Evening Star Newspaper, December 23, 1928, Page 67

MAGAZINE SECTION he Sundwy Star. 1928, ILLUSTRATED FEATURES FICTION AND HUMOR Part 7—8 Pages SUNDAY MORNING, DECEMBER 23, Celebrating Christmas Aboard the Windj ammer Far From Port the ship had run under. From the poop, from the boom, wherever they had leaped when that torrential wave had come aboard, they saw nothing but a waste of white water and the stripped spars of the stunned ship protruding. We decided we were to die, but refused BY FRANK H. SHAW. (Author of “Knocking ,” *“The King- dom” and ““The Glory of Lols.") 0 spend Christmas | super-palatial days. et to find much dif- | Yuletide at Sea in Sailing Days a Time of Feasting Such as the Galley Afforded—Pretended Cheer to Hide Pangs of Home- ppen the: rence between a liner's celebra- ion and what you might expect to | ashore. You are assured of a | as dinner of almost overwhelm- | with turkey, roast- | g, mince pies and all Yuletide comitants in rare tion, prepared by the cunning of a chef who probably holds the | cordon bleu. { There are masqueraders and Christ- | mas trees, for both the children and the adults. There is every opportunity | 1o procure rich presents from the no- tions store. Fresh flowers—Christmas roses for preference—adorn every snowy, glittering table. Except under extreme \ conditions the rocklike steadiness of the ship will disabuse your mind of every impression of being afloat, and the trained choir of stewards will ren- der a moving program of carols to fetch back memories of Christmases past. But they won't—unless you have ex- | perienced the sensation — bring back | pictures of what a windjammer Christ- mas was like; because the flight of of time has brought about the extinc- tion of such stark functions. Let me | explain. | We certainly celebrated the festive dseason in those ancient, fighting days. ‘We usually made a point of a real slap- | dang celebratiol because Christmas | Jmeant a lot to us nderers who seldom, Af ever, spent Christmas at home, and 0 were compelled to exist on memories ~—those memories which thicken the throat and cause the eyes to smart. But not infrequently the celebrations were carried out under difficulties. If we had the good fortune to be in port, well and good—I have Christmased in 2 South Australian gulf, with the ther- mometer registering 125 degrees in the shade, and ourselves compelled to keep swimming all day in order to exist. I have also spent the day of days in even ' less appetizing circumstances—down the Easting; off the Horn; in that tempes- tuous Bay of Biscay which no longer possesses terrors for such as have their business in great waters, but which then was a lively menace to our peace of mind. The fattening of the pig was the| preliminary event when the festive | time approached. Mr. Murphy was to be the great piece de resistance, for he was the only item of fresh meat aboard, and after many months of salt feeding | we felt as if our very souls were caked in brine. So that the function of the Ppig's feeding was almost a rite, and we cheerfully saw the measly potatoes which should have formed hash for ourselves surrendered to gladden the | guzzling and unconscious potential sacrifice. If our daily ration of biscuit became smaller until it threatened to vanish .altogether, we did not grumble unduly, because we knew the flinty pantiles were being surrendered in the | good cause of Christmas faring. * % x X {BUT apart from this sacrificial prepa- ration there never was much sug- igestion of what one might designate the real Christmas spirit aboard the grubpy fwindjammer that was a month or two months, or maybe three, from port. fThe --hard-working, slave-driving mate esteemed the day a cursed nuisance, be- ‘cause even he couldn't force us to labor on that occasion, unless the actual safe working of the ship demanded it. For Christmas day was the one holiday pery mitted in those easeless days, when a day was presumed to possess 24 work- ing hours and a week seven working ays. - Iyt! is different now. Seamen adhere s closely as possible to trades union hours, and if the few exigencies of their calling infrequently demand labor ©t of hours, then overtime is payable ccording to schedule. But old wind- gammer sailors are likely to declare porrowfully that sailors have ceased to exist with the passing of the slave- griving windjammers, when men had to work or go under. Anyway, no mod- ern seafarer will ever realize the expec- tancy with which we of the near-for- gotten era looked forward to our annual celebration. For if Christmas day meant nothing else, it certainly meant a chance to eat to satiety of something novel in the way of food—fresh pork and the tasty odd- ments derivable from a porker prepared for immolation. Too, the flint-hard goul of the cheeseparing steward might conceivably be softened to the point of mdding extra delectable luxuribs, such Bs an extra ounce or two of so-called butter to eke out