Letters from Father Christmas by JRR Tolkien. 1932. Part 2.
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You have been so good in writing to me (and such beautiful letters too), that I have tried to draw you some specially nice pictures this year. At the top of my ‘Christmas card’ is a picture, imaginary, but more or less as it really is, of me arriving over Oxford. Your house is just about where the three little black points stick up out of the shadows at the right. I am coming from the north, and note, NOT with 12 pair of deer, as you will see in some books. I usually use 7 pair (14 is such a nice number), and at Christmas, especially if I am hurried, I add my 2 special white ones in front.
Next comes a picture of me and Cave Bear and North Polar Bear exploring the Caves—| will tell you more about that in a minute. The last picture hasn’t happened yet. It soon will. On St Stephen’s Day, when all the rush is over, I am going to have a rowdy party: the Cave Bear’s grandchildren (they are exactly like live teddy-bears), Snowbabies, some children of the Red Gnomes, and of course Polar Cubs, including Paksu and Valkotukka, will be there.
I’m wearing a pair of new green trousers. They were a present from my green brother, but I only wear them at home. Goblins anyway dislike green, so I found them useful.
You see, when I rescued Polar Bear, we hadn’t finished the adventures. At the beginning of last week we went into the cellars to get up the stuff for England. I said to Polar Bear, “Somebody has been disarranging things here!”
“Paksu and Valkotukka, I expect,” he said. But it wasn’t. Next day things were much worse, especially among the railway things, lots of which seemed to be missing. I ought to have guessed, and Polar Bear anyway, ought to have mentioned his guess to me.
Last Saturday we went down and found nearly everything had disappeared out of the main cellar! Imagine my state of mind! Nothing hardly to send to anybody, and too little time to get or make enough new stuff.
North Polar Bear said, “I smell goblin strong.” Of course, it was obvious:—they love mechanical toys (though they quickly smash them, and want more and more and more); and practically all the Hornby things had gone! Eventually we found a large hole (but not big enough for us), leading to a tunnel, behind some packing-cases in the West Cellar.
As you will expect we rushed off to find Cave Bear, and we went back to the caves. We soon understood the queer noises. It was plain the goblins long ago had burrowed a tunnel from the caves to my old home (which was not so far from the end of their hills), and had stolen a good many things.
We found some things more than a hundred years old, even a few parcels still addressed to your
great- grand-people! But they had been very clever, and not too greedy, and I had not found out.
Ever since I moved they must have been busy burrowing all the way to my Cliff, boring, banging and blasting (as quietly as they could). At last they had reached my new cellars, and the sight of the Hornby things was too much for them: they took all they could.
I daresay they were also still angry with the Polar Bear. Also they thought we couldn’t get at them.
But I sent my patent green luminous smoke down the tunnel, and Polar Bear blew and blew it with our enormous kitchen bellows. They simply shrieked and rushed out the other (cave) end.
But there were Red Gnomes there. I had specially sent for them—a few of the real old families are still in Norway. They captured hundreds of goblins, and chased many more out into the snow (which they hate). We made them show us where they had hidden things, or bring them all back again, and by Monday we had got practically everything back. The Gnomes are still dealing with the goblins, and promise there won’t be one left by New Year—but I am not so sure: they will crop up again in a century or so, I expect.
We have had a rush; but dear old Cave Bear and his sons and the Gnome-ladies helped; so that we are now very well forward and all packed. I hope there is not the faintest smell of goblin about any of your things. They have all been well aired. There are still a few railway things missing, but I hope you will have what you want. I am not able to carry quite as much toy- cargo as usual this year, as I am taking a good deal of food and clothes (useful stuff): there are far too many people in your land, and others, who are hungry and cold this winter.
I am glad that with you the weather is warmish. It is not warm here. We have had tremendous icy winds and terrific snow-storms, and my old house is quite buried. But I am feeling very well, better than ever, and though my hand wobbles with a pen, partly because I don’t like writing as much as drawing (which | learned first), I don’t think it is so wobbly this year.
The Polar Bear got your father’s scribble to-day, and was very puzzled by it. I told him it looked like old lecture-notes, and he laughed. He says he thinks Oxford is quite a mad place if people lecture such stuff: “but I don’t suppose anybody listens to it.” The drawings pleased him better. He said: “At any rate those boys’ father tried to draw bears—though they aren’t good. Of course it is all nonsense, but I will answer it.” So he made up an alphabet from the marks in the caves. He says it is much nicer than the ordinary letters, or than Runes, or Polar letters, and suits his paw better. He writes them with the tail of his penholder! He has sent a short letter to you in this alphabet-to wish you a very Merry Christmas and lots of fun in the New Year and good luck at School. As you are all so clever now (he says) what with Latin and French and Greek you will easily read it and see that Polar Bear sends much love.
I am not so sure. (Anyway I dare say he would send you a copy of his alphabet if you wrote and asked. By the way he writes it in columns from top to bottom, not across: don’t tell him I gave away his secret.
This is one of my very longest letters. It has been an exciting time. I hope you will like hearing about it. I send you all my love: John, Michael, Christopher, and Priscilla: also Mummy and Daddy and Auntie and all the people in your house. I dare say John will feel he has got to give up stockings now and give way to the many new children that have arrived since he first began to hang his up; but Father Christmas will not forget him. Bless you all.
Your loving, Nicholas Christmas.