The Christmas Tree.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 52, 25 December 1902, Page 1

The Christmas Tree.

A quaint invitation ;from a dainty little northern maiden of some seven or eight summers reminds us that the Christmas tree is gradually securing an established place among the sweet domestic customs that are once more clustering around the sweetest festival of all the year. Our sweet little correspondent's grandparents, and many of our readers as well, can easily recall the time when the Christmas tree was as unknown, not alone in New Zealand, but in the British Isles, as Marconi's electric waves, or the ultra-violet rays. A vast incrustation of folk-lore and legend has gathered around the Christmas tree. But even in its native home, the German Fatherland, it does not seem to have been well known till the eighteenth century had passed the middle life. Goethe first set eyes upon a Christmas tree at Leipzig, in the house of Koerner's grand mother, in 1765. So, at least, he tells us in one of his writings. Religious sentiment circled about it in those days, for not alone was it adorned with the lollipops and candied indigestibles of the day, but beneath it there was a representation of the Manger of Bethlehem adorned with a figure of the Divine Babe. Two years later, in 1767, Goethe helped to decorate a Christmas tree. And in 1790 we hear of Schiller setting up one in his house, after his marriage to Charlotte von Lengefeld. m

The custom crept slowly into favor in the German Fatherland, and by 1830 had become pretty prevalent. Ten years later, in 1840, it was introduced into the Tuileries by the Princess Helena of Orleans. This set the fashion, and the French people took kindly to the idea, even though it came from beyond the Rhine. A fresh impetus was given to the custom by the German army, which kept its Christmas Day in true German fashion before Paris and in the gairison towns in almost every part of France. And to-day Paris alone requires over 50,000 Christmas trees. The same year that saw the Christmas tree first erected in the Tuileries, also witnessed the espousals of Prince Albert and the late Queen Victoria. He introduced the German custom to the Court of St. James. Here again royalty set the fashion. It was gradually taken up by the aristocracy and the gilded commoners and is making its way, though not at the pace of the seven-league boots, through England. In Scotland and Ireland it is hardly known, but it seems to be quietly gaining itself a foothold.