It was Christmas Eve at Holiday's Point and, in accordance with the custom of generations, the children and grandchildren were gathered in an unbroken circle around the old hearthstone.

In my grandfather's day the neighbors called the old home Holiday's Point because of the numerous holidays given to the servants. The community held that if my grandfather had framed the almanac he would have put into it twice as many days as did the Arabs and Romans, that he might have more holidays to bestow upon his slaves.

The old-fashioned house on the Nansemond River, between Suffolk to the right and Norfolk to the left, was built of brick imported from England. In shape like an L, the four rooms on the first floor were divided by a passage fifteen feet wide; dining-room and library on one side, parlor and chamber on the other. Four large open fireplaces gave warmth and cheerfulness to the corridor. On the first floor of the L was the nursery and above it the children's room, the name of which was never changed because, in relation to the household, its occupants remained children to the end of the chapter, however the years might age them in the view of the outside world.

The house fronted the river, which was concealed by a heavy growth of trees until the door was reached through long lanes of cypress lined with rows of cedar, when a full view of the water for miles was presented. Hidden in the woods was one of the stables, in which old Starlight had her home near enough to the cabin to answer "Ung' Bosun's" whistle.

My mother, as usual, had permitted me to come to Holiday's Point the day before Christmas, the lighting of the Yule Log being one of my greatest joys. Away back in the early dawn of my infantile mind lurked a hazy memory of the time when my little hand had held the candle that lit the old log at the back of the great fireplace. That privilege was no longer mine. Other children had since entered the family circle, and the youngest child on the plantation, whether white or black, was the one always selected to touch off the Yule Log.

Another delightful sensation preliminary to Christmas day at Holiday's Point was the sight of "Uncle Charles" driving up from the river waving a paper above the load of Christmas things and warning us that it contained instructions from Santa Claus that all the contents of the cart should be put away in the storehouse until he should come on Christmas eve, and if anyone should touch any of the boxes or ask questions about what was inside of them all the good things would turn to ashes and sawdust and there would be nothing left when Christmas came, adding, "'Member what Santa Claus did to Miss Cinderelly when she didn't mind him, stayin' out late at night."

Though the awesome paper was only a bill of lading, which Uncle Charles knew very well, believing him we shrank before it in terror. I watched the unloading curiously, and the colored children, huddled together on the quarter-kitchen doorsteps, pulled down each other's heads and whispered mysteriously as the boxes and barrels were taken out and their contents announced. There was the hogshead of New Orleans molasses, with its thick layer of sugar at the bottom, the long peaked loaves of white sugar under their thin blue "fool's-caps," the cases of raisins, dates, figs and tamarinds, barrels of nuts, oranges and crackers, boxes of cheese and, slyly pushed behind them, hampers mysteriously marked "sundries," which we at once associated with the coming visit of Santa Claus himself.

When the rays of the sun were long in the west the cheerful note of the Yule Log was heard. The great hickory log, which had lain on its forked branch support through months of golden sunshine and mellowing rain, was carried in on the shoulder of the strongest negro on the plantation, followed by a rollicking troop of Christmas revelers, white and black, and next year's log was put on the Yule Log fork, which was never left empty.

The Yule Log was laid at the back of the great fireplace and in front of it were piled cobs, chips and kindling wood, known to the plantation servants as "light 'ood," a contraction for "light wood," which was the heart of the pine. It was lit with a wax candle made in the home kitchen by Aunt Dilsey, a candle in which I felt a proprietary interest, having watched with fascinated eyes the process of its manufacture. Aunt Dilsey had let me draw one of the doubled and twisted cotton strands through a tube in the tin mould to form the wick, and I felt like a conquering hero when the end of the string emerged from the point of the tube. There were six of these tubes in Aunt Dilsey's mould, and when they were all provided with wicks she allowed me to thrust through the loops at the top of the mould the little sticks which rested on the frames and held the strands in place. Then she tied the wicks very tightly at the ends. I watched the melted white wax poured into the tubes, feeling as if I were assisting at a magic incantation. The time of greatest excitement was when, after the carefully built structure had stood all night in a cool place to harden, Aunt Dilsey would cut off the knots at the bottom of the tube, take hold of the cross-sticks and pull till six long, beautiful white waxen cylinders would come out, each with a tuft of soft white cotton at the end. Every time I saw them emerge from their cells a separate and distinct miracle seemed to have been wrought. I have yet a pair of these moulds.

One of the candles was lighted and placed in the hand of my little brother, the youngest of the family group. My father guided the tiny hand until the flame formed a cross around which the tongues of fire leaped and caught the log, embracing it lovingly, climbing upward and turning blue and crimson and golden and white and then mingling in a glorified web of color. Myriads of sparkles shot up the old chimney, like Christmas prayers flying heavenward. The crackling of the wood and the fluttering of the flames joined in a Christmas carol for all the world.

