"Christmas Eve" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of the bells up there in the old steeple at midnight on Christmas Eve. Six quaint figures, each wrapped in a shadowy cloak and wearing a bell-shaped cap. All were gray-headed, for they were among the oldest bell-spirits of the city, and "the light of other days" shone in their ...
— Kitty's Class Day And Other Stories • Louisa M. Alcott
... morning of December 24, 1849—the first Christmas eve following the gold rush. Windham, who had lain awake since midnight, pondered upon this and other things. Events had succeeded each other with such riotous activity of late that life seemed more like a dream ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... a year or two my affairs kept me in India, and nothing seemed more unlikely than that—for the present, at any rate—Jack and I should cross paths again, but by one of those strange chances which sometimes occur in this world I found myself, on the Christmas Eve of 190-, standing on the platform of Holdergate Station, having missed the connection for Scotland, and with the pleasing prospect before me of spending the night, and possibly—if trains were not available—the ensuing Christmas ...
— The Jolliest School of All • Angela Brazil
... Christmas morning by the Napoleon stage for home, and if you wish we may be married Christmas Eve. That will give you four days ...
— A Forest Hearth: A Romance of Indiana in the Thirties • Charles Major
... suddenly that they wondered where the month had gone. Christmas Eve the Happy Family spent in arranging a round-up camp out behind the house where the hill rose picturesquely, and in singeing themselves heroically in the heat of radium flares, while Luck took his camp-fire scenes that were triumphs ...
— The Phantom Herd • B. M. Bower
... from Las Palomas, allowing three days for the trip, so as to reach home on Christmas eve. By making a slight deviation, there was a country store which I could pass on the last day, where I expected to buy some presents for my mother and sisters. But I was in a pickle as to what to give Esther, and on consulting Miss Jean, I ...
— A Texas Matchmaker • Andy Adams
... Do you know it really hurts me to see you like this, alone, in a cafe, and on Christmas eve, too. It makes me feel as I did one time when I saw a bridal party in a Paris restaurant, and the bride sat reading a comic paper, while the groom played billiards with the witnesses. Huh, thought I, with such a beginning, ...
— Plays: The Father; Countess Julie; The Outlaw; The Stronger • August Strindberg
... burning them. For instance, a young man and woman who are engaged to be married throw two nuts into the fire. If they burn peacefully, the marriage will be happy; if they crack and jump away from each other, it will be unhappy. If a candle or lamp goes out suddenly on Christmas Eve, it is believed that someone in the room will die soon. Another sign of death is if you throw salt on the floor and it melts. In some places candles are burnt all night to scare away evil spirits. Another custom is to go into orchards, and strike with an axe trees which have ...
— Peeps At Many Lands: Belgium • George W. T. Omond
... of repair, he could not conveniently lodge all his distinguished guests within it, and had accordingly to arrange for some of them in the outhouses as best he could. Kenneth did not arrive until Christmas Eve, accompanied by a train of forty able bodied men, according to the custom of the times, but without his lady, which deeply offended Macdonald. Maclean of Duart had chief charge of the arrangements in the house and the disposal of the guests. Some days previously ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie
... poor disciples whom the Master left became apostles; footsore and weary they wandered—they were scorned and imprisoned and tortured until the last man of them had passed away. Their work has subdued princes and empires, and the bells that ring out on Christmas Eve remind us not only of the most tremendous occurrence in history, but of the deeds of a few humble souls who conquered the fear of death and who resigned the world in order that the children of the world might be made better. A tremendous Event truly! We are far, far ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... of Christmas Eve when I landed at Saint Pierre. I went up to Argand's Caffay, a place where all kinds of seafaring people used to go to get a drink and a bite to eat. There were quite a few in there now—French stokers ...
— Wide Courses • James Brendan Connolly
... November, and now with Christmas coming nearer, Martha was lonelier than ever for a word from him. The week before Christmas she looked for his letter every day. Christmas eve came, a beautiful moonlight, sparkling night, with the merry jingle of sleighbells, in the air, but no letter ...
— The Second Chance • Nellie L. McClung
... a Christmas Eve," she said to him, with her fingers feeling for the folds of silken flesh in the throat of the moose; "but wounded men must be humoured. And, mother dear, here are our Argonauts returned; and—and now I think ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... he assured himself, drawing his handsome features into a generous scowl, that he was, on this Christmas eve, the most depressed and bored person in the length and breadth of New England. Satherwaite was not used to being depressed, and boredom was a state usually far remote from his experience; consequently, he took it worse. With something between a groan and a growl, he ...
— The New Boy at Hilltop • Ralph Henry Barbour
... On Christmas Eve in Homeburg we all go to the Exercises to hear the children perform. They build churches in Homeburg with big doors, so that they can get big Christmas trees in them, and we grown-ups go early in order to hear the kids squeal with wonder when they come in and ...
— Homeburg Memories • George Helgesen Fitch
... at Salford, on Christmas Eve of the year 1818. His father and his grandfather before him were brewers, and the business, in due course, descended to Mr. Joule and his elder brother, and by them was carried on with success till it ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 363, December 16, 1882 • Various
... John lost his place at father's. He was so kind and obliging, and I always liked him; and I've been thinking, if you'd get him to sign the pledge over again from Christmas Eve, never to touch another drop, I'll get papa to take him back. I always do get papa to do what I want, and the fact is, he hasn't got anybody that suited him so well since John left. So you tell John that I mean to go surety for him; he certainly won't fail me. Tell ...
— Betty's Bright Idea; Deacon Pitkin's Farm; and The First Christmas - of New England • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... knew none of them; his head had been beaten in by the plates of the kicking hoofs; and they waited for his death with every moment, in the little old dusky room, with its leaded lattices, and its odour of dried lavender, and its bough of holly above the hearth. For this had chanced upon Christmas Eve. ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida
... On Christmas Eve came tidings of the convocation of the Senate, simultaneously with a change of Ministry which placed Monrad at the head of the country, and in connection with this a rumour that all young men of twenty-one were to be called out at once. This last proved to be incorrect, ...
