Tue task of wishing our readers a happy Christmas has mot been too easy a one for the past seven years. Cynics might describe it as the fallacious attempt of hope.to triumph over' experience: and they could no doubt find plentiful reasons in the world to-day for convincing us that the task is no easier and the wish has no better foundation than on the previous seven attempts. But pessimism is not only a bad creed, it isan impossible one, which the whole history of mankind emphatically rejects. Undying hope,'' says Stevenson, ''is ce-ruler of the
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.