Christmas Greetings

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21355, 24 December 1934, Page 3 (Supplement)

Christmas Greetings

A BUSY MERRY TIME The editor and staff of "The Press Junior" wish readers a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year. Most of us, the not so young as well as the very young, look forward to to-morrow more than to any other day of the year, with the possible exception of our own particular birthdays. But most of us agree that birthday times are not nearly so good as Christmas times, for at Christmas there is a feeling about that everyone is happy and that everyone wants everyone else to be happy. If to-morrow is the best day of the year, to-night is certainly the best night. It never seems that the dark comes quickly enough when we have hung up our stockings—or our pyjama trousers, with the legs well sewn up, as is the practice ot some young believers. In some houses the children write letters to Father Christmas—or to Santa Claus—saying what they want most particularly. Sometimes they ask for impossible things such as aeroplanes, which of course Father Christmas could not carry. And I know of one family in which there was a muchloved Shetland pony. Now, the pony lived more or less with the

family all the year round, so when Christmas came she always had her little sugar bag to hang up in her stall and there was a letter written, the combined effort of the brother and sister, asking for the very choicest carrots and oats. Several times it happened that Father Christmas loft a letter in very scrawly, almost unreadable writing saying that he chanced to have some carrots made of toffee, and he had not known what he would do with them until he found the pony's supjir bag. The same family generally left a glass of milk and a plate of raspberries and cream or red currants and cream for Father Christmas to have. It was quite a good way oi saying "thank you." Another way was found by Bad King John who, according to Mr A. A. Milne, "hung a hopeful stocking out." Then he climbed up the chimney stack and pinned a note there: "To all and sundry near and far— F. Christmas in particular: I want some crackers and I want some candy; I think a box of chocolates would come in handy . . . And Oh! Father Christmas, if you love me at all. Bring me a big red india-rubber ball." Whfcn the children were playing down below on Christmas Day they threw a big red ball in and sang Bad King John:

"Oh! Father Christmas, my blessings on you fall, For sending me a big red indiarubber ball." If we are very young and not yet in the secret we find that we cannot keep our eyes open long enough; for we are quite certain that old Santa Claus, who is so old that he must be extremely wise, would not think of coming until it is so dark that only a cat or fairy could sec. We have heard that he waits until midnight, and, although we have sometimes wondered how it is that he and his helpers can get round the whole world before daylight, we believe that he will not come until very late —half-past ten at the very least. And by this time it is nearly nine, and we just can't keep awake any longer. Someone is making a good deal of noise and there is a cock crowing somewhere out in the half light. But suddenly we understand the rowdiness and the earliness; it is Christmas morning. And before we have opened the other eye we have struggled to the end of the bed for that bulging, crackling, and perhaps rattling thing that was our black empty stocking hanging limply last night. We are quite overwhelmed with the delightful surprises in that stocking; perhaps we find a few of the things we particularly desired and a few of the things we

asked for. But when we have Investigated them all we wonder a little how on earth they came there. We rush outside to see if we can see the marks of the aeroplane wheels in the grass of the little paddock, and our big brother laughs at us, because, he says, aeroplanes must have huge paddocks for landing in. So we decide to look in the big paddock after breakfast. There is a story about Santa Claus and a little boy who lived in one of the cold countries on the coast of the Baltic Sea. "Little Haakon (he was called Kon for short) was the son- of very poor parents; they told him that they thought Santa Claus would not possibly be able to call at such a poor house. The father and mother thought very hard to see what they could do; an apple man went past the gate and dropped three apples, so the mother picked them up; the father brought out a piece of money that he had saved for many years and there were little Kon's new wooden shoes. All these the father and mother put in the stocking in case Santa Claus missed tha house. But Santa came; and ha found the stocking so full of love that there was room for nothing mere. He did what he could and put a charm on the gifts, so that in the morning little Kon found that all his presents would talk to him. He was a very happy little boy.