ATTRACTIONS OF WINTER WEATHER 297 



feel sadly mirthful in memory of the frolics of happier 

 times. Without going further back in our literature, 

 take Scott's famous introduction to the sixth canto of 

 " Marmion"- 



" Heap on more wood ! the wind is chill ; 

 But let it whistle as it will, 

 We'll keep our Christmas merry still." 



The ring of the metre sounds like the church bells to a 

 devotee, or the dinner-gong to a hungry man. What 

 a striking picture of the kindly joviality that levels 

 ranks and sets a truce to cares ! The baron's hall, 

 where the flames from the great log-fire that went roar- 

 ing and crackling up the vast chimney, flashed their light 

 on merry faces and burnished flagons. The stately 

 baron in the chimney-corner, unbending for once ; the 

 " heir with roses in his shoes," flirting with village 

 maiden with redder roses in her cheeks ; the boar's 

 head, bedecked with bays and rosemaries, grinning on 

 the festal board among sirloins and huge bickers of 

 plum-porridge, and wassail-bowls bobbing with the 

 roasted crabs ; the tales of the hunting-field by flood 

 and fell ; the stories of venerable, time-honoured 

 superstitions that made the hearers shudder even 

 in that merry crowd ; the mumming, the singing, 

 the laughing, and the dancing, while the winds 

 that howled and whistled through the trees and the 

 loopholes in the battlements, drove the smoke- 

 wreaths back again down the chimney, and scattered 

 the sparks from the blazing roots. Little recked 



