The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 25, 1896, Page 23

THE FRANCISCO CALL, FRIDAY, DECEMBER 25, 1896 21 earth, To-morrow we will rise to find the trees trimmed as we never can trim our Christrzas tree, and the whole world will be white. We shall not be buried. ‘We do not go toextremes. A foot of good solid snow is plenty for sleighing and coasting, and'it passes off without floods. NE might write a story and call it @K “A New England Christmas,’’ or N another and call it “A Southern €kristmas,” but who couid write & single | children begin to wish it would snow be- ' all night the sc{: whiteness description and call it “A California | fore Christmas and the granamas repeat | down and heap itself above the brown Christmas”? We have all kinds and original brands of our own besides. In the sunny southland there is the Christmas of hirds and flowers, of Eastern | tourists and balmy sunshine. In the middle comes a Christmas of velvet lawns, odorous violets, gorgeous chrysanthe- mums and perbaps a rain, but who in fan Francisco minds rain? Then up in the mountains comes, most beautiful of all to some of us, the white Christmas ol the | north, It1s winter, but not the steady winter | of the East. The snow has been down | and set its seal on the valley and the hill- | sides are leafless, but the white king has | | retreated to his mountains again and the | | fields are growing green. The jall-sown wheat peeps up and the grass of the pas- ture land sbows its color boldly. The | erystal they are almost invisible. | the doorstep and the old adage about a green Christmas and a fat churchyard. A week before the wonderful day a soff, sighing wind comes over the valley. The sun still shines warm and clear and the leafless branches hardly shake. But ever and again through the day comes that gentle sigh, All day we hear it, and at night the sigh turns to a steady whisper ana now and then a moan. The next day the wind grows steady and sweeps over the valley with a steady mur- mur, In the afternoon comes a white haze over the mountain tops and we know the snow is falling there. Still our fields show green, and still we have no storm. The third day the weatherwise children announce that *it's going to snow this afternoon,” and lessons are forgotten as they watch the white veil creeping, creep- ing, ever so slowly across the slopes down into the valiey, hiding all it covers. The little town across the flat disap- pears in white mist; the passing trainis heard but not seen; first one fence and then another is swallowed; and then—it comes. The first flakes are sp smal! and Soon the fenceposts are | furred with white, then the little ones | call them *frosted cakes,” as the flakes grow larger, whiter, more plentifal. The snow has come. Al atternoon and will float Tne chilaren will- clasp the soft, dry beauty with happy red hands, and will = fall down to embrace it and make pictures of themselves in the yielding surface. Boys will bring out sleds and men will begin to furbish up the sleigh so long idle, and eyes will glitter to rival the glistening snow. A joy forany time, but doubly a joy at Christmas. Where have the hummocks and hollows of the valley gone? Where are thie patches of rock land amid the field? All gone. Covered with a white shielding mantle. The vale is one level sheet of white. The pines hang heavy limbs piled high, and the manzanitas are only mounds of white, the forest graves, The bare twigs of oak show through, and the shaggy juniper re- fuses to be decked except in spots. The relatives will come from higher in | the hills and from other valleys in sleighs with jingling chimes or maybe only the humble sheep-bell tied to Dobbin’s neck. The soad across the hill will seem all new with its white dress; the cotton-tails will stand and gaze fearlessly, and the trees will drop co'd, clammy greeting if they are roughly touched. The world seems listening, so still it is; the glad voices ringing far across the flat, and the deep puff, puff of the engine four miles off comes plain to our ears. Christmas. It fits with turkey, mince pie and tales of Saunta Claus. OQur snow is all- a joy and never a men- ace. We know that in a month from now the sleighing and the coasting will be but a memory and that children hunting the first wild flowers on the hill will come up- on the dead brands of the bonfire they coasted by and exchange reminiscences of “the fun we had last Christmas when it snowed.” A white Christmas near glorious Shasta is fraught with pleasures galore. Or1ve HEYDEN. Yreks, Cal. Btovy of Bt. N('(holay.’ Popularly Known Among the hitt]e’ Folks as Santa Claus. By Mgs. F. K. Bextz. The memory of St. Nicholas, popularly known among the little folks as Santa Claus, and whose name is so closely asso- ciated with the festivities of Christmas, was born at Patara in Lycia, and though alayman was for his piety advanced to the bishopric of Myra. He died on the 8th of the ides of December A, D. 343. In | the Roman calendar his feastis marked for the 6ih of December. Many are the legends entwined with the name of St. Nicholas. He is the patron of schoolboys, | mariners, clerks, nay, even robbers, while | virgins do him special honor, and littte | children in the olden time, as_well as 1n the present day, locked up to him as the donor of sweetmeats and pretty things. | The fame of St. Nicholas’ virtues was so great that ar Asiatic gentlemen, on send- | ing his two sons to Athens for education, | ordered them to call on the Bishop for his Truly this is | benediction ; but they getting to Myra late in the day thought proper fo defer their visit till the morrow, and took up their lodgings at an inn, where the landlord, to secure their - baggage and effects to himself, | Nichelas murdered them in their{ sleep, and then cut them into pieces, salt- ing them and putting them into a pickling- tub with some pork which was there already, meaning to seil the whole as such., The Bisnop, however, having had a vision of this impious transaction, im- mediately resorted to the inn and calling the host to him reproached him for his horrig villainy, The man, perceiving that he was discovered, confessed his crime and entreated the Bishop to inter- cede on his behalf to the Almighty for his pardon, and the good Bishop, being moved with compassion at his contrite behavior, confession and thor- ough repentance, besought. the Almighty not only to pardon the murderer but also for the glory of his name to restore life to the two innocents who had been so in- humanly put to death, The saint had hardly finished his prayer when tke two vouths were restored to life. Somc writers hold this to be a suflicient explanation of ing of the little folks from the fact that it was customary in many countries of Kurope for parents on the vigil of St. Nicholas to convey presents of various kinds to their little sons and daughters, who were taught to beiicve that they owed them to the kindness of St. Nicholas and his train, who, going up and aown among the towns and villages, came in at the windows, though they were shut, and dis- tributed them. This legend has been poetically perpetuated in verse, and in the well-known Christmas em, ‘*'Twas the night before Christmas: "'etc., St. Nicholas and his train of tiny reindeer are charm- ingly described. “The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, in hopes that Saint Nicholas soon would be there.” This popular custom undoubtedly origin- ated in the old convents of Europe, where it was customary on the eve of Saint Nicholas for the boarders (young lady pupils) to place each a silk stocking at the the naked children and tub, which are the | door of the apartment of the abbess, with well-known emblems of 8t. Nicholas, and from this circomstance St. Nicholas be- came tke patron of scholars. The mariners also venerated him and sought his protec- tion in the hour of danger. Armstrongin his “History of Minorca” (1756) writes of Cindadella: **Near the entrance of the harbor stands a chapel, dedicated to St. Nicholas, to which the sailors resort that have suffered shipwreck, to return taanks for their | preservation and to hang up votive pic- tures (representing the danger they have escaped) in gratitude to the saint for the protection he vouchsafed them and in ac- complishment of the vows they made in the height of the storm.” Anotherlegend tells how St. Nicholas appeared on the waters to some mariners and saved them from an ocean grave. From the circum- stance of scholars being anciently de- nominated clerks the fraternity of Par- 1sh Clerks adopted St. Nicholas as their patron. In Bhakespeare robbers are called St. Nicholas’ clerks. They were alsocalled St. Nicholas’ knights. the patron saint of scholars and Nicholas, or Old Nick, 8 cant name for the devil, this equivocal patronage may possibly be solved; or, perhaps, it may be much bet- ter accounted for by the story of St and the thieves, whom he compelled to restore some stolen goods and then converted to a pious life. St. Nicholas being | Y a piece of paper inclosed, recommending themselves to *“‘Great St.. Nicholas of Her Chamber,” and the next day they were called together to witness the saint’s at- tention, who never failea to fill the silken stockings with sweetmeats and other trifles of that kind with which they made a gen- eral feast. These are some of the principal legends associated with the memory of Saint Nicholas, so deur to the childish heart under the popular name of Santa Claus. Meditations of a Wall Flower. Is it wicked to sympathize with a man who does not make a good husband? ‘What makes your mother cross when you say you believe in giving men a great deal of liberty? When the wife of the man you used to like has sprained her ankle why do you ask them to dinner? When you meet your brother driving with a person why doesn’t he see you? Why is he deferential afterward? ‘What makes you believe a stupid man must be worse than he seems? What makes you think a bright man can’t be so bad as he seems?