The Bay of the Band 
And everywhere the Christmas spirit, too. As I 
paused among the pointed cedars of the pasture, 
looking down into the cripple at the head of the 
swamp, a clear wild whistle rang in the thicket, fol- 
lowed by a flash through the alders like a tongue of 
fire, as a cardinal grosbeak shot down to the tangle 
of greenbrier and magnolia under the slope. It wasa 
fleck of flaming summer. As warm as summer, too, 
the stag-horn sumac burned on the crest of the ridge 
against the group of holly trees,— trees as fresh as 
April, and all aglow with berries. The woods were 
decorated for the holy day. The gentleness of the 
soft new snow touched everything ; cheer and good- 
will lighted the unclouded sky and warmed the thick 
depths of the evergreens, and blazed in the crimson- 
berried bushes of the ilex and alder. The Christmas 
woods were glad. 
Nor was the gladness all show, mere decoration. 
There was real cheer in abundance, for I was back 
in the old home woods, back along the Cohansey, 
back where you can pick persimmons off the trees at 
Christmas. There are persons who say the Lord might 
have made a better berry than the strawberry, but He 
didn’t. Perhaps He didn’t make the strawberry at 
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