Old Father Christmas - Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing

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My having been a very little boy and having a godmother. But I had, and she sent me presents on my

birthdays too. And young people did not get presents when I was a child as they get them now.

We had not half so many toys as you have, but we kept them twice as long. I think we were

fonder of them too. Though they were neither so handsome, nor so expensive as these new fangled

affairs you were always breaking about the house. Crop. You see, middle-class folk were more saving

than. My mother turned and died her dresses, and when she had done with them the servant was very

glad to have them. But, blessed me, your mother's maid's dress so much finer than their mistress,

I do not think they would say thank you for her bessondy silk. The bustles the wrong shape.

What's that you are laughing at, little miss? It's pania, is it? Well, well, bustle or pania,

call it what you like, but only donkeys wore paniers in my young days, and many's the ride I've had

in them. Now, as I say, my relations and friends thought twice before they pulled out five shillings

in a toy shop, but they didn't forget me, all the same. On my eight's birthday, my mother

gave me a bright blue comforter of her own knitting. My little sister gave me a ball.

My mother had cut out the divisions from various bits in the rag bag, and my sister had done some

of the seeming. It was stuffed with bran and had a quark inside, which are broken from old age,

and could no longer fit the pickle jar it belonged to. This made the ball bound when we played

prisoner's base. My father gave me the broken driving whip that had lost the lash, and an old

pair of his gloves to play coachman with. These I had longed wish for, since next to sailing in a

ship, in my ideas, came the honour and glory of driving a coach. My whole soul I must tell you

was set upon being a sailor. In those days I had rather put to see once on farmer-fodders duck pond

than ride twice a top of his hay wagon, and between the smell of the hay and the softness of it,

and the height you are up above other folk, and the danger of tumbling off if you don't look out,

for hay is elastic as well as soft. You don't easily beat a ride on a hay wagon for pleasure.

But as I say, I'd rather put to see on the duck pond, though the best craft I could borrow

was the pigsty door, and a pole to punt with, and the village boy's jeering when I got a ground,

which was most of the time. Besides the duck pond never having a wave on it worth the name,

punters you would, and so shallow you could not have got drowned in it to save your life.

You're laughing now, little master, are you? But let me tell you that drownings the death

for a sailor, whatever you may think. So I've always maintained, and have given every navigable sea

in the known world a chance, though here I am, after all, laid up in arm chairs and feather beds,

to await for bronchitis or some other slow poison, hump.

Well, we must all go as we're called. Sailors or lensmen, and as I was saying,

if I was never to sail a ship, I would have liked to drive a coach, a male coach,

serving his majesty. Her majesty now, God bless her, carrying the royal arms and bound to go,

rough weather and fair. Many's the time I've done it, in play you understand, with that whip and

those gloves. Dear, dear, the pains I took to teach my sister patty to be a highwayman,

and jump out on me from the drying grand hedge in the dusk with a stand and deliver,

which she couldn't get out of her throat for fright, and wouldn't jump hard enough for fear of

hurting me. The whip and the gloves gave me joy, I can tell you, but there was more to come.

Kitty the servant gave me a shell, that she had had by her for years. How I had coveted that

shell. It had this remarkable property. When you put it to your ear you could hear the roaring of the sea.

I had never seen the sea, but Kitty was born in a fisherman's cottage, a many an hour have I sat

by the kitchen fire, while she told me strange stories of the mighty ocean. And ever and a non,

she would snatch the shell from the mantelpiece and clap it to my ear crying,

there child, you couldn't hear it plainer than that, it's the very moral.

When Kitty gave me that shell for my very own, I felt that life had little more to offer.

I held it to every ear in the house, including the cats. And seeing Dick the sexton sun go by with

an arm full of straw to stuff guy forks, I ran out, and in my anxiety to make him share the

treat and learn what the sea is like, I clapped the shell to his ear so smartly and unexpectedly

that he, thinking me to have struck him, knocked me down there and then with his bundle of straw.

