JANUARY 
When icicles hang by the wall 
And Dick the shepherd blows his nail 
And Tom bears logs into the hall 
And milk comes frozen home in pail, 
When blood is nipp’d and ways be foul, 
Then nightly sings the staring,owl, 
Tu-whit ; 
Tu-who, a merry note, 
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. 
When all aloud the wind doth blow, 
And coughing drowns the parson’s saw, 
And birds sit brooding in the snow, 
And Marian’s nose looks red and raw, 
When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl, 
Then nightly sings the staring owl, 
Tu-whit; 
Tu-who, a merry note, 
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot 
Love's Labour's Lost, V. ii. 922. 
HE month of rejoicing, the month of Christmas, 
J- old style, of Twelfth Night sports and pastimes, 
of open hospitality to rich and poor alike, of genial 
hand-shaking and joyous welcome — in Shake¬ 
speare’s time more so even than our own. For is it 
not true of these latter years that cheap postage and 
railways have served to break down the ties of 
family affection, and severed the bonds of friendship, 
and an age essentially self-seeking and pleasure¬ 
seeking cares little for the simple gathering about 
the family board, the reunion of scattered units ; but, 
nevertheless, some semblance of old-world forms are 
t 126 ] 
