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  • A Magpie Audio Production

  • A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

  • STAVE ONE

  • MARLEY'S GHOST

  • Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that.

  • The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the

  • undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooge's name

  • was good upon 'Change for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old

  • Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

  • Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there

  • is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined,

  • myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in

  • the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my

  • unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You

  • will, therefore, permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as

  • dead as a door-nail.

  • Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he did. How could it be otherwise?

  • Scrooge and he were partners for I don't know how many years. Scrooge

  • was his sole executor, his sole administrator, his sole assign, his

  • sole residuary legatee, his sole friend, and sole mourner. And even

  • Scrooge was not so dreadfully cut up by the sad event, but that he was

  • an excellent man of business on the very day of the funeral, and

  • solemnised it with an undoubted bargain.

  • The mention of Marley's funeral brings me back to the point I started

  • from. There is no doubt that Marley was dead. This must be distinctly

  • understood, or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to

  • relate. If we were not perfectly convinced that Hamlet's Father died

  • before the play began, there would be nothing more remarkable in his

  • taking a stroll at night, in an easterly wind, upon his own ramparts,

  • than there would be in any other middle-aged gentleman rashly turning

  • out after dark in a breezy spot--say St. Paul's Church-yard, for

  • instance--literally to astonish his son's weak mind.

  • Scrooge never painted out Old Marley's name. There it stood, years

  • afterwards, above the warehouse door: Scrooge and Marley. The firm was

  • known as Scrooge and Marley. Sometimes people new to the business called

  • Scrooge Scrooge, and sometimes Marley, but he answered to both names. It

  • was all the same to him.

  • Oh! but he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! a

  • squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old

  • sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out

  • generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster.

  • The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose,

  • shrivelled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin

  • lips blue; and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice. A frosty rime

  • was on his head, and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his

  • own low temperature always about with him; he iced his office in the

  • dog-days; and didn't thaw it one degree at Christmas.

  • External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth could

  • warm, no wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than

  • he, no falling snow was more intent upon its purpose, no pelting rain

  • less open to entreaty. Foul weather didn't know where to have him. The

  • heaviest rain, and snow, and hail, and sleet could boast of the

  • advantage over him in only one respect. They often "came down"

  • handsomely and Scrooge never did.

  • Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with gladsome looks, "My

  • dear Scrooge, how are you? When will you come to see me?" No beggars

  • implored him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him what it was

  • o'clock, no man or woman ever once in all his life inquired the way to

  • such and such a place, of Scrooge. Even the blind men's dogs appeared to

  • know him; and, when they saw him coming on, would tug their owners into

  • doorways and up courts; and then would wag their tails as though they

  • said, "No eye at all is better than an evil eye, dark master!"

  • But what did Scrooge care? It was the very thing he liked. To edge his

  • way along the crowded paths of life, warning all human sympathy to keep

  • its distance, was what the knowing ones call "nuts" to Scrooge.

  • Once upon a time--of all the good days in the year, on Christmas

  • Eve--old Scrooge sat busy in his counting-house. It was cold, bleak,

  • biting weather: foggy withal: and he could hear the people in the court

  • outside go wheezing up and down, beating their hands upon their breasts,

  • and stamping their feet upon the pavement stones to warm them. The City

  • clocks had only just gone three, but it was quite dark already--it had

  • not been light all day--and candles were flaring in the windows of the

  • neighbouring offices, like ruddy smears upon the palpable brown air. The

  • fog came pouring in at every chink and keyhole, and was so dense

  • without, that, although the court was of the narrowest, the houses

  • opposite were mere phantoms. To see the dingy cloud come drooping down,

  • obscuring everything, one might have thought that nature lived hard by

  • and was brewing on a large scale.

  • The door of Scrooge's counting-house was open, that he might keep his

  • eye upon his clerk, who in a dismal little cell beyond, a sort of tank,

  • was copying letters. Scrooge had a very small fire, but the clerk's fire

  • was so very much smaller that it looked like one coal. But he couldn't

  • replenish it, for Scrooge kept the coal-box in his own room; and so

  • surely as the clerk came in with the shovel, the master predicted that

  • it would be necessary for them to part. Wherefore the clerk put on his

  • white comforter, and tried to warm himself at the candle; in which

  • effort, not being a man of strong imagination, he failed.

  • "A merry Christmas, uncle! God save you!" cried a cheerful voice. It was

  • the voice of Scrooge's nephew, who came upon him so quickly that this

  • was the first intimation he had of his approach.

  • "Bah!" said Scrooge. "Humbug!"

  • He had so heated himself with rapid walking in the fog and frost, this

  • nephew of Scrooge's, that he was all in a glow; his face was ruddy and

  • handsome; his eyes sparkled, and his breath smoked again.

  • "Christmas a humbug, uncle!" said Scrooge's nephew. "You don't mean

  • that, I am sure?"

  • "I do," said Scrooge. "Merry Christmas! What right have you to be merry?

  • What reason have you to be merry? You're poor enough."

  • "Come, then," returned the nephew gaily. "What right have you to be

  • dismal? What reason have you to be morose? You're rich enough."

  • Scrooge, having no better answer ready on the spur of the moment, said,

  • "Bah!" again; and followed it up with "Humbug!"

  • "Don't be cross, uncle!" said the nephew.

  • [Illustration: _"A Merry Christmas, uncle! God save you!" cried a

  • cheerful voice._]

  • "What else can I be," returned the uncle, "when I live in such a world

  • of fools as this? Merry Christmas! Out upon merry Christmas! What's

  • Christmas-time to you but a time for paying bills without money; a time

  • for finding yourself a year older, and not an hour richer; a time for

  • balancing your books, and having every item in 'em through a round dozen

  • of months presented dead against you? If I could work my will," said

  • Scrooge indignantly, "every idiot who goes about with 'Merry Christmas'

  • on his lips should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a

  • stake of holly through his heart. He should!"

  • "Uncle!" pleaded the nephew.

  • "Nephew!" returned the uncle sternly, "keep Christmas in your own way,

  • and let me keep it in mine."

  • "Keep it!" repeated Scrooge's nephew. "But you don't keep it."

  • "Let me leave it alone, then," said Scrooge. "Much good may it do you!

  • Much good it has ever done you!"

  • "There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I

  • have not profited, I dare say," returned the nephew; "Christmas among

  • the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas-time, when it

  • has come round--apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and

  • origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that--as a good

  • time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know

  • of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one

  • consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people

  • below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and

  • not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore,

  • uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I

  • believe that it _has_ done me good, and _will_ do me good; and I say,

  • God bless it!"

  • The clerk in the tank involuntarily applauded. Becoming immediately

  • sensible of the impropriety, he poked the fire, and extinguished the

  • last frail spark for ever.

  • "Let me hear another sound from _you_," said Scrooge, "and you'll keep

  • your Christmas by losing your situation! You're quite a powerful

  • speaker, sir," he added, turning to his nephew. "I wonder you don't go

  • into Parliament."

  • "Don't be angry, uncle. Come! Dine with us to-morrow."

  • Scrooge said that he would see him----Yes, indeed he did. He went the

  • whole length of the expression, and said that he would see him in that

  • extremity first.

