CHRISTMAS DAY

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 273, 24 December 1909, Page 4

CHRISTMAS DAY

In every year a time God sends When men may brush old (cuds aside, And wish Uod-spced to all good friends Who meet at happy (Jhristmiistide; When all the petty jars and woes That raise 'twixt men a weary strife May be forgotten, while love Hows To clear the way fur sweeter life. A time in which the world may pause From all its stress' of daily toil, Nor count a day as lost because Jit brings no store of golden spoil. In (Jhristinastidu is found a place Where kindly words are current coin, Where men arc brothel's lor a space And all in friendly greetings join. All, best of all the day# that make The changing circle of the year Is Christmas Day, whose hours awake To pleasant thoughts and plenteous, cheer. It is a time when men may meet, And count not race nor creed nor caste, When kindly love gives wing< to hupe, And memory blots the overpm..

There is no land where a". may walk in happy guise the whole year through; No land where sorrow may not stalk, And dull the heart and dim the view. There is no land that has not woes For all its people day by day; And daily some new. bunlen grows In place of those that fade away. But every land where Christmas crowns The year oi toil with days ol grace .May earn a pause from sorrow's frowns, And drink of pleasure for a space. Ah I haply we in Austral lands have less of sorroiv than the most — Our hour-glass runs with golden sunds, Our wtfes are few, our joys a host.'

For us old Christmas crowns the year With all the gifts that summer brings; He stints not of his glowing cheer, But crowns the land with all good

things. May Christinas of this 1 year be sweet To all within our sunny land,

May till right hopes fulfilment meet, May blessings throng on'every hand, May happiness find 110 place, and may In kindly feeling, hope and joy, The whole next year be Christmas Day