WINTER.*

WILLIAM COWPER.

O WINTER, ruler of the inverted year,

Thy scattered hair with sleet like ashes filled,
Thy breath congealed upon thy lips, thy cheeks
Fringed with a beard made white with other snows
Than those of age, thy forehead wrapped in clouds,
A leafless branch thy sceptre, and thy throne

A sliding car, indebted to no wheels,
But urged by storms along its slippery way,

I love thee, all unlovely as thou seem'st,
And dreaded as thou art! Thou hold'st the sun
A prisoner in the yet undawning east,
Shortening his journey between morn and noon,
And hurrying him, impatient of his stay,
Down to the rosy west; but kindly still
Compensating his loss with added hours
Of social converse and instructive ease,
And gathering, at short notice, in one group,
The family dispersed, and fixing thought,
Not less dispersed by daylight and its cares.
I crown thee king of intimate delights,
Fireside enjoyments, homeborn happiness,
And all the comforts that the lowly roof
Of undisturbed retirement, and the hours
Of long uninterrupted evening know.

From "The Task."

DIVISION VI.

CHRISTMAS VERSES OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.

FEW words will suffice by way of introduction to the Christmas Poems of the nineteenth century, as these, for the most part, treat of customs and peculiarities familiar to all. The picturesque ceremonies and rude festivities that distinguished the Christmas of bygone times have passed away, and, for ourselves, we can regard the loss of them without regret. We are too thankful to have lighted upon a more civilized age, and to have escaped all the troubles, dangers, and miseries with which the "good old times" were so thickly beset, to grieve overmuch for the loss of even the better part of them. We conceive that Queen Victoria can celebrate her Christmas with her accustomed gracious hospitality, without its being necessary for the Lord Chamberlain to assume the character, and perform all the absurdities, of a Lord of Misrule. And, although the office of poet-laureate has come to be regarded as inconsistent with the spirit of the present age, yet it was an advantageous change for the fooleries of a court-jester. We are well content, too, that the Christmas pantomime, and an occasional bal-masquè, should be the only existing remnants of the absurd Mummings of our ancestors. The Yule log and the Wassail bowl are beyond revival, and even the Christmas Carol is falling into desuetude. The practice of decking churches and houses with evergreens is, perhaps, the most honoured of all the old Christmas customs. The Boar's head has still a place in the Christmas banquet at one of our colleges, and at the mansions of some few of our nobility; yet, even this once favourite dish is very nigh displaced by the formidable baron of beef. It is at Queen's College, Oxford, that the Boar's head is brought, on Christmas day, to the high table in the Hall, while an altered version of the Old Carol printed by Wynkin de Worde, is chanted forth by a band of attendant choristers.

The following picturesque and oft-quoted description of Christmas in the olden time is from the introduction to the sixth canto of " Marmion."

CHRISTMAS IN THE OLDEN TIME:

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

HEAP on more wood!—the wind is chill; But let it whistle as it will,

We'll keep our Christmas merry still.

Each age has deemed the new-born year
The fittest time for festal cheer.

And well our Christian sires of old

Loved when the year its course had rolled,
And brought blithe Christmas back again,
With all his hospitable train.
Domestic and religious rite

Gave honour to the holy night:

On Christmas eve the bells were rung;
On Christmas eve the mass was sung;
That only night, in all the year,
Saw the stoled priest the chalice rear.
The damsel donned her kirtle sheen;
The hall was dressed with holly green;
Forth to the wood did merry men go,
To gather in the mistletoe;
Then opened wide the baron's hall
To vassal, tenant, serf, and all;
Power laid his rod of rule aside,
And ceremony doffed his pride.

The heir, with roses in his shoes,

That night might village partner choose.