scanty ration that never would extend the expected week, try we ever so nobly to economize; or v maybe a slop or turnipy marmalade; or even, if the gods were propitious, & Bstful of soft cabin biscuit that to us meant more than all the Parisian pastry in the world. And the skipper might unbend to the | further exient of issuing a tot of rum. Df present giving, decorations or dress: Ing up in the accepted way there was likely to be no hint, any more than | there would be any Christmas letters or | yadio messages from friends at home $o cheer our loneliness. ® x X X {T'HE most vivid seafaring Christmas 14" in my memory found the weary old windjammer battling with a rip-snorter bf a Biscayan gale that was one of the fiercest in my wide experience. There was another spent off the Horn that almost epualed it, but not quite: on that day we had to share our dinner with the crew of a foundered ship we bad providentially been permitted to yescue after a pretty tough struggle, and the extra mouths made for lean faring. But perhaps the Biscay Christmas merits descrintion. We were homeward bound, but our hopes of reaching home in time for the function had been dashed by an annoy- ing sequence of calms and head winds a1 not so much pecause of the approach of Christmas as because of the honest homeward-bound wind that was thrust- ing us along. The mate—well, we always said that nothing created or uncreated could ever arouse a smile on that satur- nine face; but he certainly appeared less exacting and critical as the day of fes- | tivity approached. T THE pig was killed—not scientifically, not even humanely, I very much fear. For, the ship throwing herself about in a somewhat lively fashion, as the cook broke down his pen to allow himself entry—being himself at least as fat as Mr. Murphy—the pig seemed to realize the imminence of his doom; for he made a supreme effort and un- | moored himself; scrambled between the doctor’s legs and romped effortfully along the slanting, slippery decks. With ship-motion to help his own natural impetus, he shot aft like a cask; can- noned off the end of a spare spar, re- cannoned off a hatch corner, d then turned turtle in a scupper, where the perspiring cook fell upon him with a murderous yell and stabbed him to the heart. However, he was slain; that was really the main thing. He was cut up, with never a fragment of him permitted to go to waste, and we paraded before his Jjointed remains with rare hope of suc- culent faring, drawing each other’s at- tention to his fatness and the nice ap- portionment of the lean streaks. On Christmas eve, the wind freshen- ing in boisterous squalls and a_biggish Sea running up on our quarter, the mate felt the softening impulse of the season and decided the ship should be snugged and shortened so that the day need not be interfered with by such a thing as work. The glass, we afterward heard— although all details of navigation and apprehension and ship’s business gener- ally were religiously kept from us by the afterguard until the very worst was over—was tumbling down in an alarm- ing manner, in a way to indicate trou- ble of the Biscayan sort. We so much appreciated this condescension that we laughed and sang light-heartedly as we handled the upper sails and, working downward, furled the topgallantsails, picked up the great main course and put a reef in the fore topsail. This was something like a Christmas, we de- clared—all we should need to do would be to loaf and smoke and eat and re- cover from much eating. | By midnight the wind had freshened | to a three-quarter gale, still fair, kick- | ing up a brisk sea that roared up aft| with the thunder of countless Niagaras, poised, fell disappointed astern, gath- ered fresh impetus and thundered on again astern of the scudding fabric that seemed now to taste the first quick fears of what might lie ahead. | * k% % WITH both watches on deck the cap- tain decreed that the fore topsail should be furled and a reef put in the foresall, and this was done, not uncom- fortably, for the canvas was dry and negotiable. It is when the cloths are wet before the dinning gale that han- dling big sails becomes such an ordeal that the blood starts from broken fin- gertips and the skin is clawing hands. And Christmas day did not rightly start until daylight, so we had no kick coming. lurid, & ecrimson ‘The dawn was tragedy. Occasionally a black cloud, inky save where its edges we dirty brown, drooped lower and split and spilled its contents in gusty biting squalls, shot ‘hcross by weak lightning flashes, We were running through the beginning of a mighty gale, and these little gusts ‘and splashes were merely the overture's commencement—the tuning up, as it were, of the celestial orchestra. The daily rite of deck washing was abandoned, and we felt queerly idle, almost guiltily so. When morning coffee was served there was really nothing to do. Even the ceremonial of swigging everything taut and doubly