-w w-Tv n m iminwii"it.v
DECEMBER 18, 1908
The Commoner.
13
WHILE THE CHRISTMAS CANDLES ARE BURNING
Ring the bells of Christmas
Let every one take part.
Christmas smiles on every face
And Christmas in the heart.
The joy of Christmas depends al
together on the amount of the
Christmas spirit in the heart. It
does not depend upon the amountof
money you have to spend on gifts,
'nor upon the intrinsic value of the
gifts you receive. This little bit of
platitudinous moralizing was in
spired by a little story told by a
Nebraska1 pioneer the other day.
Here is the story, told briefly:
"I moved to what is now Lincoln
county, Nebraska, in the early 80's
and took up a homestead a few miles
from where the little -city of Wallace
now stands. All I had in the world
was a wife and three small children,
a rather poor team of horses, a
poorer cow, a few chickens, a couple
of hogs, a few simple farm imple
ments, less than a hundred dollars
in money and a determination to
make a home. It was a mighty deso
late out there. Our nearest neigh
bor, as poor 'as myself, lived more
than eight miles away, and within
a radius of fifty miles there were
less than fifty homesteaders. The"
first two or three Christmas days
were pretty slim for the children,
but we raised a' little popcorn which
was utilized' on Christmas, arid the
good wife made some mittens and.
other thing's, and 'these with a. little
molasses candy made at home con
stituted the 'joys of Christmas' in
that sod house.
"We were, there three or four
years ahead of the railroad, and it
was not until the iron horse came
through that we really had a Christ
mas celebration in which money
played a part. And you couldn't
guess in -a century how we got the
money. Bones!
"Yes, sir; bones were the founda
tion of the whole thing buffalo
bones. The prairies were literally
covered?with dry and bleached buf
falo bones, and some enterprising
pioneer learned that there was a
market for tlfem in the east, where
they were ground into fertilizer.
Before the first train pulled into
Wallace we pioneers had hauled hun
dreds of wagon loads of buffalo bones
to town, and -we got good money for
them.' I presume that taken alto
gether three or four hundred car
loads of bones were shipped from
Wallace before the industry was ex
hausted. "With the money we got for our
bones sounds kind o shuddery,
don't it? my wife and I bought the
childreil gome 'store clothes,' some
toys, a' lot oX 'store candy' and some
colored candles. We went over in
the canon arid cut a. cedar tree, and
we had a real, old-fashioned Christ
mas in. that sod house that Christ
mas eve.
"We don't live in a' sod house now.
Neither have we any children of our
own o make a Christmas for. But,
just the samer we have a Christmas
tree every year, and there are child
ren to enjoy the children of the
two boys and the girl whose first
real Christmas tree in Nebraska was
the direct 'result of buffalo bones.
And among the most cherished relics
in our home are a few pairs of pol
ished buffalo horns. I never look at
them without recalling how the
bones of the noble animals that bore
them not only helped us give our
little ones a real Christmas tree, but
actually kept us from feeling the
pangs of privation."
Light the Christmas candles,
For Santa Claus draws nigh;
The Christmas bells are ringing,
The backlog blaziug high.
. "While the 'backlog' burns."
That doesn't mean anything to the
young folks of today who live in
steam-heated flats and furnace-cooled
houses. Wo say "furnace-cooled"
with full knowledge of the facts.
But mention of the "backlog"
brings up fond memories to the
white haired girls and boys of days
agone. The great, open fireplace
that fairly occupied one end of the
sitting room in the old farm house,
the swinging crane, the blazing logs,
the dancing shadows upon celling
and wall
"Now, mother, tell us about
Christmas before the war."
And we recall the dweet-faced,
gray-haired little mother who used
to tell us how Christmas was spent
on the old Missouri farm "before the
war," and always it included a Btory
of the backlog. This is how it wast
Christmas was the great event
with the colored folks. It meant lots
of gifts from massa and missus, danc
ing in the cabins, visiting with neigh
boring farms and plantations and
"high jinks" generally, just as long
as the backlog burned. That was the
rule. Christmas eve the older slaves
would haul a huge backlog up to
the master's house, drag it Into the
big sitting room with merry song and
laughter, and carefully place it In
the big fireplace. The glowing coals
were raked down, the backlog
placed, the coals heaped over it and
the fireplace filled with lightwood
knots and oak and hickory chunks.