— Recollections Of My Childhood And Youth • George Brandes
... On Christmas Eve there had been a dance at Piping Tree, and because she had danced twice with Gay (who had ridden over in obedience to a whim), Abel had parted from her in anger. For the first time she had felt the white heat of his jealousy, and it had aroused rebellion, not acquiescence, in her ...
— The Miller Of Old Church • Ellen Glasgow
... stepping-stones. There! Isn't that a worse Upas tree than poor old Ronnie's? Mine is a life untouched by love, or any gentler feelings. All that sort of thing was killed in me when I was quite a little chap. It is the story of a broken halo. Perhaps I'll tell it you some day. Meanwhile, this being Christmas Eve and not Ash Wednesday, I'll make no more confessions. Don't you want to hear the result of my psychic investigations, ...
— The Upas Tree - A Christmas Story for all the Year • Florence L. Barclay
... time it was Christmas eve in Vancouver, B.C., and the snow was falling in large, soft flakes. The electric light plants were beating their lives out in laborious heart-throbs, giving forth such power that the streets and shop windows had the appearance of the phantom ...
— Skookum Chuck Fables - Bits of History, Through the Microscope • Skookum Chuck (pseud for R.D. Cumming)
... still stood and Garstin had died on the Christmas Eve of that last year which he was to spend upon rock lighthouses. Of how he died the tablet gave a hint, but no more than a hint. There were four words ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... "It is Christmas Eve," says he, "I mark the date; here I sit alone on a rude couch of rushes, sheltered by the thatch of a herdsman's hut; I, whose inheritance was a kingdom, owe my night's harbourage to a poor serf; my throne is usurped, ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... Christmas doings, and kill him. I ought to have done it a long time ago. Why, Mex, just two weeks ago I dreamed me and Rosita was married instead of her and him; and we was living in a house, and I could see her smiling at me, and—oh! h——l, Mex, he got her; and I'll get him—yes, sir, on Christmas Eve he got her, and ...
— Whirligigs • O. Henry
... It was Christmas Eve. We sailed with a small, small wind for the cacique's village, out from harbor of St. Thomas, around a headland and along a low, bright green shore. So low and fitful was the wind that we moved like two ...
— 1492 • Mary Johnston
... nice people, just two or three, with pretty little houses, you know, dotted here and there in the side canyons, whom we could ride up to visit, and who would come down to see us, and dine and play whist and dance Virginia reels and 'Sally Waters' on Christmas Eve. That would be quite perfect. But I suppose it won't happen ...
— In the High Valley - Being the fifth and last volume of the Katy Did series • Susan Coolidge
... wives and their children and their old friends. Even misers relax a little then, and a famous statesman, who was somewhat close-fisted in his day, is reported to have given his young coloured servant twenty-five cents on Christmas Eve, telling him to go out to Mount Auburn Cemetery and see where the great men of New England lie buried. And the man, I believe, went there; but he was an African, and the spirit of Christmas was not in his race, for if it had moved him he ...
— The Little City Of Hope - A Christmas Story • F. Marion Crawford
... to be only the day before the twenty-sixth day of December. It's the chap in the big city earning sixteen dollars a week, with no friends and few acquaintances, who finds himself with only fifty cents in his pocket on Christmas eve. He can't accept charity; he can't borrow; he knows no one who would invite him to dinner. I have a fancy that when the shepherds left their flocks to follow the star of Bethlehem there was a bandy-legged young fellow among them who was just learning the sheep business. So they said to him, "Bobby, ...
— Rolling Stones • O. Henry
... look for it," said Della. "It's sold, I tell you—sold and gone, too. It's Christmas Eve, boy. Be good to me, for it went for you. Maybe the hairs of my head were numbered," she went on with a sudden serious sweetness, "but nobody could ever count my love for you. Shall I ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various
... was issued by the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminister:—A Plenary indulgence may be gained by all persons who—besides making a good Confession and received worthily the Holy Communion, and praying for the intention of his Holiness—shall, on Christmas Eve, on Christmas Day, and on the following day, abstain from all intoxicating drinks. The faithful are earnestly exhorted to endeavor to obtain the Plenary Indulgence; and to offer up this little self-denial as an act of intercession, ...
— Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 2, February 1886 • Various
... receive a small parcel for my dear Charlotte for Christmas Eve, and I have directed some prize Christmas beef to be forwarded to Leo, which I hope ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... have their own tree on Christmas eve, at the church among the evergreens and music, and Sky-High was to accompany them in his black clothes and white ruffles. The Christmas night tree was always at home, for Mrs. Van Buren and ...
— Little Sky-High - The Surprising Doings of Washee-Washee-Wang • Hezekiah Butterworth
... which he found in a very demoralised state, he issued a general order forbidding any private soldiers to enter the wine shops, half of which he closed at a personal sacrifice of L4,000 a year in licensing fees. In consequence, a mutiny broke out on Christmas Eve, 1802. Though the mutiny was quelled, the Home Government did not support the Duke, who ...
— Before and after Waterloo - Letters from Edward Stanley, sometime Bishop of Norwich (1802;1814;1814) • Edward Stanley
... were found within and without the city, where uncultured minds and affectionate hearts enjoyed life in dreamy, quiet blissfulness, unknown in these bustling times. The city people then rose at dawn, dined at eleven, and went to bed at sunset, except on extraordinary occasions, such as Christmas Eve, a tea party, or a wedding. Then those who attended the fashionable soirees of the 'upper ten' assembled at three o'clock in the afternoon, and went away at six, so that daughter Maritchie might have the pewter plates and delf teapot cleaned and cupboarded in time for evening prayer ...
— Lights and Shadows of New York Life - or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City • James D. McCabe
... the Dedication and Title of a Church rank as principal festivals; but may not be observed on Advent Sunday, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Epiphany, between the Fifth Sunday in Lent and Low Sunday inclusive, Ascension Day, or from Whitsun ...
