by A. A. Milne
He began fumbling among the limp and tattered packages that he carried. "Look! The House that Jack Built — a marvellous, deep thing, sir — and this, The Babes in the Wood. Will you take it, sir? A poor present, but a present still — not so long ago I gave them in thousands every Christmas-time. None seem to want them now."
* * *
He looked appealingly towards Father Time, as the weak may look towards the strong, for help and guidance.
* * *
"None want them now," he repeated, and I could see the tears start in his eyes. "Why is it so? Has the world forgotten its sympathy with the lost children wandering in the wood?"
* * *
"All the world," I heard Time murmur with a sigh, "is wandering in the wood." But out loud he spoke to Father Christmas in cheery admonition, "Tut, tut, good Christmas," he said, "you must cheer up. Here, sit in this chair the biggest one; so — beside the fire. Let us stir it to a blaze; more wood, that's better. And listen, good old Friend, to the wind outside — almost a Christmas wind, is it not? Merry and boisterous enough, for all the evil times it stirs among."
* * *
Old Christmas seated himself beside the fire, his hands outstretched towards the flames. Something of his old-time cheeriness seemed to flicker across his features as he warmed himself at the blaze.
* * *
"That's better," he murmured. "I was cold, sir, cold, chilled to the bone. Of old I never felt it so; no matter what the wind, the world seemed warm about me. Why is it not so now?"
* * *
"You see," said Time, speaking low in a whisper for my ear alone, "how sunk and broken he is? Will you not help?"
* * *
"Gladly," I answered, "if I can."
* * *
"All can," said Father Time, "every one of us."
* * *
Meantime Christmas had turned towards me a questioning eye, in which, however, there seemed to revive some little gleam of merriment.
* * *
"Have you, perhaps," he asked half timidly, "schnapps?"
* * *
"Schnapps?" I repeated.
* * *
"Ay, schnapps. A glass of it to drink your health might warm my heart again, I think."
* * *
"Ah," I said, "something to drink?"
* * *
"His one failing," whispered Time, "if it is one. Forgive it him. He was used to it for centuries. Give it him if you have it."
* * *
"I keep a little in the house," I said reluctantly perhaps, "in case of illness."
* * *
"Tut, tut," said Father Time, as something as near as could be to a smile passed over his shadowy face. "In case of illness! They used to say that in ancient Babylon. Here, let me pour it for him. Drink, Father Christmas, drink! "
* * *
Marvellous it was to see the old man smack his lips as he drank his glass of liquor neat after the fashion of old Norway.
* * *
Marvellous, too, to see the way in which, with the warmth of the fire and the generous glow of the spirits, his face changed and brightened till the old-time cheerfulness beamed again upon it. He looked about him, as it were, with a new and growing interest.
* * *
"A pleasant room," he said. "And what better, sir, than the wind without and a brave fire within!"
* * *
Then his eye fell upon the mantelpiece, where lay among the litter of books and pipes a little toy horse.
* * *
"Ah," said Father Christmas almost gayly, "children in the house!"
* * *
"One," I answered, "the sweetest boy in all the world."
* * *
"I'll be bound he is!" said Father Christmas and he broke now into a merry laugh that did one's heart good to hear. "They all are! Lord bless me! The number that I have seen, and each and every one — and quite right too — the sweetest child in all the world. And how old, do you say? Two and a half all but two months except a week? The very sweetest age of all, I'll bet you say, eh, what? They all do!"
* * *
And the old man broke again into such a jolly chuckling of laughter that his snow-white locks shook upon his head.
* * *
"But stop a bit," he added. "This horse is broken. Tut, tut, a hind leg nearly off. This won't do!"
* * *
He had the toy in his lap in a moment, mending it. It was wonderful to see, for all his age, how deft his fingers were.
* * *
"Time," he said, and it was amusing to note that his voice had assumed almost an authoritative tone, "reach me that piece of string. That's right. Here, hold your finger across the knot. There! Now, then, a bit of beeswax. What? No beeswax? Tut, tut, how ill-supplied your houses are to-day. How can you mend toys, sir, without beeswax? Still, it will stand up now."
* * *
I tried to murmur by best thanks.
* * *
But Father Christmas waved my gratitude aside.
* * *
"Nonsense," he said, "that's nothing. That's my life. Perhaps the little boy would like a book too. I have them here in the packet. Here, sir, Jack and the Bean Stalk, most profound thing. I read it to myself often still. How damp it is! Pray, sir, will you let me dry my books before your fire?"
