Christmas

by Washington Irving

　　There is nothing in England that exercises a more delightful spellover my imagination than the lingerings of the holiday customs andrural games of former times. They recall the pictures my fancyused to draw in the May morning of life, when as yet I only knewthe world through books, and believed it to be all that poets hadpainted it; and they bring with them the flavour of those honestdays of yore, in which, perhaps with equal fallacy, I am apt tothink the world was more home-bred, social, and joyous than atpresent. I regret to say that they are daily growing more and morefaint, being gradually worn away by time, but still moreobliterated by modern fashion. They resemble those picturesquemorsels of Gothic architecture which we see crumbling in variousparts of the country, partly dilapidated by the waste of ages, andpartly lost in the additions and alterations of latter days.Poetry, however, clings with cherishing fondness about the ruralgame and holiday revel, from which it has derived so many of itsthemes,--as the ivy winds its rich foliage about the Gothic archand mouldering tower, gratefully repaying their support by claspingtogether their tottering remains, and, as it were, embalming themin verdure.

　　Of all the old festivals, however, that of Christmas awakens thestrongest and most heartfelt associations. There is a tone ofsolemn and sacred feeling that blends with our conviviality, andlifts the spirit to a state of hallowed and elevated enjoyment.The services of the church about this season are extremely tenderand inspiring. They dwell on the beautiful story of the origin ofour faith, and the pastoral scenes that accompanied itsannouncement. They gradually increase in fervour and pathos duringthe season of Advent, until they break forth in full jubilee on themorning that brought peace and good-will to men. I do not know agrander effect of music on the moral feelings than to hear the fullchoir and the pealing organ performing a Christmas anthem in acathedral, and filling every part of the vast pile with triumphantharmony.

　　It is a beautiful arrangement, also derived from days of yore, thatthis festival, which commemorates the announcement of the religionof peace and love, has been made the season for gathering togetherof family connections, and drawing closer again those bands ofkindred hearts which the cares and pleasures and sorrows of theworld are continually operating to cast loose; of calling back thechildren of a family who have launched forth in life, and wanderedwidely asunder, once more to assemble about the paternal hearth,that rallying-place of the affections, there to grow young andloving again among the endearing mementoes of childhood.

　　There is something in the very season of the year that gives acharm to the festivity of Christmas. At other times we derive agreat portion of our pleasures from the mere beauties of nature.Our feelings sally forth and dissipate themselves over the sunnylandscape, and we "live abroad and everywhere." The song of thebird, the murmur of the stream, the breathing fragrance of spring,the soft voluptuousness of summer, the golden pomp of autumn; earthwith its mantle of refreshing green, and heaven with its deepdelicious blue and its cloudy magnificence, all fill us with mutebut exquisite delight, and we revel in the luxury of meresensation. But in the depth of winter, when nature lies despoiledof every charm, and wrapped in her shroud of sheeted snow, we turnfor our gratifications to moral sources. The dreariness anddesolation of the landscape, the short gloomy days and darksomenights, while they circumscribe our wanderings, shut in ourfeelings also from rambling abroad, and make us more keenlydisposed for the pleasures of the social circle. Our thoughts aremore concentrated; our friendly sympathies more aroused. we feelmore sensibly the charm of each other's society, and are broughtmore closely together by dependence on each other for enjoyment.Heart calleth unto heart; and we draw our pleasures from the deepwells of living kindness, which lie in the quiet recesses of ourbosoms: and which when resorted to, furnish forth the pure elementof domestic felicity.

　　The pitchy gloom without makes the heart dilate on entering theroom filled with the glow and warmth of the evening fire. Theruddy blaze diffuses an artificial summer and sunshine through theroom, and lights up each countenance into a kindlier welcome.Where does the honest face of hospitality expand into a broader andmore cordial smile--where is the shy glance of love more sweetlyeloquent--than by the winter fireside? and as the hollow blast ofwintry wind rushes through the hall, claps the distant door,whistles about the casement, and rumbles down the chimney, what canbe more grateful than that feeling of sober and sheltered securitywith which we look around upon the comfortable chamber and thescene of domestic hilarity?

