Christmas weather, sunlight, moonlight and snow; our grove a white stencil; our baraques with their red shutters by day and their lighted windows by night, like painted Christmas cards; our defaced and ruined villages new-clothed with beauty,—such was our Christmas week. But the snow, so beautiful to the eye, accentuated the bitter cold of our ill-lodged and under-nourished neighbours, and the moon pointed out to hostile aeroplanes desired points of attack. It was on account of the dangerous moonlight that the Bishop of Amiens forbade midnight masses in the churches. We, and our villagers, were the more disappointed because even during the German occupation these masses had been sung. We heard of loaded Christmas trees, and of parties where cakes and chocolate were served by German officers. “Not for all the world, you understand,” Colombe, our informant, explained, “just for themselves.” Yet all the world had had some share in the German Christmas, and we felt eager to make up a little for the added hardships caused since that time by German cruelty, for all the ruined homesteads which are but the outward sign of families scattered, missing and dead.

Yet at first, so prevalent was the feeling of sadness, we thought it might not be desirable to have a fÊte. Did the villagers want one? Had the Christmas tree too many German associations? We made inquiry of M. le Sous-PrÉfet, and of the Commandant of the Third Army. From the latter came the following reply:

So it came about that in each of the villages there was a spruce, with toys and candles and goodies, and carols and Christmas cheer. In Canizy, thanks to good fortune and to M. l’AumÔnier, the fÊte was especially pretty. I had not yet met the chaplain or planned my Christmas, when, on a late December afternoon, I happened to pass the little chapel, on my way to Visit a group of families lodged within the grounds of the old ChÂteau. Several times before I had been inside, once for a mass on All Saints’ Day, and more than once to look at the faded painting behind the altar, and at the quaintly quilted banners of the saints along the wall. These, strange to say, had been left in place by the German invaders; save for a soiled altar cloth and two or three broken windows, the church, indeed, appeared as if it might still be in constant use.

To-day, in spite of the early gathering dusk, and the long walk home, an impulse beckoned me in,—a very definite impulse, however, for I had in mind to decipher a moulded coat of arms upon the walls, and to search the sacristy. In other village churches, alas! dismantled, were to be found carved chests of drawers, black letter Bibles, brasses, and glorious books of chants. Perhaps my little chapel might contain treasures also. Past Our Lady of Lourdes and St. Anthony of Padua, past the Sacred Heart, and that humble saint of gardens, St. Fiacre, to whom had nevertheless been given the place of honour on the Virgin’s right, and up through the chancel I went. The door of the sacristy creaked at my sacrilege.

The alcove on which it opened was hung with cobwebs. The floor was littered; drawers gaping awry disclosed a medley of candle ends, tinsel flowers, vases and books. But on shelves across the end, my eye caught glowing colours of vestments, green and gold and purple, lying in the same folds, apparently, in which M. le CurÉ had left them when he went forth into captivity three years ago. In a corner cabinet were sundry images, broken for the most part, and among them that of a wax doll, broken-armed and blackened with age, but encased in a bell of glass. In an opposite corner, behind a scaffolding, I found another treasure; a tiny thatched hut upon a standard, evidently designed to be borne in processions. Ivy, turned crisp and brown, entwined its four pillars, and chestnut leaves, silvered with dust, made an appliquÉ upon the thatch. The God of Gardens, the Festival of the First Fruits, perhaps,—had I not come here upon a Roman survival in old Picardy? But, suddenly, I saw with other eyes; here were the cross and the Christ-child; I had stumbled on the Christmas crÈche.

Time pressed; I noted again the faded blazons which flanked the saints on either wall—a closed crown, a shield embossed with seven fleurs-de-lis, and upheld by two leopards—shut the outer door, and took my way to the ChÂteau. One can see that the ChÂteau of Canizy is ancient, by its two stone turrets and its Gothic arch. At least, it is so ancient that no one in the village remembers the family whose royal escutcheon adorns its chapel walls. It is but lately a ruin, however, at the wanton hands of the Germans. In a stable in the farmyard, I found the family I had come to visit, formerly domestics of the estate.

