the 20th of December, the Sunday before Christmas, when Werther visits Lotte. "She was busy making some toys which she wished to give to her little brothers and sisters at Christmas. She talked of the delight the children would feel, and of the days when the unexpected opening of the door, and the sight of the tree ornamented with candles, sweets, and apples, made one feel all the joys of paradise. 'You are,' said Lotte, trying to hide her confusion under a sweet smile, 'you are to get something too, if you are very good, a wax-taper and something else.'" During the first years of Goethe's stay in Weimar the custom does not seem to have been known there. There is no mention of it made anywhere, although we have many reminiscences of that time.
Frau Rat, the poet's mother, used always to send him Frankfort marzipan cake, and he invariably gave some of it to his friend Frau von Stein. On the 30th December 1781 he writes to her: "I must send you a piece of holiday cake, in order to satisfy my longing to see you in some degree."
It was very rare for him to spend Christmas in Weimar itself; as soon as the snow was lying on the ground he wandered away to the hills. He has never again treated Christmas poetically after that first sketch, although he might have found a subject worthy of his muse in many Christmas rejoicings, which must have impressed themselves on his mind, especially one in 1796 at Frau von Stein's, with all the attributes of Christmas-tree, candles, and presents.
Schiller has never described any Christmas scenes in his works, although he loved the festival with its bright tree. At Christmas time in 1789, a hundred years ago, when he was already secretly betrothed to Lotte v. Lengefeld, who was at that time staying with her sister Caroline in Weimar, while her mother was in Rudolphstadt, he was invited to spend Christmas with a family of the name of Griesbach. He was at that time professor of history in