  • "But why?" cried Scrooge's nephew. "Why?"

  • "Why did you get married?" said Scrooge.

  • "Because I fell in love."

  • "Because you fell in love!" growled Scrooge, as if that were the only

  • one thing in the world more ridiculous than a merry Christmas. "Good

  • afternoon!"

  • "Nay, uncle, but you never came to see me before that happened. Why give

  • it as a reason for not coming now?"

  • "Good afternoon," said Scrooge.

  • "I want nothing from you; I ask nothing of you; why cannot we be

  • friends?"

  • "Good afternoon!" said Scrooge.

  • "I am sorry, with all my heart, to find you so resolute. We have never

  • had any quarrel to which I have been a party. But I have made the trial

  • in homage to Christmas, and I'll keep my Christmas humour to the last.

  • So A Merry Christmas, uncle!"

  • "Good afternoon," said Scrooge.

  • "And A Happy New Year!"

  • "Good afternoon!" said Scrooge.

  • His nephew left the room without an angry word, notwithstanding. He

  • stopped at the outer door to bestow the greetings of the season on the

  • clerk, who, cold as he was, was warmer than Scrooge; for he returned

  • them cordially.

  • "There's another fellow," muttered Scrooge, who overheard him: "my

  • clerk, with fifteen shillings a week, and a wife and family, talking

  • about a merry Christmas. I'll retire to Bedlam."

  • This lunatic, in letting Scrooge's nephew out, had let two other people

  • in. They were portly gentlemen, pleasant to behold, and now stood, with

  • their hats off, in Scrooge's office. They had books and papers in their

  • hands, and bowed to him.

  • "Scrooge and Marley's, I believe," said one of the gentlemen, referring

  • to his list. "Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr. Scrooge, or Mr.

  • Marley?"

  • "Mr. Marley has been dead these seven years," Scrooge replied. "He died

  • seven years ago, this very night."

  • "We have no doubt his liberality is well represented by his surviving

  • partner," said the gentleman, presenting his credentials.

  • It certainly was; for they had been two kindred spirits. At the ominous

  • word "liberality" Scrooge frowned, and shook his head, and handed the

  • credentials back.

  • "At this festive season of the year, Mr. Scrooge," said the gentleman,

  • taking up a pen, "it is more than usually desirable that we should make

  • some slight provision for the poor and destitute, who suffer greatly at

  • the present time. Many thousands are in want of common necessaries;

  • hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir."

  • "Are there no prisons?" asked Scrooge.

  • "Plenty of prisons," said the gentleman, laying down the pen again.

  • "And the Union workhouses?" demanded Scrooge. "Are they still in

  • operation?"

  • "They are. Still," returned the gentleman, "I wish I could say they were

  • not."

  • "The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then?" said Scrooge.

  • "Both very busy, sir."

  • "Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had

  • occurred to stop them in their useful course," said Scrooge. "I am very

  • glad to hear it."

  • "Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind

  • or body to the multitude," returned the gentleman, "a few of us are

  • endeavouring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink, and

  • means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all

  • others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I

  • put you down for?"

  • "Nothing!" Scrooge replied.

  • "You wish to be anonymous?"

  • "I wish to be left alone," said Scrooge. "Since you ask me what I wish,

  • gentlemen, that is my answer. I don't make merry myself at Christmas,

  • and I can't afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the

  • establishments I have mentioned--they cost enough; and those who are

  • badly off must go there."

  • "Many can't go there; and many would rather die."

  • "If they would rather die," said Scrooge, "they had better do it, and

  • decrease the surplus population. Besides--excuse me--I don't know that."

  • "But you might know it," observed the gentleman.

  • "It's not my business," Scrooge returned. "It's enough for a man to

  • understand his own business, and not to interfere with other people's.

  • Mine occupies me constantly. Good afternoon, gentlemen!"

  • Seeing clearly that it would be useless to pursue their point, the

  • gentlemen withdrew. Scrooge resumed his labours with an improved opinion

  • of himself, and in a more facetious temper than was usual with him.

  • Meanwhile the fog and darkness thickened so, that people ran about with

  • flaring links, proffering their services to go before horses in

  • carriages, and conduct them on their way. The ancient tower of a church,

  • whose gruff old bell was always peeping slily down at Scrooge out of a

  • Gothic window in the wall, became invisible, and struck the hours and

  • quarters in the clouds, with tremulous vibrations afterwards, as if its

  • teeth were chattering in its frozen head up there. The cold became

  • intense. In the main street, at the corner of the court, some labourers

  • were repairing the gas-pipes, and had lighted a great fire in a brazier,

  • round which a party of ragged men and boys were gathered: warming their

  • hands and winking their eyes before the blaze in rapture. The water-plug

  • being left in solitude, its overflowings suddenly congealed, and turned

  • to misanthropic ice. The brightness of the shops, where holly sprigs and

  • berries crackled in the lamp heat of the windows, made pale faces ruddy

  • as they passed. Poulterers' and grocers' trades became a splendid joke:

  • a glorious pageant, with which it was next to impossible to believe that

  • such dull principles as bargain and sale had anything to do. The Lord

  • Mayor, in the stronghold of the mighty Mansion House, gave orders to his

  • fifty cooks and butlers to keep Christmas as a Lord Mayor's household

  • should; and even the little tailor, whom he had fined five shillings on

  • the previous Monday for being drunk and blood-thirsty in the streets,

  • stirred up to-morrow's pudding in his garret, while his lean wife and

  • the baby sallied out to buy the beef.

  • Foggier yet, and colder! Piercing, searching, biting cold. If the good

  • St. Dunstan had but nipped the Evil Spirit's nose with a touch of such

  • weather as that, instead of using his familiar weapons, then indeed he

  • would have roared to lusty purpose. The owner of one scant young nose,

  • gnawed and mumbled by the hungry cold as bones are gnawed by dogs,

  • stooped down at Scrooge's keyhole to regale him with a Christmas carol;

  • but, at the first sound of

  • "God bless you, merry gentleman, May nothing you dismay!"

  • Scrooge seized the ruler with such energy of action, that the singer

  • fled in terror, leaving the keyhole to the fog, and even more congenial

  • frost.

  • At length the hour of shutting up the counting-house arrived. With an

  • ill-will Scrooge dismounted from his stool, and tacitly admitted the

  • fact to the expectant clerk in the tank, who instantly snuffed his

  • candle out, and put on his hat.

  • "You'll want all day to-morrow, I suppose?" said Scrooge.

  • "If quite convenient, sir."

  • "It's not convenient," said Scrooge, "and it's not fair. If I was to

  • stop half-a-crown for it, you'd think yourself ill used, I'll be bound?"

  • The clerk smiled faintly.

  • "And yet," said Scrooge, "you don't think _me_ ill used when I pay a

  • day's wages for no work."

  • The clerk observed that it was only once a year.

  • "A poor excuse for picking a man's pocket every twenty-fifth of

  • December!" said Scrooge, buttoning his great-coat to the chin. "But I

  • suppose you must have the whole day. Be here all the earlier next

  • morning."

  • The clerk promised that he would; and Scrooge walked out with a growl.