taut was not demanded. The second mate, who had the dawn watch, leaned over the fife rail, smoking an unwonted pipe. He gave us a “Merry Christm: with a facetious grin and an upward look at the threatening sky. We tacked trom house corner to hatch corner, and thence by way'of the donkey engine'’s barrel, toward the galley, to preside over the preparations for the royal feast. Mr. Murphy was there, in segments; and the cook was stirring _enormous bowls of duff. We implored him to add an extra currant a bowl, and then we wakened up to the reality of leisure and began to sky- lark. To run aloft to a call of duty| vas an irk; today we inaugurated races | aloft—up the main to the dropped roval | yard, thence by the royal stay to the foretop; up the fore royal mast, down to the jostling bowspit, with a plug of sickness, and of Rest if the Pitiless Sea Did Not Decide to Turn It All Into a Day of Toil and Tragedy. E“TRAGED\' STRUCK THE SHIP, BUT WE HAD NO TIME TO APPRECIATE ITS GRIMNESS.” Drfawis ng made especially for this article by W. N. Wilson. ship’s tobacco as prize for the first to make the course. It was cold enough to make this vig- orous exercise a delight. We cavorted like monkeys among the denuded spars, daring one another to more risky feats. We slid down backstays, used the cross- tree outriggers for horizontal bars and somersaulted to our heart’s tent, for we were young and it was:'Christmas day and there was no work fo do, with promise of rich feeding to_come. ‘Then we quieted and descended to breakfast, which in no wise differed from a hundred prevlou‘:og:lkmémz cracker hash and acrid After breakfast the skipper's dgughter ap- peared at the door of our guarfers—a child of 7—bringing & box "of eigars; the steward followed her with a couple of bottles of rum. Glory be!: We lolled on the sea chests smoking the weeds with lordly enjoyment Christmases past. * ok ok X FANTAST!C though it may sound, the actual, ‘intangibly. -tangible Christmas spirit had reached us, lonely unit, out there in the heart of the clamorous bay. We dug out.our and talked of | most precious trifles for the child—a shawl bought abroad as a gift to some doxy at home—a cunning half model of the ship mounted on a fantastically Eflintcd board—the desire to give, which the ruling impulse of the season, quickened within us. The two watches, unemployed, fra- ternized, got to know each other; found mutual likings and detestations. | The port and starboard watches of a| windjammer at sea are almost abso< lute strangers—they lead a Box and| Cox existence, merely speaking to each | other in pasing. We played card| games, poker and euchre, for boxes of matches and figs of tobacco; the usual inhibition against us of the hnll-deck‘ intruding into the forecastles .was lifted; we invaded the sailors’ quarters, challenged them to gamble—and they | ridded us of all our matches and most | of our tobacco. We did not notice how the weather was worsening, although we did occasionally visit the galley to inspect proceedings there and sniff the rare incense of Mr. Murphy's cooking. Never had crackling shown so brown | and crisp! But when he was dissected and ap- portioned, we carried the messkits up hristmas hosts REVRVELVRVENR REREVENE BY ALFRED NOYES | six-inch gun. on high, wading through sluicing brine to our middles along the reeling deck and desperately afraid lest the sea should snatch our prizes from us. For we had finished with the overture to the gale, and were now fairly into the first movement of that crashing sym- phony of elemental riot. Just as we whetted our knives for the first carving, the foresail split from head rope to foot with the crack of a Instantly the ship lagged in -her impetuous stride, and & high piled following wave that had been chasing her for hours, poised, saw its opportunity and struck. It crashed on to the poop like an avalanche. It snapped the steering wheel neatly in two halves and hurled the helmsman, unconscious, to leeward in the swilling scuppers. The thud of the untended rudder and the shudder of the foremast as the great course tore itself to rags, seemed to set the ship frantic. She fell away from the wind, and almost broached to. Immediately the gale became a hurricane, because we were no longer running away from if. Captain and mate were at Christmas dinner below with the captain’s VEVEVEVRVEVEVRVE VRV EVRVER “Christmas Has Always Been Associated With Fire.Light, Candle-Lights, the Tapers on the Fir-Tree, and the Stars in the Sky} and One of Its Most Beautiful Old Names Was ‘The Feast of Lights'® wife and daughter. The second mate, pipe in mouth, had ' been leaning | against the doorpost of our quarters | aft, jollying us on our carnal appetites, jocosely asking. for' cfumbs from our rich table. He almost swallowed . his pipe as the shock came. 5 “Hell's bells—all hands!” he rasped. Some one chocked the kit containing |our portion of Mr. Murphy off in a bunk among the blankets. We did not even wait to don our oilskins. We for- got that we had been promised leisure this day of rejoicing—the ship was im- periled, and the bonds of discipline tautened instantly on us, Hungry we were, and disappointed; the most we could do was to dip our fingers into the gravy and suck them to get a fore- taste of the flavor. The great butter tins of duff were ignored; the mighty mince pie might never have been. In- dividual appetites must be sacrificed t?