* * *
"Only too willingly," I said. "How wet and torn they are!"
* * *
Father Christmas had risen from his chair and was fumbling among his tattered packages, taking from them his children's books, all limp and draggled from the rain and wind.
* * *
"All wet and torn!" he murmured, and his voice sank again into sadness. "I have carried them these three years past. Look! These were for little children in Belgium and in Serbia, Can I get them to them, think you?"
* * *
Time gently shook his head.
* * *
"But presently, perhaps," said Father Christmas, "if I dry and mend them. Look, some of them were inscribed already! This one, see you, was written 'With father's love.' Why has it never come to him? Is it rain or tears upon the page?"
* * *
He stood bowed over his little books, his hands trembling as he turned the pages. Then he looked up, the old fear upon his face again.
* * *
"That sound!" he said. "Listen I It is guns — I hear them."
* * *
"No" no," I said, "it is nothing. Only a car passing in the street below."
* * *
"Listen," he said. "Hear that again — voices crying!"
* * *
"No, no," I answered, "not voices, only the night wind among the trees."
* * *
"My children's voices!" he exclaimed. "I hear them everywhere — they come to me in every wind — and I see them as I wander in the night and storm — my children — torn and dying in the trenches — beaten into the ground — I hear them crying from the hospitals — each one to me, still as I knew him once, a little child. Time, Time," he cried, reaching out his arms in appeal, "give me back my children!"
* * *
"They do not die in vain," Time murmured gently.
* * *
But Christmas only moaned in answer:
* * *
"Give me back my children! "
* * *
Then he sank down upon his pile of books and toys, his head buried in his arms.
* * *
"You see," said Time, "his heart is breaking, and will you not help him if you can?"
* * *
"Only too gladly," I replied. "But what is there to do?"
* * *
"This," said Father Time, "listen."
* * *
He stood before me grave and solemn, a shadowy figure but half seen though he was close beside me. The fire-light had died down, and through the curtained windows there came already the first dim brightening of dawn.
* * *
"The world that
once you knew," said Father Time, "seems broken and destroyed about you. You must not let them know — the children. The cruelty and the horror and the hate that racks the world to-day — keep it from them. Some day he will know" — here Time pointed to the prostrate form of Father Christmas — "that his children, that once were, have not died in vain: that from their sacrifice shall come a nobler, better world for all to live in, a world where countless happy children shall hold bright their memory for ever. But for the children of To-day, save and spare them all you can from the evil hate and horror of the war. Later they will know and understand. Not yet. Give them. back their Merry Christmas and its kind thoughts, and its Christmas charity, till later on there shall be with it again Peace upon Earth Good Will towards Men."
* * *
His voice ceased. It seemed to vanish, as it were, in the sighing of the wind.
* * *
I looked up. Father Time and Christmas had vanished from the room. The fire was low and the day was breaking visibly outside.
* * *
"Let us begin," I murmured. "I will mend this broken horse."
The Errors of Santa Claus
Stephen Leacock
The Errors of Santa Claus
It was Christmas Eve
* * *
The Browns, who lived in the adjoining house, had been dining with the Joneses.
* * *
Brown and Jones were sitting over wine and walnuts at the table. The others had gone upstairs.
* * *
"What are you giving to your boy for Christmas?" asked Brown.
* * *
"A train," said Jones, "new kind of thing — automatic."
* * *
"Let's have a look at it," said Brown.
* * *
Jones fetched a parcel from the sideboard and began unwrapping it.
* * *
"Ingenious thing, isn't it?" he said. "Goes on its own rails. Queer how kids love to play with trains, isn't it?"
* * *
"Yes," assented Brown. "How are the rails fixed?"
* * *
"Wait, I'll show you," said Jones. "Just help me to shove these dinner things aside and roll back the cloth. There! See! You lay the rails like that and fasten them at the ends, so ——"
* * *
"Oh, yes, I catch on, makes a grade, doesn't it? just the thing to amuse a child, isn't it? I got Willy a toy aeroplane."
* * *
"I know, they're great. I got Edwin one on his birthday. But I thought I'd get him a train this time. I told him Santa Claus was going to bring him something altogether new this time. Edwin, of course, believes in Santa Claus absolutely. Say, look at this locomotive, would you? It has spring coiled up inside the fire box."
* * *
"Wind her up," said Brown with great interest. "Let's her go."
