ding
to the Old Style, the thorn blossomed as usual.[102]{26}

Let us turn to the customs of the Roman Empire which may be in part
responsible for the German Christmas-tree. The practice of adorning
houses with evergreens at the January Kalends was common throughout the
Empire, as we learn from Libanius, Tertullian, and Chrysostom. A grim
denunciation of such decorations and the lights which accompanied them
may be quoted from Tertullian; it makes a pregnant contrast of pagan and
Christian. "Let them," he says of the heathen, "kindle lamps, they who
have no light; let them fix on the doorposts laurels which shall
afterwards be burnt, they for whom fire is close at hand; meet for them
are testimonies of darkness and auguries of punishment. But thou," he
says to the Christian, "art a light of the world and a tree that is ever
green; if thou hast renounced temples, make not a temple of thy own
house-door."{27}

That these New Year practices of the Empire had to do with the
_Weihnachtsbaum_ is very possible, but on the other hand it has closer
parallels in certain folk-customs that in no way suggest Roman or Greek
influence. Not only at Christmas are ceremonial "trees" to be found in
Germany. In the Erzgebirge there is dancing at the summer solstice round
"St. John's tree," a pyramid decked with garlands and flowers, and lit up
at night by candles.{28} At midsummer "in the towns of the Upper Harz
Mountains tall fir-trees, with the bark peeled off their lower trunks,
were set up in open places and decked with flowers and eggs, which were
painted yellow and red. Round these trees the young folk danced by day
and the old folk in the evening";{29} while on Dutch ground in
Gelderland and Limburg at the beginning of May trees were adorned with
lights.{30}

Nearer to Christmas is a New Year's custom found in some |270| Alsatian
villages: the adorning of the fountain with a "May." The girls who visit
the fountain procure a small fir-tree or holly-bush, and deck it with
ribbons, egg-shells, and little figures representing a shepherd or a man
beating his wife. This is set up above the fountain on New Year's Eve. On
the evening of the next day the snow is carefully cleared away and the
girls dance and sing around the fountain. The lads may only take part in
the dance by permission of the girls. The tree is kept all through the
year as a protection to those who have set it up.{31}

In Sweden, before the advent of the German type of