‘ ¢ the common need of the harassed ship. We went on.deck, into the screaming welter of a freshly furious squall that droned and shrilled, whipping off the tops of towering waves and - flinging them in solid spindrift wafts into our faces so that they cut like knives. The | second mate gained the poop in a stride | |and & jump and fought like a devil | with what remained of the wheel. | " We youngsters ran forward, gather- ing up the aroused deckhands as we went, and fastened onto the gear of the rioting foresail. One voluminous flap snapped the chain forestack like pack- thread, just as Svensen, a Scandinavian deck hand, was about to take a turn| with the lazy tack to allow the chain | to be unhooked, and the iron clew of | the sall whipped past him. It did no more than flick his sou'wester crown, but it lifted the top of his skull from him as the top is lifted from an egg. Tragedy struck the ship, but we had no time to appreciate its grimness. We | fought the snapping, murderous clew of | the fore-course, yelling and cursing on the clewline; dodging as we hauled; and | after strenuous effort we got the thing | quiet. | BUT instead of furling the sail and | leaving it at that, the skipper, dis- | gruntled probably at the interruption to his Christmas feasting, ordained that a new sail should be got up and bent forthwith, as, the wind continuing fair, we must needs take advantage of its vigor. Furthermose, the damaged wheel would be repaired forthwith by means | of handspikes lashed across what re- | mained of it, and all thought of | Christmas celebrations would be stowed | away until the ship was once more in | fighting trim. |~ “We moved about the necessary labors | like men moving through tragedy: with ! memory of dead Svenson to sadden us. He was a good man, strong as a bull, i as useful as a whole watch on a hal- | yard, a good shipmate, able to sing a ! sentimental song with the best in the | second dog watch, with a trick of | carving ship models and a predilection | for talking in the sea’s lingua franca of | a flaxen-haired maiden awaiting his re- | | turn in some stark Norse fjord. And he | was dead—snatched from life like the blowing out of a match. Bending sail—especialiy such a heavy | one as a fore-course—is no light matter even in fine weather; with the ship going mad and white water striking everywhere, the task became a night- mare of blind effort. The old frantic program of toil settled down on the Christmas ship. We forgot our recent bonhomie, our careless jests and our | heart-warming memories. Christmas! | The pitiless sea recognized no such truce; it probably thought it had caught us in an unguarded moment and was | | anxious to wreak a retarded vengeance | on the men and the fabric who had | | braved its rigors for many blnhngi * oK X * years. ! Daylight faded prematurely from the glooming sky as we labored. Ere the final yellow, livid streaks died we, work- | ing aloft, saw a heart-stopping picture | down to leeward. A first-rate battle- | ship was laboring woundily in the deep- | er troughs, her funnels®had gone by the board; she was washed fore and aft like a half-tide rock. We scudded on; it was impossible even to read her sig- nals, supposing she had flung any bu ing to the gale. If & 20,000-ton battle ship could suffer so, what chance had we—a mere wisp of 1,800 tons, with no steam to help us? ‘Worn, dlmpmmted. sore and salt| soaked, we ultimately descended—to a | fresh orgy of toil. There was so much to_be done—so terribly guch. For the gale was increasing still and the ship | was imperiled. Everything, so we gath- ered, depended on that fag of & top- gallant sail; would it hold together suf- ficiently to keep us scudding away from | those devastating seas? It was now im- possible to think of bending a substi- | tute; human toil could not. master the | hostility of the. furious wind. | * ok K K - G EEP aft here, all hands!” was the | order, Four men were at the wrecked helm, stripped and sweating, as they humored the riotous fabric| through her worst, flurries. White water | roared up astern, towered, fell—missed us or caught us. The ship writhed, but she was splendid in her frenzies of battling effort. She scudded like a scalded cat, hurrying with tremors from the savagery of the tumultuous waves. “Watch below. Go below and get your dinner! Keep handy for a call!” We of the starbowlines fought a way below, ravenous. The cold and unpalatable ruins of Mr. Murphy had been spilled from the bunk