WE love them and know them, or at least a few lines before going blank. Here are Christmas carols rated by how many lines you can sing, from least to most:

In The Bleak Midwinter – 0.5 lines

The first four words are the title, after which you’re f**ked. ‘Snow lay all around’? ‘Jesus was a child’? ‘Stars shone from the sky’? You’ve heard it a thousand times and always zoned straight out of this forbidding dirge.

I Saw Three Ships (Come Sailing In) – 1 line

The title’s clear and it’s one of those with a nice merry tune, but after that? Is it ‘On Christmas Day, on Christmas Day’ or is that just muscle memory from all the times you’ve cheerfully improvised? What do these ships have to do with anything, anyway? They’re never mentioned in any other aspect of Christmas, whether Biblical or Santa.

God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen – 2 lines

Again, once you’ve sung ‘on Christmas Day’ it seems impossible to stop. The rest of the verse can be filled by repeating that until a final ‘On Christmas Day in the morning!’ so why bother learning more?

The Holly And The Ivy – 2.5 lines

You thread your way through the surprisingly intricate melody, impressed that your memory’s leading you there so surefootedly, then hit ‘the rising of the sun’ and you’re in the void of the unknown, lost in the forest, blundering. Stop here. Nobody will judge you.

Ding Dong Merrily On High – 3 lines

Though technically two of them – the first and third – are the same line, and the title. Nonetheless, that’s a good chunk of the song you’re into before you, and all the other once-a-year churchgoers, fall silent and look round at each other mouthing ‘You too?’

O Come All Ye Faithful – 4 lines

We’re going all the way to Bethlehem on this one, before taking two lines off to gather breath for the good bit. You know? The good bit, where you begin quietly then belt it right out making the stained glass rattle? And pleasing God, presumably. Enjoy it, big man.

Silent Night – whole verse

Drop the tempo, drop the word count and now a whole verse is possible. Such an achievement that it feels like the whole song is in your grasp. It isn’t. There are another two verses about shepherds and radiant beams you’ve never deigned to notice.

Away In A Manger – 3 verses

Four-word lines and four-line verses and bang, you’re right up to Jesus not making any crying because your brain keeps coming up with words accidentally memorised during your infant school nativity and never forgotten. It’s a Christmas miracle! Shit tune though.