"To-night is Christmas eve;
To-morrow is Christmas day.
Maria, fetch the jug of wine;
Let's be merry while we may."
And all was happiness and merry-making. Rusks, butter-cakes, pastes of nuts and honey, sweetmeats made by the nuns, rosoli, and cherry brandy were freely passed around. There was much talk of going to midnight Mass, to the Nativity play at dawn, to see the Bethlehem manger which we boys had constructed in the tower, and also of making sherbet out of the snow that carpeted the court.
Suddenly in the midst of all this merriment I was struck by the deep meaning of these words, sung by my paternal grandmother:—
"Christmas comes,
Christmas goes;
But soon we all shall be of those
Who come back—never!"