And as long as that backlog burned
the Christmas holidays lasted. That
was a matter as fixed as the laws of
the Medes and Persians.
"The slaves," said the little moth
er, "used to work, a trick on father.
Of course he knew it, but he winked
at it, and he enjoyed the fun as well
as they did. They used to cut the
backlog always the biggest piece of
black oak they could find, about four
feet long immediately after the
close of the Christmas festivities.
Then they would haul it down to the
creek and sink it in the water and
leave it there to soak until the day
before the next Christmas. In the
afternoon they would raise that water-soaked
log, drag It to the house
and about 10 o'clock Christmas eve
would put it in the fireplace; It
usually took it from five days to a
week to burn completely to ashes,
and until the last vestige of Are dis
nnneared from it the festivities last
ed. There was always a rivalry
ariiong the different farms to see
which could make the backlog last
longest."
If every day was Christmas
And all the world were mine
To do with as I fancied
How childish eyes would shine!
It takes so little to make a child
happy, and the joy of doing it is so
great, the wonder of it all la that
there are any unhappy children in
the world. There may be a lot of
satisfaction in building big library
buildings, or in con tribu tins huge
sums to this or that missionary so
ciety, but there would bo a lot more
In making happy the unfortunate lit
tle ones who have little or nothing
to mako them happy. Wo who live
in comfortable homes and aro able
to prepare the way for Santa Claus
to visit our own little ones aro very
apt to forget the little ones who havo
never seen the jolly old Christmas
saint, never heard the jingle of his
sleighbells, never received even the
smallest token from his hands. You
may think you live In a community
where there are no poor, but that Is
because you never investigated. Just
look around a little bit and see If
you can not discover a few children
whoso happiness you can mako suro
by expending a few dimes. Just how
easy It is to make a child happy may
be illustrated by the following true
incident:
The architect of this department
was born whllo the' great civil war
was being fought, and whilo his
soldier father was campaigning with
Thomas. Two or three years after
the war a reunion was held in the
little Illinois village where tho vet
eran father was pastor of a little
church. Bunting was scarce in those
days, and very high priced, and tho
possessor of a flag had reason to feel
proud. The writor's mother was de
termined that her little boy should
carry a flag in tho procession on this
eventful day, so sho proceeded to
make one. The crown of an old for
age cap furnished tho blue for the
field, and the judicious use of poke
berry juice furnished tho red for
the stripes, A piece of white goods
furnished tho base for the flag. Tho
stars were sewed on the field the
stars being cut out of white flannel.
The red stripes were sowed on the
white background. But there wasn't
enough of tho blue to go 'round so It
was really only a flag on one side.
But it was a flag and the little fellow
who carried it that day, tightly
clutched in one hand while tho other
hand clung to the finger of the father
whose army coat bore upon its
sleeves the stripes of a sergeant, was
the happiest boy in all the state of
Illinois, if not in the whole world.
For thirty years that little home
made flag was a cherished relic that
money could not buy. But in the
stress of moving from one town to
another soirie years ago it got lost.
But the memory of It still survives,
and whenever some incident calls it
to mind, along with it comes tho
memory of a happy childhood, the
memory of the best mother a boy
ever had. the memory of playmates
a panorama that can not be equalled.
If you want to know just what
fun there is in Christmas, make it a
point to hunt up some poor little
boy or girl and give them a taste of
the real Christmas spirit. It will
cost but a dollar or two, and you'll
draw daily dividends on tho Invest
ment as long as you live.
The Cedars of the Lebanon
Were doubtless fair to see,
But not a one was equal to
The glorious Christmas tree.
I don't remember the first Christ
mas tree I ever saw, but the first
Christmas tree I remember about
grew right out of the pulpit In a little
Christian church in Metamora, 111.
A plain little frame church surround
ed by a board fence, with a stileblock
In front and hitchracks on both sides
of the street. The incandescent and
arc lights were undreamed of, and
the man or woman who had been
down to Peoria and seen gas burning
was considered a traveler with a
record. Smoky kerosene lamps light
ed the church, but tho Christmas
tree was lighted with candles not
"boughten candles," but tallow can
dles made by the women of the con
gregation. A candle mold was a
household necessity In those days
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