The German child normally is in a stronger position about Christmas than the English child, for in this country there are two great days for presents and festivities. Early in December arrives St. Nicholas, bringing with him cakes and nuts and sweets. His visits are paid, of course, during the night, and shoes and stockings are, with the hopefulness of youth, left by the bedside for him to fill. On Christmas Day is the Christmas tree with further cakes and presents and delights. German brutality is always difficult to understand in view of the position held by the children and the obvious wealth of care and affection lavished on them. For in even greater measure than in England is Christmas the children’s feast. During the holiday season the affairs of their elders are temporarily suspended, while the latter devote themselves to a round of juvenile gaiety and amusement. Children’s plays appear at the theatre, even the Opera House abandons Mozart and Wagner and gives special performances of _Hänsel und Gretel_ for the benefit of juvenile audiences. I have no recollection of Germany more pleasant than that of the Opera House filled in Christmas week with a crowd of excited children come to listen to Humperdinck’s delightful play. The white frocks filled stalls and boxes like petals of a great bouquet. Large bows of ribbon on the fair heads fluttered like banners in a breeze as the adventures of Hänsel and Gretel and the witch were followed with shrieks of excitement. On one side of me sat a little English girl, holding on tight to her chair so as not to spring out of it altogether; on the other, a little German girl, with a hand thrust firmly into her mouth in order to secure some measure of silence. But as the adventures of the play deepened, the situation proved too much for my small neighbour, who flung herself finally with cries of excitement into her mother’s arms. I envied the actors their audience. It must have been a joy to play in an atmosphere of such entire appreciation. When the culminating moment is reached, and clever Hänsel pops the wicked witch into the oven destined for the children, squeals of joy broke out all over the theatre: squeals only to be renewed in intensity when the oven door was reopened and the witch brought out cooked and browned in the shape of an enormous gingerbread. Let us be thankful for the unconsciousness of childhood, keeping alive in the world great treasures of joy and laughter, when the grim realities of post-war Europe oppress our souls.