 spirits
with a shelter to which they might repair, "and remain unnipped with
frost and cold winds, until a milder season had renewed the foliage of
their darling abodes."[367] In early times the Church made a stand
against this use of evergreens as being a pagan custom, but the
interdict was not persevered in, and later on we find the decoration of
the churches a recognised practice, the note for Christmas eve in the
old Calendar being, _Templa exornantur_.[368]

The observance, however, which most concerns us here is that of the
Christmas-tree, the evolution of which furnishes us with one of the most
interesting chapters in the history of religious development. To the
present generation the Christmas-tree appears such an essential feature
of the festival, as celebrated in this country, that many will be
surprised to hear how recent an importation it is. But as a matter of
fact, the Christmas-tree was practically unknown in England until it was
introduced by the late Prince Consort.[369] Even in Germany, the land of
its origin, it was not universally established as an integral part of
the festival until the beginning of the present century,[370] and it was
only at that date that it came to be known as the "Weihnachtsbaum" and
"Christbaum."[371] Goethe in 1774 describes it as adorned with wax
tapers, sweetmeats, and apples, but calls it simply the "decorated
tree."[372] Schiller in 1789 finds no more distinctive name for it than
the "green tree."[373] Since that time, or rather since 1830, its
diffusion throughout the world has been so marvellously rapid that there
is nothing to compare with it in the whole history of popular customs.

In Germany the Christmas-tree can be traced back more or less in its
present form to the beginning of the seventeenth century, when an
unnamed writer, in some extremely fragmentary notes, tells us that it
was the custom at Strasburg to set up fir-trees in the houses at
Christmas, and to deck them with roses of  paper, apples,
etc.[374] The next mention of it occurs half a century l