wherein they had been cached and, together with the puddings, were swilling about the door in a foot of greasy, filthy brine! Gloomily we | realized that our Christmas dinner w: to be a feast of Dead Sea fruit, no more. | We recovered what we could, cleansed it as best we might, and as we com- menced to eat the ship suddenly stopped dead; there was a roar, a blow! “Look out; she's going down! Open that door!” The door refused to open, | jammed fast by the weight of water | that filled the decks. Those who had | remained in the open told us afterward | they were certain the end had come; to take it cowardliwise. “Get that skylight up!” It was cov- ered and battened, but our weight tare the canvas adrift; as the leaf of the sea window lifted a little water cas< caded down. “God! she's under!” There seemed nothing to do. Escape was forbidden and we were condemned to die in the noisy dark. The ship was inert, killed. We heard the life- boats crunch to splinters on either side of the deckhouse. They could not have lived an instant in that boiling horror had they remained intact. Mark now the glory of that ship! We felt her give a little, tentative shake, as it were a flirt of her deflant tail. She settled back, sluggish and stunned still, as more big water surged over her. She quivered afresh, with greater ve- hemence, indignant at her thralldom. She cowered back—watching her op- portunity. She advanced sideways, lift- ed a little, shook herself a little more. Then she roared up from her down- bearing—frantic, vigorous—determined to maintain her record for fighting quality. She stormed forward, a roaring war- rior, indomitable. She'd matched her cunning against the bitter enmity of the sea and she'd won. She hounded forward like a scared gull, treading down the snorting combers. She writhed and pitched, she rolled and staggered, but she raced on, thunderous in her splendor. She shook herself free of that impossible weight of water and allowed us to reach the open. We made a breathless way to the compan- ionship of our fellows, clinging to the rigging, astride the booms, cowered on the chart house top. They told us in gasps that as the great wave struck rockets had been seen flarmg into the screaming sky—then had ceased. Some unknown ship had fared worse than we, but we could do nothing. We could only hold on and continue the fight to best of our ability —hopeless men. And Christmas day was past and gone before we had the ship victorious. We ate the sodden, tasteless pork funereally, relishing it not at all. But the ship had bestowed on us the Christmas gift of life, thanks to the glorious ship! Oldest Christmas Tree. BY ISABELLE FLORENCE STORY. 'HE oldest Christmas tree the world has ever known is the Gen. Grant tree, a hoary old sequoia giant growing on the Pacific slopes of California’s Sierra Nevada. Three years ago this tree was dedicated as the “Nation's Christmas Tree” and interesting cere- monies held at its base at noon on Christmas day. So successful was the first celebration that it became an an- nual event and this year the fourth an- nual program bids fair to surpass all that have gone before. Last vear's ceremonies were the most impressive vet held. In the presence of over 1000 people A message was read from President Coolidge carrying the greetings of the Nation's Chief Ex- ecutive to the people of the West, and Gov. Young of California made the principal address. In addition to these two features and the invocation and benediction by visiting clergymen, the program included musical selections consisting of carols, solos and choral numbers. Since the Gen. Grant tree is located in a npational park, the park superintendent, Col. John R. White, gave the address of welcome. It was desired to broadcast this pro- gram, but mechanical difficulties de- veloped in getting a radio hook-up into the High Sierra, where Gen. Grant Park is located. Therefore, a duplicat: program was given at San Francis~o and broadcast, reaching a possibi: audience of 16.000,000 people. ‘The old tree, which now forms the central feature of this Christmas cele- bration, was already a mature tree per- haps 2,000 years when the star led the shepherds and wise men to Bethlehem. It was taller then than now, for it was in its early maturity and who knows but that its highest branches, reaching hundreds of feet toward the sky, caught a gleam from the brilliant star as it sped on its way toward Bethlehem? Although now estimated as Ssome- where between 3,000 and 4,000 years of age, and perhaps older, the ancient trze is still vigorous. It is now 266.6 feet in height, despite the fact that its top- most branches long ago were struck by lightning and torn off. How much higher it once was. no one knows. Dur- ing the course of the centuries many fires caused by lightning have scarred its sturdy trunk and killed some of its branches. At its greatest base diameter the tree measures 40.3 feet, but it nar- rows in to 