  • The office was closed in a twinkling, and the clerk, with the long ends

  • of his white comforter dangling below his waist (for he boasted no

  • great-coat), went down a slide on Cornhill, at the end of a lane of

  • boys, twenty times, in honour of its being Christmas-eve, and then ran

  • home to Camden Town as hard as he could pelt, to play at blindman's

  • buff.

  • Scrooge took his melancholy dinner in his usual melancholy tavern; and

  • having read all the newspapers, and beguiled the rest of the evening

  • with his banker's book, went home to bed. He lived in chambers which had

  • once belonged to his deceased partner. They were a gloomy suite of

  • rooms, in a lowering pile of building up a yard, where it had so little

  • business to be, that one could scarcely help fancying it must have run

  • there when it was a young house, playing at hide-and-seek with other

  • houses, and have forgotten the way out again. It was old enough now, and

  • dreary enough; for nobody lived in it but Scrooge, the other rooms being

  • all let out as offices. The yard was so dark that even Scrooge, who

  • knew its every stone, was fain to grope with his hands. The fog and

  • frost so hung about the black old gateway of the house, that it seemed

  • as if the Genius of the Weather sat in mournful meditation on the

  • threshold.

  • Now, it is a fact that there was nothing at all particular about the

  • knocker on the door, except that it was very large. It is also a fact

  • that Scrooge had seen it, night and morning, during his whole residence

  • in that place; also that Scrooge had as little of what is called fancy

  • about him as any man in the City of London, even including--which is a

  • bold word--the corporation, aldermen, and livery. Let it also be borne

  • in mind that Scrooge had not bestowed one thought on Marley since his

  • last mention of his seven-years'-dead partner that afternoon. And then

  • let any man explain to me, if he can, how it happened that Scrooge,

  • having his key in the lock of the door, saw in the knocker, without its

  • undergoing any intermediate process of change--not a knocker, but

  • Marley's face.

  • Marley's face. It was not in impenetrable shadow, as the other objects

  • in the yard were, but had a dismal light about it, like a bad lobster in

  • a dark cellar. It was not angry or ferocious, but looked at Scrooge as

  • Marley used to look: with ghostly spectacles turned up on its ghostly

  • forehead. The hair was curiously stirred, as if by breath of hot air;

  • and, though the eyes were wide open, they were perfectly motionless.

  • That, and its livid colour, made it horrible; but its horror seemed to

  • be in spite of the face, and beyond its control, rather than a part of

  • its own expression.

  • As Scrooge looked fixedly at this phenomenon, it was a knocker again.

  • To say that he was not startled, or that his blood was not conscious of

  • a terrible sensation to which it had been a stranger from infancy, would

  • be untrue. But he put his hand upon the key he had relinquished, turned

  • it sturdily, walked in, and lighted his candle.

  • He _did_ pause, with a moment's irresolution, before he shut the door;

  • and he _did_ look cautiously behind it first, as if he half expected to

  • be terrified with the sight of Marley's pigtail sticking out into the

  • hall. But there was nothing on the back of the door, except the screws

  • and nuts that held the knocker on, so he said, "Pooh, pooh!" and closed

  • it with a bang.

  • The sound resounded through the house like thunder. Every room above,

  • and every cask in the wine merchant's cellars below, appeared to have a

  • separate peal of echoes of its own. Scrooge was not a man to be

  • frightened by echoes. He fastened the door, and walked across the hall,

  • and up the stairs: slowly, too: trimming his candle as he went.

  • You may talk vaguely about driving a coach and six up a good old flight

  • of stairs, or through a bad young Act of Parliament; but I mean to say

  • you might have got a hearse up that staircase, and taken it broadwise,

  • with the splinter-bar towards the wall, and the door towards the

  • balustrades: and done it easy. There was plenty of width for that, and

  • room to spare; which is perhaps the reason why Scrooge thought he saw a

  • locomotive hearse going on before him in the gloom. Half-a-dozen

  • gas-lamps out of the street wouldn't have lighted the entry too well, so

  • you may suppose that it was pretty dark with Scrooge's dip.

  • Up Scrooge went, not caring a button for that. Darkness is cheap, and

  • Scrooge liked it. But, before he shut his heavy door, he walked through

  • his rooms to see that all was right. He had just enough recollection of

  • the face to desire to do that.

  • Sitting-room, bedroom, lumber-room. All as they should be. Nobody under

  • the table, nobody under the sofa; a small fire in the grate; spoon and

  • basin ready; and the little saucepan of gruel (Scrooge had a cold in his

  • head) upon the hob. Nobody under the bed; nobody in the closet; nobody

  • in his dressing-gown, which was hanging up in a suspicious attitude

  • against the wall. Lumber-room as usual. Old fire-guard, old shoes, two

  • fish baskets, washing-stand on three legs, and a poker.

  • Quite satisfied, he closed his door, and locked himself in; double

  • locked himself in, which was not his custom. Thus secured against

  • surprise, he took off his cravat; put on his dressing-gown and slippers,

  • and his nightcap; and sat down before the fire to take his gruel.

  • It was a very low fire indeed; nothing on such a bitter night. He was

  • obliged to sit close to it, and brood over it, before he could extract

  • the least sensation of warmth from such a handful of fuel. The

  • fire-place was an old one, built by some Dutch merchant long ago, and

  • paved all round with quaint Dutch tiles, designed to illustrate the

  • Scriptures. There were Cains and Abels, Pharaoh's daughters, Queens of

  • Sheba, Angelic messengers descending through the air on clouds like

  • feather beds, Abrahams, Belshazzars, Apostles putting off to sea in

  • butter-boats, hundreds of figures to attract his thoughts; and yet that

  • face of Marley, seven years dead, came like the ancient Prophet's rod,

  • and swallowed up the whole. If each smooth tile had been a blank at

  • first, with power to shape some picture on its surface from the

  • disjointed fragments of his thoughts, there would have been a copy of

  • old Marley's head on every one.

  • "Humbug!" said Scrooge; and walked across the room.

  • After several turns he sat down again. As he threw his head back in the

  • chair, his glance happened to rest upon a bell, a disused bell, that

  • hung in the room, and communicated, for some purpose now forgotten, with

  • a chamber in the highest story of the building. It was with great

  • astonishment, and with a strange, inexplicable dread, that, as he

  • looked, he saw this bell begin to swing. It swung so softly in the

  • outset that it scarcely made a sound; but soon it rang out loudly, and

  • so did every bell in the house.

  • This might have lasted half a minute, or a minute, but it seemed an

  • hour. The bells ceased, as they had begun, together. They were succeeded

  • by a clanking noise, deep down below, as if some person were dragging a

  • heavy chain over the casks in the wine merchant's cellar. Scrooge then

  • remembered to have heard that ghosts in haunted houses were described as

  • dragging chains.

  • The cellar door flew open with a booming sound, and then he heard the

  • noise much louder on the floors below; then coming up the stairs; then

  • coming straight towards his door.

  • "It's humbug still!" said Scrooge. "I won't believe it."

  • His colour changed, though, when, without a pause, it came on through

  • the heavy door, and passed into the room before his eyes. Upon its

  • coming in, the dying flame leaped up, as though it cried, "I know him!

  • Marley's Ghost!" and fell again.

