Old Christmas: From the Sketch Book of Washington Irving
()
About this ebook
Washington Irving
Washington Irving Was born in New York City in 1783. He lived in the United States, England, and Spain (where he served as an American diplomatic attache). A prolific author, Irving wrote The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., Diedrich Knickerbocker's History of New York, The Alhambra, and biographies of George Washington and Christopher Columbus, among other works. He is best remembered, however, for his two most famous stories, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle."
Read more from Washington Irving
Rip Van Winkle Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Christmas Library: 250+ Essential Christmas Novels, Poems, Carols, Short Stories...by 100+ Authors Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Old Christmas Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Classic American Short Story MEGAPACK ® (Volume 1): 34 of the Greatest Stories Ever Written Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Gothic Novel Collection Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Knickerbocker's History of New York Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Oxford Book of American Essays Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Gothic Classics: 60+ Books in One Volume Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Greatest Ghost and Horror Stories Ever Written: volume 1 (30 short stories) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Other Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tales of the Alhambra: A Selection of Essays and Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Greatest Christmas Stories: 120+ Authors, 250+ Magical Christmas Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTales of a Traveller Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Tour on the Prairies: An Account of Thirty Days in Deep Indian Country Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Greatest American Short Stories: 50+ Classics of American Literature Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Harvard Classics: All 71 Volumes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Other Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Classic Christmas Stories: A Collection of Timeless Holiday Tales Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings30 Occult & Supernatural masterpieces you have to read before you die (Golden Deer Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Old Christmas
Related ebooks
The Trial of Aaron Burr Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRobin Hood Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5God Bless America: A Captivating Account of the Role of Religion in Founding the United States Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFather Bill, The Reflections of a Beloved Rebel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Children's Own Longfellow Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Calusan Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Tam O'Shanter Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBattle-Pieces and Aspects of the War Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5In Pursuit of Peace in Israel and Palestine Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Richard Carvel — Complete Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Virginian Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Man Upstairs Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings7 best short stories by Nathaniel Hawthorne Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWind in the Willows (Illustrated): Children's Classic with Original Illustrations Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Doctor Thorne Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5David Copperfield Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWashington on Courage: George Washington's Formula for Courageous Living Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Inward Witness to Christianity Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRemains: Non-Viewable: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5South Dakota’s Cowboy Governor Tom Berry: Leadership During the Depression Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Life, Public Services and Select Speeches of Rutherford B. Hayes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Charterhouse of Parma Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5What I Saw in America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings50 Classic Christmas Stories Vol. 3 (Golden Deer Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Prairie Trilogy: O Pioneers!, The Song of the Lark, and My Ántonia Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Collected Works of EMILY DICKINSON: The Complete Works PergamonMedia Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
History For You
100 Things You're Not Supposed to Know: Secrets, Conspiracies, Cover Ups, and Absurdities Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Whore Stories: A Revealing History of the World's Oldest Profession Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Victorian Lady's Guide to Fashion and Beauty Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Becoming Cliterate: Why Orgasm Equality Matters--And How to Get It Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5100 Amazing Facts About the Negro with Complete Proof Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Richest Man in Babylon: The most inspiring book on wealth ever written Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wise as Fu*k: Simple Truths to Guide You Through the Sh*tstorms of Life Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The ZERO Percent: Secrets of the United States, the Power of Trust, Nationality, Banking and ZERO TAXES! Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Great Awakening: Defeating the Globalists and Launching the Next Great Renaissance Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Great Reset: And the War for the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Secret History of the World Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Lessons of History Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Summary of The War of Art: by Steven Pressfield | Includes Analysis Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Power of Geography: Ten Maps That Reveal the Future of Our World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Gulag Archipelago [Volume 1]: An Experiment in Literary Investigation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dance of the Dissident Daughter: A Woman's Journey from Christian Tradition to the Sacred Feminine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Grief Observed Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Devil's Chessboard: Allen Dulles, the CIA, and the Rise of America's Secret Government Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of the Donner Party Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Old Christmas
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Old Christmas - Washington Irving
A man might then behold At Christmas, in each hall Good fires to curb the cold, And meat for great and small. The neighbours were friendly bidden, And all had welcome true, The poor from the gates were not chidden, When this old cap was new.
