An English Christmas

Christmas Day, December 25th, celebrates the birth of Christ, and is thus the greatest of Christian festivals. However, many people feel that the religious meaning of Christmas is diminished by the commercialisation of it.

As Christmas draws near, the big shops stay open long after dark, and get more and more crowded. Everyone is buying Christmas presents for friends and relations.

The home is decorated with colourful paper chains, leaves of holly and mistletoe, and attractive greeting cards received through the post from friends. In the corner there may be a Christmas tree with its branches decorated with shining ornaments such as coloured lights and glass balls, and sometimes hung with gifts.

On Christmas Eve, it is said, Father Christmas, also called Santa Claus, brings presents but only to good children. He knows just what every child wants, and he brings it all in a great sack. On Christmas Eve, when the children are asleep, he comes silently down the chimney and leaves the presents near their beds.

Christmas Eve comes at last. When the children go to bed they often hang up a large stocking or a pillow-case to receive the presents. "Now go off to sleep quickly," says the mother, "because he won't come until you're asleep!" But they are too excited to sleep and are not even drowsy. So they just pretend to sleep, hoping to catch a glimpse of Father Christmas. Meanwhile, unknown to them, mother and father are busy filling stockings and pillow-cases with presents in the next room. When they are sure the children are really asleep, the parents creep like robbers into their bedroom and leave the presents near their beds.

The next morning it is Christmas. The children wake up with shouts of "He's come!" and immediately start opening all their parcels. The grown-ups, less excitable, save their own presents till breakfast time. After breakfast, many people go to church; but the children will be playing with their new toys, and the mother will probably be preparing the Christmas dinner. This includes poultry for the main course (e. g. chicken, turkey, duck, goose), salads, breads, and vegetables, and features a variety of desserts, for example, pies, puddings, and ice cream.

In the afternoon many families listen to the Queen broadcasting to the Commonwealth. In the evening, after a huge tea, often including a big Christmas cake covered with a frosting as sweet as candy and as smooth as pudding, the family will probably sit round the fire eating nuts, sweets and fruit, talking or watching television, or playing party games.

Everybody likes to be happy and full of goodwill at Christmas time. The great writer Charles Dickens loved Christmas, and described its merriness and warm-heartedness in books like A Christmas Carol with drawing-room scenes of blazing log fires, while the December snow outside made all the country white. This is why people today talk of a "good, old-fashioned Christmas", and why many hope it will be a "white" one—but it seldom is, for snow is a rarity in December.

The theatre plays its part during the Christmas season by putting on special shows for children. The circus is another thing that parents may very well take their children to see as a Christmas treat. Lions and tigers have been patiently trained to leap through the air and even the more docile beasts like elephants and horses do astonishing tricks.

So the children usually count the weeks, then the days, to Christmas. And almost everyone' enjoys the happiness of Christmas.