  • The same face: the very same. Marley in his pigtail, usual waistcoat,

  • tights, and boots; the tassels on the latter bristling, like his

  • pigtail, and his coat-skirts, and the hair upon his head. The chain he

  • drew was clasped about his middle. It was long, and wound about him like

  • a tail; and it was made (for Scrooge observed it closely) of cash-boxes,

  • keys, padlocks, ledgers, deeds, and heavy purses wrought in steel. His

  • body was transparent; so that Scrooge, observing him, and looking

  • through his waistcoat, could see the two buttons on his coat behind.

  • Scrooge had often heard it said that Marley had no bowels, but he had

  • never believed it until now.

  • No, nor did he believe it even now. Though he looked the phantom through

  • and through, and saw it standing before him; though he felt the chilling

  • influence of its death-cold eyes; and marked the very texture of the

  • folded kerchief bound about its head and chin, which wrapper he had not

  • observed before; he was still incredulous, and fought against his

  • senses.

  • "How now!" said Scrooge, caustic and cold as ever. "What do you want

  • with me?"

  • "Much!"--Marley's voice, no doubt about it.

  • "Who are you?"

  • "Ask me who I _was_."

  • "Who _were_ you, then?" said Scrooge, raising his voice. "You're

  • particular, for a shade." He was going to say "_to_ a shade," but

  • substituted this, as more appropriate.

  • "In life I was your partner, Jacob Marley."

  • "Can you--can you sit down?" asked Scrooge, looking doubtfully at him.

  • "I can."

  • "Do it, then."

  • Scrooge asked the question, because he didn't know whether a ghost so

  • transparent might find himself in a condition to take a chair; and felt

  • that, in the event of its being impossible, it might involve the

  • necessity of an embarrassing explanation. But the Ghost sat down on the

  • opposite side of the fire-place, as if he were quite used to it.

  • "You don't believe in me," observed the Ghost.

  • "I don't," said Scrooge.

  • "What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your own

  • senses?"

  • "I don't know," said Scrooge.

  • "Why do you doubt your senses?"

  • "Because," said Scrooge, "a little thing affects them. A slight disorder

  • of the stomach makes them cheats. You may be an undigested bit of beef,

  • a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato.

  • There's more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!"

  • Scrooge was not much in the habit of cracking jokes, nor did he feel in

  • his heart by any means waggish then. The truth is, that he tried to be

  • smart, as a means of distracting his own attention, and keeping down his

  • terror; for the spectre's voice disturbed the very marrow in his bones.

  • To sit staring at those fixed glazed eyes in silence, for a moment,

  • would play, Scrooge felt, the very deuce with him. There was something

  • very awful, too, in the spectre's being provided with an infernal

  • atmosphere of his own. Scrooge could not feel it himself, but this was

  • clearly the case; for though the Ghost sat perfectly motionless, its

  • hair, and skirts, and tassels were still agitated as by the hot vapour

  • from an oven.

  • "You see this toothpick?" said Scrooge, returning quickly to the charge,

  • for the reason just assigned; and wishing, though it were only for a

  • second, to divert the vision's stony gaze from himself.

  • "I do," replied the Ghost.

  • "You are not looking at it," said Scrooge.

  • "But I see it," said the Ghost, "notwithstanding."

  • "Well!" returned Scrooge, "I have but to swallow this, and be for the

  • rest of my days persecuted by a legion of goblins, all of my own

  • creation. Humbug, I tell you; humbug!"

  • At this the spirit raised a frightful cry, and shook its chain with such

  • a dismal and appalling noise, that Scrooge held on tight to his chair,

  • to save himself from falling in a swoon. But how much greater was his

  • horror when the phantom, taking off the bandage round his head, as if it

  • were too warm to wear indoors, its lower jaw dropped down upon its

  • breast!

  • Scrooge fell upon his knees, and clasped his hands before his face.

  • "Mercy!" he said. "Dreadful apparition, why do you trouble me?"

  • "Man of the worldly mind!" replied the Ghost, "do you believe in me or

  • not?"

  • "I do," said Scrooge. "I must. But why do spirits walk the earth, and

  • why do they come to me?"

  • [Illustration: _To sit staring at those fixed glazed eyes in silence,

  • for a moment, would play, Scrooge felt, the very deuce with him._]

  • "It is required of every man," the Ghost returned, "that the spirit

  • within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and

  • wide; and, if that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do

  • so after death. It is doomed to wander through the world--oh, woe is

  • me!--and witness what it cannot share, but might have shared on earth,

  • and turned to happiness!"

  • Again the spectre raised a cry, and shook its chain and wrung its

  • shadowy hands.

  • "You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling. "Tell me why?"

  • "I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "I made it link

  • by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free-will, and of my

  • own free-will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to _you_?"

  • Scrooge trembled more and more.

  • "Or would you know," pursued the Ghost, "the weight and length of the

  • strong coil you bear yourself? It was full as heavy and as long as this,

  • seven Christmas-eves ago. You have laboured on it since. It is a

  • ponderous chain!"

  • Scrooge glanced about him on the floor, in the expectation of finding

  • himself surrounded by some fifty or sixty fathoms of iron cable, but he

  • could see nothing.

  • "Jacob!" he said imploringly. "Old Jacob Marley, tell me more! Speak

  • comfort to me, Jacob!"

  • "I have none to give," the Ghost replied. "It comes from other regions,

  • Ebenezer Scrooge, and is conveyed by other ministers, to other kinds of

  • men. Nor can I tell you what I would. A very little more is all

  • permitted to me. I cannot rest, I cannot stay, I cannot linger anywhere.

  • My spirit never walked beyond our counting-house--mark me;--in life my

  • spirit never roved beyond the narrow limits of our money-changing hole;

  • and weary journeys lie before me!"

  • It was a habit with Scrooge, whenever he became thoughtful, to put his

  • hands in his breeches pockets. Pondering on what the Ghost had said, he

  • did so now, but without lifting up his eyes, or getting off his knees.

  • "You must have been very slow about it, Jacob," Scrooge observed in a

  • business-like manner, though with humility and deference.

  • "Slow!" the Ghost repeated.

  • "Seven years dead," mused Scrooge. "And travelling all the time?"

  • "The whole time," said the Ghost. "No rest, no peace. Incessant torture

  • of remorse."

  • "You travel fast?" said Scrooge.

  • "On the wings of the wind," replied the Ghost.

  • "You might have got over a great quantity of ground in seven years,"

  • said Scrooge.

  • The Ghost, on hearing this, set up another cry, and clanked its chain so

  • hideously in the dead silence of the night, that the Ward would have

  • been justified in indicting it for a nuisance.

  • "Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed," cried the phantom, "not to know

  • that ages of incessant labour, by immortal creatures, for this earth

  • must pass into eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is

  • all developed! Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in

  • its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too

  • short for its vast means of usefulness! Not to know that no space of

  • regret can make amends for one life's opportunities misused! Yet such

  • was I! Oh, such was I!"

  • "But you were always a good man of business, Jacob," faltered Scrooge,

  • who now began to apply this to himself.

  • "Business!" cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. "Mankind was my

  • business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy,

  • forbearance, and benevolence were, all, my business. The dealings of my

  • trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my

  • business!"