— Ritual Conformity - Interpretations of the Rubrics of the Prayer-Book • Unknown
... Christmas Eve at last arrived and Mary with many misgivings retired early, as children often do in order to hasten the coming of the day. She slept well, but awoke just as the sun came peeping up from behind ...
— Little Tales of The Desert • Ethel Twycross Foster
... that Tavia does not worry," Dorothy cautioned the young man. "I know she has a trouble, and I am sure somehow it will be all adjusted by to-night. I depend upon the witches of Christmas Eve." ...
— Dorothy Dale's Queer Holidays • Margaret Penrose
... Rachel has set me free! It is her own doing, entirely her own wish. I had no idea of it until Christmas Eve, when she sent me a letter telling me that she was going to South Africa with her mother, and could not continue our engagement. She asked me not to come to Bournemouth as arranged, but I went all the same. I could not accept ...
— The Heart of Una Sackville • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... cold which I had experienced in the general's troika in St. Petersburg might be compared to a moderate rheumatism, that which I encountered in the sleigh outside the walls of Moscow, on Christmas Eve, 1876, was like a fierce gout. The ride was in all conscience Russian enough to have its ending among gypsies, Tartars, or Cossacks. To go at a headlong pace over the creaking snow behind an istvostshik, named Vassili, the ...
— The Gypsies • Charles G. Leland
... went down to Hare Street,—for I went on Christmas Eve—I was present for the first time at the high supper in Whitehall, which His Majesty gave to the Spanish Ambassador. I had never been at such a ceremony before; and went out of curiosity only, being given admission to one of the stands by the door, whence I might ...
— Oddsfish! • Robert Hugh Benson
... I'm thankful something happened, so you stayed. I'm sure my wedding would be incomplete Without your presence. Selfish, I'm afraid You'll think your Helen. But I love you so, How can I be quite willing you should go? Come Christmas Eve, or earlier. Let me know And I will meet you, dearie! at the train. Your happy, loving Helen." Then the pain That, hidden under later pain and care, Had made no moan, but silent, seemed to sleep, Woke from its trance-like lethargy, to steep My tortured ...
— Maurine and Other Poems • Ella Wheeler Wilcox
... Christmas eve, Where all could linger and none could grieve, A dazzling vision of wealth and pride, A royal feast and a ...
— Love or Fame; and Other Poems • Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
... went here and yonder and that's how come I'm here. I emigrated here. I left Raleigh, North Carolina Christmas Eve 1883. I've ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume II, Arkansas Narratives, Part 2 • Works Projects Administration
... "We never could stand it till Christmas day. We always rush through supper, Christmas eve, to be ready as soon as we can. You should see our house when we get ...
— Teddy: Her Book - A Story of Sweet Sixteen • Anna Chapin Ray
... his deep heartfelt cares to the merciful God, trusting that he would soon come to his aid; and the merciful God did not fail him. For on Christmas eve the bell at the drawbridge sounded, and Rolf, looking over the battlements, saw the chaplain of Drontheim standing there, with a companion indeed that surprised him,—for close beside him appeared the crazy pilgrim, and the dead men's ...
— Sintram and His Companions • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... sky had been obscured by clouds. He believed that they were not far from the Land's End, and well over to the British coast. Old Hulks insisted that they were too far to the southward, and ordered the schooner to be headed more to the northward. Night was approaching. It was Christmas Eve. The wind was strong, and a heavy snowstorm prevented the possibility of their sighting ...
— Tales of the Sea - And of our Jack Tars • W.H.G. Kingston
... Christmas Eve, and the four commercial travellers were spending the holiday at Grassminster. Probably each suspected that the others had no homes, and perhaps each was conscious of the fact that he was in that predicament himself. ...
— Amusements in Mathematics • Henry Ernest Dudeney
... sprit-sail put off from the bank. The owner, a countryman from a small ranch, asked for a tow to Corumba, which we gave. He had with him in the boat his comely brown wife—who was smoking a very large cigar—their two children, a young man, and a couple of trunks and various other belongings. On Christmas eve we reached Corumba, and rejoined the other members of ...
— Through the Brazilian Wilderness • Theodore Roosevelt
... reflected that it is Christmas Eve—do we live in a melodrama, that I should wander homeless on Christmas Eve? Seriously, you cannot expect a man of taste to lend himself to so hackneyed a situation? Besides, I share this apartment with the composer monsieur Nicolas ...
— A Chair on The Boulevard • Leonard Merrick
... the Shepherds includes a genuine comedy, the first comedy worthy of the name to appear in England. While watching their flocks on Christmas Eve, the shepherds are joined by Mak, a neighbor whose reputation for honesty is not good. Before they go to sleep, they make him lie down within their circle; but he rises when he hears them begin to snore, steals ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... they fulfilled their commission, and purchased a fine dress pattern at the village store. It cost rather more than six dollars, but this they paid out of their own pockets, and did not report to Andy. Just after supper, as he was about to go home to spend Christmas Eve, they placed ...
— Only An Irish Boy - Andy Burke's Fortunes • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... you this little gift, Dear Portia, now we crave your leave, And let it have the grace to lift Our hearts to yours this Christmas eve. ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... sisters, and in India no one can go to church on Christmas without a new and holiday-colored garment. One after another they come from Jewel's deft fingers and lie on the floor in a rainbow heap. When Christmas Eve comes all are finished—except her own. On Christmas morning all the family are in church at that early service dearest to the Indian Christian, with its decorations of palm and asparagus creeper, its carols and rejoicings and new and shining raiment. In the midst sits Jewel and ...
— Lighted to Lighten: The Hope of India • Alice B. Van Doren
... until Christmas Eve, when our visitor proposed walking into Peterborough, in order to give the children a treat of raisins to make a ...
