The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 16, 1900, Page 22

(3] » THE SU AY CALL ma ol s 2he - of “h show. Perhaps I Ger e eye, the sun; who wears the gray hat of clouds and the blue cloak of storm; who blesses the field and gives victory; who is ther the giver wof all good things. During these twelve days all work ceased, 2ll fizhting was interrupted: it was a time Mo dedicatea to the greatest god. Great joy reigned in the streets and in the houses, where every guest was welcome. A great Christmas log burned in the chimney: it was allowed to get it In the woods with- out belng sccused of theft. The rooms were adorned with green branches, which were necessarily taken from fir trees, as they were the cnly ones to be had at thag season, A boar was roasted for the meal. The reason why this feast was celebrated at this particular fitrlod is evidently the \ S A\\\\\ raturn of the sun to the earth. The shortest day Is over, the days begin again to lergthen and this is an event of im- portance for the Inhabitants of a northern cltme. The “Jul festival ts the feast of th® returning sun. The popular idea was that at that time the gods came down upon the earth to bless humanity. Saérifices were made in their honor, things were brought out for them to bless—for instance water. which was then considered as consecrated when our forefathers were Christlanized—we intentionally use this expression, because many of these were brought to the new religian by ot Charlemagne foree erms, {t ( \ DN N AR R SR NN SN 8 N\ N obliging them with tne swora o be oap- tized in the river EIb—{t was natural that they. did not like to give up this, their cherished time of rejoicing. And were there not many things which made it easy to chauge it into & Christian festi- val? Why has the Christlan church chosen the 2t(h of December for the cele- bration of the nativity? Is it not be- cause of the symbol that Christ is the spiritual sun who makes an end to the darkness of this earth? When the days diminish again—June 24th—we remember John the Baptist, who said, “I must de- crease, but he must increas When the long winter nights have reached their longest we celebrate the coming of him who calls himself “the light of the world.” So very naturall:” the old heathen “Jul" into feast was gradually transformed Christmas. ‘What our heathen f fathers only fancied. that their gods visit- ed the earth in that night, has become true when the son of God became man at Bethlehem. The imagined blessings of the god Wodan became real when God visited his people A reminder of the old name is to be found in one joke which is still some- times made at Christmas. A present is being packed up in a great many paper wraps, each one bearing a different ad- dress. The child which receives the par- cel opens it, and then finds to its dismay that it must give it on to another person, whose name is in the second wrap. So it goes rrom hand to hand, each recipient hoping with a kind of excitement that he may be the last one. This is called “Jul- Klapp”'—which might be translated into Jul-Trap. In the churches Christmas is celobrated, like Easter and Whitsuntide, by two days —one might almost say by three days, ds a divine sefvice in the afternoon or evening of the 24th of December In the lighted church with a Christmas tree is almost universal now. Nevertheless Christmas has maintained its character of a family feast. The home is its chief center. Among the peculiar German toms we must mention the manger. tree and presents. Origina manger considered as an in tutior: of the Roman Catholic church, th Christmas tree as Protestant—but this difference has entirely vanished. Now we find both among Catholic and Protest- ant. The Christmas tree has spread won- derfully quickly all over Germany and beyond. Yet it is not an old institution. We find the first Christmas tree at Strassburg in Alsace in the year 1604. Sometimes we see pictures of Luther sit- ting with his family under the Christmas tree, but these pictures contain an anach- ronism. They only show how impossible the idea for a German now Is to fancy Christmas without the Christmas tree. Every German wants his Christmas tree. The writer of these lines once spent Christmas on a German steamer between Southampton and New York. Though the sea was very rough the German passen- gers and the cap- tain had no thought of daisvensing with the Christmas tree. When Emperor Fred- erick spent his last Christmas on earth as German Crown Prince at San Remo, the German home on Italian ground was naturally adorned with the Christmas tree, We find the tree in every Ger- man home, from the palace of the Empe- ror to the smallest house of the work- tngman. He must be very poor, indeed, who cannot afford a the tree, be it ever so small] for his famyk. When one travels on the raflways in De- cember one meets large wagons carrying the small fir trees from our woods to the large cities and in the cities before Christ. mas the market places look like woods It sight to walk on the evening of the 24th of December t as one sees thre he streets tree in every se. The origin of mas tree for all that remains v wn. Someé people s that it came to v from the Scandin Oth world, who has come to lig! The ornaments on symbols of all the good things spirftual and temporal, which God, the father of lights, from whom cometh every good and perfect gift, bestows on his children. It iy always a great pleasure for parents to adorn the tree, which is generally done a room, closed during that perfod for t: children. They light It up In the even. ing of the 2th, and then the tree gener. ally remains as it is, an emblem of the whole Christmas season, until the 24 of January, at some places until the 6th. On the last night of the year is gen- erally lighted once mo Then, when the time is over, the children are al- lowed to plunder it. Now the tree s mot 1 ited to the S also in the churches, and especially in all s No Christian ke to remain with- Men's festival for g no home tles place where they are Hving. poetry has also made the s generally short- ened into * “hrist-tree), a subject of d of which says, best of manger, into which lald, Mary and Joseph coming from the fields to a d done everywhere, presents are perhaps the v poor f their homes =o0o0d thing; ness came | celebrated it must b ¥ that a it 1s inde oy. And such it is 1 7 for chil- dren, but who share the Joy of their childrer: and feel young again in them, and finally also for those wha live in the memory of a happy childhood.