[.article__paragraph--cap] [.small-caps] Christmas Eve [.small-caps] , and twelve of the clock.
“Now they are all on their knees,”
An elder said as we sat in a flock
By the embers in hearthside ease.[.article__paragraph--cap]

We pictured the meek mild creatures where
They dwelt in their strawy pen,
Nor did it occur to one of us there
To doubt they were kneeling then.

So fair a fancy few would weave
In these years! Yet, I feel,
If someone said on Christmas Eve,
“Come; see the oxen kneel,

“In the lonely barton by yonder coomb
Our childhood used to know,”
I should go with him in the gloom,
Hoping it might be so.

[.smalltext] First published in The Times of London on Christmas Eve, 1915 [.smalltext]

[.imgcaption] Hans Baldung, Nativity , 1520 [.imgcaption]