great spiced leg of the newly-killed Christmas pig are made ready for the roasting. The preparations have been getting more active every day since the feast day of St. Lucia, on December 13. On that morning one of the girls of the house, dressed in long white robes, with an ivy wreath crowned with lighted candles on her head, brought coffee and little cakes called St. Lucy's cats and golden chariots to the bedside of all the family in the early morning. She called out to them. "Christmas is coming!"

QUAINT AND CURIOUS CEREMONIALS.

The legend is very beautiful. Once, before history dawned, the people in the Scandinavian lands were starving. The winter was terrible. The crops had failed, and the long night had darkened the land. Just at the darkest and most hopeless hour, over the icebound sea came a mysterious ship, not manned by sailors, but with a fair maid, crowned with fire, sitting in the stern. The ship came through the ice with magic speed, and it was loaded with food and supplies of all sorts. The people were saved, and since then they have celebrated the day as their thanksgiving feast. " Dipping Day." When the day before Christmas dawns the whole family is early astir. The roast pork is baked, and just at noon the Christmas bread is cut for the first time, and the pieces dipped in the gravy from the roast pork. This is so important that the day is generally called Dipping Day. At 5 o'clock a great table is prepared, with all the cakes and bread piled in as many heaps as there are members of the family. The food must not be taken from the table, and each heap must last its owner through the season.

At 8 o'clock Jul Tomten, the Scandi-1 navian Santa Claus comes, and the Christmas tree is lighted. Then, when the excitement is over, the great meal of the day is served, of which lut fisk \ and the rice porridge, made with cinnamon and milk, are the principal dishes. While the night is still black on Christmas morning all the family rise up atad put candles in the windows. Then all take torches and go in sleigh 3 and on foot to the church where the 5 o'clock service is held. When they reach the door of the chapel, each tosses his torch on a pile, making a great bonfire. During the whole season no one must come to the house without eating something. Should a guest go away unfed the Christmas spirit would go with him. ln the Latin countries, the interest of Christmas centres around the Presipio, the replica of the scene of the Nativity, and' the midnight Mass on Christmas Eve. As in all localities, the Natale, as Christmas is called in Italy, is for the family. "Natale coi Tuoi," they say, "Christmas with thine own." It is not Santa who brings the gifts to the little ones of Southern Europe. It is the Infant Jesus Himself, and the children find the presents on Christinas morning. The midnight Mass begins the festivities that last for a week. Parretone—sweet bread—is baked in all the houses, and there is much dancing and feasting for the whole seven days. Groups of singers go about from house to house, and even from village to village, singing the carols, "Pastorale di Natale," playing their accompaniments on the coma musa, an instrument not unlike the bagpipes of the Scotch. In France the same custom is followed, and the instrument is called a hautboy. In Czecho-Slovakia the celebrations take on a religious tone, as in the Latin lands. Christmas Day is so sacred that the floors of the house are not even swept. No other housework is done. After the morning Mass the family returns home to partake of a Christmas luncheon which has been cooked on the

preceding day. The cattle are fed special food, and so are the wild birds. Christmas is a family day, and not much visiting is indulged in, though every girl has some new garment to celebrate the day, as on Easter. The Roast Goose. It is on Christmas Eve that the important celebration takes place. There is a great dinner at which the roast duck or goose is the piece de resistance. All of the best of the family table furnishings are brought out for the occasion, and the food is varied and plentiful. Under a large round loaf placed on the table are coins to signify that there shall be plenty during the coming year. After dinner there is much visiting, and the tree is lighted with candles and decorated with nuts and fruit and coloured paper. Seeds are strung and painted in gay colours and gifts are exchanged by family members and friends. Outside the door stands another tree, undecorated, and candles are in every window. Then at midnight cames the Mass of the Nativity, and the scene is enacted by living people. There is the Blessed Infant, the crib, Mary, Joseph and the Shepherds, real shepherds who come down from the Tatra Mountains for the service. Two choirs, one of boys and one of girls, sing in competition. The festivities continue until January 7, and little work is done in house or on the farm until the holidays are over. One of the pretty features of the Czecho-Slovakian Christmas is the group of small boys, dressed as ancient shepherds, who go about from house to house

with a "crib" made to work in marionette fashion, so that the wax figures move and enact the scene of the Nativity. Christmas in Spain. Here it is again that Christmas is celebrated on January 7 and not on December 25. The legend of the "Three Wise Men" is the basis of the celebration, and the children in. Spain know that the three kings, riding on enormous horses, come by the windows of good children and leave gifts in the shoes that are waiting on the window sill. In Holland the youngsters put out their wooden shoes, with hay in them for the horses of Santa Claus, and he gratefully takes the hay and leaves pleasant gifts for the thoughtful children. All over the inhabited land of this earth there are Christmas spirits abroad, and little children tingling with anticipation of the joys to come. When the day dawns here on the west edge of the world, we can sing with all the enthusiasm of the occasion the ancient carol, God rest you, merry gentlemen, May nothing you dismay, For Jesus Christ, our Saviour, Was born upon this day. and know that our voices are part of the great chorus of "peace on earth, goodwill to men," that is rising from every hearth in the Christian world.