God Rest you, Merry Christians by Maud Van Buren

_George Madden Martin_

It was the night before Christmas. Any Christian must have known / it, apart from the calendar, by reason of a driving, haunting sense / of things yet undone, and a goaded gathering together of exhausted / faculties for a final sprint towards the accomplishing of all before / the dawning of The Day.[6]

Because we long have associated certain things with Christmas we have / come to believe them integrant. The blended odor of orange peel, / lighted tapers, and evergreens rushing upon us as the Church door opens / means Christmas, even as much as the murmuring voices of the children / within, each pew a variegated flower-bed of faces up-lifted to the / light and tinsel of a giant tree.

Aromatic odors, other than frankincense and myrrh, mean Christmas, / cedar, spices; and certain flavors, an almond kernel laid against a / raisin and crushed between molars to the enravishment of the palate, / seem to belong to Christmas; the translucent olive of preserved citron, / exuding sugared richness, suggests Christmas, together with the / crinkled layers of the myriad-seeded, luscious-hearted fig; blazing / brandy means Christmas, and the velvet smoothness of egg, cream and Old / Bourbon blended, seems part of Christmas too.

But because the average Christian is an unreasoning creature, and, like / the ox, bending his neck to the yoke because the yoke offers, plods / the way along unquestioning beneath it, the preceding mad rush means / Christmas too, and the feverish dream wherein, for instance, the long / strand of embroidery silk forever pulls through, unknotted. And it is / expected that the bones should ache at Christmas, and the flesh cry out / for weariness, and the brain be fagged to the excluding of more than a / blurred impression of The Day when it is come.

In the Rumsey household the celebration of the festival began on / Christmas Eve with a family gathering of children and grandchildren. / There is a certain wild, last hour, preceding the moment of gracious / and joyous bestowal, made up of frenzied haste and exhaustion. It was / that hour now.

"Anne Rumsey calls it the tears and tissue-paper stage," was told as / evidence of Anne's singular attitude towards the ways of the Christian / world about her.

"And I am sure I don't know what I've done to have any one as queer as / Anne for my child," Mrs. Rumsey, handsome, imposing, on her knees by / the bed tying parcels, was saying to her married daughter, Florrie, / come home with her babies for Christmas. "There's no one prides / themselves more on the conventional than I do, and I am sure you / never did an unconventional thing in your life. But I suppose every / family has to have its black sheep, not"-hastily at Florrie's horrified / disclaimer-"not that I mean that, of course-Florrie, how you take one / up! -nor ugly duckling exactly, either, for Anne is the handsomest / of you all-what did I tie in this package, do you know? I'm sure I / don't-but that a child of mine should thus deliberately each year stand / apart, outside the Christmas spirit, while others-it almost looks as / if I had not brought my children up with a proper regard for sacred / things."

Down-stairs, in the big, circular hallway, Anne Rumsey, outstretched in / a long wicker chair, lay gazing into the fire. It was nice to lie there / and watch the flames and listen to the crackle of the logs. Hickory / logs seem to belong to Christmas. Anne's grandfather, years ago, in the / country, used to bring in hickory logs for Christmas. Anne had provided / these for to-night herself. She had gone to a place in the country she / knew of, and walked over to a farm and negotiated for them. She had / waited a week for some member of her family to find time from shopping / to make the jaunt with her, and then had gone alone. It was ideal / December weather; the snow crunched under foot, the sky was brilliant, / a top-knotted cardinal bird and a jay on a thorn-hedge against the blue / looked at her as she passed along the road. It was good to be alive.

Her mother was testy that night at dinner. Her handsome face was / flushed to floridness beneath her gray pompadour. "I'm sure I haven't / time to know whether the weather is perfect or not, if I half do my / duty for my family at Christmas. For Heaven's sake, Anne, don't be so / aggressively high-spirited; it gets on my nerves."

And to-night, Christmas Eve, Anne lay looking into the fire. It was / nice to know it was snowing outside those drawn curtains, it made one / love their warmth and crimson more, and snow seems part of Christmas. / That morning she had put holly about, idling over the pleasure of / trying it here, there. Now she reveled in the color and cheer about / her. She had dressed for the evening with a sort of childlike and / smiling gaiety, slowly and pleasurably, because the dress seemed part / of the season and the joy, and in the scarlet gown looked some dryad of / the holly-tree herself, or some Elizabethan's concept of the Twelfth / Night spirit.

The outer door behind her opened to a latch-key and closed.

"Is that you, Daddy? " called Anne. "Come to the blaze and warm."

"I can't," confessed the big-headed, square little man, struggling / out of his overcoat; "I'm a disheveled wreck and I've got to dress / for dinner, I suppose. What time do you look for 'em all around? God / bless my soul, Anne, it's good to see somebody composed and enjoying / themselves. I've been looking for something for the grandchildren."

"You said you were too busy, didn't really have time -- "

"Yes, yes, I did, I know I did, but -- "

"-at the eleventh hour you rushed out; what did you buy, Daddy?"

"Just a trifle, a trifle around," confessed John Rumsey hastily, moving / towards the stairway; "just a trifle-been putting greenery around, / Anne? It looks nice-but I'm worried by a sort of after-recollection. / Didn't I give Florrie's boy a silver cup before, some time or other?"