The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844

Оглавление

Various. The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844

DESCRIPTIVE POETRY

VICISSITUDES

THE IDLEBERG PAPERS

A CHRISTMAS YARN

WINTER EVENING

SONG OF THE NEW YEAR

ON COLOUR

STANZAS

SUGGESTED BY GLIDDON'S LECTURES ON THE ANTIQUITIES OF EGYPT

THE QUOD CORRESPONDENCE

CHAPTER NINETEENTH

CHAPTER TWENTIETH

LINES TO DEATH

SKETCHES OF EAST-FLORIDA

NUMBER FOUR

THOUGHTS FROM BULWER

SONNET: TO THE OLD YEAR

THE MAIL ROBBER

NUMBER SIX

LETTER SIXTH

LETTER FROM JAMES JESSAMINE

TO THE EDITOR OF THE KNICKERBOCKER

LOVE’S ELYSIUM

GANGUERNET: OR, ‘A CAPITAL JOKE.’

APOSTROPHE TO AN OLD HAT

THE COUNTRY

TO AN EVENING CLOUD

LITERARY NOTICES

EDITOR’S TABLE

A LAMENT

LINES

Отрывок из книги

At Christmas every body is or should be happy. The genial influence of the season lightens alike the lofty hall and the lowly cottage. It is the same at home or abroad, on the land or the billow, in royal purple or in ragged poverty; here and every where, to one and to all, it is always ‘merrie Christmas.’ At such a time there is an obligation due from every man to society, to be happy, and the more cheerfully it is paid, the better. The man who would be found scowling and glowering like a thunder-cloud, cherishing his private griefs or animosities at a time when every other countenance is glowing with light, and hope, and sunshine, should be denied all the charities of humanity, and exiled to Kamschatka, or some other inhospitable clime, to growl and fret with the wild beasts, or the wilder elements.

How dear is the light of home when glowing with the fires of Christmas! What though the elements be wild without, or Jack Frost blow his whistling pipe at the door, or fierce winds rumble down the chimney, and tell of sweeping gusts and howling storms abroad, if within and around that charmed circle is breathed the spirit of kindness and affection! Should the titled stranger or the ragged beggar knock, throw wide open the doors of thy hospitality; and while prattling infants recount the joys of the season, and school-boy striplings pursue their holiday sports, and gray-haired men who have traversed the wide world over, tell how in all their wanderings they have never passed a Christmas from home; he will turn his thoughts with a melancholy pleasure to the distant fireside beyond the sea, and to the friends who are gathered there, and wonder where the wanderer is spending his Christmas.

.....

Mr. Hardesty walked to the window, lifted the curtain, and looked out. The mists and clouds had cleared away, and left the sky all bright and blue. The sun had just risen, and was shedding his early splendor on the myriad snow-drops as brightly as if to atone for the darkness and gloom of yesterday. It was a cheerful and beautiful view; but Mr. Hardesty heard the sound of shuffling footsteps overhead; so he turned shivering from the window to dress himself for the day. ‘It’ll never do to be caught in this fix,’ said Mr. Hardesty.

His first search was for his boots, but these had been taken out, as he supposed, to be polished. He would put on his breeches and wait for his boots. He cast his eye on the pile of clothes, but the breeches were not there. Then he looked on the floor, and in all the corners of the room, and then on the bed and under the bed—but in vain. ‘What the d–l has become of my breeches!’ said Mr. Hardesty.

.....