— Roughing it in the Bush • Susanna Moodie
... another happy memory. The carols, the marching around the ship of the choristers Christmas Eve, the services and the story of Christmas by Mrs. Barton gave a contrast of seriousness that made us appreciate the frivolities all the more. How cheery the dining room was with its garlands of red berries and huge Christmas tree, swaying with the motion of the ship, and what fun when jovial ...
— The Log of the Empire State • Geneve L.A. Shaffer
... traditions, he has kept up the observance of old customs; no Christmas Eve has ever been passed under the roof of his Harmas without the consecrated meats upon the table; the heart of celery, the nougat of almonds, the dish of snails, and the savoury-smelling turkey. Then, stuck into the Christmas bread (15/7.), the sprigs ...
— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros
... mean and dirty, And there's none in Harston under thirty, And folks in Shelford and those parts, Have twisted lips and twisted hearts, And Barton men make cockney rhymes, And Coton's full of nameless crimes, And things are done you'd not believe At Madingley on Christmas Eve. Strong men have run for miles ...
— Poems of To-Day: an Anthology • Various
... Christmas Eve ... Finished shoes and clothes put on the table. Shoemaker and Wife hid in the corner of the room ...
— A Study of Fairy Tales • Laura F. Kready
... muffled through the thickest variety of a pea-soup fog. 'It wouldn't really be London without an occasional day like this! I'm off to tramp the city.' It is one of Hugh Walpole's superstitions that he should always begin his novels on Christmas Eve. He has always done so, and he believes it brings him luck. Often it means the exercise of no small measure of self-control, for the story has matured in his mind and he is aching to commence it. But he vigorously adheres to his custom, and by the time he begins to ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton
... was provoked at the expense of Finn Hoyer, a boy of fourteen, whose bare back his brother insisted upon exhibiting to his guest; for it was decorated with a facsimile of the picture on the stove, showing roses and luscious peaches and grapes in red relief. Three years before, on Christmas Eve, the boys had stood about the red-hot stove, undressing for their bath, and Finn, who was naked, had, in the general scrimmage to get first into the bath-tub, been pushed against the glowing iron, the ornamentation of which had ...
— Boyhood in Norway • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... unable to resist such an appeal, made at such a time, and gave his promise. A short time afterwards the operation was successfully performed, and when the queen was convalescent, the king redeemed his promise and gave his consent to the marriage of his second son. It was on Christmas Eve, and the king had come to his wife's apartments to see her. He found Ebba Munck and his son Oscar with her. The maid-of-honor was, at the time of his entrance, singing one of his poems to Her Majesty, which, oddly enough, was on the ...
— Norwegian Life • Ethlyn T. Clough
... vacation and Lewisham was free. He declined the plumber's invitation; "work" kept him in London, he said, though it meant a pound or more of added expenditure. These absurd young people walked sixteen miles that Christmas Eve, and parted warm and glowing. There had been a hard frost and a little snow, the sky was a colourless grey, icicles hung from the arms of the street lamps, and the pavements were patterned out with frond-like forms that were trodden into slides as the day ...
— Love and Mr. Lewisham • H. G. Wells
... Christmas eve. A man lies stretched on his blanket in a copse in the depths of a black pine forest of the Saginaw Valley. He has been hunting all day, fruitlessly, and is exhausted. So wearied is he with long hours of walking, that he will not even seek to reach the lumbermen's camp, half a mile distant, without ...
— The Wolf's Long Howl • Stanley Waterloo
... not hit him, would subdue him instantly, and cause him to lie down meekly beside the stick! Can it be that the Italian peasants, who still believe cattle kneel in their stalls at midnight on the anniversary of Jesus' birth, decorate the mangers on Christmas eve with holly, among other plants, because of a survival of this old pagan notion about its ...
— Wild Flowers, An Aid to Knowledge of Our Wild Flowers and - Their Insect Visitors - - Title: Nature's Garden • Neltje Blanchan
... had placed the cold, fresh-smelling little tree in a corner of the sitting-room, it was already Christmas Eve. After supper we all gathered there, and even grandfather, reading his paper by the table, looked up with friendly interest now and then. The cedar was about five feet high and very shapely. We hung it with the gingerbread animals, ...
— My Antonia • Willa Cather
... short on this occasion to see any portion of Mr. Rhodes's estate or the animals—antelope of many kinds, wildebeestes, elands, and zebras—which roamed through his woods. We lunched with him two days later on Christmas Eve, and then the weather was so hot that we only lazily enjoyed the shade and breezes on the stoep. Well do I remember on that occasion how preoccupied was our host, and how incessantly the talk turned to Johannesburg and the raging discontent ...
— South African Memories - Social, Warlike & Sporting From Diaries Written At The Time • Lady Sarah Wilson
... a person of great sanctity, on Christmas eve addressed the assembly, and represented that it would well become them, at that solemn season, to put up their prayers for some token which should manifest the intentions of Providence respecting their future sovereign. This was done, and ...
— Bulfinch's Mythology • Thomas Bulfinch
... personality may be said to be the leavening idea, which the poet has introduced into the Greek play. It is entirely absent in the original. It baptizes, so to speak, the Greek play, and converts it into a Christian poem. It is the "new truth" of the poet's 'Christmas Eve'. ...
— Introduction to Robert Browning • Hiram Corson
... Mallory's new chaperon and companion, had arrived the night before, on Christmas Eve. She had appeared just in time for dinner, and the two ladies had spent the evening together. Diana's first impressions had been pleasant—yes, certainly, pleasant; though Mrs. Colwood had been shy, and Diana ...
— The Testing of Diana Mallory • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... enough to buy a ton of coal, and so put an end to poor George's daily pilgrimage to the coal yard, but now as the Christmas week drew near she decided to use it for gifts. Father Gerhardt was also secreting two dollars without the knowledge of his wife, thinking that on Christmas Eve he could produce it at a critical moment, and ...
