“Next time I think, yes, I know that next time we shall have a Christmas story.”
A CHRISTMAS BARRING OUT
’Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
Bobby and Alice and Pink had hung their stockings by the living-room mantle and, though it was very, very early, they decided to go to bed. They always wanted to go to bed early on Christmas Eve. Morning seemed to come so much more quickly when they went to bed early. They wouldn’t even wait for a story. They would just say good night to Grandma and go right to bed.
“Why!” exclaimed Grandma in surprise, when they had explained their intentions to her, “you mustn’t go to bed so soon. You’d be awake in the morning before daylight! Come in and visit with me a while and I’ll see if I can’t think up a story to tell you, the same as on other nights.”
So they went in and sat down on their stools in front of the fire. Grandma put on her spectacles, but, instead of her knitting, she took up her Bible. The children were very still while she read the story of the first Christmas—how in a stable in Bethlehem the baby Christ was born, and how an angel appeared to the shepherds, who were watching their flocks, and told them about the Savior’s birth, and then a host of angels came and praised God, saying, “Glory be to God on high, and on earth peace, good will toward men,” just as we sing today on Christmas.
“I think,” said Grandma, “that I will tell you tonight about a Christmas treat at our school. When I was a little girl we had a custom, handed down from pioneer times, called ‘barring out.’ A few days before Christmas the teacher would arrive to find the schoolhouse door securely fastened. Before he was admitted he would have to sign a paper promising to ‘treat’ his pupils.
“In those days we didn’t have much ‘store’ candy, and we looked forward for weeks to the Christmas treat we got at school. You wouldn’t think much of it today—six sticks of red and white striped candy apiece, wintergreen and sassafras and clove and maybe one of horehound. My, but it tasted good to us! We didn’t eat it all up at once, either. No, indeed!