And pitiful memory’s enchantment
Has mingled the gloom round us cast,
With a glow as from ashes of embers
That crumble on hearths of the past!
And a note of boy-laughter, long vanish’d, or the gold of a ringlet, each leaves
An echo—a gleam—that forever must haunt the dusk of our Christmas Eves!
And the children draw near once again, wife,
And, marveling, hark to the quaint
Immemorial holiday legend
Of the beautiful reindeer-drawn saint.