December.

The emblem of the Saxon Calendar is that of the threshing season (Fig. 274). The flail has a reverend antiquity amongst us; the round sieve slowly does the work of winnowing; the farmer stands by with his notched stick, to mark how many baskets of the winnowed corn are borne to his granary. Other emblems show us the woodman bearing his fuel homewards, to make his hearth cheerful in the Winter-monat, winter-month; or the jolly yeoman lifting his drinking horn during the festivities of the Heligh-monat, holy month, for December was called by both these names. Then was the round table filled with jocund guests (Fig. 275). Then were the harp and the pipe heard in the merry halls; and the dancers were as happy amidst the smoke of their wood-fires, as if their jewels had shone in the clear blaze of a hundred wax-lights (Figs. 248, 266).