A Visit From Saint Nicholas

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Title: A Visit From Saint Nicholas
Author: Clement Moore
Illustrator: F.O.C. Darley
Release Date: December 23, 2005 [EBook #17382]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
0. START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VISIT
FROM SAINT NICHOLAS ***
Produced by Jason Isbell, Irma Špehar, Melissa Er-Raqabi
and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
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A VISIT FROM SAINT NICHOLAS.
Illustration
ILLUSTRATED FROM DRAWINGS
By F.O.C. Darley.
NEW YORK:
JAMES G. GREGORY, PUBLISHER.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1862 by JAMES G.
GREGORY, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United

States, for the Southern District of New York.
[Illustration: Saint Nicholas]
[Illustration]
N. ORR, Engraver.
C.A. ALVORD, Printer.
[Illustration]
A VISIT FROM ST. NICHOLAS.
By Clement C. Moore.
Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house Not a
creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by
the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of
sugar-plums danced in their heads;
And mamma in her kerchief, and I
in my cap,
Had just settled our brains for a long winter's nap--
[Illustration]
When out on the lawn there rose such a clatter,
I sprang from my bed
to see what was the matter,
Away to the window I flew like a flash,

Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.
The moon, on the breast
of the new-fallen snow,
Gave a lustre of mid-day to objects below;

When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature
sleigh, and eight tiny rein-deer,
With a little old driver, so lively and
quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.
More rapid than
eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and
called them by name;
[Illustration]
"Now, Dasher! now, Dancer! now, Prancer and Vixen!
On! Comet,

on! Cupid, on! Dunder and Blitzen--
To the top of the porch, to the
top of the wall!
Now, dash away, dash away, dash away all!"
As
dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an
obstacle, mount to the sky,
So, up to the house-top the coursers they
flew,
With a sleigh full of toys--and St. Nicholas too.
And then in a
twinkling I heard on the roof,
The prancing and pawing of each little
hoof.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the
chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound.
He was dressed all in fur from his head to his foot,
And his clothes
were all tarnished with ashes and soot;
A bundle of toys he had flung
on his back,
And he looked like a peddler just opening his pack;
His
eyes how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were
like roses, his nose like a cherry;
[Illustration]
His droll little month was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard on his
chin was as white as the snow;
The stump of a pipe he held tight in
his teeth,
And the smoke, it encircled his head like a wreath.
He had
a broad face, and a little round belly
That shook when he laughed,
like a bowl full of jelly.
[Illustration]
He was chubby and plump--a right jolly old elf;
And I laughed when
I saw him in spite of myself.
A wink of his eye, and a twist of his
head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.
He spoke not a
word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings; then
turned with a jerk,
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And
giving a nod, up the chimney he rose.
He sprang to his sleigh, to his
team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle;

But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
"Merry
Christmas to all, and to all a good night!"

[Illustration: MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL]
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Moore
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