Hallowe’en to Candlemas 
or Heligh monath. It was also called Guil erra. Guil 
was the term for the feast of Thor, the thunder-god, 
and the word “ yule ” is said to have come from this 
word. It meant the gathering in of all, the harvest of the 
year. 
January 6. — Twelfth Night. We crowned no King of 
the Bean, but Boy had a little Christmas-tree, and we 
gathered, to enjoy it with him, a number of little neigh- 
bours. It is wonderful how far some of these sturdy little 
Borderers will plod for a “ ploy,” a “ cake-walk,” as a 
gathering of the sort is delightfully called in Jamaica. We 
introduced to their wondering Presbyterian gaze the Christ- 
mas tableau called in France a Creche , and in Spain 
a Nacimiento , such as delights yearly Italian, French, and 
Spanish children. I felt a little as I imagine Mary Queen 
of Scots must have felt when she introduced her Scottish 
Court to the gay French pastime of the Feast of the Bean, 
and the grim Scots lords looked on wide-eyed and solemn 
at the sport around the fair Maid of Honour who drew the 
Bean in the Twelfth Cake, and appeared resplendent in a 
dress of cloth of silver and so many jewels (lent by Queen 
Mary) that “ more in our whole jewelhouse,” writes 
enviously the British ambassador, “ were not to be found.” 
I used to love making a Creche in my childhood, and now 
my wee Scots laddie has taken kindly to the pretty old 
Provencal custom. He toiled like a little beaver for days 
before, bringing along in his little cart moss-covered stones, 
branches of laurel and box, and ivy and holly, the “ Women’s 
Christmas herb,” as old Bullein calls it, which, cunningly 
blended, and powdered with flour and cottonwool, do duty 
for the lentiscus, myrtle, and rosemary branches which, 
similarly bepowdered, make the winter’s landscape around 
the thatched shed and Virgin and Child. Then out of the 
box, wherein they repose all the summer months, come 
the dear little earthen figures, veritable gens de la Creche , 
come all the way from the far-off shores of the Mediter 
ranean. The Kings with their gaily painted blue and red 
robes and gilt crowns — how fascinating was Baltasar, the 
59 