When he understood the rights of the case, he begged my pardon handsomely and gave me two

whole treacle sticks, and part of a third out of his bridge's pocket, in return for which I

forgave him freely, and promised to let him hear the sea roar on every Saturday half-holiday

till further notice. And speaking of Dick and the straw, reminds me that my birthday falls on

the 5th of November. From this it came about that I had always to bear a good many jokes about

being burnt as guy forks, but on the other hand I was allowed to make a small bonfire of my own,

and to have eight potatoes to roast therein, and eight pennies of crackers to let off in the evening,

a potato and a pennies of crackers for every year of my life.

On this 8th birthday, having got all the above-name gifts, I cried in the fullness of my heart,

there never was such a day, and yet there was more to come.

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For the evening coach brought me a parcel and the parcel was my godmother's picture book.

My godmother was a gentle woman of small means, but she was accomplished. She could make very

spirited sketches and knew how to color them after they were outlined and shaded in Indian ink.

She had a pleasant talent for versifying. She was very industrious. I have it from her own lips

that she copied the figures in my picture book from prints in several different houses at which

she visited. They were fancy portraits of characters, most of which were familiar to my mind.

There were guy forks, punch, his then majesty the king, boogie, the man in the moon,

the clerk of the weather office, a dance, and old father Christmas.

Beneath each sketch was a stanza of my godmother's own composing.

My godmother was very ingenious. She had been mainly guided in her choice of these characters

by the prints she happened to meet with as she did not trust herself to design a figure.

But if she could not get exactly what she wanted, she had a clever knack of tracing

an outline of the attitude from some engraving and altering the figure to suit her purpose in

the finished sketch. She was the soul of truthfulness, and the note she added to the index of

contents in my picture book spoke at once for her honesty in a vowing obligations and her

ingenuity in availing herself of opportunities. They ran thus. Number one, Guy forks,

outlined from a figure of a warehouse man, rolling a sherry cask into Mr. Rudd's wine vaults.

I added the hat, cloak, and boots in the finished drawing. Number two, punch, I sketched him from

the life. Number three, his most gracious majesty the king, on a court jug bought in cheap side.

Number four, Bogey, with bad boys in the bag on his back.

I outlined from a Christian, bending under his burden in my mother's old copy of the Pilgrim's

progress, the face from giant despair. Number five and number six, the man in the moon,

and the clerk of the weather office, from a book of caricatures belonging to Dr. James.

Number seven, a dance, from a stealing raving framed in rosewood that hangs in my uncle Wilkinson's

parlor. Number eight, old Father Christmas, from a German book at Lady Littleums.

My sister Patti was six years old. We loved each other dearly. The picture book was almost as

much hers as mine. We sat so long together on one big footstool by the fire,

with our arms round each other, and the book resting on our knees, that Kitty called down blessings

on my godmother's head for having sent a volume that kept us both so long out of mischief.

If books was Alice as useful as that, they do for me," said she, and though this speech did not

mean much, it was a great deal for Kitty to say, since not being herself an educated person,

she naturally thought that little enough good comes of learning.

Patti and I had our favour at amongst the pictures. Bogey now was a character one did not care

to think about too near bedtime. I was tired of Guy Fawkes and thought that he looked more natural

made of straw, as dicted him. The dance was a little too personal, but old Father Christmas took

our hearts by storm. We had never seen anything like him, though nowadays you may get a

plaster figure of him in any toy shop at Christmas time, with hair and beard like cotton wool and a

Christmas tree in his hand. The custom of Christmas trees came from Germany. I can remember when they

were first introduced into England, and what wonderful things we sought them. Now every village

school has its tree, and the scholars openly discuss whether the presents have been good or mean,

as compared with other trees of former years. The first one that I ever saw I believed to have come

from the good Father Christmas himself, but little boys have grown too wise now to be taken

in for their own amusement. They are not excited by secret and mysterious preparations in the back

drawing room. They hardly confess to the thrill, which I feel to this day, when the folding doors

are thrown open, and amid the blaze of tapers, Mama, like her fate, advances with her scissors

to give everyone what falls to his lot. Well, young people, when I was eight years old,

I had not seen a Christmas tree, and the first picture of one I ever saw was the picture of that

held by old Father Christmas in my godmother's picture book.

