CHRISTMAS IN FRANCE

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 81, 29 December 1928, Page 4

CHRISTMAS IN FRANCE

To the Eglishroan Christmas means “home.” To the Frenchman it means something rather different, for the great Christmas feast is, for' all who can afford it, a midnight supper taken in a" restaurant. This is an expensive matter in Paris, and the reveillon, or Christmas Eve supper, must" be arranged for at least a fortnight aheaxl in the more popular places if one would be sure of a table. The family reunions among the comfortably circumstanced take place round restaurant tables, with jazz bands blaring away, paper streamers flying, and a continuous popping of champagne corks. Countless quantities of pate de foie gras pies from Alsace, truffled turkeys, and the popular “boudin,” known iu England as black pudding, disappear in these reveillon suppers.

Parisians make a point of staying out of doors from an early hour on Christmas Eve to dawn on Christmas morning. He would be a strange Parisian who did not watch Christmas morning dawn. All night long great crowds parade the boulevards, singing, shouting, and behaving like children at a free and easy party. They refuse to go to bed on December 24. They must hold out until daylight on Christmas Day. Consequently Paris looks like a city of the dead until weil after noon on the 25th.

But this spirit of irresponsible gaiety is only one side of the French Christmas. Christinas is first and foremost a religious festival, and no foreigner in Paris can fail to be impressed by the fervour and enthusiasm of the crowds who throng all the churches on Christmas Eve and-the following day. By ten o'clock on Christmas Eve it is useless to try to get into the great, church of La Madeleine. By that time it is packed to the very doors with people waiting to bear the midnight Mass. It is not until after Mass that the revels begin, hut religious duty done, the worshippers pour forth into the restaurants or return to their homes, aud tjiere in ptniily reunion spend the small hours of the morning in feasting. The midnight Mass, the reveillon celebration and the traditions of Father Christmas and the Christmas tree are the only three great survivals of all the host of Christmas customs once current here. Bitt these three show no signs of waning.