* * *
"All right," said Jones. "Just pile up two or three plates something to lean the end of the rails on. There, notice way it buzzes before it starts. Isn't that a great thing for kid, eh?"
* * *
"Yes," said Brown. "And say, see this little string to pull the whistle! By Gad, it toots, eh? just like real?"
* * *
"Now then, Brown," Jones went on, "you hitch on those cars and I'll start her. I'll be engineer, eh!"
* * *
Half an hour later Brown and Jones were still playing trains on the dining-room table.
* * *
But their wives upstairs in the drawing-room hardly noticed their absence. They were too much interested.
* * *
"Oh, I think it's perfectly sweet," said Mrs. Brown. "Just the loveliest doll I've seen in years. I must get one like it for Ulvina. Won't Clarisse be perfectly enchanted?"
* * *
"Yes," answered Mrs. Jones, "and then she'll have all the fun of arranging the dresses. Children love that so much. Look, there are three little dresses with the doll, aren't they cute? All cut out and ready to stitch together."
* * *
"Oh, how perfectly lovely!" exclaimed Mrs. Brown. "I think the mauve one would suit the doll best, don't you, with such golden hair? Only don't you think it would make it much nicer to turn back the collar, so, and to put a little band — so?"
* * *
"What a good idea!" said Mrs. Jones. "Do let's try it. Just wait, I'll get a needle in a minute. I'll tell Clarisse that Santa Claus sewed it himself. The child believes in Santa Claus absolutely."
* * *
And half an hour later Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Brown were so busy stitching dolls' clothes that they could not hear the roaring of the little train up and down the dining table, and had no idea what the four children were doing.
* * *
Nor did the children miss their mothers.
* * *
"Dandy, aren't they?" Edwin Jones was saying to little Willie Brown, as they sat in Edwin's bedroom. "A hundred in a box, with cork tips, and see, an amber mouthpiece that fits into a little case at the side. Good present for Dad, eh?
* * *
"Fine!" said Willie appreciatively. "I'm giving Father cigars."
* * *
"I know, I thought of cigars too. Men always like cigars and cigarettes. You can't go wrong on them. Say, would you like to try one or two of these cigarettes? We can take them from the bottom. You'll like them, they're Russian — away ahead of Egyptian."
* * *
"Thanks," answered Willie. "I'd like one immensely. I only started smoking last spring — on my twelfth birthday. I think a feller's a fool to begin smoking cigarettes too soon, don't you? It stunts him. I waited till I was twelve."
* * *
"Me too," said Edwin, as they lighted their cigarettes. "In fact, I wouldn't buy them now if it weren't for Dad. I simply had to give him something from Santa Claus. He believes in Santa Claus absolutely, you know."
* * *
And, while this was going on, Clarisse was showing little Ulvina the absolutely lovely little bridge set that she got for her mother.
* * *
"Aren't these markers perfectly charming?" said Ulvina. "And don't you love this little Dutch design — or is it Flemish, darling?"
* * *
"Dutch," said Clarisse. "Isn't it quaint? And aren't these the dearest little things, for putting the money in when you play. I needn't have got them with it — they'd have sold the rest separately — but I think it's too utterly slow playing without money, don't you?"
* * *
"Oh, abominable," shuddered Ulvina. "But your mamma never plays for money, does she?"
* * *
"Mamma! Oh, gracious, no. Mamma's far too slow for that. But I shall tell her that Santa Claus insisted on putting in the little money boxes."
* * *
"I suppose she believes in Santa Claus, just as my mamma does."
* * *
"Oh, absolutely," said Clarisse, and added, "What if we play a little game! With a double dummy, the French way, or Norwegian Skat, if you like. That only needs two."
* * *
"All right," agreed Ulvina, and in a few minutes they were deep in a game of cards with a little pile of pocket money beside them.
* * *
About half an hour later, all the members of the two families were again in the drawing-room. But of course nobody said anything about the presents. In any case they were all too busy looking at the beautiful big Bible, with maps in it, that the Joneses had brought to give to Grandfather. They all agreed that, with the help of it, Grandfather could hunt up any place in Palestine in a moment, day or night.
* * *
But upstairs, away upstairs in a sitting-room of his own Grandfather Jones was looking with an affectionate eye at the presents that stood beside him. There was a beautiful whisky decanter, with silver filigree outside (and whiskey inside) for Jones, and for the little boy a big nickel-plated Jew's harp.