What are those things on the tree? I asked. Candles, said my father.

No father, not the candles, the other things. Those are toys, my son. Are they ever taken off?

Yes, they are taken off, and given to the children who stand round the tree.

Patti and I grasped each other by the hand, and with one voice murmured, how kind of old Father Christmas?

By and by, I asked, how old is old Father Christmas?

My father laughed and said 1,830 years, child, which was then the year of our Lord,

and thus 1,830 years since the first great Christmas day.

He looks very old, whisper Patti, and I, who was for my age, what Kitty called Bible learned,

said thoughtfully, and with some puzzledness of mind, then he's older than Methuselah.

But my father had left the room and did not hear my difficulty.

November and December went by, and still the picture book kept all its charm for Patti and me,

and we pondered on and loved old Father Christmas as children can love and realize a fancy friend.

To those who remember the fancies of their childhood, I need say no more.

Christmas week came, Christmas Eve came. My father and mother were mysteriously and unaccountably

busy in the parlour. We only had one parlour, and Patti and I were not allowed to go in.

We went into the kitchen, but even here was no place of rest for us. Kitty was all over the place,

as she phrased it, and cakes, mince pies, and puddings were with her. As she justly observed,

there was no place there for children and books to sit with their toes in the fire when

her body wanted to be at the oven all along. That cat was enough for her temper, she added.

As to Pus, who obstinately refused to take a hint which drove her out into the Christmas frost,

she returned again and again with soft steps and a stupidity that was, I think,

affected to the warm hearth, only to fly at intervals like a football before Kitty's hasty slipper.

We have more sense, all less courage, we bow to Kitty's behest and went to the back door.

Patti and I were hardy children, and accustomed to run out in all weather's without much extra

wrapping up. We put Kitty's shawl over our two heads and went outside. I rather hoped to see

something of Dick, for it was holiday time, but no Dick passed. He was busy helping his father

to bore holes in the carved seats of the church, which were to hold sprigs of holy for the morrow.

That was the idea of church decoration in my young days.

You have improved on your elders there, young people, and I am candid enough to allow it.

Still, the sprigs of red and green were better than nothing, and like your lovely

wreaths and pious devices, they made one feel as if the old blackwood were bursting into life

and leaf again for very Christmas joy. And, if one only knelt carefully, they did not scratch his nose.

Added Godfather Garble, chuckling and rubbing his own, which was large and rather red.

Well, he continued. Dick was busy and not to be seen. We ran across the little yard and looked

over the wall at the end to see if we could see anything or anybody. From this point there was a

pleasant meadowfield sloping pretty lay away to a little hill, about three-quarters of our

distance, which catching some fine breezes from the moors beyond was held to be a place of cure

for hooping cough or kink cough as it was vulgarly called. Up to the top of this kitty had dragged me

and carried patty when we were recovering from the complaint as I will remember.

It was the only change of air we could afford, and I dare say it did as well as if we had gone

into badly-drained lodgings at the seaside. This hill was now covered with snow and stood off

against the grey sky. The white fields looked vast and dreary in the dusk. The only gays things to

be seen were the red berries on the holy hedge in the little lane, which, running by the end of our

backyard, led up to the hall, and a fat Robin Redbreast who was staring at me.

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Look! I looked. An old man was coming along the lane. His hair and beard were white as

cotton wool. He had a face like the sort of apple that keeps well in winter. His coat was

old and brown. There was snow about him in patches, and he carried a small fir tree.