The old, bent grandmother, vacant-eyed and silent, sat in a corner nearest the fire. The mother, whom I never saw without her black cap, shook hands and dusted off a chair. The daughter, lovely as a beam of sunshine in that dark interior, offered me wine.

“But no,” I protested, “it is late,” and having paid for the knitting of a pair of stockings, which was my errand, I continued, “Tell me, please. I have just come from the sacristy. There is a little house there.”

“The crÈche!”

“There is also a doll.”

“Yes, the little Jesus!”

“Have you then all you need for the crÈche, and would you like a mass for NoËl?”

At that even the grandmother’s eyes lighted.

“A mass! We have not had one for three years!”

Who, then, would clean the church, who trim the crÈche, who tell me what to get for it? The answers came as rapidly as the questions. Elmire had always had charge of the crÈche; she would return with me at once to see what was lacking.

Together we made our way back and inventoried (1) the crÈche itself; (2) a white lace-bordered square, (3) the little Jesus, and (4) some tinsel, or angel’s hair.

“There is lacking,” Elmire thought quickly, “a Saint Joseph, a Blessed Virgin, six tapers, cotton wool, and perhaps a star.”

Twice on my homeward journey I was stopped by Elmire’s younger brother, running after me with breathless messages: “Elmire says, would you please get a shepherd,” and, “Elmire asks for three little sheep.”

Where one was to get these was as much a mystery as the priest for the mass. But I promised that all should be done.

The figures for the crÈche were actually found in Amiens. To them was added a new little Jesus in a cradle; and the whole was brought by hand to Elmire. The delight of the entire family in unwrapping the various bundles was equalled only by my own in watching them. Afterwards, in the stable, the crÈche was trimmed. Artificial flowers, blue and pink and tinsel, bloomed under Elmire’s deft fingers; the pillars were fluted with coloured paper, the roof plaited with holly leaves. A lamp was necessary in the dark place, and its light fell on the eager faces of the family, grouped about that fairy hut. “In a stable,” I thought as I looked at them, “in a stable, the Christ is born again.”

But it was M. l’AumÔnier who voiced my thought at mass on Christmas Day. He had made a children’s service of this, centred about the crÈche. After the cantiques, led by the soldier-boy, after the triumphal Adeste, Fideles, the children knelt in a circle about the cradle of the Christ.

“My children,” began the chaplain, “this year, you yourselves live in huts, in barns, and in stables; so in a stable lives the little Jesus, as you see. You know what it is to be cold, beneath the snow upon the roof; so does the little Jesus. You have been hungry; so is he.

“My children, it behooves you, therefore, to make for the little Jesus a cradle in your hearts; cleanse them, each of you, and ask the little Jesus in.

“What next should you do, my children? Should you not pray first of all for yourselves, that you may be kept from sin? Next, forget not to pray for the soldiers of la Patrie, who only a few miles away, guard you from your enemies. Next, think on your fathers, your older brothers and sisters, who are with the Germans in captivity. Beseech mercy for them, my children, that the good God may return them to your homes. Next, be especially thoughtful of your mothers and obedient to them, who stand to you in the place of both your parents. And last, but also of importance, my children, remember in your prayers your benefactresses, these ladies who have given you this year the Christmas crÈche.”

M. l’AumÔnier said more, but I could not hear it. I was aware that he himself set the children an example by praying for us, heretics though we were. It was only when we came out into the open sunlight, and walked up the street to Mme. LefÈvre’s to strip the tree, that laughter became possible, and that one could see the accustomed smile in his eyes. Yet even at the fÊte, we could not escape from thanks. The presents, selected to be sure with care, but so inadequate compared with the needs, were hardly distributed when a hush fell on the packed room. A boy stepped forward, and began to read from a piece of paper in his hand. A girl followed. Their elders listened with the greatest satisfaction, nodding their heads and smiling at our amazement. And this is what they said,—a measure not of what we did, but of the spirit of stricken Canizy: