How Mrs. Claus Saved Christmas by Jeff Guinn

this,” I replied. “As much as possible, we cannot allow it to affect our gift-giving. You know our rule is to always respect the faith of others, even when it is different from our own.”
    â€œOf course I know our rule,” Arthur said, sounding exasperated. “The problem is not with people like us, but with those who insist the only correct faith is identical to what they themselves believe, and that anyone with any different opinion is automatically evil. Which brings us to the Puritans. They are Protestants who disagree with all but the very simplest forms of worship. They’re the ones who are complaining about Christmas and insist everyone calls December 25 Christ-tide instead. This group Nicholas and Felix want to join is led by Puritans, who say they’re going to America so they may worship as they please. I very much fear that in America they will establish a colony where only their religious beliefs are tolerated. By ‘religious freedom,’ they mean the right to force everyone else to believe as they do.”
    But Nicholas and Felix returned from the London docks so excited that Arthur and I couldn’t bring ourselves to warn them about the people they’d just met. They told us all about it when we sat down for supper. Leonardo joined us. William Brewster, Nicholas said, was the organizer who met with them. Brewster explained he and his friends called themselves the Saints. Within a month, they hoped to have one hundred volunteer colonists, who would sail to America aboard two ships. Upon arrival, they’d start a new community near Jamestown, where everyone would farm and hunt and be happy.
    â€œOnly about one-third are actually members of the Saints,” Felix said happily. “Everyone else brings some sort of necessary talent—a blacksmith, a doctor, some toolmakers, and so on. I told Mr. Brewster that I was a good craftsman and wood-carver, while my friend Nicholas was a willing worker, if not an especially good one. Do you know what Mr. Brewster replied?”
    â€œWe hardly need to mention this, Felix,” Nicholas interrupted.
    â€œNo, it’s funny. Mr. Brewster said he could tell that Nicholas was at least good at eating, and that he’d certainly lose weight in America.”

    William Brewster
    It was obvious Felix and Nicholas had their hearts set on joining the Saints on their voyage, so Arthur and I decided we wouldn’t caution them about their new companions. After all, we thought, Nicholas in particular had been successfully bringing Christmas to people around the world for centuries. Even if William Brewster and the Saints didn’t cooperate, he was bound to succeed eventually.
    In the three weeks between the time we arrived in London and the day the Saints set sail for America, Arthur and I did not bring up our concerns about Christmas in England. Nicholas and Felix were so excited about America that we didn’t want to spoil the moment for them. Instead, we talked about what the new colony might be like, and whether it would be cold enough around Jamestown to require them to wear warmer cloaks, and how they would spend their time secretly crafting toys for the children in the new colony to wake up and discover by their beds on Christmas Day.
    The Saints sailed aboard the Mayflower in September 1620. The 102 colonists were supposed to be divided between two ships, but the second had problems with leaking and William Brewster didn’t want to delay the voyage for repairs. So everyone was crammed aboard a single vessel. We learned from Nicholas’s letters that things turned sour immediately, with the thirty or so Saints trying to impose their ways on everyone else. In history books, the Saints would be called the Pilgrims, and most of their early squabbles would eventually be forgotten. But when they finally landed on the coast of Plymouth, Massachusetts—hundreds of miles north of Jamestown—Brewster and the