The same conviction seized upon us both. With one breath we exclaimed,

it's of Father Christmas! I know now that it was only an old man of the place with whom we

did not happen to be acquainted, and that he was taking a little fir tree up to the hall to be

made into a Christmas tree. He was a very good human old fellow and rather deaf,

for which he made up by smiling and nodding his head a good deal and saying,

hi, hi, to be sure, at likely intervals. As he passed us a met our earnest gaze,

he smiled and nodded so affably that I was bold enough to cry, good evening Father Christmas.

Same to you, said he in a high-pitched voice.

Then you are Father Christmas, said Patti.

And a happy new year, once Father Christmas is reply which rather put me out,

but he smiled in such a satisfactory manner that Patti went on.

You're very old, aren't you?

So I be Miss, so I be, said Father Christmas nodding.

Father, said you're eight hundred and thirty years old, I muttered.

I, I to be sure, said Father Christmas, I'm a long age.

A very long age, thought I, and I added, you're nearly twice as old as Methusel that you know,

thinking that this might not have struck him.

I, I, said Father Christmas, but he did not seem to think anything of it.

After a pause he held up the tree and cried,

do you know what this is little Miss?

A Christmas tree, said Patti, and the old man smiled and nodded.

I lent over the wall and shouted, but there are no candles.

By and by, said Father Christmas, nodding as before,

when it's dark they'll all be lighted up, that'll be a fine sight.

Toys too, they'll be, won't there? Screamed Patti.

Father Christmas nodded his head, and sweeties, he added, expressively.

I could feel Patti trembling and my own heart beat fast, the thought which agitated us both

with this. Was Father Christmas bringing the tree to us?

But very anxiety and some modesty also kept us from asking outright.

Only when the old man shouted his tree, and prepared to move on, I cried in despair,

oh, are you going?

I'm coming back by and by, said he, how soon, cried Patti.

About four o'clock, said the old man smiling, I'm only going up Yonder,

and nodding and smiling as he went, he passed away down the lane.

Up Yonder, this puzzled us, Father Christmas have pointed, but so indefinitely

that he might have been pointing to the sky, all the fields, all the little wood at the end

of the Squires' grounds. I thought the latter, and suggested to Patti that perhaps he had some place

underground, like Aladdin's cave where he got the candles, and all the pretty things for the tree.

This idea pleased us both, and we amused ourselves by wondering what old Father Christmas

would choose for us from his stores in that wonderful hole where he dressed his Christmas trees.

I wonder, Patti, said I, why there's no picture of Father Christmas's dog in the book.

Four, at the old man's heels in the lane, they're crept a little brown and white spaniel,

looking very dirty in the snow. Perhaps it's a new dog that he's got to take care of his

cave, said Patti. When we went indoors we examined the picture of fresh by the dim light from the

passage window, but there was no dog there. My father passed us at this moment and patted my head.

Father, did I? I don't know, but I do think Old Father Christmas is going to bring us a Christmas

tree tonight. Who's been telling you that, said my father? But he passed on before I could

explain that we had seen Father Christmas himself, and had had his word for it that he would return

at four o'clock, and that the candles on his tree would be lighted as soon as it was dark.

We hovered on the outskirts of the room till four o'clock came. We sat on the stairs and watched

the big clock, which I was just learning to read. And Patti made herself giddy with constantly

looking up and counting the four strokes towards which the hour-hand slowly moved.

We put our noses into the kitchen now and then to smell the cakes and get warm,

and a non we hung about the parlor door and were most unjustly accused of trying to peep.

What did we care what our mother was doing in the parlor? We who had seen Old Father Christmas himself

and were expecting him back again every moment. At last the church clock struck.

The sands boomed heavily through the frost, and Patti thought that they were four of them.

Then, after due choking them, wearing our own clock struck, and we countered the strokes quite

clearly, one, two, three, four. Then we got Kitty's shawl once more and stole out into the backyard.

