The Waterbury Democrat., 1936-12-07
WOMAN,S REALM
EA8ENTU
 Your ChiMrgn
By Olive Roberts Barton

The CnrlStn1a6 season 6n0ulQ pc g time for sympathetic lessons and implanting deeply into the child's character the verities and virtues.
 Stories are by far the best way to reach into the recesses of his heart and stir his conscience to action. The single story of the Manager and the Star and the Wise Men, will typify quite easily the homage of riches to the grandeur of worth, however lowly. And the tribute of age to babyhood must touch them, too. This story should be told to all children, regardless of ones belief about the divinity e the Child Jesus. It is the ;=:ost beautiful story in the world. No other can match 1t in any way.
 From there, we must descend to more contemporary literature.
 And "The Night Before
 Christmas"
 By all means, read to them or let them learn that exciting picture of The Night Before Christmas" with the Jolly old Elf on the roof and his reindeer prancing through the sky. But had almost put 1t last. It is important and jolly and gay, and all that, but 1t is neither the Alpha nor Omega of Christmas. I love 1t as well as you do, but except for very little children, 1t is not enough. For instance, I believe that Charles Dickens Christmas Car ol" is one story that should be read in every family the day before Christmas. "Tiny Tim" will live, has lived for ages. He will continue to be our little lame hero with courage and merriment in his heart. And down with the gloomy Scrooges who boot at Christmas, and are 50 dried out in their shriveled souls that well, just read 1t and learn. It is good for old and young, each Christmas of life. A reminder that selfishness is lonely, that good-fel- lowship is real gain.
 Another Christmas story that carries weight is the trago-comic one of Birds Christmas Carol" How the sick child could dispense happiness to a family of healthy Ruggleses and get the thrill of lifetime. Read between the lines and ask the children what they see in the story. They will tell you.
 Rewards O; kindness Then there is the tale by my old favorite, Mary Brccht Pulver, "The Dwarf and the Cobbler's Sons"--of q poor shoemaker and his three sons who admitted the poor way farer to the.r low1y home in Christi mas Eve.
 Naturally, being a fairy, he load cd tLem with gifts and candy, showing that kindness and virtue are not always their only reward. l find it again in Wilhelmina liar per's assemblage of stories under the title, Merry Christmas to You" a volume, by the way, that I con- sider classic in its choice of sea- sonal stories, including those of other lands.
 Christmas is something else be- sides dolls and mechanical toys and tinsel stars. They arc important in the child,s life, and the holiday should be mad enough and merry enough to lift 1t above all other days of the year.
 But beneath. and motivating 1t, should come the kindly thought for others, and the reverence for that child who gave His life for the bettcrment of his fellow men. Giving of gifts that are far above glitter and color and intrinsic value. The gifts that count. And the chil- dren should be told. or read, about them in order to carry the pattern of sacrifice and service throughout life.
 | Copyright, 1936, NEA Service, Inc)