Evening star., 1898-12-24
CHRISTMAS SCENES
Incidents of the Holiday Season Wit
messed About Town.
REJOICINGS MINGLE With The MOANS
The Pathetic as Well as Panto-
mime Represented.
KALEIDOSCOPIC VIEW S

The heart drama of the holidays is on.
and up and down the stage of the Christian
world the players move. There is music
from the laughing lips of little ones, merry
and mad with delight, expectancy and
hope; the greetings from sturdy throats,
and now and then the rnurmur of a moan
Tor in the play of Christmas time there is
pathos as well as pantomime
But the grand theme is one of gladness,
and over it all stretches the sanctity of
home and fireside. and mothers love, and
all that makes the heart beat tenderly and
the soul expand.
Christmas scenes may be always the
same. but, paradoxical though it may be to
say it, they are always different. The bril-
liancy and the movement of the pieces may
he similar in color, year after year. but
the kaleidoscope never repeats the same
figures. so Christmas never repeats it's pic
turesqueness. In this great city the COM
ing of Christmas was shrouded in fog for a
time. and rain. and there was general dis
comfort for those who were intent on hOli-
day buying but yesterday the sun came,
rising full of promise. and regular WASH
ington day was the result-bright and tenn
perate, with no clouds to cloak the blue
above or the smiles below, and the streets
teemed with thousands bound storewardS
The faces of the merchants were ilumi-
mated with little less satisfaction than those
Of the thrOng5 that crowded their estab-
Hshments, for every conner seemed to be
well supplied with the coin of the realm,
and better still, willing and eager to part
with ii. Until nearly midnight the busi-
ness section was still populated with busy
buyers. and during the earlier hours of
the evening and night the crowds in many
of the big esta blishments were so immense
that progress was difficult.
Again the ThrOng..
This morning. although the heavens were
overcast by a thick haze. the throngs
poured out again and it looked to an OBJ
server who pushed his way through them
that everybody in the District and nearby
Maryland and Virginia had postponed their
Christmas buying until Christmas eve.
A Star reporter spent couple of the
morning hours struggling through the
crowds, and occasionally conversing with
merchants who were catering to them.
Everywhere the conclusion of the purvey
ors to the public was the same and the
consensus of the big and little dealers was
the same: THE best Christmas business
in our experience"
To the student of national affairs this
constant repetition was a striking ilustra-
ton of the restoration of American conf
dence in American common sense, and the
determination of the nation to look ahead
and not behind. 1t exemplified in strik-
ing degree the fact that there would be no
danger hereafter to the substantial side of
bleS of theorists and dnctrinaires were to
be set aside by the strong. sturdy sense
that underlies and, at last, crowns the in
stitutiOns Of the greatest republic on earth.
The Markets.
In the markets, too, the satisfaction was
equally supreme. They were, OF course,
crowded with the seekers for all that en-
ters into the composition of that most glo-
rious meal of the whole year, the Christ
mas dinner, and the Christmas decorations
were never SO generally OF so lavishly in
dulged in. Holly and mistetoe, evergreens
in wreaths and gariands. And Christmas
trees. Never were SO many of the spruce
pines sent home to be surreptitiously
night and made beautiful by the same low
ing hands that Were to fill the little stock
ings hung on the mantel, while sleepy lit
tie heads dreamed of Kriss Kringle and
Santa Claus. the god of gladness of the tiny
tots of christendom, wherever the teach
ings and example of the Babe of the Nam
ger elevateS and ennobles and solaces and
satisfies.
And everywhere in christendom the radi-
ance which fell on that manger will send
its luminous rays tomorrow, and If St
James in his mansion will send from his
luxurious plenitude some Christmas cheer
TO the gaunt and hungry st. Giles in his
hovel: if the rich will remember the poor,
the strong give aiding hand to the weak,
an enemy hold out his hearty clasp to him
who he is angered with; if al hearts will
open to receive the full effulgence of the
light that fell on Bethlehem, then even
Christmas time in heaven will be grander
than 1t ever was before.