REFLECTIONS ON CHRIST MAS.

Waikato Times, Volume X, Issue 712, 9 January 1877, Page 2

REFLECTIONS ON CHRIST MAS.

(By Snyder.)

I Christmas comes bat once a year. I don't know that this fact has ever struck anyone but myself. I believe the observation to be quite original, and I hope no one will pirate it. For my part I wish Christmas would only come once m ten years, and that Christmas Bills would be sent m at about the same interval. It would leave me of a most peaceful and unpurturbed mind. Why do people eat and drink move at Christmas than any other season 1 I am sure I cannot understand why they should. Don't we eat as much every day throughout the three hundred and sixty five days of the year (leaving out the odd six hours and twenty five minutes) as we feel inclined to ; and don't we drink as much or a good deal more than is good for us.

Why when the sun is almost vertical " atid the pers.piratiou.-i' oozes from every pore of our bodies do we gorge ourselves "with rich meats, * and sweet sticky, heavy, indigestible puddings and cakes? Why do we drink of strong drinks until we feel uncomfortable' to ourselves, ; until some of us become tipsy, and others drunk, and others have a fancy for puddles and gutters to sleep m? Why is all this thus? I don't know only that it is so ; ever has been, and it is likely ever will be. When a Prince is born wo consume ever so many tons of gunpowder to announce the event, and •on that' day iti eabn year of his life we do ths same m commemoration of it. But I do not know that we grizzle and swill, and fill our childrens stomachs with unwholesome food on that occasion, as we do when we celebrate the nativity of He who beside the Great Sacrifice taught us m all love, and wisdom as none were taught before or since. May I be excused for using a strong expressionf but blow me if I can understand, it Men cannot wish me a merry Christmas and a happy New Year without he does it m beer or brandy, and of course I must have beer, or brandy with him "which with other beers or brandies gone,besfie, and brandies that I know wpttiave to follow, makes me anything bat unerry' orliappy ; but -causes me to feel >cry queer, there any man or woman today m Coromandel, or indeed throughout the ' Colony who is not ;glad that Christmas has gone by, and will he or she not be equally pleased when the New Year is buried with ths centuries of the •past? On a common every-day-week-day I see children free and happy and joyous, playing, romping, and exercising' their bodies, m the roadway or m a by-lane, or on some bit «of green paddock ; but on Christmas Day they must do nothing of the kind. They must needs be dressed and tricked out m finery m "which they most not move from their seats, until an, overdressed mother with a baby m arms, and a Sunday-best dressed father takes them out an uncomfortable walk with a basket .of food to be eaten,

fitting on the grass where there are likely to be caterpillars. If it could

be proved I would bet drinks for the

•company, all round that there are •more children spanked, more cross and over heated mothers, more

swearing fathers on a Christmas Day than any oilier day of the year.

Only imaginoiihe vanity . and vexation of spirit m a mother exhausting herself cooking over a blazing 'fire, or a hot stove all the morning to prepare a kind of food for children

which makes them ill. The distended stomachs of the little ones have on the next day to be reduced by

the application of salts and senna,

•while man, proud- man, only a little lower than the angels, has to semi 'for a five grain blue pill and a black draught. And N this is. what is m •commemoration of a solemn festival.

When I contemplate this matter my feelings are so outraged that nothing but -well no matter — Mine's a little square gin landlord if you please. What's your own? Here's wishing you a merry Christmas and a happy New Year; and •ihe landlord says "the same to you my boy," «fee., swallows down what he does not want, and, has had too .much of already.