Not the smallest fragment of the log must be left over after the twelve-day feast. It had lain seasoning in the sunshine and the starshine, in the rain and in the wind, in the frost and in the dew, in winter cold and summer heat, that it might be well prepared to give itself wholly to the sacrifice. Had a remnant remained in the ashes, disaster would have marked the year until the next Yule Log had removed the ban by entirely disappearing. Virginia had not received, with the traditional heritage, the Old World custom of preserving a fragment of one Yule Log to serve as a lighting torch for the next and to ward off evil demons until Christmas came again. The servants were to have holiday while there was a scrap of it left.

The ashes of the Yule Log were carefully saved apart from the others, as they were of peculiar sacredness. Lye made from them was of magic efficacy in the manufacture of soap, bringing it to a much-desired degree of hardness and excellence. The negroes used the lye to kill evil spirits and free themselves from the sins they had committed during the year.

Old Santa Claus's rack, the "chimbly rack," made of black walnut and handsomely decorated, with nails driven into it on which the stockings were to be hung, was brought in by Uncle Charles and placed above the marble mantelpiece. Over each nail was printed the name of the one for whom it was intended. Aunt Serena brought in the basket of stockings that she had knit of the finest spun cotton or wool and hung them on the nails, singing her Christmas incantation, "Christmas comes but once't a yeah, En ebby las' niggah has his sheah." The loved ones who had gone before were remembered and stockings for them were hung upon the rack. Their gifts were of money to be used in providing Christmas cheer for the unfortunate, the bereaved and the lonely. Thus was the memory of those who had passed beyond kept in grateful hearts.

From the wall above the portrait of my grandfather Underwood, with long hair and velvet-flowered vest and rolls of cravat, looked seriously down. I had never seen him, but my grandmother said that "he believed in God, woman and blood; was proud but not haughty, hospitable, generous, firm and unchangeable in his opinions, quiet and commanding, affectionate, courting responsibilities instead of shirking them."

For weeks all had been busy with preparations. The wood had been cut and piled, the corn gathered, the pigs killed, the mince-meat and souse and fruit cake prepared, the sausage chopped and the hominy beaten, the winter clothes all spun, woven and made. We sat by the fire with rest, peace and wonder in our hearts, cracking nuts and roasting apples, the old silver punch-bowl of apple-toddy steaming on the table, while we listened to stories of olden times and of times that never were. My uncle in his cadet uniform, home for the holidays on furlough from the Virginia Military Institute, told us fascinating tales of soldier-boy life, sending delicious thrills of joy and terror through every nerve.

Presently my black mammy took me in her motherly arms and carried me along the hall through the middle of the house, flanked by doors opening into the living rooms, up the wide stairway into another long corridor bounded by the same number of doors leading into bedrooms all in their Christmas dress of arbor-vitÆ, holly and mistletoe. In each of the fireplaces were wood and kindling to be lit when the guests should arrive on the morrow. Into the prettiest and smallest room she carried me and put me into my little eider-downy trundle bed.

The next morning I was awakened by the music of the Christmas horns and the popping of firecrackers. When I had been dressed I was taken to the dining-room, where my grandmother stood by a table whereon was a large bowl of egg-nog from which, with a silver ladle, she was filling glasses for us all, for even the babies in old Virginia were given a taste of egg-nog on Christmas morning.

After breakfast my grandmother went to service and would return with guests who were to come to us after the Christmas sermon in the lavishly decorated village church.

Soon the first carriage rolled into the yard, the coachman proudly flourishing the whip, which he used merely as an insignia of his office. "Dar dey come! Dar dey come! Dar dey come!" We all ran out to welcome the visitors. The carriage doors were opened, the steps folded up on the inside were let down, and the servants called out "Christmus gif', Marse, Christmus gif', Missus," all holding out their hands and clamoring as my uncle emerged from the coach, "I cotch him firs'! I cotch him firs'! I cotch Miss firs', didn' I, Marse?" each claiming the reward, regardless of actual priority in time.

My uncle was immaculate in frock coat and trousers of black broadcloth, new boots, snowy linen front trimmed profusely with ruffles, high collar and stock and shining silk hat. He turned with courtly grace and helped Auntie from the carriage.

Auntie was the wonder of my childhood. I fancied that if I should be very good and learn my lessons perfectly and avoid giving trouble to my elders, and say my prayers and read my Bible at the rate of one chapter every day and five on Sunday maybe the Lord would let me grow up as proper and as smart, but never as religious, as Auntie. In the meantime I liked to stand in remote corners unobserved and imagine that I was forming myself upon her. Her speckless, wrinkleless, swishing new black brocaded silk frock looked as if it had been moulded around her. Her crinoline stood out in a perfectly balanced symmetrical balloon of unapproachable beauty. Her oval face held just the right proportion of pink and white and her mouth was bowed at the temperance curve. Her sharp gray eyes looked into the center of things. She was a strict Methodist, a fierce Whig, an uncompromising moralist.

A little boy was handed out and then a screaming bundle which turned out to be a baby girl.

The carriage was laden with boxes and packages of Christmas gifts—a present for each servant and other articles to be put with our Christmas stockings still hanging on the rack.