We ran to our old place and peeped, but could see nothing. We better get up onto the wall,

I said, and with some difficulty and distress from rubbing her bare knees against the cold stones

and getting the snow up her sleeves, Patti got on the coping of the little wall.

I was just struggling after her when something warm and something cold coming suddenly against the

bare calves of my legs made me shriek with fright. I came down with a run, and bruised my knees,

my elbows, and my chin, and the snow that hadn't gone up Patti's sleeves went by my neck.

Then I found that the cold thing was a dog's nose, and the warm thing was his tongue,

and Patti cried from her post-of observation,

it's Father Christmas's dog, and he's licking your legs.

It really was the dirty little brown and white spaniel, and he persisted in licking me and

jumping on me and making curious little noises that must have meant something if one had known his

language. I was rather harassed at the moment, my legs were sore, I was a little afraid of the dog,

and Patti was very much afraid of sitting on the wall without me.

You won't fall, I said to her. Get down will you, I said to the dog.

Humpty-dumpty fell off a wall, said Patti.

Oh wow, said the dog. I pulled Patti down, and the dog tried to pull me down,

but when my little sister was on her feet, to my relief, he transferred his attentions to her,

when he had jumped at her and licked her several times, he turned round and ran away.

He's gone, I said, I'm so glad. But even as I spoke he was back again,

crouching at Patti's feet and glaring at her with eyes the colour of his ears.

Now Patti was very fond of animals, and when the dog looked at her, she looked at the dog,

and then she said to me, he wants us to go with him.

On which, as if he understood our language, although we were ignorant of his,

the spaniel sprang away and went off as hard as he could, and Patti and I went after him,

a dim hope crossing my mind. Perhaps Father Christmas has sent him for us.

This idea was rather favoured by the fact that the dog led us up the lane.

Only a little way, then he stopped by something lying in the ditch, and once more we cried in

the same breath, it's old Father Christmas. Returning from the hall, the old man had slipped upon

a bit of ice and lay stunned in the snow. Patti began to cry, I think he's dead, she sobbed.

He's so very old, I don't wonder, I murmured, but perhaps he's not our fetch Father.

My father and kitty were soon on the spot.

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Kitty was as strong as a man, and they carried far the Christmas between them into the kitchen.

There, he quickly revived. I must do Kitty the justice to say that she

did not utter a word of complaint at this disturbance of her labours,

and that she drew the old man's chair close up to the oven with her own hand.

She was so much affected by the behavior of his dog, that she admitted him even to the hearth,

on which, puss, being acute enough to see how matters stood, lay down with her back so close

to the spaniels that Kitty could not expel one without kicking both.

For our parts, we felt sadly anxious about the tree, otherwise we could have wished for no

better treat than to sit a Kitty's round table, taking tea with Father Christmas.

Our usual fare of thick bread and treacle was tonight exchanged for a delicious variety of cakes,

which won none the worst to us for being tasters and wasteers, that is little bits of dough or

shortbread put in to try the state of the oven, and certain cakes that had got broken or burnt in

the baking. Well, there we sat, helping Old Father Christmas to tea and cake, and wondering in our

hearts what could have become of the tree. But you see, young people, when I was a child,

parents were stricter than they are now, even before Kitty died, and she has been dead many

a long year, there was a change, and she said that children got to think anything became them.

I think we were taught more honest shame about certain things than I often see in little boys and

girls now. We were ashamed of boasting or being greedy or selfish. We were ashamed of asking for

anything that was not offered to us, and of interrupting grown-up people or talking about ourselves.

Why, papas and mamas nowadays seem quite proud to let their friends see how bold and greedy and

talkative their children can be. A lady said to me the other day,

you wouldn't believe Mr. Garble, how forward dear little Harry is for his age, he has his word in

everything, and is not a bit shy, and his papar never comes home from time, but Harry runs to ask

if he's brought him a present. Papar says he'll be the ruin of him.

