Published,
as it here appears, in _Short Stories_, January, 1911.]
Now, a Christmas story should be one. For a good many years the
ingenious writers have been putting forth tales for the holiday numbers
that employed every subtle, evasive, indirect and strategic scheme they
could invent to disguise the Christmas flavor. So far has this new
practice been carried that nowadays when you read a story in a holiday
magazine the only way you can tell it is a Christmas story is to look at
the footnote which reads: ["The incidents in the above story happened on
December 25th.--ED."]
There is progress in this; but it is all very sad. There are just as
many real Christmas stories as ever, if we would only dig 'em up. Me,
I am for the Scrooge and Marley Christmas story, and the Annie and
Willie's prayer poem, and the long lost son coming home on the stroke
of twelve to the poorly thatched cottage with his arms full of talking
dolls and popcorn balls and--Zip! you hear the second mortgage on the
cottage go flying off it into the deep snow.
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