The Christmas Peace

'The Christmas Peace' is a Christmas-themed novel written by Thomas Nelson Page. The story is about two families, the Hampdens and the Draytons, who had lived within a mile of each other for over fifty years. They had been born on adjacent plantations and were considered good men and good neighbors, but the two families had never been close. They had a long-standing feud that started in early colonial days, and no one knew how the trouble began. The families had been on opposite sides ever since they established themselves on opposite hills in the old county, and the feud had been passed down from father to son for several generations. The Hampdens were dark and stout, hot-blooded, fierce, and impetuous, while the Draytons were slender, fair, and usually lived to old age. The Draytons were generally cool-headed, deliberate, and self-contained, and thus had prospered throughout the years, while the Hampdens had not.