  • It held up its chain at arm's length, as if that were the cause of all

  • its unavailing grief, and flung it heavily upon the ground again.

  • "At this time of the rolling year," the spectre said, "I suffer most.

  • Why did I walk through crowds of fellow-beings with my eyes turned down,

  • and never raise them to that blessed Star which led the Wise Men to a

  • poor abode? Were there no poor homes to which its light would have

  • conducted _me_?"

  • Scrooge was very much dismayed to hear the spectre going on at this

  • rate, and began to quake exceedingly.

  • "Hear me!" cried the Ghost. "My time is nearly gone."

  • "I will," said Scrooge. "But don't be hard upon me! Don't be flowery,

  • Jacob! Pray!"

  • "How it is that I appear before you in a shape that you can see, I may

  • not tell. I have sat invisible beside you many and many a day."

  • It was not an agreeable idea. Scrooge shivered, and wiped the

  • perspiration from his brow.

  • "That is no light part of my penance," pursued the Ghost. "I am here

  • to-night to warn you that you have yet a chance and hope of escaping my

  • fate. A chance and hope of my procuring, Ebenezer."

  • "You were always a good friend to me," said Scrooge. "Thankee!"

  • "You will be haunted," resumed the Ghost, "by Three Spirits."

  • Scrooge's countenance fell almost as low as the Ghost's had done.

  • "Is that the chance and hope you mentioned, Jacob?" he demanded in a

  • faltering voice.

  • "It is."

  • "I--I think I'd rather not," said Scrooge.

  • "Without their visits," said the Ghost, "you cannot hope to shun the

  • path I tread. Expect the first to-morrow when the bell tolls One."

  • "Couldn't I take 'em all at once, and have it over, Jacob?" hinted

  • Scrooge.

  • "Expect the second on the next night at the same hour. The third, upon

  • the next night when the last stroke of Twelve has ceased to vibrate.

  • Look to see me no more; and look that, for your own sake, you remember

  • what has passed between us!"

  • When it had said these words, the spectre took its wrapper from the

  • table, and bound it round its head as before. Scrooge knew this by the

  • smart sound its teeth made when the jaws were brought together by the

  • bandage. He ventured to raise his eyes again, and found his supernatural

  • visitor confronting him in an erect attitude, with its chain wound over

  • and about its arm.

  • The apparition walked backward from him; and, at every step it took, the

  • window raised itself a little, so that, when the spectre reached it, it

  • was wide open. It beckoned Scrooge to approach, which he did. When they

  • were within two paces of each other, Marley's Ghost held up its hand,

  • warning him to come no nearer. Scrooge stopped.

  • Not so much in obedience as in surprise and fear; for, on the raising of

  • the hand, he became sensible of confused noises in the air; incoherent

  • sounds of lamentation and regret; wailings inexpressibly sorrowful and

  • self-accusatory. The spectre, after listening for a moment, joined in

  • the mournful dirge; and floated out upon the bleak, dark night.

  • Scrooge followed to the window: desperate in his curiosity. He looked

  • out.

  • The air was filled with phantoms, wandering hither and thither in

  • restless haste, and moaning as they went. Every one of them wore chains

  • like Marley's Ghost; some few (they might be guilty governments) were

  • linked together; none were free. Many had been personally known to

  • Scrooge in their lives. He had been quite familiar with one old ghost in

  • a white waistcoat, with a monstrous iron safe attached to its ankle, who

  • cried piteously at being unable to assist a wretched woman with an

  • infant, whom it saw below upon a doorstep. The misery with them all was,

  • clearly, that they sought to interfere, for good, in human matters, and

  • had lost the power for ever.

  • Whether these creatures faded into mist, or mist enshrouded them, he

  • could not tell. But they and their spirit voices faded together; and the

  • night became as it had been when he walked home.

  • Scrooge closed the window, and examined the door by which the Ghost had

  • entered. It was double locked, as he had locked it with his own hands,

  • and the bolts were undisturbed. He tried to say "Humbug!" but stopped at

  • the first syllable. And being, from the emotion he had undergone, or the

  • fatigues of the day, or his glimpse of the Invisible World, or the dull

  • conversation of the Ghost, or the lateness of the hour, much in need of

  • repose, went straight to bed without undressing, and fell asleep upon

  • the instant.

  • STAVE TWO

  • THE FIRST OF THE THREE SPIRITS

  • When Scrooge awoke it was so dark, that, looking out of bed, he could

  • scarcely distinguish the transparent window from the opaque walls of his

  • chamber. He was endeavouring to pierce the darkness with his ferret

  • eyes, when the chimes of a neighbouring church struck the four quarters.

  • So he listened for the hour.

  • To his great astonishment, the heavy bell went on from six to seven, and

  • from seven to eight, and regularly up to twelve; then stopped. Twelve!

  • It was past two when he went to bed. The clock was wrong. An icicle must

  • have got into the works. Twelve!

  • He touched the spring of his repeater, to correct this most preposterous

  • clock. Its rapid little pulse beat twelve, and stopped.

  • "Why, it isn't possible," said Scrooge, "that I can have slept through a

  • whole day and far into another night. It isn't possible that anything

  • has happened to the sun, and this is twelve at noon!"

  • The idea being an alarming one, he scrambled out of bed, and groped his

  • way to the window. He was obliged to rub the frost off with the sleeve

  • of his dressing-gown before he could see anything; and could see very

  • little then. All he could make out was, that it was still very foggy and

  • extremely cold, and that there was no noise of people running to and

  • fro, and making a great stir, as there unquestionably would have been if

  • night had beaten off bright day, and taken possession of the world.

  • This was a great relief, because "Three days after sight of this First

  • of Exchange pay to Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge or his order," and so forth,

  • would have become a mere United States security if there were no days to

  • count by.

  • Scrooge went to bed again, and thought, and thought, and thought it over

  • and over, and could make nothing of it. The more he thought, the more

  • perplexed he was; and, the more he endeavoured not to think, the more he

  • thought.

  • Marley's Ghost bothered him exceedingly. Every time he resolved within

  • himself, after mature inquiry, that it was all a dream, his mind flew

  • back again, like a strong spring released, to its first position, and

  • presented the same problem to be worked all through, "Was it a dream or

  • not?"

  • Scrooge lay in this state until the chime had gone three quarters more,

  • when he remembered, on a sudden, that the Ghost had warned him of a

  • visitation when the bell tolled one. He resolved to lie awake until the

  • hour was passed; and, considering that he could no more go to sleep than

  • go to Heaven, this was, perhaps, the wisest resolution in his power.

  • The quarter was so long, that he was more than once convinced he must

  • have sunk into a doze unconsciously, and missed the clock. At length it

  • broke upon his listening ear.

  • "Ding, dong!"

  • "A quarter past," said Scrooge, counting.

  • "Ding, dong!"

  • "Half past," said Scrooge.

  • "Ding, dong!"

  • "A quarter to it," said Scrooge.

  • "Ding, dong!"

  • "The hour itself," said Scrooge triumphantly, "and nothing else!"

  • He spoke before the hour bell sounded, which it now did with a deep,

  • dull, hollow, melancholy ONE. Light flashed up in the room upon the

  • instant, and the curtains of his bed were drawn.

