Not being acquisitive of worldly goods, he made it the only possession he cherished throughout his life. Gideon, barefooted and in his nightgown, stepped outside the door to accept the wonderful instrument, the dearest Christmas present of his life. He placed the violin against his shoulder and, disregarding the cold wind, played a Mississippi popular tune, 'Killiecrankie,' based on an old Scottish ballad by Robert Burns, commemorating the Scots' victory over the English at the Battle of Killiecrankie in 1687. What is even more striking is Burkhalter's discovery that every Christmas dawn thereafter, for sixty-three years in succession, Gideon arose from bed wherever the day found him, and, as he was, in nightclothes and barefooted, played his Christmas tune three times. That made the fiftieth time without missing a single Christmas.
Ignorance is such a terrible, stubborn, throat-cutting thing.