"A man might then behold, At Christmas in each hall, Good fires to curb the cold, And meat for great and small; The neighbours were friendly bidden, And all had welcome true, The poor from the gates were not chidden, When this old cap was new. "Black-jacks to every man Were fill'd with wine and beer; No pewter pot nor can In those days did appear; Good cheer in a nobleman's house Was counted a seemly shew; We wanted no brawn nor souse, When this old cap was new." Can our readers bear, after this sad ditty, to listen to the enumeration of good things described by Whistlecraft to have been served up at King Arthur's table on Christmas day? If the list be authentic, there is the less reason to wonder at the feats of courage and strength performed by the Knights of the Round Table. "They served up salmon, venison, and wild boars, By hundreds, and by dozens, and by scores. "Hogsheads of honey, kilderkins of mustard, Muttons, and fatted beeves, and bacon swine; Herons and bitterns, peacocks, swan, and bustard, Teal, mallard, pigeons, widgeons, and, in fine, Plum-puddings, pancakes, apple-pies, and custard. And therewithal they drank good Gascon wine, With mead, and ale, and cider of our own; For porter, punch, and negus were not known." But we cannot pursue this matter further. It is not to be treated with any degree of calmness before dinner, and we have not dined. We must proceed to less trying parts of our subject. Of the earnest manner in which our ancestors set about the celebration of this festival, the mock ceremonial with which they illustrated it, the quaint humors which they let loose under its inspiration, and the spirit of fellowship which brought all classes of men within the range of its beneficent provisions, we have a large body of scattered evidence, to be gleaned out of almost every species of existing record, from the early days of the Norman dynasty down to the times of the Commonwealth. The tales of chroniclers, the olden ballads, the rolls of courts, and the statute-book of the land, all contribute to furnish the materials from which a revival of the old pageantry must be derived, if men should ever again find time to be as merry as their fathers were.