And then there are the numerous public servants who nowadays receive from the public no special Christmas benefaction--How gracefully they might obtain it by infusing into their occupations a little Yuletide pageantry! As it is, the subway guards celebrate the golden springtime by donning white raiment. Let them on Christmas day be wreathed with mingled holly and mistletoe, and let them chant, in lusty chorus: God rest you, merry gentlemen! Let nothing you dismay. Please slip us some coin, you’ve got money to boin, And this is Christmas day. Few subterranean voyagers could resist this appeal. And the street cleaners, how comes it that they are unrewarded of the public? Their predecessors, the crossing sweepers of London fifty years ago, exacted tribute from pedestrians not only at Christmas time, but on every day of the year. Let our street cleaners assume holiday garb and manner, let them expect Christmas gifts, but give in turn a Christmas spectacle. Methods of doing this will readily suggest themselves--an appropriate thing would be for them to procure mediæval attire at any theatrical costumer’s, and build great bonfires at such points of vantage as Columbus Circle, Times Square, Madison Square, and Union Square. Over these bonfires boars’ heads should be roasted and great bowls of steaming punch should hang. From passersby who partook of their hospitality the street cleaners, through one of their number dressed as an almoner, should request a golden remembrance. These things may yet come to pass. They are not so archaic as seemed in nineteen-thirteen a worldwide war. And the municipal Christmas trees are a good beginning. But to return to our muttons, or, rather, to our geese and plum puddings, the most important thing for us to remember in the selection of Christmas presents is their suitability to the person for whom they are intended. We may like books, but let us not therefore feel obliged to sustain our literary reputation by giving books to our neighbour who wants a box of cigars or a jumping-jack. We have the precedent, furnished by Saint Nicholas, and we have a higher precedent still. For the first great Christmas gift to humanity was what humanity most needed, and always needs--a child. A BOUQUET FOR JENNY