Old Song.
CHRISTMAS
There is nothing in England that exercises a more delightful spell over my imagination than the lingerings of the holiday customs and rural games of former times. They recall the pictures my fancy used to draw in the May morning of life, when as yet I only knew the world through books, and believed it to be all that poets had painted it; and they bring with them the flavour of those honest days of yore, in which, perhaps with equal fallacy, I am apt to think the world was more home-bred, social, and joyous than at present. I regret to say that they are daily growing more and more faint, being gradually worn away by time, but still more obliterated by modern fashion. They resemble those picturesque morsels of Gothic architecture which we see crumbling in various parts of the country, partly dilapidated by the waste of ages, and partly lost in the additions and alterations of latter days. Poetry, however, clings with cherishing fondness about the rural game and holiday revel, from which it has derived so many of its themes--as the ivy winds its rich foliage about the Gothic arch and mouldering tower, gratefully repaying their support by clasping together their tottering remains, and, as it were, embalming them in verdure.
Of all the old festivals, however, that of Christmas awakens the strongest and most heartfelt associations. There is a tone of solemn and sacred feeling that blends with our conviviality, and lifts the spirit to a state of hallowed and elevated enjoyment. The services of the church about this season are extremely tender and inspiring. They dwell on the beautiful story of the origin of our faith, and the pastoral scenes that accompanied its announcement. They gradually increase in fervour and pathos during the season of Advent, until they break forth in full jubilee on the morning that brought peace and good-will to men. I do not know a grander effect of music on the moral feelings than to hear the full choir and the pealing organ performing a Christmas anthem in a cathedral, and filling every part of the vast pile with triumphant harmony.
It is a beautiful arrangement, also, derived from days of yore, that this festival, which commemorates the announcement of the religion of peace and love, has been made the season for gathering together of family connections, and drawing closer again those bands of kindred hearts which the cares and pleasures and sorrows of the world are continually operating to cast loose; of calling back the children of a family who have launched forth in life, and wandered widely asunder, once more to assemble about the paternal hearth, that rallying-place of the affections, there to grow young and loving again among the endearing mementoes of childhood.
There is something in the very season of the year that gives a charm to the festivity of Christmas. At other times we derive a great portion of our pleasures from the mere beauties of nature. Our feelings sally forth and dissipate themselves over the sunny landscape, and we live abroad and everywhere.
The song of the bird, the murmur of the stream, the breathing fragrance of spring, the soft voluptuousness of summer, the golden pomp of autumn; earth with its mantle of refreshing green, and heaven with its deep delicious blue and its cloudy magnificence, all fill us with mute but exquisite delight, and we revel in the luxury of mere sensation. But in the depth of winter, when nature lies despoiled of every charm, and wrapped in her shroud of sheeted snow, we turn for our gratifications to moral sources. The dreariness and desolation of the landscape, the short gloomy days and darksome nights, while they circumscribe our wanderings, shut in our feelings also from rambling abroad, and make us more keenly disposed for the pleasures of the social circle. Our thoughts are more concentrated; our friendly sympathies more aroused. We feel more sensibly the charm of each other's society, and are brought more closely together by dependence on each other for enjoyment. Heart calleth unto heart; and we draw our pleasures from the deep wells of living kindness, which lie in the quiet recesses of our bosoms; and which, when resorted to, furnish forth the pure element of domestic felicity.
The pitchy gloom without makes the heart dilate on entering the room filled with the glow and warmth of the evening fire. The ruddy blaze diffuses an artificial summer and sunshine through the room, and lights up each countenance into a kindlier welcome. Where does the honest face of hospitality expand into a broader and more cordial smile--where is the shy glance of love more sweetly eloquent--than by the winter fireside? and as the hollow blast of wintry wind rushes through the hall, claps the distant door, whistles about the casement, and rumbles down the chimney, what can be more grateful than that feeling of sober and sheltered security with which we look round upon the comfortable chamber and the scene of domestic hilarity?
The English, from the great prevalence of rural habits throughout every class of society, have always been fond of those festivals and holidays which agreeably interrupt the stillness of country life; and they were,