Thus man
passes away; his name passes from record and recollection; his
history is as a tale that is told, and his very monument becomes
a ruin.
* Sir T. Browne.
CHRISTMAS.
But is old, old, good old Christmas gone? Nothing but the hair of
his good, gray old head and beard left? Well, I will have that,
seeing I cannot have more of him.
HUE AND CRY AFTER CHRISTMAS.
A man might then behold
At Christmas, in each hall
Good fires to curb the cold,
And meat for great and small.
The neighbors were friendly bidden,
And all had welcome true,
The poor from the gates were not chidden
When this old cap was new.
OLD SONG.
NOTHING in England exercises a more delightful spell over my
imagination than the lingerings of the holiday customs and rural
games of former times. They recall the pictures my fancy used to
draw in the May morning of life, when as yet I only knew the
world through books, and believed it to be all that poets had
painted it; and they bring with them the flavor of those honest
days of yore, in which, perhaps with equal fallacy, I am apt to
think the world was more homebred, social, and joyous than at
present.
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