arties and excursions are often
arranged for spending a short time in the parks and fields, and
Christmas picnics partake much of the character of English
"gipsy-parties." The inhabitants being chiefly English, many of the
ceremonies customary in English homes are observed, and the changes
that are made are enforced for the most part by the difference in
climate, and by the altered circumstances under which the various
festivities are arranged.

In "A Summer Christmas," Douglas B. W. Sladen thus describes the
Australian festivities:--

"The Christmas dinner was at two,
And all that wealth or pains could do
Was done to make it a success;
And marks of female tastefulness,
And traces of a lady's care,
Were noticeable everywhere.
The port was old, the champagne dry,
And every kind of luxury
Which Melbourne could supply was there.
They had the staple Christmas fare,
Roast beef and turkey (this was wild),
Mince-pies, plum-pudding, rich and mild,
One for the ladies, one designed
For Mr. Forte's severer mind,
Were on the board, yet in a way
It did not seem like Christmas day
With no gigantic beech yule-logs
Blazing between the brass fire-dogs,
And with 100 deg. in the shade
On the thermometer displayed.
Nor were there Christmas offerings
Of tasteful inexpensive things,
Like those which one in England sends
At Christmas to his kin and friends,
Though the Professor with him took
A present of a recent book
For Lil and Madge and Mrs. Forte,
And though a card of some new sort
Had been arranged by Lil to face
At breakfast everybody's place.
When dinner ended nearly all
Stole off to lounges in the hall.

* * * * *

All save the two old folks and Lil,
Who made their hearts expand and thrill
By playing snatches, slow and clear,
Of carols they'd been used to hear
Some half a century ago
At High Wick Manor, when the two
Were bashful maidens: they talked on,
Of England and what they had done
On byegone Christmas nights at home,
Of friends beyond the Northern foam,
And friends beyond that other sea,
Yet further--whither ceaselessly
Travellers follow the old track,
But whence no messenger comes back."

CHRISTMAS IN NEW ZEALAND.

In 1887, we received a letter from Mr. W. M. Stanton, of Nelson, New
Zealand, giving the following interesting account of the colonists'
observance of Christmas:--

"And now, a