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'Twas the nocturnal segment of the diurnal period preceding the annual Yuletide
celebration, and throughout our place of residence, kinetic activity was not
in evidence among possessors of this potential, including that species of
domestic rodent knows as Mus musculus.
Hosiery was meticulously suspended from the forward edge of the wood burning
caloric apparatus, persuant to our anticipatory pleasure regarding an
imminent visitation from an eccentric philanthropist among whose folkloric
appellations is the honorific title of St. Nicholas.
The prepubescent siblings, comfortably ensconced in their respective accommodations
of repose, were experiencing subconscious visual hallucinations of variegated
fruit confections moving rhythmically through their cerebrums.
My conjugal partner and I, attired in our nocturnal head coverings, were about to take
slumbrous advantage of the hibernal darkness when upon the avenaceous exterior
portion of the grounds there ascended such a cacophony of dissonance that I
felt compelled to arise with alacrity from my place of repose for the
purpose of ascertaining the precise source thereof.
Hastening to the casement, I forthwith opened the barriers sealing this fenestration,
noting thereupon that the lunar brilliance without, reflected as it was on the
surface of a recent crystalline precipitation, might be said to rival that of
the solar meridian itself -- thus permitting my incredulous optical sensory
organs to behold a miniature airborne runnered conveyance drawn by eight diminutive
specimens of the genus Rangifer, piloted by a minuscule aged chauffer so ebullient
and numble that it became instantly apparent to me that he was indeed our
anticipated caller.
With his ungulate motive power travelling at what may possibly have been more vertiginous
velocity that patriotic alar predators, he vociferated loudly, expelled breath
musically through contracted labia, and addressed of the octet by his or her
respective cognomen - "Now Dasher, now Dancer..." et al. - quiding them to the
uppermost exterior level of our abode, through which structure I could readily
distinguish the concatenations of each of the 32 cloven pedal extremities.
As I retracted my cranium from its erstwhile location, and was performing a 180 - degree
pivot, our distinguished visitant achieved - with utmost celerity and via a
downward leap - entry by way of the smoke passage.
He was clad entirely in animal pelts soiled by the ebony residue from the oxidations of
carboniferous fuels which had accumulated on the walls thereof. His resemblance
to a street vendor I attributed largely to the plethora of assorted playthings
which he bore dorsally in a commodious cloth receptacle.
His orbs were scintillant with reflected luminosity, while his submaxillary dermal
indentations gave every evidence of engaging amiability. The capillaries of his
malar regions and nasal appurtenance were engorged with blood which suffused
the subcutaneous layers, the former approximating the coloration of Albion's floral
emblem, the latter that of the Prunus avium, or sweet cherry.
His amusing sub - and supralabials resembled nothing so much as a common loop knot, and
their ambient hirsute facial adornment appeared like small, tabular and columnar
crystals of frozen water.
Clenched firmly between his incisors was a smoking piece whose grey fumes, forming a
tenuous ellipse about his occiput, were suggestive of a decorative seasonal
circlet of holly. His visage was wider than it was high, and when he waxed
audibly mirthful, his corpulent abdominal region undulated in the manner of
impectinated fruit syrup in a hemispherical container.
He was, in short, neither more nor less than an obese, jocund, multigenarian gnome, the
optical perception of whom rendered me visibly frolicsome despite every effort
to refrain from so being. By rapidly lowering and then raising one eyelid and
rotating his head slightly to one side, he indicated that trepidation on my part
was groundless.
Without utterance and with dispatch, he commenced filling the aforementioned appended
hosiery with various of the aforementioned articles of merchandise extracted
from his aforementioned previously dorsally transported cloth receptacle.
Upon completion of this task, he executed an abrupt about-face, placed a single manual
digit in lateral juxtaposition to his olfactory organ, inclined his cranium forward
in a gesture of leave-taking, and forthwith affected his egress by renegotiating
(in reverse) the smoke passage.
He then propelled himself in a short vector onto his conveyance, directed a musical
expulsion of air through his contracted oral sphincter to the antlered quadrupeds
of burden, and proceeded to soar aloft in a movement hitherto observable chiefly
among the seed-bearing portions of a common weed.
But I overheard his parting exclamation, audible immediately prior to his vehiculation beyond
the limits of visibility: "Ecstatic yuletide to the plenary constituency, and to that
selfsame assemblage, my sincerest wishes for a salubriously beneficial and
gratifyingly pleasurable period between sunset and dawn."