CHRISTMAS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7589, 24 December 1902, Page 2

CHRISTMAS.

* . / The philosophic Anglo-Saocon temperament is 'so proverbially superior to sruch uncpnsidtered trifles as the weather, that, even with a. prospect of the "hooded clouds like friars telling their Christmas beads in ' drops of rainy£' we are fain to quite contentedly, wish our readers the .timehonouredl Yule-tide wish, "\A Merry Christmas and A Happy New Tear." The analyst ' who is always probing for the hearts of modern instances will probably point to the weather as a judgment upon those tradespeople who have grown to regard the altruistic festival as primarily a sort of Tom Tiddler's ground of opportunity. But the force of competitiin nowa-J days necessarily clouds our sentimentality with commercialism. It is so, -much easier to spend a " Merry Christmas" with a record week's takings lying snugly to one's j credit in the bank, that any ethical dissertations proving its impropriety are very far from convincing. Still, the broad benevolence which is always associated with the season will suffice to condone the dis- ! appointment of the weather, and yre have no ddubfc that the " general plenty" ofj cheerfujiie-ss wiJl cur& " particular dearth." To take the mental audit of the year to- an accompaniment of grey sjdes and " the I rhythmic beat of the rain's innumerable feet " may not be our Antipodean idtea of a seasonable Christmas ; but we Ihave always been noted for a perversion of the seasons which destroys all literary traditions and makes the designers -of Christmas cards proyincialist-s of the worst type. We cannot say with Berowne — At Christmas I no more dasire a tos© Tihan- wish a snow ih May's mew-i&ngled shows. But we can, and do, display all the old characteristics of our fathers' fathers, who, if they left us no heritage pf Christmas weather, left us at least one of unalterable sentiment. With them We ling -ihe ;be!ls and' we raise'tibe strain, We hang up garlands everywhere Anjl bid !• the J-apers twinkle fair, And: feast and Jrplic—^and* then ' we go Back to the samp old lives again. '.