— Jennie Gerhardt - A Novel • Theodore Dreiser
... amorous songs and ditties (if young especially), and cannot abstain though it be when they go to, or should be at church. We have a pretty story to this purpose in [5531]Westmonasteriensis, an old writer of ours (if you will believe it) An. Dom. 1012. at Colewiz in Saxony, on Christmas eve a company of young men and maids, whilst the priest was at mass in the church, were singing catches and love songs in the churchyard, he sent to them to make less noise, but they sung on still: and if you will, you shall have the ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... did not think it enough simply to put a fresh load of compost about the tree. Some old English customs are suggestive at least. I find them described chiefly in Brand's "Popular Antiquities." It appears that "on Christmas eve the farmers and their men in Devonshire take a large bowl of cider, with a toast in it, and carrying it in state to the orchard, they salute the apple-trees with much ceremony, in order to make ...
— Wild Apples • Henry David Thoreau
... It is Christmas Eve. Drip, drop, drip, falls the rain from the leafless boughs on to the sodden earth. The apology for daylight that has been doing its dull duty for the last few hours is slowly effacing itself, and the gale is celebrating the fact, and showing ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... it fell out that on Christmas eve Wilhelmine ordered her coach to convey her to the castle. She drove through the snow in no happy frame of mind. Christmas trees and the favourite!—could anything be more incongruous? and she knew it. ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... had perhaps some vague idea of sleeping out, but that would have killed me, for a heavy mist that covered all the tops of the hills and that made a roof over the valley, began to drop down a fine rain; and, as they sing in church on Christmas Eve, 'the heavens sent down their dews upon a just man'. But that was written in Palestine, where rain is a rare blessing; there and then in the cold evening they would have done better to have warmed ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... French Hagmena song still in use seems to give some authority to such a derivation; others, dissatisfied with a heathen source, find the term to be a corruption of [Greek text which cannot be reproduced], i.e., THE HOLY MONTH. The Hagmena songs are sometimes sung on Christmas Eve and a few of the preceding nights, and sometimes, as at Richmond, on the eve of the new year. For further information the reader is referred to Brand's Popular Antiquities, vol. i. 247-8, Sir ...
— Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of England • Robert Bell
... ten at night on Christmas Eve that Handel finished the score of Faramondo; on Boxing Day he began the composition of Serse. Faramondo had only six performances, and Serse did not appear on the stage until April 15, when it ran for five nights only. It is remembered now, if ...
— Handel • Edward J. Dent
... a short but brilliant reign, died in his 24th year. He was succeeded by his brother William the Lion, who was forthwith crowned at Scone on Christmas Eve 1165 in ...
— Sutherland and Caithness in Saga-Time - or, The Jarls and The Freskyns • James Gray
... days? Then you will come to my Christmas Eve party. I shall be delighted to see you,—and flattered! Just think of throwing away a fortune to satisfy one’s curiosity! I’m surprised at you, but gratified, on the ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson
... of the Lynher the party had been actively engaged in building a shed for the stores. This labour was still continued, after my arrival, and completed on Christmas eve. ...
— Journals Of Two Expeditions Of Discovery In North-West And Western Australia, Vol. 1 (of 2) • George Grey
... borrowed Samson's pack basket. I felt bad because we couldn't go and make any arrangements with Santa Claus for the children. Joe was dreadfully worried, for Betsey had told him that Santa Claus never came to children whose father and mother were sick. Christmas Eve Abe came with the pack basket chock-full of good things after the children were asleep. He took out a turkey and knit caps and mittens and packages of candy and raisins for the children and some cloth for a new dress for me. Mrs. ...
— A Man for the Ages - A Story of the Builders of Democracy • Irving Bacheller
... pretty Corot village of two months ago. But our outpost is situated in a house where we are obliged to show no sign of life, so as to conceal our presence from the enemy. And so here we are at nine o'clock in the morning, in a darkness that would make it seem to be late on Christmas eve. ...
— Letters of a Soldier - 1914-1915 • Anonymous
... from shopping, they shivered with the cold and ran to the register. Then papa came home, and they had the happiest Christmas eve imaginable. Of course one cannot make one's charities go all around the world, but Mrs. Linley thought she had stretched hers a long distance. So she had. And yet she might have given the child at her door a few pennies. But ...
— The King's Daughter and Other Stories for Girls • Various
... these poems, some five or six hundred years ago, are precisely the same feelings which warm the heart of a poet and his readers to-day. There is nothing ancient but the spelling in this exquisite Lullaby, for instance, which was sung on Christmas eve: ...
— Outlines of English and American Literature • William J. Long
... It was Christmas Eve, and Kate Dayton, one of Pomford's pretty girls, had found the Little Gray Lady sitting alone before the fire gazing into the ashes, her small frame almost hidden in the roomy chair. The winter twilight had long since settled ...
— The Little Gray Lady - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith
... repulsed an attempt made in canoes to take the vessel by boarding, and killed Karaka. Emboldened by this, they afterwards made an expedition to the shore and cut up or stove in all their enemies' canoes lying on the beach. This was on Christmas Eve. On Boxing Day they landed and burnt the principal native village, which Kelly calls the "beautiful city of Otago of about six hundred fine houses"—not the only bit of patent exaggeration in his story. Then ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves
... It was late on Christmas eve when Ungava Bob, returning from the Indian camp, drew his toboggan into the clearing in the centre of which stood the river tilt. Its roof was scarcely visible in the moonlight above the high drifted snow. He had hoped that some of the others ...
— The Gaunt Gray Wolf - A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob • Dillon Wallace
... memorable evening for her, the 24th of December, 1911—she had expected her husband to remain with her, for it was not only Christmas eve, but the night when, as manager of a large manufacturing concern, he brought up from New York the money with which to pay off the men on the next working day, and he never left her when there was any unusual amount of money in the house. But with the first glimpse she had of his ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... our Christian sires of old Loved when the year its course had roll'd And brought blithe Christmas back again, With all its hospitable train. Domestic and religious rite Gave honour to the holy night: On Christmas Eve the bells were rung; On Christmas Eve the Mass was sung; That only night in all the year Saw the staled priest the chalice rear. The damsel donn'd her kirtle sheen; The hall was dressed with holly green; Forth to the wood did merry men go, To gather in the mistletoe. ...