Madam said I, even without your word for it, I am quite aware that your child is forward,

he is forward and greedy and intrusive as you justly point out, and I wish you joy of him when

those qualities are fully developed. I think his father's fears are well-founded.

But bless me, nowadays it's come and tell Mrs. Smith what a fine bore you are and how many

houses you can build with your bricks, or the dear child wants everything he sees, or

little pet never lets mamas alone for a minute, does she love? But in my young days it was

self-praises no recommendation. Is it getting used to tell me, or you're knocking too hard at

number one? As my father said when we talked about ourselves, or little boys should be seen but not

heard, as a rule of conduct in company, or don't ask for what you want, but take what's given you

and be grateful. And so you see, young people, Patty and I felt a delicacy in asking old father

Christmas about the tree. It was not until we had had tea three times round with tasters and

wasters to much. That Patty said very gently, it's quite dark now, and then she heaved a great sigh.

Burning anxiety overcame me, I lent towards father Christmas and shouted, I had found out that

it was needful to shout, I suppose the candles are on the tree now. Just about putting them on,

said father Christmas. And the presents too, said Patty. I, I, to be sure, said father Christmas,

and he smiled delightfully. I was thinking what further questions I might venture upon when he

pushed his cup towards Patty saying, since you are so pressing, Miss, I'll take another dish.

And Kitty, swooping on us from the oven cried, make yourself at home, sir, there's more where

these came from, make along our Miss Patty and hand-lamp cakes. So we had to devote ourselves to

the duties of the table, and Patty, holding the lid with one hand and pouring with the other,

supplied father Christmas's wants with a heavy heart. At last he was satisfied, I said grace,

during which he stood, and indeed he stood for some time afterwards with his eyes shut.

I fancy under the impression that I was still speaking. He had just said a fervent,

oh man, and receded himself, when my father put his head into the kitchen and made this remarkable

statement. Old father Christmas is sent a tree to the young people. Patty and I uttered a cry of

delight, and we forthwith danced around the old man saying, oh how nice, oh how kind of you,

which I think must have bewildered him, but he only smiled and nodded.

Come along, said my father, come children, come Ruben, come Kitty, and he went into the

parlour and we all followed him. My godmother's picture of a Christmas tree was very pretty,

and the flames of the candles were so naturally done in red and yellow that I always wondered that

they did not shine at night, but the picture was nothing to the reality.

We have been sitting almost in the dark. For, as Kitty said,

firelight was quite enough to burn at mealtimes, and when the parlor door was thrown open,

and the tree with lighted tapers on all the branches burst upon our view, the blaze was dazzling,

and through such a glory ran the little gifts, and the bags of coloured muslin with acid drops,

and pink rose drops and comforts inside, as I shall never forget.

We all got something, and Patty and I, at any rate, believed that the things came from the

stores of old father Christmas. We were not undissieved, even by his gratefully accepting a bundle

of old clothes, which had been hastily put together to form his present.

We were all very happy. Even Kitty, I think, though she kept her sleeves rolled up,

and seemed rather to grudge and join herself, a weak point in some energetic characters.

She went back to her oven before the lights were out, and the angel on the top of the tree was

taken down. She locked up our present, a little workbox at once. She often showed it off afterwards,

but it was kept in the same bit of tissue paper till she died. Our present certainly did not last

so long. The old man died about a week afterwards, so we never made his acquaintance as a common

personage. When he was buried, his little dog came to us. I suppose he remembered the hospitality

he had received. Patty adopted him, and he was very faithful. Puss always looked on him with

favour. I hoped, during our rambles together in the following summer, that he would lead us at last

to the cave where the Christmas trees addressed, but he never did.

Our parents often spoke of his late master as Old Ruben, but children are not easily

disabused of a favourite fancy, and in Patty's thoughts and in mine, the old man was long

gratefully remembered as Old Father Christmas.

End of Old Father Christmas by J.H. Ewing.

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