  • The curtains of his bed were drawn aside, I tell you, by a hand. Not the

  • curtains at his feet, nor the curtains at his back, but those to which

  • his face was addressed. The curtains of his bed were drawn aside; and

  • Scrooge, starting up into a half-recumbent attitude, found himself face

  • to face with the unearthly visitor who drew them: as close to it as I am

  • now to you, and I am standing in the spirit at your elbow.

  • It was a strange figure--like a child: yet not so like a child as like

  • an old man, viewed through some supernatural medium, which gave him the

  • appearance of having receded from the view, and being diminished to a

  • child's proportions. Its hair, which hung about its neck and down its

  • back, was white, as if with age; and yet the face had not a wrinkle in

  • it, and the tenderest bloom was on the skin. The arms were very long and

  • muscular; the hands the same, as if its hold were of uncommon strength.

  • Its legs and feet, most delicately formed, were, like those upper

  • members, bare. It wore a tunic of the purest white; and round its waist

  • was bound a lustrous belt, the sheen of which was beautiful. It held a

  • branch of fresh green holly in its hand: and, in singular contradiction

  • of that wintry emblem, had its dress trimmed with summer flowers. But

  • the strangest thing about it was, that from the crown of its head there

  • sprung a bright clear jet of light, by which all this was visible; and

  • which was doubtless the occasion of its using, in its duller moments, a

  • great extinguisher for a cap, which it now held under its arm.

  • Even this, though, when Scrooge looked at it with increasing steadiness,

  • was _not_ its strangest quality. For, as its belt sparkled and

  • glittered, now in one part and now in another, and what was light one

  • instant at another time was dark, so the figure itself fluctuated in its

  • distinctness: being now a thing with one arm, now with one leg, now with

  • twenty legs, now a pair of legs without a head, now a head without a

  • body: of which dissolving parts no outline would be visible in the dense

  • gloom wherein they melted away. And, in the very wonder of this, it

  • would be itself again; distinct and clear as ever.

  • "Are you the Spirit, sir, whose coming was foretold to me?" asked

  • Scrooge.

  • "I am!"

  • The voice was soft and gentle. Singularly low, as if, instead of being

  • so close beside him, it were at a distance.

  • "Who and what are you?" Scrooge demanded.

  • "I am the Ghost of Christmas Past."

  • "Long Past?" inquired Scrooge; observant of its dwarfish stature.

  • "No. Your past."

  • Perhaps Scrooge could not have told anybody why, if anybody could have

  • asked him; but he had a special desire to see the Spirit in his cap; and

  • begged him to be covered.

  • "What!" exclaimed the Ghost, "would you so soon put out, with worldly

  • hands, the light I give? Is it not enough that you are one of those

  • whose passions made this cap, and force me through whole trains of years

  • to wear it low upon my brow?"

  • Scrooge reverently disclaimed all intention to offend or any knowledge

  • of having wilfully "bonneted" the Spirit at any period of his life. He

  • then made bold to inquire what business brought him there.

  • "Your welfare!" said the Ghost.

  • Scrooge expressed himself much obliged, but could not help thinking that

  • a night of unbroken rest would have been more conducive to that end. The

  • Spirit must have heard him thinking, for it said immediately:

  • "Your reclamation, then. Take heed!"

  • It put out its strong hand as it spoke, and clasped him gently by the

  • arm.

  • "Rise! and walk with me!"

  • It would have been in vain for Scrooge to plead that the weather and the

  • hour were not adapted to pedestrian purposes; that bed was warm, and

  • the thermometer a long way below freezing; that he was clad but lightly

  • in his slippers, dressing-gown, and nightcap; and that he had a cold

  • upon him at that time. The grasp, though gentle as a woman's hand, was

  • not to be resisted. He rose: but, finding that the Spirit made towards

  • the window, clasped its robe in supplication.

  • "I am a mortal," Scrooge remonstrated, "and liable to fall."

  • "Bear but a touch of my hand _there_," said the Spirit, laying it upon

  • his heart, "and you shall be upheld in more than this!"

  • As the words were spoken, they passed through the wall, and stood upon

  • an open country road, with fields on either hand. The city had entirely

  • vanished. Not a vestige of it was to be seen. The darkness and the mist

  • had vanished with it, for it was a clear, cold, winter day, with the

  • snow upon the ground.

  • "Good Heaven!" said Scrooge, clasping his hands together as he looked

  • about him. "I was bred in this place. I was a boy here!"

  • The Spirit gazed upon him mildly. Its gentle touch, though it had been

  • light and instantaneous, appeared still present to the old man's sense

  • of feeling. He was conscious of a thousand odours floating in the air,

  • each one connected with a thousand thoughts, and hopes, and joys, and

  • cares long, long forgotten!

  • "Your lip is trembling," said the Ghost. "And what is that upon your

  • cheek?"

  • Scrooge muttered, with an unusual catching in his voice, that it was a

  • pimple; and begged the Ghost to lead him where he would.

  • "You recollect the way?" inquired the Spirit.

  • "Remember it!" cried Scrooge with fervour; "I could walk it blindfold."

  • "Strange to have forgotten it for so many years!" observed the Ghost.

  • "Let us go on."

  • [Illustration: _"You recollect the way?" inquired the spirit. "Remember

  • it!" cried Scrooge with fervour; "I could walk it blindfold."_]

  • They walked along the road, Scrooge recognising every gate, and post,

  • and tree, until a little market-town appeared in the distance, with its

  • bridge, its church, and winding river. Some shaggy ponies now were seen

  • trotting towards them with boys upon their backs, who called to other

  • boys in country gigs and carts, driven by farmers. All these boys were

  • in great spirits, and shouted to each other, until the broad fields were

  • so full of merry music, that the crisp air laughed to hear it.

  • "These are but shadows of the things that have been," said the Ghost.

  • "They have no consciousness of us."

  • The jocund travellers came on; and as they came, Scrooge knew and named

  • them every one. Why was he rejoiced beyond all bounds to see them? Why

  • did his cold eye glisten, and his heart leap up as they went past? Why

  • was he filled with gladness when he heard them give each other Merry

  • Christmas, as they parted at cross-roads and by-ways for their several

  • homes? What was merry Christmas to Scrooge? Out upon merry Christmas!

  • What good had it ever done to him?

  • "The school is not quite deserted," said the Ghost. "A solitary child,

  • neglected by his friends, is left there still."

  • Scrooge said he knew it. And he sobbed.

  • They left the high-road by a well-remembered lane, and soon approached a

  • mansion of dull red brick, with a little weather-cock surmounted cupola

  • on the roof and a bell hanging in it. It was a large house, but one of

  • broken fortunes: for the spacious offices were little used, their walls

  • were damp and mossy, their windows broken, and their gates decayed.

  • Fowls clucked and strutted in the stables; and the coach-houses and

  • sheds were overrun with grass. Nor was it more retentive of its ancient

  • state within; for, entering the dreary hall, and glancing through the

  • open doors of many rooms, they found them poorly furnished, cold, and

  • vast. There was an earthly savour in the air, a chilly bareness in the

  • place, which associated itself somehow with too much getting up by

  • candle-light, and not too much to eat.

