Hidden Treasure

Taranaki Daily News, 17 December 1926, Page 5 (Supplement)

Hidden Treasure

CHRISTMAS STOCKINGS ROMANTIC STORIES. (By • Thornton Hall.’’ —Copyright.) To millions of children, not only* in our own Empire, but in many a foreign laud, such as Germany, Holland and Belgium, the Christmas Stocking is perhaps the greatest of Yuletkle anticipations and delights, all the more fascinating as it is enveloped in so much mystery. And it is right that it should be so. for its originator was, it is said, none other than the great St. Nicholas himself, or Santa Klaus, as the Dutch call tie Saint. According to Naogengus. the versifier of ancient customs: St. Nicholas money used to give to maidens secretly, Who, that he still may use his wonted liberality, The mothers all their children on the eve do cause to fast, And when they every one at night in senseless sleep are cast, Both apples, nuts, and pears they bring, and other things beside. As caps and shoes, and petticoats, which secretly they hide. And. in the morning found, they say that this St. Nicholas brought. And if tradition is to be believed, a Hocking was the favourite hiding-place for the Saint’s largesse. Of one Christmas stocking the founder of a well-known store tells a very pretty and romantic story. One day a stranger called to see him —on Saturday, 23rd of December—and asked him. if possible, to prepare “a great big stocking” for his daughter who was ill, and to have it ready by Christmas morning. It was to contain a large doll, dinner and tea-sets, a cooking stove and pots and pans, several articles of doll’s furniture, and a box full of doll’s clothes. That evening, although they were overwhelmed with work, the stocking was made on the premises. It was covered in blue satin, trimmed with silver tinsel and tied with blue ribbons: and, as it was too late to be delivered by one of the carts and the next day was Sunday, it was determined that the child should not be disappointed. So on Sunday evening (Christmas Eve) the great shopkeeper himself got out his car, drove to his business premises, and secured a Father Christmas wig and cloak. These he placed in the car with ibe great blue satin stocking, and a little after one a.m. on Christmas morning he astonished the night porter at the hotel by driving up arrayed as Santa Claus. (He had donned the wig and cloak as he neared his destination), and asking for the number of little Miss ’«j room, sent up a telephone message to her father’s room. In a few minutes Daddy appeared, arrayed in his dressing-gown, and appar- , rntly recognised the visitor in spite of . his disguise. “Bless you.” he said, “I thought you’d forgotten all about us!” ; They went to the little one’s room to- 1 get her, and her father woke her up just as the strange “Santa” was about to disappear through the door, and told j her to blow a kiss to Father Christmas. • who had just brought her the beautiful ; big stocking.

• But it is not only to children that l’.c | Christmas stocking brings delight and • surprise. Only last year a young lady I awoke on Chrstmas morning to find a j stocking attached to the rail at the foot |of her bed. It was, as she quickly | guessed, the Yuletide gift of a man who I had won her heart, and whose heart she i felt sure she had won, but who had j never summoned up courage to put his 'fate to the test of a proposal. 1 It was with eager fingers that she 'opened the stocking, full of curiosity to (explore its contents. One by one she ( extracted a small box of chocolates, a box of Turkish cigarettes and a microscopic vanity bag. That at last, when I her heart sank at the thought that not '.even a word of greeting was within. | she found in the “toe” of the stocking a tiny casket wrapped in a half-sheet of paper. As she read the contents of the paper she discovered that the long-delayed offer had come at last. And on opening the casket she found a beautiful diamond engagement ring. No less delightful was the experience of a young lady who. on Christmas morning three years ago, received a “lucky stocking” from her fiancee in the foot of which she found one of the most costly and beautiful crackers ever made. In size it was insignificant, for it was little longer than the palm of her hand —its actual length was just over four inches; but its cost was £5OO. It consisted of a tiny sheaf of wheat fashioned so cunningly of pure gold that its modelling by one of the most skilful of goldsmiths was the work of six months; and in the centre was concealed ;a ring set with pearls of the most per- ■ feet shape and purity. I The three daughters of an American J millionaire had, as one of them said. | “the duckiest surprise of their lives” when on Christmas morning last year, among the contents of their stockings each found a small golden casket bearing her pet name in brilliants. On opening the caskets each revealed a cracker of lace-edged silk, which, beautiful as it was. was in disappointing contrast to the gorgeous casket which held it. On opening the cracker, however. there blazed forth lights from a coiled necklace of diamonds of the purest water, the cost of which was said to be at least £l,OOO. But perhaps the most romantic of j these stories is that of M’lle. Rosalie | Montobodial. a poor lace-maker of St. : Didier-la-Seauve, a Department of I Haute Loire. She hung up one of her | stockings at the foot of her bed. little dreaming what a revolution this simple act was to work in her life. On awaking on Christmas morning she ■ opened her stocking to find the usual ! small presents from her parents and her I brothers and sisters; and, last of all a | small slip of printed paper with the i message attached: “All I have to give i you. May it bring yon good luck!” j signed by a friend. "Sophie Carlier.” The paper. Mademoiselle saw, was a 1 ticket in a Christinas Lottery, and she smiled with pleasure at the kind thought as she folded the ticket up and put it in her purse. A few days later she chanced to see the result of the lottery in a local paper; taking the ticket out of her purse, she was amazed and delighted to find that the ticket from which she had hoped nothing had actually won a prize of a quarter of a million francs.