Judge — December 7, 1912 — page 26: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE Her pote is conscions, MISTLETOE. Does she know That he suspends the mistletoe? And if he's free this test to try. Why does he wink the other eye? Ler ChLows: A Christmas Dream. By J. A. WALDRON. DREAMED a dream on Christmas Eve that no one, surely, will believe. All will discredit it because in it I was with Santa Claus and witnessed many things so queer I hesitate to tell them here. Old Santa had just filled his pack and made it ready for his back. It holds a million things or more from Santa’s rare and endless store, and like some basket magical, though taken from 'tis always full. Though I saw Santa plainly, he seemed not at all to notice me. He sat in silence with a map spread out upon his ample lap to mark his course o’er land and sea while waiting for his evening tea. His cook—he has no wife, you know—came in and said she meant to go. She said her job did not quite suit and he must find a substitute. Cooks everywhere just grump and gad, and with most folks they get in bad. Well, Santa’s smile quick left his face and he ripped up a dress of Jace perhaps intended for this cook, who gave him then a wrathful look; and when she put the teapot down I saw her slip from out her gown and drop into the teapot quick some sort of dope with movement slick. 'Twould take much more than this, I think, to drive old Santa Claus to drink; that is to say, to rum, per- haps, though sometimes he may like his schnapps. Full many a cup of tea he quaffed. The more he drank the more he laughed. Uncanny was his jollity, and I at first thought I should flee. He seized his pack, and full of joy piled me upon it like a toy, and rushing forth into the night began his world-embracing flight. He used a sleigh, as all well know, but needed neither ice nor snow. We sailed away o’er mount and plain, through many weathers, snow and rain—through wind and sleet and zero air—though all the time it seemed quite fair. A dozen reindeer ran ahead. Their bells were sound- less as they fled, and all the ghostly journey seemed quite fitting in the dream I dreamed. A continent would loom and melt into an ocean ere I felt a moment pass, and yet between a million Christmas homes were seen and gifts uncounted were bestowed from Santa’s rick and boundless load. Though I upon the top reposed I was in no way in- composed, for magic marked this Christmas flight and wonders multiplied that night. The greater woncers, though, to me might have been traced to Santa’s tea, sophisticated by his cook, and of which he so much par- took; for at the homes of wealth, where boys and girls had much, he left few toys, while poorer children’s wishes found complete fulfillment on his round; and to strange humors he gave vent as here and there we quickly went. Some men by others well esteemed got prison wear the while they dreamed; and others, poor and furnished ill, of good things must have found their fill; and many men of lean estate awoke to find their riches great, each one admonished that his door shculd always open to the poor. Fantastic tricks, too, Santa played on men and wom- en, boy and maid. In one old spinster’s stocking thin I saw him slip a manikin; in one old bach’s dingy place a woman's form of wondrous grace. ‘Twas wax, of course; but ‘twas a hint that ought to stir a heart of flint. A man with millions strangely made Old Santa left a hoe and spade; to one I knew ill-hap had struck he left a parcel labeled ‘‘Luck’’; to pals of mine that Fortune bars he gave next season’s motor cars. This got my goat, and I to see just what he purposed giving me quite foolishly the silence broke, and empty-handed I awoke! comicbooks.com