This question is not so easily answered as you may suppose; for though all little folk know that a Christmas-box is a gift made at Christmas-tide, such was not the original meaning of the word. Christmas-boxes were at first what we now call money-boxes. They were known as thrift-boxes, and consisted of small wide clay bottles with imitation stoppers, the upper part covered with a kind of green glaze. On the side was a slit into which money could be put, and as the money was collected at Christmas, the boxes in the course of time gave the name to the present.