21.7 feet in diameter above the bulge, ‘The species to which this tree be- longs is the Sequoia gigantea, popularly referred to as the “Big Trees.” Now they grow nowhere else but on the Pacific slope of the Sierra Nevada mountain range in California, although scientific investigations of fossil tree deposits show that centuries ago, possibly in prehistoric times, when a milder climate prevailed, they occurred in many widely separated places, ranging from what is now Yellowstone National Park to Asia. The age of the Big Trees is not a mat- ter of conjecture. Trees that have fallen from natural causes have been sawed across and a count made of their rings, each of which indicates a year in the life history of the tree, On one fallen monarch of the forest, John Muir, the famous naturalist, actually counted DELEVEVERVEVEVRVEVEVEVEREDEER 4,000 rings, and trees showing an age of 2500 years are not uncommon. Prof. Ellsworth Huntington of Yale made a study of the Big Trees several years ago and gave us some interesting figures. He states that among the down trees he studied, 79 were over 2,000 years of age, 3 were over 3,000 and 1 was a veteran of 3,150 years. It is by comparison with these trees of which the age is known, and studying the rate of growth of the young trees, that the age of the older living sequoias is estima.ad. In order to protect the last of the Big Trees the Government has estab- lished two nstional parks, Sequoia and Gen. Grant, -ontaining some of the most interesting groves pow left. In | Sequoia National Park:, sbne there are scores of sequoia t-ees 20 to 30 feet in diameter, with a few still larger, and thousands with a diameter of more than 10 feet. This park contains the Gen. Sherman tree, considered the largest of them all. Gen. Grant Park, an area of only 4 square miles, contains a magnificent grove of sequoias in addition to the one for which it is named. There are also three groves of the Big Trees in the Yosemite Na- tional Park. One of them contains the famous Wawona tree, through which a motor road runs. in the equat tudes and. though | we had been four months on the voyage, | we saw no prespect of making port be- | fore New Year. Not all the whistling in the world had brought the desired fresh breczes in the tropics, but as we hounded north, the good northeast trade that we hand found quickened end took to itself the vigorous note of Etorm. Two days be Long since, around the red coal fire. S When even the old were young, = ’ And Waits would trudge through miles of ‘mire For joys of the songs they sung, A strange old folk would make them merry Because of a star on high And one immortal Child of Heaven Who came on earth to die. Oh, night of bitter “pain! Oh, world" by ‘travail torn! Shall angels_sing, again Because Thy Light is born, To shine once more, and set Once more—on- Olivet, sre December 25 we were | flaynting and skyscrapers, with | kites evervwhere it was possible to set | them; romping northward at an eleven- knot clip and not being unduly troubled by it. It was for all the world as if the honest fabric shared our desires to reach home in time, and was putting her best foot forcmost to fulfill our hopes. sented a glorious picture as, robe clamorous white from truck to ay, she recled off the boisterous knc at left the wallowing tramp freighters, sullying the sky with their smoke clouds, hopelessly astern The pig was fatted to perfection; he was so fat that he could barely move and the rats used him as permanent pastures without his noticing their at- tacks to any great extent. The steward, unbending, talked largely of Christmas duff and perhaps mince pies; with a treasure of desscrt to follow, and brandy sauce to add the seasonable flavor to it He spent much time in the galley, close conference with the “doctor’— ho was colored and enthusiastic, even ies in the culinary art., reasingly genial— The young ghosts gather at our side. Their faces lift and glow, Rapt in a deeper Christmastide Thgn gods or angels know. What god has ever tasted death And seen no hope on high, As these, without one glimpse beyond, Marched thro' the dark to die? It was the Feast of Pights— (Draw close around the fire!) On that strange night of nights Was born the World's Desire— (Shut out the dark; and yet- Can our dark hearts forget?) sh A deeper tale, a stranger song Has hushed our mirth tonight. We cannot hear that hcavenly throng, Or see that ancient Light. There is a memory in the cup; And, in the dark, a cry For all those myriads of the young Who come on earth to die. A On this new Feast of Lights, Draw close around the fire. On this new night of mights Is born the World's Desire. Though Christ had not been born Tomorrow is Christmas morn. i iy il Fishing for Something. “What are you fishing for, little boy “Whales.” “But there are no whales in this w“No. nor anything else, so I might Just ‘ well fish for whales” Iw&wwwwwwwwwwww RRERERVERERVERERRVERERER %m%zfi?%%mwm*@fi