— English Villages • P. H. Ditchfield
... Days and weeks and even months can pass by without that yearning for family and home, but in all the years since I hung my stocking in front of the big fireplace in the old home I have never learned to face Christmas Eve in a strange place with any degree of happiness. I believe the rangers all felt the same way. Several days before Christmas they began to plan a ...
— I Married a Ranger • Dama Margaret Smith
... It was Christmas Eve. They were in the kitchen of her uncle's farmhouse. The deaf old woman sat in her chair by the fire knitting. Upon her sunken face there was a curious sardonic smile that was her habitual expression. The two men stood in the doorway. Mary sat at the table looking aimlessly ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Various
... too much color. December, in the Puget Sound country, means the climax of the wet season when under the interminable curtain of the rain, dawn seems to touch hands with twilight. It was hardly four o'clock that Christmas eve when the Aquila arrived with the guests from Seattle, but the villa lights were on. A huge and resinous backlog, sending broad tongues of flame into the cavernous throat of the fireplace, gave to the illumination a ruddier, flickering ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... He gave much thought to the matter in the effort to secure many small articles which elaborately concealed their value. And he had taste. The result of his endeavor was that many friends who would not have thought of remembering Monty with even a card were pleasantly surprised on Christmas Eve. ...
— Brewster's Millions • George Barr McCutcheon
... Brethren A Song of Low Degree A German Christmas Eve A Christmas Idyll The Manifestation All Souls' Day in a German Town By Rivers and Streams Spring A Lark's Song 'Luvly Miss' Four Stories Told To Children: The Dreadful Griffin The Discontented Daffodils The Fairy Fluffikins ...
— The Grey Brethren and Other Fragments in Prose and Verse • Michael Fairless
... priest had finished the story the people all marched away carrying their candles and singing. Each night they marched and sang in this way until at last it was Christmas Eve. ...
— The Mexican Twins • Lucy Fitch Perkins
... ideal, had the power of transmuting common duties into gold and crystal. This new factor pushed softly behind each little customary act, urging what was commonplace over the edge into the marvellous. The habitual became wonderful. It felt like Christmas Eve, like the last night of the Old Year, like the day before the family moved for the holidays to the sea—only more so. Even To-morrow-will-be-Sunday had entirely disappeared. A thrill of mysterious ...
— The Extra Day • Algernon Blackwood
... many of Montague's earlier acquaintances, and others whom he had not met before. They amused themselves in all the ways with which-he had become familiar at house-parties; likewise on Christmas Eve there were festivities for the children, and on Christmas night a costume ball, very beautiful and stately. Many came from New York to attend this, and others from the neighbourhood; and in returning calls, Montague saw ...
— The Metropolis • Upton Sinclair
... such dire condition and wanting to die at once, I told his mother I would comfort him, somewhat, by wishing him a merry Christmas and showing him my business card. You know, the ones we just got back from the engravers late Christmas Eve. ...
— Polly's Business Venture • Lillian Elizabeth Roy
... have given occasion for an attempted crime, supposed to have been sanctioned by Henry, which may show us that while the Pope was asserting a right to rule over the nations, he could not rule in his own city. On Christmas Eve, 1075, the city of Rome was visited with a violent tempest. Darkness brooded over the land. The inhabitants thought that the day of judgment was at hand. In the midst of this war of the elements two processions were seen ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 5 • Various
... On Christmas Eve the old city was very gay. The churches were decorated, and splendidly dressed men and women passed in and out with smiles and congratulations. The fandangoes and the gambling houses were all open. From the huertas around, great numbers of families had come ...
— Remember the Alamo • Amelia E. Barr
... Christmas eve had come round once more, and at a tavern, near the gibbet, a few friends were enjoying a pipe and glass around the cheerful burning yule-log, when the conversation turned to the murderer, and a wager was made that a certain ...
— Bygone Punishments • William Andrews
... As the shades of Christmas Eve began to fall, Aunt Annie was seated by the sick-bed, engaged in making entries in the household washing-book with a lead pencil. Henry lay with his eyes closed. Mrs. Knight was out shopping. Presently there was a gentle ting of the front-door ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett
... away with the ball may keep it; but this seldom occurs, as it is kicked to pieces before the game is over. And this is Christmas Day here. At Kirby, a man named Tom Mattham (since deceased) used to go round the town on Christmas Eve, about twelve o'clock, with a bell, and chant a few carols; this was too solemn to be compared to the London waits, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 290 - Volume X. No. 290. Saturday, December 29, 1827. • Various
... well," said Charlotte, hiding her embarrassment under sweet smile. "And what do you call behaving well? What should I do, what can I do, my dear Charlotte?" said he. "Thursday night," she answered, "is Christmas Eve. The children are all to be here, and my father too: there is a present for each; do you come likewise, but do not come before that time." Werther started. "I desire you will not: it must be so," she continued. "I ask it of you as ...
— The Sorrows of Young Werther • J.W. von Goethe
... inexhaustible mine, he drew out successively locks, three-deckers, squadrons of cavalry, battalions of infantry, pedlars with their packs, jugglers with their cups; in fact, all those wonders, which, on Christmas eve, turn the heads of all children beyond the Rhine; and that, with such undisguised transports of joy, that Monsieur de Frejus himself respected his royal pupil's happiness. The assistants watched him with that religious ...