—New York Press. e The money deposited in the corner- stone of a new church at London, Ont., excited the cupidity of some mean thieves St. Nicholas probably became the darl-| and they stole it. Literary Value of The Story of Christ By James ‘Whatever one may believe or disbelieve as to the sacredness or divine origin of the Christian Bible, no one who considers its style of litetary composition thoughtfully will demur from the verdict of its une- qualed merit that has already been passed upon it by many masters of Western liter- ature. And of all the Christian Scriptures there is none that surpasses in dramatic element or in classic simplicity and dig- nity of style that part of the New Testa- ment wherein is related the tale of the | Christ. The story itself—laying aside for the time the question of 1ts miracles and mar- | vels—is one of keenest human interest. Imagine, if we can, that the story of the Christ were to be published to the world to-day for the first time, say in the form of a pretty holiday romance. Then it might be viewed and criticized, and, re- viewed merely as a literary production. ‘Would it not at once be pronounced the work of 8 master in fiction? Would it not “be read and reread by old and young purely for its merit as a fascinaiing work of literary art—always supposing, of course, that the narrative were presented in the same pleasing garb of dramatic form and classic style as we find it re- corded in the Bible by the four evangel- ists. Consider the story itself. What de- lightful touches of realism and idealism are mingled in the simple narrative of the carpenter’s son who came to be crucified for bis greatness and goodness. From first to last it is a forceful romance, full of human passion, human weakness, human treachery and humar strength and great- ness. It lacks nothingin local coloring, though only a bere word, or at most some simple interpolating phrase here and there throughout the long drama, is em- ployed to portray it. In plot, incident and action there is nothing to be desired. | in no other story is there so lovable a hero. The treachery of Judas is not excelled in fiction. The chief charac- ters in the drama are portrayed with care- ful, painsteking fidelity, though one does not realize this fact until he has studied thoughtfully the eatire narrative. And herein is the greatest of art—the kind of art that conceals its own art. And the slory reads along as though its writing had been but a pleasing pastime to those who gave the world its written siory of the life of Christ. Consider the directness, strength and simpticity of its art in literary composi- tion. Take the narrative written by one of the four chief biographers of Jesus. The merit of all their work is equal, though each book has its own character- istic features. Of them all Luke is said to have been the most learned, and his work is considerably more exhaustive. He was a Gentile, born at Antioch, and was fora long time the friend and companion of Paul. He does not claim to have been a witne:s of the things that he wrote, but is said to have derived his knowledge directly from those who were witnesses, “There is no labored introduction to the book of Luke and no attempt is made at fine writing. In four terse sentences at the beginning of his book Luke tells wh? he was moved to write. Succeeding this brief preface, in the next six lines the author introduces to his readers the two H. Griffes | chief characterg of his opening verses. | “There was in the days of H-rod, the | King of Judea, a ceriain priest named | Zacharias,” says Luke, and therein he has ‘\ said more and proceeded farther along in | his narrative than any other author since | him could have done in as many long ! paragraphs as there are words in his sen- | tences. From first to last you will not find a single instance wherein the author has attempted to express more than one prop- osition in one sentence. Let any writer who thinks this an easy task attempt it for himself. He will find it one of the most difficult things in composition; he will find it, it is almost safe to say, an | utter impossibility to preserve this quality of unity throughout any lengthy descrip- tion or narrative. In power and forcefulness the writings of 8t. John stand pre-eminent,and nowhere else in literature is there a better ex- emplification of the fact that brev- ity and terseness of style makes for beauty and strength of expres- sion.* Consider the opening paragraph of John: *“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” In these simple, forceful words there is a wealth of eloguence and power that basnot been equaled by any other writer. In the same chapter John de- scribes the whole meaning of the life of | Christ in eleven words, “‘He came to his larly enough, his is the only one of the four Gospels the autheniicity ot which has never been questioned by the most pro-4 found and critical of the theological scholars, Yet John was a man utterly without education. He was a fisherman and was mending his nets on the shores of Galilee when he first met the Carpenter’s Son. To speak of 2 man as being uneducated in these latter centuries of the Christian era means as a rule that he lacks the higher or classical education, but in the first century after Christ that man was famously educated who could but read and write. How John could have written his wonderful narrative of the life of Christ is a mystery indeed. Even in our own day the fishermen who can read and write are very far from being qualified to engage in the simplest kind of literary enterprise. Buthere was a lowly fisherman who be- carae the biographer of the greatest figure and personality known to the Western world, and his account stands out among all theothers as remarkable for its strength and purity of literary constraction. Matthew