I think it was the ninth night, I was told, that the wild animals came in from the forest, fields and desert. Some had traveled a long way. They came in late at night when everybody was asleep. They didn’t want to scare people.
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They came in quietly to see the Son of Heaven, baby Jesus, for already the birds were telling the story of the first Christmas gift. There were wolves, foxes, bears, deer, rabbits, squirrels, crows, owls, eagles and on and on. At least one representative from all the animal and bird clans. Some of the birds who lived by the rivers, lakes and seas, also represented the fish clans and the other animal and insect clans that lived too far away to make the journey. I remember a storyteller saying that, all night, for three nights, the barn was full, as each wild animal took turns to look at the sleeping Christ child, the son of Supreme Being.
The larger animals held the smaller animals up so they could see into the manger. Arturis, a great cave bear, came each night and laid down on one side of the manger, so the small ones could also climb up on his back to see baby Jesus.
Until that first night, even the tabby cats were wild. Ms. Cat came in from the forest, looked around the barn and saw all the barn and house mice and thought, “plenty of food after the temporary, peace-among-the-beasts, truce, but look at all the roaches. This is no place for the son of God or any other human baby, for that matter, and the human houses are not much better than this barn. It looks like these humans need some help to keep their homes clean.”
My cat told me this part. Her ancestor moved in and spread the word and other cats moved into our homes. Cats chose to live with people, they did not become tame first. That’s why cats still have an independent streak, but they do keep our homes and barns free from creepy crawly things.
From “Christmas Stories,” traditional Christmas stories collected between 1962 and 1975 from people in the Southeastern [US] region and adapted for telling by Bluegrass Storyteller, Chuck Larkin
source: http://chucklarkin.com/stories/Christmas_1.pdf
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