— The Conspirators - The Chevalier d'Harmental • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... America. On the same day of November, 1784, on which Seabury was consecrated by the non-jurors at Aberdeen, Coke began preaching and baptizing in Maryland, in rude chapels built of logs or under the shade of forest trees. On Christmas Eve a conference assembled at Baltimore, at which Asbury was chosen bishop by some sixty ministers present, and ordained by Coke, and the constitution of the Methodist church in America was organized. Among ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske
... short, from first to last, my wife was inexorable. But for the spectacle of Berry and Jonah being relentlessly driven along the same track, life would have lost its savour. Indeed, as far as we three were concerned, most of the working hours of Christmas Eve were spent ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates
... Allington, and at three o'clock on Christmas Eve, just as the darkness of the early winter evening was coming on, Lily Dale and Grace Crawley were seated together, one above the other, on the steps leading up to the pulpit in Allington Church. They had been working ...
— The Last Chronicle of Barset • Anthony Trollope
... and the boots, and deprived herself of food that she might save enough money wherewith to take them out of pawn. Christmas Eve came, and she had not recovered them. She sat in her room lonely and with a sad heart, but there was mirth and noise below her, for even among the poor Bacchus must ...
— London's Underworld • Thomas Holmes
... Brown's Lagoons, and entered our camp just as our companions were sitting down to their Christmas dinner of suet pudding and stewed cockatoos. The day was cloudy and sultry; we had had a heavy thunder-storm on Christmas eve. ...
— Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia • Ludwig Leichhardt
... and not the least merry portion of it was that mixed with the older people. Little Ellen was half beside herself with spirits; the secret of which, perhaps, was the fact, which she several times in the course of the evening whispered to Ellen as a great piece of news, that "it was Christmas eve!" ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell
... foot it, pacing slow, Monk-like, one behind another!— Don't you hear me? Don't you know I'm a little nervous, Brother? Won't you speak? Then, by your leave, Here's a guest for Christmas Eve! ...
— In Divers Tones • Charles G. D. Roberts
... conferred by Richard II. in 1394. But the poet, now seventy-one years of age, and probably broken down by the reverses of the past few years, was not destined long to enjoy his renewed prosperity. On Christmas Eve of 1399, he entered on the possession of a house in the garden of the Chapel of the Blessed Mary of Westminster — near to the present site of Henry VII.'s Chapel — having obtained a lease from Robert Hermodesworth, a monk of the adjacent convent, for fifty-three years, at the annual ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer
... too, was a part of himself. He, too, had had his feeling for humanity in the large. For years he had run a boys' club at a little mission school in which his wife had been interested, and on Christmas Eve he had formed the habit of gathering up a dozen small urchins right off the street and taking them 'round and fitting them out with good warm winter clothing, after which he had gone home to help Judith trim ...
— His Family • Ernest Poole
... passed, news came that peace had been signed on Christmas Eve, one after another the ships of war came straggling home. Some had taken prizes, all had been harried by the winter storms—and none brought news of the Huntress. One Carolina vessel that put in for repairs told of picking up a crew adrift ...
— The Windy Hill • Cornelia Meigs
... father and son curled up on the big mat by the register, sound asleep. It was against the regulations entirely, and he was going to wake them up and put them out, when he happened to glance through the glass doors at the storm without, and remembered that it was Christmas Eve. With a growl he let them sleep, trusting to luck that the inspector wouldn't come out. The doorman, ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... eve ... (I'll have to go a bit slow now) ... On Christmas eve, you remember, when out-of-doors the big snow-flakes were slowly and softly fluttering down, grandmother would get the huge Bible and her treasure-box and bring them up to the little round table covered with its red cloth ...
— The Long Ago • Jacob William Wright
... Monk was a wonderful doctor, for by Christmas Eve the little girl was completely cured of her lameness. This may seem incredible, but it was owing in great part to the herbs and simples, which are of a species that our doctors have no knowledge of; and also to a wonderful lotion which has ...
— The Pot of Gold - And Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins
... afternoon of Christmas Eve they went, by her desire, to a church in Soho, where the Christmas Oratorio was being given; and coming away passed, by chance of a wrong turning, down Borrow Street. Ugh! How that startled moment, when ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... is of his death and not of his life or works which I wish to tell, for it was singular. He died on Christmas Eve, 1432. The winter that year in the north of France was, as is well known, terrible for its severe cold. The rich stayed at home, the poor died, and the unfortunate third estate of gipsies, balladmongers, tinkers, tumblers, and thieves had no chance of displaying their dexterity. In fact, ...
— Orpheus in Mayfair and Other Stories and Sketches • Maurice Baring
... chronicle still preserved amongst the MSS of the British Museum, furnishes several particulars of her entertainment. On Christmas eve, the great hall of the palace being illuminated with a thousand lamps artificially disposed, the king and queen supped in it; the princess being seated at the same table, next to the cloth of estate. After supper she was served ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... was most particular about the dyeing of his Easter eggs and the ritual of hanging up his stocking on Christmas Eve. She had wanted to go on dyeing eggs for him at Easter and hanging up his stocking on Christmas Eve, even when he was twelve years of age and could not be expected to tolerate such things any longer. He liked the Easter ceremonial better, perhaps, than that of Christmas. His mother would bid ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... cheerful, loving, never naughty but most obedient. The child seemed religious by nature, which feeling was fostered by his good mother. He loved to go to church on Sundays and fast days. The midnight mass on Christmas eve, when Adam Liszt, carrying a lantern, led the way to church along the country road, through the silent night, filled the child's thoughts with ...
— The World's Great Men of Music - Story-Lives of Master Musicians • Harriette Brower
... she said, fiercely; 'this is Christmas eve! there's none for me—I wish I could cry, but my tears are dried up,' snatching her tawdry cap from her head and stamping on it; 'but you're not a devil yet. Go home, if you've got a home! out ...
— Continental Monthly , Vol. 6, No. 1, July, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... (1754-1832), the poet of the poor, was born at Aldborough, in Suffolk, on Christmas Eve of the year 1754. He stands thus midway between Goldsmith and Wordsworth— midway between the old and the new school of poetry. His father was salt-master— or collector of salt duties— at the little seaport. After being taught a little at several schools, it was agreed that George should ...