was a tax-gatherer, and of course a man of considerable learning for those days. His life of Christ . lacks somewhat of combining all the qualities that are perfected in the book of Luke, and his style, though at all times pleas- ing and original, is also at times uneven, and those who are critically inclined might pick a flaw with some of his verses on the charge of tautology. Bt the most critical of all critics must admit that asa whole Matthew’s version of the Sermon on the Mount is an incomparably beau- tiful literary production. The value of the story of Jesus does not, however, rest entirely upon its classical conformity, its purity, its beauty and its strength of technical literary construc- tion. Technical greatness alone is not true greatness, and there must be some- thing more than technical accuracy to make lasting any work of art. Of course the biographers of Jesus were particularly fortunate in the subject about which they wrote, even for a time laying aside the question—or the fact, as one may view it— of his divine and miraculous origin. But while this is true, it is also a fact that his biographers were poetsand artists of rare perception, as well as mere biog- raphers, for not one of them but seems to have had the genius of literary discrimin- ation; the facuity of knowing what to write and what not to write; the power of enlarging and drawing out the most dra- matic incidents in the character of their hero. It wasa character rich in material for both the artist and the poet, and it seems as though these early writers lost not a word, incident or scene of real dra- matic, historic and romantic interest. As tae life of Jesus is told by Matthew, by Luke or by John, and even to a very large extent by Mark, this carpenter’s son set every chord of humanity in vibration. His touch was upon the entire range of passions and emotions and inner aspira- tions, snd the whole octave of human sympathnies were awakened by his master hand. And in saying all of this one does not vitiate or weaken or detract from, in the slightest degree, the religious and the dogmatic estimation in which the story of the Christ is held by the churches. Handshaking came into vogue during the reign of Henry II in England. own, and his own received him not.”’ Herein is summed up the whole story of the Christ. In the fifth chapter, in describing the departure of Jesus from Galilee, the fare- well feast that was given him, and his subsequent departure for Jerusalem, the author says: ‘‘After this, there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.” And therein is a long jour- ney described, or at Jeast told as forcibly and as clearly as thongh many thousands of words had been used in the description. The literary value of the tale of Christ may or may not be due in some measure to those who translated the evangelical writings from the original manuscripts. This is a question, however, that it is a waste of time to inquire into, and the fact remains that no transiator has ever yet lived who could produce a great and last- ing piece of work from an indifferent original. On the contrary, however, it is true that some of the masterpieces of literature have been sadiy marred by the vandal hand of indifferent transiators, and it is also troe that the very best of translations always fall short of doing entire justice to the original production. And while all honor may be due to the early translators of the story of the life of Christ the fact remains that the original biographers produced mcnumental works that have not since been ¢qualed by the greatest ol writers and, it is safe to say, will never be excelled. When it is con- sidered that at the period when these four books were writtea (during t e first century of the Christian era) printing was unknown and that even the art of a very laborious and complicated system of penmanship was a remarkably rare ac- complishment, one begins to marve! at the wonderful character of the literary works produced by these men. Especially is this ] the case with Evangelist John, and, singu. Christmas eve scores of little brass- bound apprentices on ships now in port received a dollar each with which to enjoy the great holiday. To the average San Francisco pleasure-seeker this may seem a small amount, but those boys will spend the whole of the feast day enjoying themselves, and will then have some left. In years gone by I bave spent many holidays in this port on one dollar, and persuaded myself that I nad had a good time. That is to say, that one dollar is the general limit of the captain’s gene- rosity on such occasions, put the lads bave discovered a way to outwit the cap- tain. In the first place, they will pour into their commander’s ear a tale of woe about their lack of'clothing, want of soap, need of tableware, and other complaints, until he is persnaded to make an agree- ment with some water-front tailor to let the boys have about ten doilars’ worth of goods each, for which he will be responsi- ble and which he will charge up to their account. On leaving the ship the boys wiil at once proceed to their tailor and will make a flat-footed proposition to him to sell their ten dollars’ worth of credit for anything they can get. 