long disposed of; Terence and Plautus acted no more, in an arena of
huddled desks and forms, all chipped, and notched, and inked;
cricket-bats, stumps, and balls, left higher up, with the smell of
trodden grass and the softened noise of shouts in the evening air;
the tree is still fresh, still gay. If I no more come home at
Christmas-time, there will be boys and girls (thank Heaven!) while
the World lasts; and they do! Yonder they dance and play upon the
branches of my Tree, God bless them, merrily, and my heart dances
and plays too!

And I do come home at Christmas. We all do, or we all should. We
all come home, or ought to come home, for a short holiday--the
longer, the better--from the great boarding-school, where we are for
ever working at our arithmetical slates, to take, and give a rest.
As to going a visiting, where can we not go, if we will; where have
we not been, when we would; starting our fancy from our Christmas
Tree!

Away into the winter prospect. There are many such upon the tree!
On, by low-lying, misty grounds, through fens and fogs, up long
hills, winding dark as caverns between thick plantations, almost
shutting out the sparkling stars; so, out on broad heights, until we
stop at last, with sudden silence, at an avenue. The gate-bell has
a deep, half-awful sound in the frosty air; the gate swings open on
its hinges; and, as we drive up to a great house, the glancing
lights grow larger in the windows, and the opposing rows of trees
seem to fall solemnly back on either side, to give us place. At
intervals, all day, a frightened hare has shot across this whitened
turf; or the distant clatter of a herd of deer trampling the hard
frost, has, for the minute, crushed the silence too. Their watchful