“Dear me, sir, no!  Just as you say.  Holidays are not in the least wearisome any more.  Plague on it!  When a man tells me now that he hates holidays, I find myself getting very wroth.  I pin him by the buttonhole at once, and tell him my experience.  The fact is, if I were at dinner on a holiday, and anybody should ask me for a sentiment, I should say, ‘God bless all holidays!’”

MASTER SANDY’S SNAPDRAGON*

* This story was first published in Wide Awake, vol. 26.

ELDRIDGE S. BROOKS

There was just enough of December in the air and of May in the sky to make the Yuletide of the year of grace 1611 a time of pleasure and delight to every boy and girl in “Merrie England” from the princely children in stately Whitehall to the humblest pot-boy and scullery-girl in the hall of the country squire.

And in the palace at Whitehall even the cares of state gave place to the sports of this happy season.  For that “Most High and Mighty Prince James, by the Grace of God King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland”—­as you will find him styled in your copy of the Old Version, or what is known as “King James’ Bible”—­loved the Christmas festivities, cranky, crabbed, and crusty though he was.  And this year he felt especially gracious.  For now, first since the terror of the Guy Fawkes plot which had come to naught full seven years before, did the timid king feel secure on his throne; the translation of the Bible, on which so many learned men had been for years engaged, had just been issued from the press of Master Robert Baker; and, lastly, much profit was coming into the royal treasury from the new lands in the Indies and across the sea.

So it was to be a Merry Christmas in the palace at Whitehall.  Great were the preparations for its celebration, and the Lord Henry, the handsome, wise and popular young Prince of Wales, whom men hoped some day to hail as King Henry of England, was to take part in a jolly Christmas mask, in which, too, even the little Prince Charles was to perform for the edification of the court when the mask should be shown in the new and gorgeous banqueting hall of the palace.

And to-night it was Christmas Eve.  The Little Prince Charles and the Princess Elizabeth could scarcely wait for the morrow, so impatient were they to see all the grand devisings that were in store for them.  So good Master Sandy, under-tutor to the Prince, proposed to wise Archie Armstrong, the King’s jester, that they play at snapdragon for the children in the royal nursery.

The Prince and Princess clamoured for the promised game at once, and soon the flicker from the flaming bow lighted up the darkened nursery as, around the witchlike caldron, they watched their opportunity to snatch the lucky raisin.  The room rang so loudly with fun and laughter that even the King himself, big of head and rickety of legs, shambled in good-humouredly to join in the sport that was giving so much pleasure to the royal boy he so dearly loved, and whom he always called “Baby Charles.”