Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1894-12-22

blood sausage, and chocolate soup two
things easily and quickly cooked. There
might be also fruit, cold chicken, galantine
and so on.
In richer and more worldly circles the
reveillon is a more sumptuous spread. Its
special mark is lobster, truffied pheasant,
meat jellies, champagne, hot house fruits
and candies.
On the boulevard.
But in the great majority of little fin de
steele Paris families it is Baby, so to
bed. When you wake up you will see what
Pere Noel has brought for you" The single
servant minds the child. Papa and mamma
put on their coats and sally out into the
streets to taste the joys of Christmas eve
in Paris Their 'reveillon" they will take
at a restaurant or brasserie-without hay
ing gone to church beforehand.
The boulevard is packed Its lights make
1t as bright any theater. Colors of all
kinds shoot from the shop windows. All
the cafes blaze. But the special feature is
a line of wooden booths erected on the
Sidewalks, near the curbS, where novelties
in strange profusion sell themselves" as
the word goes in French. The proprietors
OF the booths are small shopkeepers, try
ing to make large Christmas sales of any
shop-worn stuff they have on hand, folks
out OF work, poor widows, knowing youths,
fair-fakirs-anyone who can get credit for
supplies of goods to stock the booth, and
who can pay the first installment of his
lege of putting up the booths to a stock
company. To saunter past. the booths,
make bargains of things you can never
need, smile at the strange ideas of "use-
ful GIFTS, candy, musical Instruments,
brooms, lamps, antiquities and every other
object under heaven, not to speak of toys
which dominate the whole, is one of the
peculiar pleasures of the Christmas eve
in Paris.
The "reveillons'' passed in the restaur-
ants and brasseries have no religious sig
nlncation or sanction. 1t Is an excuse to
guzzle and eat fine cold Dishes
The church going Is very extraordinary
There is no midnight mass at Notre Dame,
but all the other churches are so crowded
that you enter them with difficulty as early
as IL O'Clock at night Such churches as
the Madeleine and Saint-Eustache, because
of their music, are besieged. Beside the
music and the solemn function a special
Christmas feature is uncovered in the
churches.
hem" of Catholic churches in America.
In one corner of the church, usually on
the altar of side chapel. some kind of
representation CT the Christ-child lying in
the manager is attempted. The figures are
usually in wax, and when only three per-
sons are representative infant the Virgin
mother ard Saint Joseph-they are some
times of considerable size. The real day
for the Bethlehems is Christmas Christ
mas morning, when all well-brought-up
children make the tour of many a church
and lay their oranges and apples in the
holy garden, as a gift. The fruits are gath
cred up from time to- time and sent to
children's hospitals.
A Christmas PantOmime.
The Bethlehems are of every kind and
they are seen in every church in France
Unless the figures be extremely large ones
there arc regularly more than three, even
in the humblest churches. In order of i'm
portance come first, among the supple
mentary figures of the creche, the three
W Use men, the Magi Kings, Gaspard, Mel
chior and BalthaZar-your old friends of
Ben Hur." AS an actual fact their bones
are now reposing in the cathedral of Co.
logne, locked up in gold trunk, whose