bag of chaff. In some
part of this "bottle of hay" envelope, there is a "needle" as a
present to be hunted for. A friend of mine once received from her
betrothed, according to the Christmas custom, an exceedingly large
brown paper parcel, which, on being opened, revealed a second parcel
with a loving motto on the cover. And so on, parcel within parcel,
motto within motto, till the kernel of this paper husk--which was at
length discovered to be a delicate piece of minute jewellery--was
arrived at."

One of the prettiest of Christmas customs is the Norwegian practice of
giving, on Christmas Day, a dinner to the birds. On Christmas morning
every gable, gateway, or barn-door, is decorated with a sheaf of corn
fixed on the top of a tall pole, wherefrom it is intended that the
birds should make their Christmas dinner. Even the peasants contrive
to have a handful set by for this purpose, and what the birds do not
eat on Christmas Day, remains for them to finish at their leisure
during the winter.

On New Year's Day in Norway, friends and acquaintances exchange calls
and good wishes. In the corner of each reception-room is placed a
little table, furnished all through the day with wine and cakes for
the refreshment of the visitors; who talk, and compliment, and flirt,
and sip wine, and nibble cake from house to house, with great
perseverance.

Between Christmas and Twelfth Day mummers are in season. They are
called "Julebukker," or Christmas goblins. They invariably appear
after dark, and in masks and fancy dresses. A host may therefore have
to entertain in the course of the season, a Punch, Mephistopheles,
Charlemagne, Number, Nip, Gustavus, Oberon, and whole companies of
other fanciful and historic characters; but, as their antics are
performed in silence, they are not particularly cheerful company.

CHRISTMAS IN RUSSIA.

With Christmas Eve begins the festive season known in Russia as
_Svyatki_ or _Svyatuie Vechera_ (Holy Evenings), which lasts till the
Epiphany. The numerous sportive ceremonies which are associated with
it resemble, in many respects, those with which we are familiar, but
they are rendered specially interesting and valuable by the relics of
the past which they have been the means of preserving--the fragments
of ritual song which refer to the ancient paganism of the land, the
time-honoured customs which originally belonged to the feasts with
which the heathen Slavs greeted each year the return of the