— A Brief History of the English Language and Literature, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John Miller Dow Meiklejohn
... had never been taught that it was their duty, as servants, to "obey their masters." In this particular showing a most utter disregard of the interest of their "kind-hearted and indulgent owners." They left home on Monday, Christmas Eve, 1855, under the leadership of Frank Wanzer, and arrived in Columbia the following Wednesday at one o'clock. As willfully as they had thus made their way along, they had not found it smooth sailing by any means. The biting frost and ...
— The Underground Railroad • William Still
... confidence, and saved him so far from the terrible course of deceit and corruption. She could not much take to heart the mad exploits of the so-called boys, even though she spent three hours in heart-beatings on Christmas Eve, when Hector, Mary, Tom, Blanche, and the dog Toby, were lost the whole day. However, they did come back at six o'clock, having been deluded by an old myth of George Larkins, into starting for a common, three ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... rosy lights were flickering; and silver tinsel and evergreen wreaths and brilliant little glass globes of silver and wine colour could be seen, and glimpses were caught of Christmas trees, with people decking them by firelight—reminders that this was Christmas Eve. The ride-stealers had disappeared from the highway, though now and then, over the gasping and howling of the horseless carriage, there came a shrill jeer from some young passer-by upon ...
— The Magnificent Ambersons • Booth Tarkington
... it to the best of their ability. New teachers were pressed into the service. Dr. Maverick gave them a talk on health, and another on preparing food for the sick, and the special care some diseases required. And Jack Darcy proposed that Christmas Eve the cooking-school should give a supper, the tickets being at the low price of twenty-five cents. Every dish was to be cooked ...
— Hope Mills - or Between Friend and Sweetheart • Amanda M. Douglas
... science has long since exploded. "The matter," said Mr. John Goodsir, "of the organized frame to its minutest parts is in a continual flux." Our bodies are never the same for any two successive days. The feet that Mary shall dance with next Christmas Eve will not be the same feet that bore her triumphantly through the previous Christmas holidays. The brain that she learns German with to-day does not contain a cell in its convolutions that was spent in studying French one year ago. Whether her present feet can dance better or worse than ...
— Sex in Education - or, A Fair Chance for Girls • Edward H. Clarke
... over the white, chill earth it was the morning of Christmas Eve. With a shudder, Nello clasped close to him his only friend, while his tears fell hot and fast on the dog's frank forehead. "Let us go, Patrasche—dear, dear Patrasche," he murmured. "We will not wait to be kicked out: ...
— A Dog of Flanders • Louisa de la Rame)
... German family festival on Christmas eve is a pleasant thing to see. We accepted with pleasure the invitation of Frau B—— and her family, to be present at theirs. In a large salon adjoining that where the table was laid for supper, was another long table spread with a white cloth. Toward the farther end of the ...
— In and Around Berlin • Minerva Brace Norton
... engaged on further writings on Christian Science. In every sense she is the recognized head of the Christian Science Church. At the same time it is her most earnest aim to eliminate the element of personality from the faith. "On this point, Mrs. Eddy feels very strongly," said a gentleman to me on Christmas eve, as I sat in the beautiful drawing-room, where Judge and Mrs. Hanna, Miss Elsie Lincoln, the soprano for the choir of the new church, and one or two other friends ...
— Pulpit and Press • Mary Baker Eddy
... way that part of an orchard descended with its growing trees, and they continued to flourish at their new level. More wonderful still, two cottages settled down on to the shore, without falling in pieces. The ground began to slide on the night of Christmas Eve, and by the evening of December 26 the great mass had fallen. To the west is a great chasm, and the cliff rises high on the seaward side. Farther east, no cliff rises beyond the chasm, but little hillocks and sand-dunes slope unevenly to the beach. The undercliff ...
— Devon, Its Moorlands, Streams and Coasts • Rosalind Northcote
... hydrophobia. From this time on, these painful attacks became chronic with Smith. They were liable to come on at any time, but especially on Saturday nights, on the first of the month, and on Thanksgiving Day. He always had a very severe attack of hydrophobia on Christmas Eve, and after ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock
... parent yet is left—a wretched thing, A sad survivor of his buried wife, A palsy-smitten, childish, old, old man, A semblance most forlorn of what he was, A merry cheerful man. A merrier man, A man more apt to frame matter for mirth, Mad jokes, and anticks for a Christmas eve; Making life social, and the laggard time To move on nimbly, never yet did cheer The ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb
... was at least Ward's equal in mental stature and originality. Goodman and the others began to realize that for Mark Twain the rewards of the future were to be measured only by his resolution and ability to hold out. On Christmas Eve Artemus lectured in Silver City and afterward came to the Enterprise office to give the boys a farewell dinner. The Enterprise always published a Christmas carol, and Goodman sat at his desk writing it. He was just ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... midnight, meanwhile. As they still were so young, and because on every Christmas eve in the excess of their joy they went to bed very late and only after being overcome by sleep, they never had heard the midnight tolling, and never the organ of the church when holy mass was being celebrated, although ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... than a hundred grandchildren rode on his knee. All children loved him for he could tell them wonderful fairy tales and strange stories of the forest. He told them of the goblins that came at night to water the horses, of how the oxen talked in their stalls on Christmas Eve, of how a spider shut up in a nutshell could cure the fever, and of the marvellous powers possessed by horse shoes and four-leaved clover. He knew more strange things than ...
— The Junior Classics • Various
... Andrew Jackson's beloved wife, and on his death-bed the warrior and statesman called for it. It was the favorite of Gen. Robert E. Lee, and was sung at his funeral. The American love and familiar preference for the remarkable hymn was never more strikingly illustrated than when on Christmas Eve, 1898, a whole corps of the United States army Northern and Southern, encamped on the Quemados hills, near Havana, took up ...
— The Story of the Hymns and Tunes • Theron Brown and Hezekiah Butterworth |