From the next carriage my father and mother alighted—my father, always my ideal, tall, stately, erect as an Indian, seemed to me more than usually handsome as he lifted me up to a level with his classic face. His holiday attire, snowy ruffles, rigid stock, black broadcloth and, above all, the flowers of his brocaded vest, were to me an inexhaustible source of delight. My beautiful mother's coal-black hair, without wave or crinkle, was carried plainly from her face and wound in a plaited coil. She was very fair and her cheeks looked as if they had stolen two of the pink roses from the garden of May. Her eyes were like sparkling sapphires. Her black moire-antique dress had wide bishop sleeves, and she wore a white crÊpe shawl that, falling back, revealed the square of fine embroidered white thread cambric around her neck, crossing in front to form a V.

When all the family carriages had come a stranger might have wondered if grandmother's house could hold the many who claimed her Yuletide hospitality. We knew that her home was measured by her heart.

My father, the oldest son-in-law, was the first to take down his Christmas stocking from Santa's rack. He was always sure of a knife, a black stock and a silk bandanna, whatever else old Santa might have left for him. His last year's knife was then given to the foreman. We who could not reach so high were held up to take down our stockings.

The plantation servants never failed to offer their tributes of affection to the Master and his family and to receive gifts from them. Among their numerous presents were always a plug of tobacco, a pipe and a bandanna handkerchief for each. All the servants who had been working away from home came back at Christmas and added their gifts to those "w'at Marse Santa had done fotch down de chimbly." Many of my grandmother's servants had been away from the home plantation, being allowed to choose their places of service and to return if they did not find them satisfactory.

Dinner was the great event that followed. Every leaf had been put into the old mahogany table, and another table added at each end. A turkey which had been penned up for weeks to fatten and become tender, stuffed with pecan nuts, lay in delicious brownness on a china platter. Opposite was a roast pig with an orange in its mouth, "kase pigs kin have apples every day, but come Christmus 'course even pigs must have sump'n extra," my mammy explained. On one side of the table was a huge dish of fried oysters, on the other an old Smithfield ham, baked as it could be only by one born to the art. Sweet and sour pickles and preserves, for which Aunt Dilsey was famous, were scattered about among all the vegetables known to a Virginia plantation. On a side table were a saddle of mutton, a round of beef and a bowl of chicken salad. On another table was the dessert—sillibub, tipsy-cake, charlotte-russe, mince-pies, plain cake and fruit cake, to be followed by the plum pudding, flaming with magic fires which must be left to burn out of themselves, lest some of the glow they held in their fiery hearts should fail to be diffused throughout our lives in the coming year. The sideboard glistened with decanters and glasses and great bowls of apple-toddy and egg-nog.

All the good things left were sent to supplement the feast of the servants which they had spent days in preparing. It was spread in the wide old weaving-room, the loom being hidden by decorations of holly and mistletoe. We went in to see their table with its beautiful ornamentations, loaded with goodies, 'possum and sweet potatoes at each end. The 'possums had been caught early and fed in a lavishly hospitable manner, that they might wax fat and juicy for the feast.

After dinner papa and the uncles, followed by the boy friends and cousins, went out to the office in the yard a short distance from the mansion house and soon such mirthful peals issued therefrom that curiosity called us all out and the house was deserted while we sat listening to such stories and jokes as we shall never enjoy again. Then they talked of fox hunts, of the prancing gray and the good old red that had carried them to victory, the music of the horns, the baying of the hounds, the laughing girls, all eager for the brush. Crouched by my grandmother's side, I heard about last year's crops, the condition of the roads, the neighborhood news, the latest styles in collars and stocks, politics, bits of history and appreciations of literature.

At night "Fiddling Jim" was called in, and in the room where the Yule-fire burned there was a dance, opening with the minuet and winding up with the Virginia reel. In all the dances my grandmother joined with a lightness and grace that would have done honor to sixteen. Youth no more than age served as a bar to pleasure, and I danced the Highland fling and other fancy dances.

Then the sandman came by and mammy took me up to my little trundle bed. Half lost between waking and sleeping, I heard the crunching of the snow beneath the tread of horses and the roll of wheels and knew that some of the guests who lived near were returning to their homes. Melodies, dance-songs and the shuffling and pattering of feet, mingled with the thrum of the banjo, bones and fiddle, floated from the negro quarters.

Soon old mammy and her turban, the black faces, the hand-fed lamb, the goats and dogs, the coons and the rabbits, the peacocks' gorgeous big-eyed tails, and long-whiskered Santa Claus, my grandmother, my mothers lovely eyes and the Blessed Babe in the manger, all got mixed up in a tangle of shadows and came sliding between the peeping, twinkling stars on a moonbeam into the room and danced around my trundle bed.

With my tender little heart full of child love and unwavering faith, my wee soul borne on the higher sentiments of adoration, faith and spiritual sympathy, my Christmas dolly clasped close in my arms, my lips wreathed in mysterious smiles, I laughed and—a-n-d—a-n—Christmas was over.