colonial architecture—is the Mecca of patriotic pilgrims. All the year round they come to look upon the room where the Declaration of Independence was signed, and upon the Bell which rang its message to the land.
To-day that message rings the knell of the past, and the deathless promise of the future:
Life, though it is beset by greater perils; liberty, though it is restricted by an excess of legislation; and the pursuit of happiness, though it is turned into new, and possibly nobler, channels. The old society "in which men looked up without envy or malice, and even found life richer from the thought that there were degrees of excellency and honour," has been replaced by a society in which perpetual change has bred dissatisfaction and insecurity. But more clearly than before the note of a real Democracy, of a sense of comradeship, of a natural, cheerful, irresponsible interest in one another, has been struck in what was once the City of Brotherly Love. It gives to Christmas something which earlier Christmases never knew; a coming-together of people whose lives are, by force of circumstance, apart, a closing-in of circles which are commonly and necessarily remote.
For a week before the feast, the great pioneer department store of America sets aside a half-hour in the morning and a half-hour at dusk for community singing of Christmas hymns and carols. The rush of
