ABOUT
;;; THE FESTIVE SEASON.^ • "HH HIS is the period o£ Sashj when we ex- ' KW% cha^S Q ' compliments of the season ;' JS. t .. when we meet and despatch to each othe r : ... . :l>^jpost (this is when we are young and green, and df- the feminine persuasion) more or : i4esa> highly coloured cards bearing the | Jl^l 1 ® dra^s-rglowing -tirpxa'pid-
tures for the papers and magazines of the old' English Christmas,, and enthuses about was- ; sail bowls and Yule-logs and* things. He delights also to describe the little village church covered with snow, and/the cottage by the brook, now frozen over — the brook, not the cottage. A favourite theme -of this class of writers, too, is 'The Wanderer's Beturn ' : 'The tall, bronzed, bearded man stood upon the brow of tlie hill, and the thoughts of years passed through his busy brain as his gaze fell , upon the home of his che— ild— : ho6d. Where are his parents now ? Where the friends of his youth ? Are they all gone, all dead?— all— ' fco be continued in our next. * * ■» This is the time when the red-faced school children come tumbling out of the picturesque old Bchoolhouse with its snow- covered roof, and run whooping home. This is the period when the sturdy woodman, after being implored to ■' spare that tree,' growls that he %vants it for firewood, and, spitting on his hands, proceeds to chop it down without more ado, while a little robin redbreast — not much robin and a good deal of redbreast— perches on a rail and chirrups out * A Merry Christmas,' and if you dont believe it, buy a twopenny Christmas card and see. * * # ' Christmas^ pomes > but once a year, and when it comes it brings good cheer ' — co it does, for such of us as have money in the bank and can afford to provide the good cheer on a liberal scale for selves and friends. But it fails to bring good cheer to the homeless and the friendless, and the unfortunate. Such of you as have a superfluity of good cheer might think of the people at the Befuges and the Hospital, and the poor stonebreakers whose chance of good cheer is remote I am afraid, unless some good Samaritan remembers them.
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Bibliographic details
Observer, Volume 9, Issue 522, 22 December 1888, Page 3
Word Count
373ABOUT Observer, Volume 9, Issue 522, 22 December 1888, Page 3
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