The _Premiere Communion_ is the chief event in the life of a Belgian
child.
CHAPTER VI
CHRISTMAS IN BELGIUM
Christmas is not kept in Belgium in the same way as in England,
Germany, and other countries. There are special services in church,
but no Christmas-trees, Christmas presents, or family dinner-parties.
This was not always so, and some traces still remain in different
parts of the old customs which used to be observed in Belgium. The
ancient Belgians had a festival at mid-winter, and when they were
converted to Christianity they continued to use a good many of their
old rites at that season of the year, and the few very old Christmas
customs which survive really began when Belgium was a pagan or heathen
land.
Some of these customs are rather curious. In the Valley of the Meuse
the pagans used to feast on the flesh of wild boars at their
mid-winter banquets, and now the people of Namur have roast pork for
dinner on Christmas Day. The _petite bourgeoisie_ of Brussels often
eat chestnuts on that day--an old usage handed down from the days when
the Germans ate acorns--and think they can find out what is going to
happen in the future by burning them.
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