We have hinted what sort of Christmas box we would wish for the children. It would be one full, as that of the child Christ must be, of the pieces of silver that were lost and are found. But Christmas, with its peculiar associations, has deep interest for men, and women too, no less. It has so in their mutual relations. At the time thus celebrated, a pure woman saw in her child what the Son of man should be as a child of God. She anticipated for him a life of glory to God, peace and good will to man. In every young mother's heart, who has any purity of heart, the same feelings arise. But most of these mothers let them go without obeying their instructions. If they did not, we should see other children—other men than now throng our streets. The boy could not invariably disappoint the mother, the man the wife, who steadily demanded of him such a career.
And man looks upon woman, in this relation, always as he should. Does he see in her a holy mother worthy to guard the infancy of an immortal soul? Then she assumes in his eyes those traits which the Romish church loved to revere in Mary. Frivolity, base appetite, contempt are exorcised; and man and woman appear again in unprofaned connection, as brother and sister, the children and the servants of the one Divine Love, and pilgrims to a common aim.
Were all this right in the private sphere, the public would soon right itself also, and the nations of Christendom might join in a celebration, such as "kings and prophets waited for," and so many martyrs died to achieve, of Christ-Mass.
MARIANA[33]
AMONG those whom I met in a recent visit at Chicago was Mrs. Z., the aunt of an old schoolmate, to whom I impatiently hastened, to demand news of Mariana. The answer startled me. Mariana, so full of life, was dead. That form, the most rich in energy and coloring of any I had ever seen, had faded from the earth. The circle of youthful associations had given way in the part that seemed the strongest. What I now learned of the story of this life, and what was by myself remembered, may be bound together in this slight sketch.
At the boarding school to which I was too early sent, a fond, a proud, and timid child, I saw among the ranks of the gay and graceful, bright or earnest girls, only one who interested my fancy or touched my young heart; and this was Mariana. She was, on the father's side, of Spanish Creole blood, but had been sent to the Atlantic coast, to receive a school education under the care of her aunt, Mrs. Z.
This lady had kept her mostly at home with herself, and Mariana had gone from her house to a day school; but the aunt being absent for a time in Europe, she had now been unfortunately committed for some time to the mercies of a boarding school.
A strange bird she proved there—a lonely one, that could not make for itself a summer. At first, her schoolmates were captivated with her ways, her love of wild dances and sudden song, her freaks of passion and of wit. She was always new, always surprising, and, for a time, charming.
But, after a while, they tired of her. She could never be depended on to join in their plans, yet she expected them to follow out hers with their whole strength. She was very loving, even infatuated in her own affections, and exacted from those who had professed any love for her, the devotion she was willing to bestow.
Yet there was a vein of haughty caprice in her character; a love of solitude, which made her at times wish to retire entirely; and at these times she would expect to be thoroughly understood, and let alone, yet to be welcomed back when she returned. She did not thwart others in their humors, but she never doubted of great indulgence from them.