An illustration from The Bachelor's Christmas by Robert Grant (1895).  The caption reads: "Alone in his bachelor quarters on Christmas Eve."

Here's a precursor to "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" -- the proposal occurred 52 years earlier, as we see in the Daily Colonist, 1900.  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

An illustration from an 1884 issue of Puck magazine.  The caption reads: "His Christmas Prayer: 'Oh! — — — —!'"  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

In came the Christmas goat, from Svenska Minnen och Bilder by Nils Petrus Ödman (1899).  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

"A Little Christmas Dream": an illustration from an 1868 issue of Punch magazine.  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

Who dances the frozen yule away?  Why, it's the hearthstone goblins, of course!  They teach the wind to sing and usher back the spring.  They teach the gulls to scream and dance the ages into dream.  From Cosmopolitan Magazine, 1893.  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

It's a nearly-forgotten fact that too much mistletoe can actually prevent kisses.  Our proof appears in The Quiver, 1892.  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

Here's a precursor to the classic The Lion in Winter, in which Eleanor of Aquitaine says, on Christmas day, "Of course he has a knife; he always has a knife; we all have knives!  It's 1183 and we're barbarians!"  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

So many reasons for the season: old-school holiday yard decorations from The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of the English Nation (1885), via the British Library.  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

A person disguised as a Christmas-type tree, from an 1896 issue of Punch magazine.  The caption reads: "I am immense in it, my boy, immense!"  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

"Always remember that a house of merriment is better than a house of mourning."
—A Manual of Fire Department Equipment and Practice

Pictured below: "Bringing in the Lump of Coal," from a 1918 issue of Life magazine.

If you got a lump of coal for Christmas, here's how to change it — one letter at a time — into the "Jelly of the Month Club" (the gift that keeps on giving):

COAL, COWL, COWS, CAWS, JAWS, JAMS

"Christmas Eve Parade":  an illustration from Told After Supper by Jerome K. Jerome (1891).  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

A precursor to a key scene in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, from Punch, 1859.  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.

Nearly a century before Dr. Seuss's Grinch stole Christmas and over a century before Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas, witches were doing it in Punch (1862).  This should also be of interest: How to Be Your Own Cat.

An illustration from an 1896 issue of Munsey's magazine.  This will also be of interest: The Collected Lost Meanings of Christmas.