Douglas daily dispatch., 1926-12-19

Dear Mr. Santa Claus:-This letter
is impertinent- and ungrateful No
one is more deeply in your debt than
/ am Year after year l have braved
the terrors of the dark to journey
downstairs and see what you had
left for me. was never disap-
pointed. Even my repeated failure
to catch you in the act Of filling
stockings and piling fascinatins
packages on chairs and tables was
atoned for by what 1 found in the
stockings and the packages. II yoa
recall, L wrote to you every year
to tell you how grateful 1 was. Your
secretary can probably find these
letters if you would like to refer
to them. 1 will send him the dates
on request. 1
But there is something that ought
to be said to you, and which I do
not think ever has been said. So I
am going to say it. Judging by your
appearance, your attire, your ex-
pensive turnout and the lavishness
with which you throw money around
at this season of the year, you are
a person of great wealth. AS far
as can gather from my reading,
you always have been. In the old
legends, which ascribe to You va
rious names, you are pictured as a
man to whom money was never hard
to come by And it is for this rea-
son, 1 judge, that you do not seem
to know that there is any world
but your own.
This is not your own fault. It is
state of mind which has been
shared by many people of almost
equal Importance. Even Louis XIV
would have not been a bad old fell
low if he had been able to under
stand the feelings. of the peasants
down in the Midi, and the tatterde-
malions in the slums of Paris. He
might have tried to do somethins
for them if he could have got il
through his thick head that poor
people can really have troubles.
Now, if 1 have made it clear thar
this is not mere carping criticism,
/ will continue. noticed wnen
was a. child, that always on Christ
mas morning, when I came out into
the snow with my new sled, tnaS
a half-dozen other children, whom
ways looking over the fence, waiting
to be asked to take a ride with ms
I am afraid that did not always
ask them. I am afraid that even
eloated over them a little at first
although later in the day-I trust
did let them sit on my sled, if
it was only by way of showing off
After school opened the first OF
/ the year many boys and girls would
gather at recess and talk over the
things you brought them, each OF
us insisting that you had been bet
ter to him than you had to the 9TH
ers. And always on the outskirts
of these little groups was a cluste!
of children to whom you had no.
brought anything at all.
with grown ups it was much tbs
same. My father and mother wers
always remembered by you, and be-
cause you set us such a good eX
ample, we children gave them pres
ents, too. They were never very
suitable presents. We used to buy
things for them which neither they
nor aTly one else could possibly use
But we did not know any better
We felt that we had to buy some
thing-we insisted on buying some
thing. And unless big sister OF
brother went to the store. with u
we got something which was ut
terly worthless
But the grown-ups who lived dowl
the street a way-the old man wht
was night watchman in the gra1r
elevator-the. old lady who did ou
washing when she was we'll enough
and the man with the crutches Wh'
was supported-if you can call I
that - by the town none of thes'
even so much as hoped that yo'
would do anything for them-an'
you never did.
used to talk TO them about Christ
mas sometimes and ask them Wha
YOU were going to bring them, an
if they were going to have turke:
and plum pudding for dinner. The!
would always smile at me, and sa:
that they hoped so, and that the,
hoped 1 would have very merr!
christmas, too. never remembe
one of them t aSt4ng sorry for. him
self. or complaining. But somehow
knew that they were just pre-
tending. I thought perhaps it wa
only vanity that made them DO ina
AS boys always pretend tnat tnel
fathers are richer, than the father
Of other boys, sand that they nav
rag carpets on the floors becaus
their mothers are afraid that thos
new tangled rugs are full of diseas
germs. L know now that they wer