'he tailor will tell the boys that he has to pay the captain 40 per cent commission for the privilege of having the ship’s crew for customers. This is a little steep, but 25 per cent is an average figure. Then the dealer will tell the boys that, as arule, about one-half of the customers run away from their ships before the vessel sails, in which event the tailor loses the amount of his bill. Onthisshowing he will persuade the boys that it is about the right thing to give them $2 25 in return for their signature to a $10 bill of goods. It being a case of Hobson’s choice the boys compro- mise with the amount named and two or three Chinese cigars thrown in, the tailor suggesting that the gift of the cigarsisa dead loss to him and is only indulged in for the purpose of securing the trade of the young gentlemen when they again come into port. Armed with $3 25 the apprentices then proceed to have a main royal time. Al- though they have probably just lett their supper table their first point of attack will be a restaurant where each will drink about three cups of coffee and eat about twelve varieties of dyspeptic confection- ery. This will cost them on an average about tour bits each, and then they will proceed to take in all the free shows on Kearny street and Montgomery avenue, and probably by way of variety they will spend half an hour in the reading-room attached to the Mariders’ Church, and when they leave each will be carrving several copies of some sectarian magazine. On Christmas day a dime will invariably be blown in for a trip to Golden Gate Park. The park has great attractions for the sailor boys, and they can always be found around the moiky-house and the birdhouse, surrounded by an open- mouthed, credulous crowd listening to their tales of the remarkable monkeys and birds that they have seen and caught and tamed and eaten and been attacked by in all manner of foreign countries. A seat in the gallery of a theater will certainly take | a portion of their money, for there are no boys in the world who appreciate a theater more than sailor boys. They would cruise around the world to see a ballet. How the Captain’s Dollar Is Increased By S. W. Booth On Christmas evening thers is pretty sureto be a dinner given to them by some one of the societies that make a special effort of looking after the sailors’ inter- ests. These feeds are always good, and as & rule modest young ladies take the part of waitresses, and the absent boys feel for a couple of hours as though they really did havs some friends in the un- sociable port of San Francisco. After the dinner comes an entertainment, at the close of which another attack will be made on a restaurant. Not content with filling themselves with as much as they can eat the aporentice will have an eye to the future. He will watch his oppore tunity, and when no proprietor or waiter is looking .in his direction he will empty the sugar-bowl in a paper bag which he had in his pocket for that very purpose. This will greatly help out his whack for the weex and make it unnecessary for him to beg a few extra sweetenings from the steward or obtain them from one of the crew in return for a new shirt orsomething of equal value. Before goingon board it is the invariable rule to compare funds and see who shall purchase the rooty for coffee early the next morning. A rooty is the sailor’s name for a loaf of broad, ana while in port the apprentices always take care that there is soft tack for the early morning meal. When all these things and their expenses have been summed up each boy finds that he has spent a happy Christmas on about a $150, and still has something left for the coming Sunday. ‘When polishing the brasswork the next mvorning the captain, if he be a genial kind of a fellow, will ask the lads what they did on Christmas day, and when they have completed their narration he wili wonder how 1in the world they accomplished so mach on a dollar. This is not a sailor’s yarn, but an expe- rience that all the boys on our ship went through many times. Experts as Egg-Eaters. “Do you like egas?” was the question that stirred up a ‘‘’49-er” to make some talk in a Bangar store the other day. He wasan old man and he straightened up to something like the height of his prime as he answered : “I had a surfeit of them once. 'Twas many years ago when I was on the way home from California. We left the isth- must on a good brig bound for New York, but ran into a coral reef in the Caribbean Sea and were wrecked. It was a patch of sand just out of the water, but you ought to see the flocks of seafowl that nestled on it! They had to move out of the way to give us room to stay there and that was about all they woula do. Their nests were everywhere and there were eggs in abund- ance. We ate about a barrel of them every day during the twelve days we were there. “Some of us got off in a boat and went to S8an Juan, in Nicaragua, where we got a vessel to go after those we leit on the reef. That vessel was commanded by William Lawrence of Bath, who was killed by a man named Wilkinson while he was & policeman there. We tried to get to the reef, but bad weather stove us upso we had to set in for New Orleans, where we found the rest of the men rescued by an- other vessel; but eges—'" the old man’s face took on a peculiar expression,—Lew= iston (Me.) Journal.