heeded at first, was forced more and more upon his notice; and the
anxious voice of his oldest deacon calling, "Mr. Dudley! Mr. Dudley!"
rose high and loud; while a great thundering at the front door of the
church announced that the people below had also caught the sound of
the music, and were clamorous for admission. Mr. Dudley hastened round
to prevent their causing any disturbance to the congregation within;
but he came only in time to see the door burst open, and to be borne
in with the crowd. All gazed about in wonder. The congregation,
indeed, were gone, and the preacher, and the choir; and the room was
cold. But there was a great green cross over the pulpit, and words
along the walls, and festoons upon the galleries, and great wreaths,
like vast green serpents, coiled about the cold pillars. The church of
the Orthodox parish of ---- had been fairly dressed for Christmas by
spirit hands.

When Mr. Dudley reached his home, after the wonder had in part spent
itself, he found that an enormous Christmas pie had been left at his
door by a white-haired old man dressed in black, about six in the
morning, just after he had gone to visit his sick parishioner. The
girl who received it reported the old man as saying, in a tremulous,
but very kind voice, "Give your master the Christmas blessing of an
old Puritan minister." How the meaning of this message would have been
known to Mr. Dudley, had not the events we have told disclosed it, who
can say?

Need I add, that my friend, Mr. Dudley, from whose lips I have taken
down the above narrative, has directed the decorations to remain in
his church during the coming month, and that he avows the intention of
observing the Christmas of the following year with public services,
unless, indeed, he should be anticipated by his ancient