December, 1916 
11 
House & Garden 
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CONCERNING THE HOUSE OF CHRISTMAS 
Which Is The House That Waves Its Hand To The World In Good Cheer 
EDITH WARES 
Illustrations by Jack Manley Rose 
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Outside the House of Christmas the decorated doorway waves its greeting 
to the j)assersby. Laurel garlands and holly toreaths enliven the entrance. 
Ostentatious? Perhaps it is to the neighbor ivho does not believe in Christmas 
with her own little household. The neigh¬ 
bors mean nothing except persons who ob¬ 
ject to the pianola being played after eleven. 
This callousness is the stigma of the 
urbanite. 
Come Christmas, and the housewife buys 
the prettiest, reddest-berried wreath she 
can find, and hangs it on the apartment 
door to show the John Smiths and the old 
maid Whites that she wishes them well— 
C HRISTMAS is the one season of the 
year when half the world can wave 
its hand to the other half without fear of 
rebuff or reproach. 
We would not think of sending the 
pouchy owner of the brown-stone across 
the way a rosy apple at Thanksgiving, or 
a valentine on February 14th. He would 
not understand. 
But on Christmas Eve we greet him with 
a candle burning in the win¬ 
dow. We deck the door and 
pile high the window-sill with 
the green things of our cheer 
for him. 
He understands then—be¬ 
cause he is doing the same. 
Christmas is also the one 
season of the year when we 
can look into other people’s 
windows without regard for 
what other people think. Most 
other people are thinking of 
the good time they are having 
and how pretty it all looks. 
. . . And we are thinking 
just about the same. 
That is the peculiar democ¬ 
racy of Christmas. 
There is no use being happy 
unless you can be happy with 
someone else. There is no 
use drawing the shades and 
trying to keep the joy indoors. 
It won’t be kept indoors. 
The house and all who are 
in it fling their greetings hap¬ 
hazard to whomsoever passes. 
We can do this too. We 
can start a wave of good 
cheer on its way. We can 
make our homes houses of 
Christmas. 
W HAT a callous disre¬ 
gard city apartment 
dwellers have for the interiors 
of the other apartments about 
them ! The country neighbor 
would simply die of curiosity, 
but she who dwells in an 
apartment is concerned only 
despite everything. All the frigidity ac¬ 
crued through a long year of disregard for 
the pianola ruling is forgotten. The little 
red holly berries are veritable pills for hu¬ 
man grumpiness. And so Mrs., Smith, who 
most loudly objected to the pianola, hangs 
a garland on her door, and the old maid 
Whites, who also objected to it, hang a 
garland on theirs, a garland with a sprig of 
mistletoe in its heart—the minxes! 
Soon the news spreads 
from floor to floor. The ele¬ 
vator man talks about it. The 
children ask questions. Be¬ 
fore night, the whole house¬ 
hold of fifty-odd families is 
celebrating Christinas! 
T HERE is a friendliness 
between suburbanites — 
or else there isn’t—and Christ¬ 
mas does more than anything 
else toward straightening out 
misunderstandings as to the 
merits of one’s children and 
one’s golf score. This is how 
the Christmas spirit works: 
Mothers send their chil¬ 
dren bearing tiny cards tied 
with bright red ribbon to the 
houses in the neighborhood. 
Everyone is invited to the 
Christmas tree, the really 
truly Christmas tree that will 
he held that night in the back 
yard. 
When they arrive, there it 
is, ablaze with candles against 
the night sky, as if stars had 
dropped like snowflakes on 
the tree. The children sing 
carols and the grownups for¬ 
get about golf scores, and the 
whole affair is as simple and 
pretty and fresh as the coun¬ 
tryside itself. . . . Then 
back through the snowy 
streets, past houses where 
candles burn in windows. 
This is an old custom, this 
burning a candle in the win¬ 
dow on Christmas Eve. It is 
