He asks for the children, and then demands of their parents a report of their conduct during the past year. The good children are rewarded with sugar-plums and other things, while for the bad ones a rod is given to the parents with instructions to use it freely during the coming year.
In those parts of Pennsylvania where there are many German settlers, the little sinners often find birchen rods suggestively placed in their stockings on Christmas morning.
In Poland, the Christmas gifts are hidden, and the members of the family search for them.
In Sweden and Norway, the house is thoroughly cleaned, and juniper or fir branches are spread over the floor. Then each member of the family goes in turn to the bake house, or outer shed, where he takes his annual bath.
But it is back to Old England, after all, that we look for the merriest Christmas. For two or three weeks beforehand, men and boys of the poorer class, who were called “waits,” sang Christmas carols under every window. Until quite recently these carols were sung all through England, and others of similar import were heard in France and Italy.
The English are said to “take their pleasures sadly,” but in the matter of Christmas they can “give us cards and spades and still win.” Parties of Christmas drummers used to go around to the different houses, grotesquely attired, and play all sorts of tricks. The actors were chiefly boys, and the parish beadle always went along to insure order.
The Christmas dinner of Old England was a thing capable of giving the whole nation dyspepsia if they indulged freely.
The main dish was a boar’s head, roasted to a turn, and preceded by trumpets and minstrelsy. Mustard was indispensable to this dish.
Next came a peacock, skinned and roasted. The beak was gilded, and sometimes a bit of cotton, well soaked in spirits, was put into his mouth, and when he was brought to the table this was ignited, so that the bird was literally spouting fire. He was stuffed with spices, basted with yolks of eggs, and served with plenty of gravy.
Geese, capons, pheasants, carps’ tongues, frumenty, and mince, or “shred” pies, made up the balance of the feast.