We waded and ploughed our way through the snow to church. I think Mr. Rumfry, if that is the gentleman's name who preached an admirable Christmas sermon, in a beautiful church there is, will remember the platoon of four men and four women, who made perhaps a fifth of his congregation in that storm,--a storm which shut off most church-going. Home again; a jolly fire in the parlor, dry stockings, and dry slippers. Turkeys, and all things fitting for the dinner; and then a general assembly, not in a caravanserai, not in a coffee-room, but in the regular guests' parlor of a New-England second-class hotel, where, as it was ordered, there were no "transients" but ourselves that day; and whence all the "boarders" had gone either to their own rooms, or to other homes. For people who have their wives with them, it is not difficult to provide entertainment on such an occasion. "Bertha," said Wolfgang, "could you not entertain us with one of your native dances?" "Ho! slave," said Dick to Hosanna, "play upon the virginals." And Hosanna played a lively Arab air on the tavern piano, while the fair Bertha danced with a spirit unusual. Was it indeed in memory of the Christmas of her own dear home in Circassia? All that, from "Bertha" to "Circassia," is not so. We did not do this at all. That was all a slip of the pen. What we did was this. John Blatchford pulled the bell-cord till it broke (they always break in novels, and sometimes they do in taverns). This bell-cord broke. The sleepy boy came; and John said, "Caitiff, is there never a barber in the house?" The frightened boy said there was; and John bade him send him. In a minute the barber appeared,--black, as was expected,--with a shining face, and white teeth, and in shirt sleeves, and broad grins. "Do you tell me, Caesar," said John, "that in your country they do not wear their coats on Christmas day?"--"Sartin, they do, sir, when they go out doors." "Do you tell me, Caesar," said Dick, "that they have doors in your country?"--"Sartin, they do," said poor Caesar, flurried. "Boy," said I, "the gentlemen are making fun of you. They want to know if you ever keep Christmas in your country without a dance." "Never, sar," said poor Caesar. "Do they dance without music?" "No, sar; never." "Go, then," I said in my sternest accents,--"go fetch a zittern, or a banjo, or a kit, or a hurdy-gurdy, or a fiddle."