The Christmas season was a highlight of the country house calendar. Social barriers between master and servant were loosened, family intrigues stalked the dinner table, romantic hopes were dashed or realized, and the multi-layered community which lived on and around the great estate drew together to reanact the annual cycle of custom and tradition. Including extracts from Dickens, Evelyn Waugh, Washington Irving and Henry James, as well as first hand accounts from diaries, letters and account books, this book recounts Christmas as it was celebrated in the stately homes of England and Wales.