  • They went, the Ghost and Scrooge, across the hall, to a door at the

  • back of the house. It opened before them, and disclosed a long, bare,

  • melancholy room, made barer still by lines of plain deal forms and

  • desks. At one of these a lonely boy was reading near a feeble fire; and

  • Scrooge sat down upon a form, and wept to see his poor forgotten self as

  • he had used to be.

  • Not a latent echo in the house, not a squeak and scuffle from the mice

  • behind the panelling, not a drip from the half-thawed water-spout in the

  • dull yard behind, not a sigh among the leafless boughs of one despondent

  • poplar, not the idle swinging of an empty storehouse door, no, not a

  • clicking in the fire, but fell upon the heart of Scrooge with softening

  • influence, and gave a freer passage to his tears.

  • The Spirit touched him on the arm, and pointed to his younger self,

  • intent upon his reading. Suddenly a man in foreign garments: wonderfully

  • real and distinct to look at: stood outside the window, with an axe

  • stuck in his belt, and leading by the bridle an ass laden with wood.

  • "Why, it's Ali Baba!" Scrooge exclaimed in ecstasy. "It's dear old

  • honest Ali Baba! Yes, yes, I know. One Christmas-time when yonder

  • solitary child was left here all alone, he _did_ come, for the first

  • time, just like that. Poor boy! And Valentine," said Scrooge, "and his

  • wild brother, Orson; there they go! And what's his name, who was put

  • down in his drawers, asleep, at the gate of Damascus; don't you see him?

  • And the Sultan's Groom turned upside down by the Genii: there he is upon

  • his head! Serve him right! I'm glad of it. What business had _he_ to be

  • married to the Princess?"

  • To hear Scrooge expending all the earnestness of his nature on such

  • subjects, in a most extraordinary voice between laughing and crying; and

  • to see his heightened and excited face; would have been a surprise to

  • his business friends in the City, indeed.

  • [Illustration: _"Why, it's Ali Baba!" Scrooge exclaimed in ecstasy.

  • "It's dear old honest Ali Baba."_]

  • "There's the Parrot!" cried Scrooge. "Green body and yellow tail, with

  • a thing like a lettuce growing out of the top of his head; there he is!

  • Poor Robin Crusoe he called him, when he came home again after sailing

  • round the island. 'Poor Robin Crusoe, where have you been, Robin

  • Crusoe?' The man thought he was dreaming, but he wasn't. It was the

  • Parrot, you know. There goes Friday, running for his life to the little

  • creek! Halloa! Hoop! Halloo!"

  • Then, with a rapidity of transition very foreign to his usual character,

  • he said, in pity for his former self, "Poor boy!" and cried again.

  • "I wish," Scrooge muttered, putting his hand in his pocket, and looking

  • about him, after drying his eyes with his cuff: "but it's too late now."

  • "What is the matter?" asked the Spirit.

  • "Nothing," said Scrooge. "Nothing. There was a boy singing a Christmas

  • Carol at my door last night. I should like to have given him something:

  • that's all."

  • The Ghost smiled thoughtfully, and waved its hand: saying, as it did so,

  • "Let us see another Christmas!"

  • Scrooge's former self grew larger at the words, and the room became a

  • little darker and more dirty. The panels shrunk, the windows cracked;

  • fragments of plaster fell out of the ceiling, and the naked laths were

  • shown instead; but how all this was brought about Scrooge knew no more

  • than you do. He only knew that it was quite correct: that everything had

  • happened so; that there he was, alone again, when all the other boys had

  • gone home for the jolly holidays.

  • He was not reading now, but walking up and down despairingly. Scrooge

  • looked at the Ghost, and, with a mournful shaking of his head, glanced

  • anxiously towards the door.

  • It opened; and a little girl, much younger than the boy, came darting

  • in, and, putting her arms about his neck, and often kissing him,

  • addressed him as her "dear, dear brother."

  • "I have come to bring you home, dear brother!" said the child, clapping

  • her tiny hands, and bending down to laugh. "To bring you home, home,

  • home!"

  • "Home, little Fan?" returned the boy.

  • "Yes!" said the child, brimful of glee. "Home for good and all. Home for

  • ever and ever. Father is so much kinder than he used to be, that home's

  • like Heaven! He spoke so gently to me one dear night when I was going to

  • bed, that I was not afraid to ask him once more if you might come home;

  • and he said Yes, you should; and sent me in a coach to bring you. And

  • you're to be a man!" said the child, opening her eyes; "and are never to

  • come back here; but first we're to be together all the Christmas long,

  • and have the merriest time in all the world."

  • "You are quite a woman, little Fan!" exclaimed the boy.

  • She clapped her hands and laughed, and tried to touch his head; but,

  • being too little, laughed again, and stood on tiptoe to embrace him.

  • Then she began to drag him, in her childish eagerness, towards the door;

  • and he, nothing loath to go, accompanied her.

  • A terrible voice in the hall cried, "Bring down Master Scrooge's box,

  • there!" and in the hall appeared the schoolmaster himself, who glared on

  • Master Scrooge with a ferocious condescension, and threw him into a

  • dreadful state of mind by shaking hands with him. He then conveyed him

  • and his sister into the veriest old well of a shivering best parlour

  • that ever was seen, where the maps upon the wall, and the celestial and

  • terrestrial globes in the windows, were waxy with cold. Here he produced

  • a decanter of curiously light wine, and a block of curiously heavy cake,

  • and administered instalments of those dainties to the young people: at

  • the same time sending out a meagre servant to offer a glass of

  • "something" to the postboy who answered that he thanked the gentleman,

  • but, if it was the same tap as he had tasted before, he had rather not.

  • Master Scrooge's trunk being by this time tied on to the top of the

  • chaise, the children bade the schoolmaster good-bye right willingly;

  • and, getting into it, drove gaily down the garden sweep; the quick

  • wheels dashing the hoar frost and snow from off the dark leaves of the

  • evergreens like spray.

  • "Always a delicate creature, whom a breath might have withered," said

  • the Ghost. "But she had a large heart!"

  • "So she had," cried Scrooge. "You're right. I will not gainsay it,

  • Spirit. God forbid!"

  • "She died a woman," said the Ghost, "and had, as I think, children."

  • "One child," Scrooge returned.

  • "True," said the Ghost. "Your nephew!"

  • Scrooge seemed uneasy in his mind; and answered briefly, "Yes."

  • Although they had but that moment left the school behind them, they were

  • now in the busy thoroughfares of a city, where shadowy passengers passed

  • and repassed; where shadowy carts and coaches battled for the way, and

  • all the strife and tumult of a real city were. It was made plain enough,

  • by the dressing of the shops, that here, too, it was Christmas-time

  • again; but it was evening, and the streets were lighted up.

  • The Ghost stopped at a certain warehouse door, and asked Scrooge if he

  • knew it.

  • "Know it!" said Scrooge. "Was I apprenticed here?"

  • They went in. At sight of an old gentleman in a Welsh wig, sitting

  • behind such a high desk, that if he had been two inches taller, he must

  • have knocked his head against the ceiling, Scrooge cried in great

  • excitement:

  • "Why, it's old Fezziwig! Bless his heart, it's Fezziwig alive again!"

