The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1912-12-05
ST. NICHOLAS, BEARER # OF GIFTS, TO BE HoNoRED
 IN MANY HANDS

Ir~France, Belgium and Holland, St
 Nicholas Day. which falls to14ferrow,
 is- the great chfIdren's holiday, taking
 the place of our Christmas which in
 those lands is a more distinctly re-
 ligious holiday In Holland it is the instead of Santa Claus, who goes about carrying gifts to good children travel
 ing on a white horse instead of in a
 sleigh drawn by reindeer Tonight bed filled with joyous anticipations of what the morrow will bring. The children leave carrots on the hearth stone for the consumption of the horse so that the animal may be properly entertained while the jolly old saint is going down the chimney.
 Instead of hanging up stockings on Christmas eve. as with us, the French youngsters will hang up their shoes to- night, in the confident expectation that they will be filled with gifts by St.
 Nicholas. It is in the villages and rural districts of France, away from blase and enlightened Paris, that the feast of St. Nicholas is most generally observed. The rules of the game re- quire that the hour before midnight tonight must be in complete darkness so that St. Nick may not. be surprised in France is a period of family re- unions, but tomorrow will be ex- clusive1y a children's holiday, in which the adults have no part except to see that the Saint does his duty in the matter of presents.
 St. Nicholas is the patron saint of Russia, but owing to the diff difference in celebrated until thirteen days hence In the land of the Czar, St. Nicholas is the patron of the under dog, the the children-and as. the vast majority of Russians are poor and oppressed, he naturally has a wide following
 In a little Italian town there are dis. D1aved two ho2 OS said to be those of one and the same saint, and it is seri- ously explained that one is the head of the good man as boy, and the istence two genuine bodies of St Nicholas, one at Bari, Italy, and an other, equally bona ffde in the church in the fortress of San Nicola del Lido. The Russians believe. that the one at Bari is genuine, and not many years ago Russian official offered 2. COG, ,090.- rubles for the relies The bones of the Saint were translated to Bari in 1907 and from them, it is said. d.@t:the mama of St Nicholas" still flows and heals organized many great pilgrimages to Bari, and on the last one the Italian medical officials -allege, were respon- s!ble for introducing the Asiatiezchol-
 St. Nicho1as was born toward the end of the third century, and became archbishop of Myra, in Lycia, on the desth of his uncle, who had held that position. Throughout his life he was the special protector of the poor and the Yronged, and for centuries after his death he was the patron of the wandering ninstrels and vagabonds, the reckless and improvident, the crim- ina1 and the imprisoned. In those days the term t'cIerk of st. NichoIas'' a th-ef- Respectab ble people will look askz-ce at this asoScia ton of St. with the dregs of humanity, but certainly they are entitled to one friend in the long calendar of saints.
 St. Nicholas was the hero Of mum erous tales in the days when literature was young and full of the spirit of fun and adventure Fat, jovia1 whlsk- cred, there was nothing of the ascetic about the saint who in these days has become the patron of children