A is for ADVENT. Early versions of the Advent calendar saw cupboard doors marked with chalk, God descending to earth on ladders (one rung per day) and Christmas clocks counting down, tick after tock. German publisher Gerhard Lang produced the first commercial Advent calendar in 1908, but it was our magazine’s Editor, Mark Hedges— and our then Art Editor, Phil Crewdson—who produced the greatest Advent calendar of all in 2007 and the most anticipated COUNTRY LIFE cover ever since.
B is for BELLS. From the ringing of bobtails to the resounding peal from church bells at Midnight Mass, a sense of magic lingers in every chime and echo. The jingling percussion accompanies many a Christmas song, but their guiding abilities go far beyond the music. In poor weather, bells would be attached to carriages to warn others and were used to guide horses through dark and blustery streets. Father Christmas’s sleigh bells were introduced in the 1700s in sketches of his horse-drawn transport.
C is for CHRIST CHILD, in whom Christmas began. He was born in a stable in Bethle hem, wrapped in cloth and laid in a lowly man- ger, yet the angels proclaimed him, shepherds adored him and Three Kings or Wise Men from the East followed a star that led to him.
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Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
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We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
