Sun, nature, spirit, philanthropy: Christmas Day in early 19th-C. England.

The beauty of the day was of itself sufficient to inspire philanthropy. Notwithstanding the frostiness of the morning, the sun in his cloudless journey had acquired sufficient power to melt away the thin covering of snow from every southern declivity, and to bring out the living green which adorns an English landscape even in mid-winter. Large tracts of smiling verdure contrasted with the dazzling whiteness of the shaded slopes and hollows. Every sheltered bank, on which the broad rays rested, yielded its silver rill of cold and limpid water, glittering through the dripping grass; and sent up slight exhalations to contribute to the thin haze that hung just above the surface of the earth. There was something truly cheering in this triumph of warmth and verdure over the frosty thraldom of winter; it was…the emblem of Christmas hospitality, breaking through the chills of ceremony and selfishness, and thawing every heart into a flow.

Washington Irving, “Christmas Day” in The Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.

For another post by Irving, see here.