Happy EDWARDIAN Christmas.

from 'Ladies Home Companion.'

" .... Kissing under the mistletoe is a very old custom, and no girl should feel indignant or hurt if one of her admirers shows a keen desire to salute her in the way that Cupid strongly approves.
Girls should remember, however, that because a man wishes to kiss her under the mistletoe, he does NOT necessarily mean to Propose to Her..."

(and this only just under 100 years ago.   How times have changed!)

SISTERS' LOVE

How precious is a sister's love
Calm, durable, and kind.
Friendship or passion vainly try
A firmer knot to bind.

It gushed beside our mother's knee
When 'baby' slumbered there;
'Twas hallowed by the lisping breath
Of our first infant prayer.

'Twas cherished by the cradle side,
And on the cheerful hearth;
It grew 'midst all our infant griefs,
And all our childish mirth.

It blent our voices to one tone
When, round our father's knee,
We sang, in happy artlessness,
Some sacred melody.

It strengthened when advancing years
Bade childish thoughts depart.
And other joys, and hopes, and cares
Engrossed the busy heart.

It grows more firmly in the soul,
While other things decay.
Next only to our filial love,
It cannot pass away.

Such, precious sisters, is your love;
And such, I trust, is mine.
These holy bonds, so pure, so sweet,
Shall Heaven itself untwine?

(Fanny Barker. 1875).

MY PICTURES

 I wonder why it is that when

I pictures draw of boys and men,

And horses too, for my Mamma,

She doesn't quite know what they are.

Sometimes I draw a big brick house

Sometimes a cat and little mouse;

And then Mamma will say to me;

"Why, yes, this is a mouse, I see"

When really, what she's looking at

I'm sure she must know, is a cat.

And if I draw a butterfly,

That goes far up into the sky;

She thinks - I can't imagine how -

Perhaps it is the old red cow!

But when I draw, as best I can,

A Picture of a big tall man,

Then clap my hands and shout "Hurrah!"

She always knows it is Papa!

***   ***   ***

'The Superseded'

One or two things have happened recently which have made me feel my age, and be a little melancholy.    I seem to remember my own Grandma feeling the same at about my age and Thomas Hardy's little poem (1901) seems to sum it up ...

As newer comers crowd the fore,

We drop behind.

-We who have laboured long and sore

Times out of mind,

And keen are yet, must not regret

To drop behind.

Yet there are some of us who grieve

To go behind;

Staunch, strenuous souls who scarce believe

Their fires declined,

And know none spares, remembers, cares

Who go behind.

'Tis not that we have unforetold

The drop behind;

We feel the new must oust the old

In every kind;

But yet we think, must we, must we,

Too drop behind?

***   ***   ***   ***

'A KNITTED SCARF '

' .....  This scarf for outdoor sports, which comes to us from Sweden, is decidedly a novelty for its simplicity and general usefulness.  The fact that it is worn close-fitting and out of the way, while being merely a straight scarf in the making, is not the least of its charms.......  The scarf is made absolutely straight, in plain garter stitch.        To don the scarf, the centre of the length is placed around the waist in front, with the width well spread out and extending somewhat below the waistline.  Then the ends are carried under the arms and crossed at the centre of the back, brought over the shoulders and beneath the centre of the scarf in front; the whole pulled as closely to the figure as possible.  '   (1908)

(We are always looking for new ways of wearing our scarves nowadays ..... who will be the first to try this?)

"Flo's Letter"

A sweet little baby brother had come to live with Flo,
And she wanted it brought to the table that it might eat and grow;
'It must wait for a while' said Grandmama, in answer to her plea,
'For a little thing that hasn't teeth can't eat like you and me'.

'Why hasn't it teeth, dear gran'ma?' asked Flo in great surprisel
'Oh my! But isn't it funny? No teeth! But nose and eyes;
I guess the baby's toofies must have been forgot.
Can't we buy him some like grandpa's?  I'd like to know why not.'

That afternoon, to the corner, with papers, pen and ink,
Went Flo, saying 'Don't you talk - if you do you'll disturb my think.
I'm writing a letter gran'ma, to send to heaven tonight.
And 'cause its very important, I want to get it right.'

At last the letter was finished - a wonderful letter to see -
Directed up to heaven, and then Flo read it to me;
'Dear God, the baby you brought us was awfully nice and sweet,
But because you forgot his toofies, the poor little thing can't eat.'

'So that's why I'm writing this letter, on purpose to let you know
Please come and finish the baby - that's all, from little Flo.'

The Parent Prayer.

I bend above the little heads beyond the blanket's edge -
Wee polls of tangled gold-brown hair like wind-blown wisps of sedge
Then oh, the yearning that I know, compared with once when I
Longed but for my own pleasure in the time called by-and-by.
Yet now - what, as one's own begot, one's selfishness may cure?
'Lord keep my children happy, and my happiness is sure.'

And now I know (as once I could not dream or even care)
What as my parents bent o'er me at bedtime, was their prayer
The loyalty, all latent then, wells up intensified -
The pent up love of childhood and of riper years beside.
When I, their child, was tombed within the night's sweet sepulture,
They prayed, 'God make her happy, and our joy will be secure'.


('Girl's Own Annual' - Strickland W.Gillilan.)