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often the most uncomfortable furniture is literally stored, the room being
rarely opened except to entertain guests. In winter, it is frequently sealed.
as it may contain no stove to heat it. In many of the village homes, the front
room was opened only when the clergyman called or when a member of the
family died and the body laid out in it.
This morning our parlour was the respository of the Christmas tree, a
ceiling-high spruce which grandfather had cut from our woodlot and which
I had helped him to drag across the snow-covered fields. Tissue paper-wrapped
gifts lay among its boughs which were bright with the glass and metal orna-
ments we used to get from Germany, among them a Christmas tree decoration
I have not seen for years: lithographed pictures of Santa Claus and apoplectic
children and cherubim with loops of tinsel on either side through which to
thread the boughs.
Also on this tree were objects whose presence would terrify a Canadian of
today: small wax candles in holders clamped to the end of the boughs. To
expose a tree to such a fire menace would terrify a modern Canadian family
which either illuminates its tree with festoons of small electric lights or is
content to let the lights of the room reflect from its tinsel strands.
Hazardous or not, our tree was so aromatic in the clear, chill air of the
parlour and kept so beautifully fresh there, that one year my grandmother
refused to let us remove it until Easter,
Ralph MARVEN,
Press and Information Representative,
CBC International Service.
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