Evening star., 1928-12-23
By ALICE ROGERS HAGER.

Wv YHEN Santa, with his jolly
a wise smile and his mysterious
wv pack overfiowing with good
les, explores the chimney
pots of Washington tomor-
row night, he will find the boys and
girls of all ages waiting for him as
eagerly as ever. even as they wait for
his coming in nearly every part of the
Christian world. Eyes will sparkle and
shine, small heads will go burrowing
under bedclothes lest the good saint
catch them peeping-and it is we'll
known that he is fairly hard on peppers
---And when Christmas morning dawns
fI.Sre will be the glorious tree in its
corner, %iSaEling alight and dropping
every one of its branches IN an invita-
ton to childish hands to pluck the
fruit that the best loved of all the
fairies has left behind Father and
mother and granddad and grand
mother will shake their hands over such
happiness. And so the feast of the
Christ Child will be celebrated once
more with singing and laughter and
good will, while the far distant song of
the herald angels drifts again through
the hearts of men.
And Santa. who is a stout fellow. and
better Arctic explorer than Richard
Byrd himself, will not mind in the least
IL, during the course of long afternoon,
when belt buckles have been eaSed to
accommodate the last helping of turkey
ana plum pudding, the elders explore his
genealogy In a lazy state of wonder
that there can be SO many queer things
under the sun, nor will the ears of the
Druids burn beneath the leaf mold of
old England when the story of the
carols is told once more.
Now, this, you must understand, is
proceeding that can take place only
II there is a contented hum of voices
from nursery and sun porch, or if Tom,
DICK and Margery are out on the ter
races testing out the miracles of the
new sled.
I'D like to have a peep" says grand
dad, who, like the elephants child. has
"satiable curiosity" Into the homes
on the other side Of the globe Just now
ana see what they are doing. under
stand they have some queer ways of
enjoying Christmas, and that they call
santa by all sorts of outlandish names
AND that reminds me-Dick asked this
morning If there really is a Santa"
What did you say?" asked grandma
anxiously.
Told him to ask his dad. of course p"
with chuckle. Hes the family au-
thority."
DAD laughs comfortably and answers
you're not far wrong at that AS it |
happens, can tell him something about |
A.. got mold OF some books at the |
library the other night that told a |
lot about Santa Claus. Sure. there is a
real Saint Nick, and I don't mean lust |
Inc spirit OF Christmas in the symbolical |
sense, nor the department store variety. |
AND there are more different ways of |
celebrating the 25th of December than |
you can shake stick at It's like the |
story of the Christmas spiders. who. |
when the Christ Child let them 60 in |
to look at the Christmas tree in the |
house that had been so cleaned up |
that there wasn't any place for them |
TO stay-they climbed all over the tree |
and examined every last thing on it |
before they left. And when the Christ |
Child came to see that they hadn't |
harmed anything, he found the tree |
Just covered with spider webs that the |
spiders hadn't known they had made, |
SO to keep the children from being dis |
appointed, He changed all the feathery |
things into pure gold, and the result |
was nicer than anything that had ever
been done before"
X x Il
WWHAT does that have to do with
w the things we were talking |
about?" asks mother
"a lot" says father patiently. "You |
see every country where there are |
Christians has been Just like one of |
those spiders, climbing over the tree of |
Christmas and leaving its own cob
webby trail Of ideas and customs |
behind"
And suppose the loving kindness
they all have in their hearts Is what |
the Christ Child uses to turn the cob
webs to gold" contributes mother, |
happy with her idea.
Exactly" father approves. "If you |
like, I'll tell you what I learned about |
them"
dol" they all chorus.
WELL" says father. This is how it |
was:
ITO go back to the beginning, where