The Savannah morning news., 1902-12-21

| TO Mexico, trying to find a way to
take them back TO Spain. They spend
| one Christmas Eve in being worship
| ped as demigods by a tribe of Indians.
\ They spend many others in working
| as slaves.
Twelve years later the Star shines
| on fernando de Soto, lying in camp
| in the Chickasaw Country. 1t is the
second Christmas Eve away from his
wife, the beautiful Dona Isabella, and
he is never to see her again. The Star
looks down upon him in 1541, near the
Mississippi, with his great expedition
scattered and all but destroyed, but
the dauntless heart of him brave and
unfearing. Christmas Eve 1912 finds
no such person as fernando de Soto,
Captain General of Cuba, Adelantado
of Florida, on earth.
In 1886 three strange men see the
Star through German prison bars, and
surely il must shine to them with a
mysterical meaning. For the three pris-
oners are the Three Holy Kings of
Germany, being the tailor Johann
| Bockhold of Leyden and his compan-
ions, who are in prison for being the
leaders of the Anabaptists and pro-
Chalmers of new Zion. In the first
month of the New Year their bodies
| dressed in mockery like Kings, with
crowns on their heads, shall be eX-
hibited in iron cages high on the dome
of Munster Cathedral where they are
TO hang for many generations.
In 1867 the Star sees a gathering in
Antwerp. 1t is a terrible gathering
that conceives a thought of inhuman
wickedness and ferocity Yet out of
this Christmas meeting shall great
freedom be born. For it is that of
the Spanish rulers in the Netherlands
and at it is adopted the decree of the
Inquisition that condemns all the in
habitants of the Netherlands, with but
few exceptions, to death. And the War
of Liberation follows. 1t is the first to
break the cruel and deadening power
of Spain.
In the New World the Star looks
on the colonsts of jamestown stealing
out on Christmas Eve in 1907 to get
| corn from the Indians by strategy.
Two years later, Christmas Eve sees
| them suffering grievously for food
| again.
ammo Domini 1920; and the Pilgrim
Fathers rest from their labor of build
ing the settlement which they have
begun that morning.
Christmas Eve, 1915 and 1876 sees
war in the New World. In the first
year the New Englanders, instead of
! gathering around social fireplaces, are
abroad, driving before them the rem
nants of the Wampanoag Indians
whom they have defeated in a great
| battle near Narragansett Bay; and in
| 1916 the French are taking Cayenne
in Guiana after a stubborn seige.
In 1886 the Star shines on grim and
moody faces in the town of New York.
| Sir Edmond Andross, the first Royal
| Governor and Vice Regent of New
England, has just arrived and is maxi
| ing roaring Christmas Eve of it.
| Two years afterward the Star
! CLEANS on his royal master, James
H., spending his Christmas Eve in the
| French Court, a fugitive driven from
his throne in England.
In the next year the Star shines on
another man who lorded it for while.
Through the grated window of a Bos-
ton prison it looked on Capt. Kidd.
with sixteen pounds of chains on
him." waiting for the trial that is to
hang him.
Sitting with a few companions by a
camp fire in the primeval wilderness of
Pennsylvania, a young surveyor looks
up at it in 1853. He is George Wash
ingtOn, nine days journey on his way
home from Lake Erie, where he has
been to carry a message to the Com
| mander of the French that wifi end
finally in the French and Indian War
Indians are prowling on his path that
Star of Bethlehem as if he were gaz-
! ing at it from his home in Virginia.
Fourteen years later two other
young surveyors pass a similar Christ
mas Eve in the wilderness. They are
not to become so famous personally as
that other surveyor, but their names
are destined to be linked forever with
q great cause. They are Mason and
DIXON sitting under the Star at the
end of their trail. They have reached
warpath and the Indians have forced
them to stop, thirty-six miles from
their objective point. But they have
practically run their line and they fin
ish it on Dec. &c.
Christmas Eve. 1878, and there are
bands and flying banners in New York
Young and old mechanics and royster-
ers and citizens of substance, are
marching together. Singing "God
Save the King" they head straight for
| the Wharves where two teaships are
| lying. Some of the chests go over
| board, still to the accompaniment of
I the loyal tune. The others are left on
| the ships, but the vessels are forced
| TO return home without unloading
Lieut.. John Paul Jones in his new
uniform and clothed in his three-dav-
| old dignity as member of the Corps of
| Naval Officers appointed by Congress.
| swaggers around proudly on Christmas
Eve in Philadelphia in 1775
Ammo Domini 1776 sees "a 900 men
crossing the ice-covered Delaware.
And in 1T77 the Star shines on Val
ley Forge. where men sit around pitt
able fires in rags-penniless, hungry.
freezing and unfaltering
Christmas Eve, 1888: George Wash
ington has surrendered his commission
! the day before. For the first time I'm
seven years. he looks up to the Star
without heavy care