　　The English, from the great prevalence of rural habits throughoutevery class of society, have always been fond of those festivalsand holidays which agreeably interrupt the stillness of countrylife; and they were, in former days, particularly observant of thereligious and social rites of Christmas. It is inspiring to readeven the dry details which some antiquarians have given of thequaint humours, the burlesque pageants, the complete abandonment tomirth and good-fellowship with which this festival was celebrated.It seemed to throw open every door, and unlock every heart. Itbrought the peasant and the peer together, and blended all ranks inone warm generous flow of joy and kindness. The old halls ofcastles and manor-houses resounded with the harp and the Christmascarol, and their ample boards groaned under the weight ofhospitality. Even the poorest cottage welcomed the festive seasonwith green decorations of bay and holly--the cheerful fire glancedits rays through the lattice, inviting the passenger to raise thelatch, and join the gossip knot huddled around the hearth,beguiling the long evening with legendary jokes and oft-toldChristmas tales.

　　One of the least pleasing effects of modern refinement is the havocit has made among the hearty old holiday customs. It hascompletely taken off the sharp touchings and spirited reliefs ofthese embellishments of life, and has worn down society into a moresmooth and polished, but certainly a less characteristic surface.Many of the games and ceremonials of Christmas have entirelydisappeared, and like the sherris sack of old Falstaff, are becomematters of speculation and dispute among commentators. Theyflourished in times full of spirit and lustihood, when men enjoyedlife roughly, but heartily and vigorously; times wild andpicturesque, which have furnished poetry with its richestmaterials, and the drama with its most attractive variety ofcharacters and manners. The world has become more worldly. Thereis more of dissipation, and less of enjoyment. Pleasure hasexpanded into a broader, but a shallower stream, and has forsakenmany of those deep and quiet channels where it flowed sweetlythrough the calm bosom of domestic life. Society has acquired amore enlightened and elegant tone; but it has lost many of itsstrong local peculiarities, its homebred feelings, its honestfireside delights. The traditionary customs of golden-heartedantiquity, its feudal hospitalities, and lordly wassailings, havepassed away with the baronial castles and stately manor-houses inwhich they were celebrated. They comported with the shadowy hall,the great oaken gallery, and the tapestried parlour, but areunfitted to the light showy saloons and gay drawing-rooms of themodern villa.

　　Shorn, however, as it is, of its ancient and festive honours,Christmas is still a period of delightful excitement in England.It is gratifying to see that home feeling completely aroused whichseems to hold so powerful a place in every English bosom. Thepreparations making on every side for the social board that isagain to unite friends and kindred; the presents of good cheerpassing and repassing, those tokens of regard, and quickeners ofkind feelings; the evergreens distributed about houses andchurches, emblems of peace and gladness; all these have the mostpleasing effect in producing fond associations, and kindlingbenevolent sympathies. Even the sound of the waits, rude as may betheir minstrelsy, breaks upon the mid-watches of a winter nightwith the effect of perfect harmony. As I have been awakened bythem in that still and solemn hour, "when deep sleep falleth uponman," I have listened with a hushed delight, and, connecting themwith the sacred and joyous occasion, have almost fancied them intoanother celestial choir, announcing peace and good-will to mankind.

　　How delightfully the imagination, when wrought upon by these moralinfluences, turns everything to melody and beauty: The verycrowing of the cock, who is sometimes heard in the profound reposeof the country, "telling the night-watches to his feathery dames,"was thought by the common people to announce the approach of thissacred festival:

　　"Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated, This bird of dawning singeth all night long: And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad; The nights are wholesome--then no planets strike, No fairy takes, no witch hath power to charm, So hallow'd and so gracious is the time."Amidst the general call to happiness, the bustle of the spirits,and stir of the affections, which prevail at this period, whatbosom can remain insensible? It is, indeed, the season ofregenerated feeling--the season for kindling, not merely the fireof hospitality in the hall, but the genial flame of charity in theheart.

　　The scene of early love again rises green to memory beyond thesterile waste of years; and the idea of home, fraught with thefragrance of home-dwelling joys, reanimates the drooping spirit,--as the Arabian breeze will sometimes waft the freshness of thedistant fields to the weary pilgrim of the desert.

　　Stranger and sojourner as I am in the land,--though for me nosocial hearth may blaze, no hospitable roof throw open its doors,nor the warm grasp of friendship welcome me at the threshold,--yetI feel the influence of the season beaming into my soul from thehappy looks of those around me. Surely happiness is reflective,like the light of heaven; and every countenance, bright withsmiles, and glowing with innocent enjoyment, is a mirrortransmitting to others the rays of a supreme and ever shiningbenevolence. He who can turn churlishly away from contemplatingthe felicity of his fellow beings, and sit down darkling andrepining in his loneliness when all around is joyful, may have hismoments of strong excitement and selfish gratification, but hewants the genial and social sympathies which constitute the charmof a merry Christmas.