The Gift of the Magi, Part 4: The Wisest Gifts

For there lay The Combs. It was the set of combs, for the sides and the back of the head, that Della had admired for a long time in a Broadway shop window. They were beautiful combs, made of real tortoise shell, with jewels around the edges. They were just the right colour to wear in her beautiful hair, the hair that was now gone. They were expensive combs, she knew. Her heart had wanted them badly, without the smallest hope of ever owning them. And now they were hers, but the long hair that should have worn them was gone.

But she held them close to her heart, and at last she was able to look up with wet eyes and a smile and say, “My hair grows so fast, Jim!”

And then Della jumped up like a little cat that has burned its fur, and cried, “Oh, oh!”

Jim had not yet seen his beautiful present. She held it out to him eagerly on her open hand. The precious metal seemed to shine with her own bright and loving spirit.

“Isn’t it a dandy, Jim? I hunted all over town to find it. You’ll have to look at the time a hundred times a day now. Give me your watch. I want to see how it looks on it.”

Instead of doing what she asked, Jim fell down on the couch, put his hands behind his head and smiled.

“Dell,” he said, “let’s put our Christmas presents away and keep them for a while. They’re too nice to use just now. I sold the watch to get the money to buy your combs. And now, why don’t you put the chops on?”

The magi, as you know, were wise men, wonderfully wise men, who brought gifts to the baby Jesus in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Because they were wise, their gifts were surely wise ones too, perhaps with the right to exchange them if someone received the same gift twice.

And here I have told you, not very well, the simple story of two foolish children in a flat. Very unwisely, they gave up for each other the greatest treasures of their home.

But in a last word to the wise people of today, let it be said that of all who give gifts, these two were the wisest. Of all who give and receive gifts, people like them are the wisest. Everywhere they are the wisest. They are the magi.