New-York tribune., 1879-12-21
GJFTS VITHOUT MONEY.

GIFTS WITHOUT MONEY.
What to do about Christmas How many
good people (of both man and womankind) will
go about the streets during the next three
days their heads aching with that yearly
problem. Their friends are many and
their pocketbo0ks are SO lean. The very rich
and the very poor have less trouble about the
matter. The laborer's wife, anxi0usly ch0os-
ing a wooden monkey IN cellar near the fer
ries for the baby. knows the baby viii be sat-
isfed; it is born into the class, blessed at
least in that it expects nothing. The million
aires wife, driving from bric-a-brac shop 10
jewelers. carries a long list OF expectant
friends, and carelessly ticks them off with
costly useless baubles But it is the middle
class, the people with small incomes, culti-
waited tastes and warm affections, who
usually find Christmas and Its requirements
as much of pain a pleasure. They think
that on this one day of the year poverty
should cease 10 grind. Why should not the
poor clerk, peering wistfully in the shop
window, be able to buy his boy the books
which he wants so much The poor clerks
wife scans his shabby coat and pinchbeck
watch She measures his worth with that of
meaner, moro lucky men. She would hang
his lean limbs with broadcloth and gold. like
theirs, if she could Why must he be Lazarus
in rags to-day while Dives in purple holds
high holiday On this of all days of the
year, the birthday of Christ, who made all
men equal7 Even sober, miserly Deborah
franklin bought her husband china bowl
and silver spoon, because surely he was
"worthy, il any man living was, to eat no
"more on TIM 1t is beggarly soul which
4. u-it a nah
frenzy of giving, and it is one of the hardest
riddles of the years poverty why money
should stand in the way when our true
love would show itself through some little
token.
The only answer to the riddle is that per-
haps we make too much of the mere giving of
tokens on Christmas. If we have the money,
let us spend it,. 1t is worth while to scrimp
and save month or two later, TO make this
one crowning day of the year happier for a
child or a friend. But If we have not money
let us do without it, and keep Christmas still.
Our friend is not less our friend because we
do not give him a book or bit of old Sat
suma. Ten to one we have never sad q single
word to him in our lives which would hint our
hearty appreciation for him, which alone makes
book or crockery of value We Americans
are lavish of money, but almost as nIggardly
as our English cousins in Our words or signs
of affection or sympathy. Old Andrew jack
sons eleventh commandment" to "mlnd
"yom own business" is practised by
most well-bred Americans more rigor-
ously than all of the others. When man
in this country once sets about his life's work
of making living he has no time to be pick
ing up friends or going abouc into the high
ways and byways to show sympathy with
lonely OF tempted souls. 1t is uncivil, ned
ding, according to his code. There may be
too much in any mans life of this reticence
and dread of intrusion into the lives of Others,
and there can be no better time than this for
each of US to consider whether there has not
been too much of it in ours.
A few months ago a clergyman in parish
in Canada died, al our readers will recollect,
of starvation he went in and out among his
parishioners 20 the last, but owing to this let
alone policy of good breeding nobody asked
the cause of his pallor and sunken jaws until
it was too late. There are other kinds of
starvation than those of the body, hints of
which we see about us every day, and they
are the kind which well-bred and good Chris
tian people stand aloof from and let alone.
How many young man is there to-day in
this and every great city, who has come up
from some poor home followed by the prayers
of father and mother; who is fighting day by
day temptations which will ruin him. body
and soul, if he yields. and from which
proper companionship will save him. He is
utterly friendless and alone. He goes to
church, and the crowd OF well-meaning
worshippers brush past him without a
word lie goes to his work, and his en-
ployer puts him aside ut night as he does
his ledger, as tool. not human being
Would noe word of sympathy. cordial in
yitation. little womanly interest-if our
reader Ia woman--bs Of more value here
than any gift which money could buy In our
circle of acquaintance, in our own households,
is there no tired woman, no man with whom
the world has dealt hardly, to whom We have
often felt impelled to hold out our hands
with hearty goodwill. bus have not done it.
The boy yondsr, rough, disorderly, chatter
ing Of baseball. gasA the theatre-his