My friend's shadow fell across her work, and she looking
up, their eyes met; but her face said plainly, "I do not know you
here, and here you do not know me. Here I am a woman loved and
respected." My friend passed in and spoke to the older woman, the
wife of one of his host's tenants, and she turned towards, and
introduced the younger--"My daughter, sir. We do not see her very
often. She is in a place in London, and cannot get away. But she
always spends a few days with us at Christmas."
"It is the season for family re-unions," answered my friend with
just the suggestion of a sneer, for which he hated himself.
"Yes, sir," said the woman, not noticing; "she has never missed her
Christmas with us, have you, Bess?"
"No, mother," replied the girl simply, and bent her head again over
her work.
So for these few days every year this woman left her furs and
jewels, her fine clothes and dainty foods, behind her, and lived for
a little space with what was clean and wholesome. It was the one
anchor holding her to womanhood; and one likes to think that it was,
perhaps, in the end strong enough to save her from the drifting
waters. All which arguments in favour of Christmas and of Christmas
customs are, I admit, purely sentimental ones, but I have lived long
enough to doubt whether sentiment has not its legitimate place in
the economy of life.
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