Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1925-12-20

that year 10000 persons We're bap-
TIED in Kent, and Christmas now be-
came the principal festival of the
year. the kings Sumptuously enter
tanning the great men of their do
minions, and charity being lavished.
at this time if at no other, upon the
poor.
All through English history we find
important events, such as royal wed
dingS, baptismS, Coronations and con-
ferenceS, held on Christmas day Ma
tilda. daughter of Henry l. was de-
cIared her fathers successor on Christ
mas day, 1925, at a general assembly
of English and Norman barons and
the clergy, and Stephen of Blois was
crowned at Westminster Abbey during
the Christmas season of 1885.
In a Complaint of Christmas, -
printed by John Taylor in 1916, the
Water Poet says:
''All the liberty and harmless sports,
the merry gambols. dances and frs
coils, with which the toiling plough
man and labourer once a year were
wont to be recreated, and their spirits
and hopes revived for a whole twelve
month, are now extinct and put out of
use. in such a fashion as if they had
never been. Thus are the merry lords
of bad rule at Westminster; nay, more,
their madness hath extended itself to
the very vegetables; senseless trees,
herbs and weeds are in profane esti-
nation amongst them-holly, ivy, mis-
tletoe, rosemary, bays, are accounted
ungodly branches of superstition for
your entertainment. And to roast n
sirloin of beef, to touch collar of
Drawn. to take a pie, to put plum in
the pottage pot, to burn a great can
die, or to lay one block the more in the
fire for your sake, Merry Christmas, is
enough to make a man to be suspected
and taken for a Christian, for which
he shall be apprehended for commit
ting high Parliament Treason"
Thus the pendulum seems to have
been swung quite as far III one direc
ton by the Puritan ZealotS as it haC
gone the other way at the hands o
many vain-glorious monarchs and dig
nitaries. But this new order of thing
did not last long. Even before the &c
cession to the throne of Charles II
mobs resisted with arms the would-bt
! enforcers of the new laws, and wit
Charles at the helm all went = a
Christmastide. at least-quite as merry
as marriage bell.
In both town and city the spirit OF
hospitality and good fellowship reigned
again and continued without more seri
! Gus Interruptions than those of a tenn
porary nature because OF wars.
Reads Weekly Journal of January 9
1881, contains the following by Thomas
/ North, which splendidly describes both
| he setting and atmosphere of what
! we now consider AN Old English
| christmas" and which was inspired by
| he writer's visit to the home of a
| friend in London:
1t was the house of an eminent and
! worthy merchant, and tho, sir, have
: been accustomed in my own country
70 what may very well be called good
| Housekeeping, yet I assure you
| hould have taken this dinner to have
| been provided for whole parish
rather than for about a dozen gentle
| men. Tis impossible for me to give
| YOU half our bill of fare, so you must
be content to know that we had tur
| llieS, geese, capons, buildings of q
1 iozen sorts more than 1 had ever seer
| II my life. besides Drawn, roast beef
| and many things of which / know not
| he names, mined pyes in abundance
and a thing they call plumb pottage
| which may be good for ought I know
| hough 1t seems to me to have so diff
| ferent tastes. The god of plenty
| seemed to reign here and to make
everything perfect