  • Old Fezziwig laid down his pen, and looked up at the clock, which

  • pointed to the hour of seven. He rubbed his hands; adjusted his

  • capacious waistcoat; laughed all over himself, from his shoes to his

  • organ of benevolence; and called out, in a comfortable, oily, rich, fat,

  • jovial voice:

  • "Yo ho, there! Ebenezer! Dick!"

  • Scrooge's former self, now grown a young man, came briskly in,

  • accompanied by his fellow-'prentice.

  • "Dick Wilkins, to be sure!" said Scrooge to the Ghost. "Bless me, yes.

  • There he is. He was very much attached to me, was Dick. Poor Dick! Dear,

  • dear!"

  • "Yo ho, my boys!" said Fezziwig. "No more work to-night. Christmas-eve,

  • Dick. Christmas, Ebenezer! Let's have the shutters up," cried old

  • Fezziwig with a sharp clap of his hands, "before a man can say Jack

  • Robinson!"

  • You wouldn't believe how those two fellows went at it! They charged into

  • the street with the shutters--one, two, three--had 'em up in their

  • places--four, five, six--barred 'em and pinned 'em--seven, eight,

  • nine--and came back before you could have got to twelve, panting like

  • race-horses.

  • "Hilli-ho!" cried old Fezziwig, skipping down from the high desk with

  • wonderful agility. "Clear away, my lads, and let's have lots of room

  • here! Hilli-ho, Dick! Chirrup, Ebenezer!"

  • Clear away! There was nothing they wouldn't have cleared away, or

  • couldn't have cleared away, with old Fezziwig looking on. It was done in

  • a minute. Every movable was packed off, as if it were dismissed from

  • public life for evermore; the floor was swept and watered, the lamps

  • were trimmed, fuel was heaped upon the fire; and the warehouse was as

  • snug, and warm, and dry, and bright a ball-room as you would desire to

  • see upon a winter's night.

  • In came a fiddler with a music-book, and went up to the lofty desk, and

  • made an orchestra of it, and tuned like fifty stomachaches. In came Mrs.

  • Fezziwig, one vast substantial smile. In came the three Miss Fezziwigs,

  • beaming and lovable. In came the six young followers whose hearts they

  • broke. In came all the young men and women employed in the business. In

  • came the housemaid, with her cousin the baker. In came the cook, with

  • her brother's particular friend the milkman. In came the boy from over

  • the way, who was suspected of not having board enough from his master;

  • trying to hide himself behind the girl from next door but one, who was

  • proved to have had her ears pulled by her mistress. In they all came,

  • one after another; some shyly, some boldly, some gracefully, some

  • awkwardly, some pushing, some pulling; in they all came, any how and

  • every how. Away they all went, twenty couple at once; hands half round

  • and back again the other way; down the middle and up again; round and

  • round in various stages of affectionate grouping; old top couple always

  • turning up in the wrong place; new top couple starting off again as soon

  • as they got there; all top couples at last, and not a bottom one to help

  • them! When this result was brought about, old Fezziwig, clapping his

  • hands to stop the dance, cried out, "Well done!" and the fiddler plunged

  • his hot face into a pot of porter, especially provided for that purpose.

  • But, scorning rest upon his reappearance, he instantly began again,

  • though there were no dancers yet, as if the other fiddler had been

  • carried home, exhausted, on a shutter, and he were a bran-new man

  • resolved to beat him out of sight, or perish.

  • There were more dances, and there were forfeits, and more dances, and

  • there was cake, and there was negus, and there was a great piece of Cold

  • Roast, and there was a great piece of Cold Boiled, and there were

  • mince-pies, and plenty of beer. But the great effect of the evening came

  • after the Roast and Boiled, when the fiddler (an artful dog, mind! The

  • sort of man who knew his business better than you or I could have told

  • it him!) struck up "Sir Roger de Coverley." Then old Fezziwig stood out

  • to dance with Mrs. Fezziwig. Top couple, too; with a good stiff piece of

  • work cut out for them; three or four and twenty pair of partners; people

  • who were not to be trifled with; people who _would_ dance, and had no

  • notion of walking.

  • But if they had been twice as many--ah! four times--old Fezziwig would

  • have been a match for them, and so would Mrs. Fezziwig. As to _her_, she

  • was worthy to be his partner in every sense of the term. If that's not

  • high praise, tell me higher, and I'll use it. A positive light appeared

  • to issue from Fezziwig's calves. They shone in every part of the dance

  • like moons. You couldn't have predicted, at any given time, what would

  • become of them next. And when old Fezziwig and Mrs. Fezziwig had gone

  • all through the dance; advance and retire, both hands to your partner,

  • bow and curtsy, cork-screw, thread-the-needle, and back again to your

  • place; Fezziwig "cut"--cut so deftly, that he appeared to wink with his

  • legs, and came upon his feet again without a stagger.

  • When the clock struck eleven, this domestic ball broke up. Mr. and Mrs.

  • Fezziwig took their stations, one on either side the door, and, shaking

  • hands with every person individually as he or she went out, wished him

  • or her a Merry Christmas. When everybody had retired but the two

  • 'prentices, they did the same to them; and thus the cheerful voices died

  • away, and the lads were left to their beds; which were under a counter

  • in the back-shop.

  • During the whole of this time Scrooge had acted like a man out of his

  • wits. His heart and soul were in the scene, and with his former self. He

  • corroborated everything, remembered everything, enjoyed everything, and

  • underwent the strangest agitation. It was not until now, when the bright

  • faces of his former self and Dick were turned from them, that he

  • remembered the Ghost, and became conscious that it was looking full upon

  • him, while the light upon its head burnt very clear.

  • "A small matter," said the Ghost, "to make these silly folks so full of

  • gratitude."

  • "Small!" echoed Scrooge.

  • The Spirit signed to him to listen to the two apprentices, who were

  • pouring out their hearts in praise of Fezziwig; and, when he had done

  • so, said:

  • "Why! Is it not? He has spent but a few pounds of your mortal money:

  • three or four, perhaps. Is that so much that he deserves this praise?"

  • "It isn't that," said Scrooge, heated by the remark, and speaking

  • unconsciously like his former, not his latter self. "It isn't that,

  • Spirit. He has the power to render us happy or unhappy; to make our

  • service light or burdensome; a pleasure or a toil. Say that his power

  • lies in words and looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it

  • is impossible to add and count 'em up: what then? The happiness he gives

  • is quite as great as if it cost a fortune."

  • He felt the Spirit's glance, and stopped.

  • "What is the matter?" asked the Ghost.

  • "Nothing particular," said Scrooge.

  • "Something, I think?" the Ghost insisted.

  • "No," said Scrooge, "no. I should like to be able to say a word or two

  • to my clerk just now. That's all."

  • His former self turned down the lamps as he gave utterance to the wish;

  • and Scrooge and the Ghost again stood side by side in the open air.

  • "My time grows short," observed the Spirit. "Quick!"

  • This was not addressed to Scrooge, or to any one whom he could see, but

  • it produced an immediate effect. For again Scrooge saw himself. He was

  • older now; a man in the prime of life. His face had not the harsh and

  • rigid lines of later years; but it had begun to wear the signs of care

  • and avarice. There was an eager, greedy, restless motion in the eye,

  • which showed the passion that had taken root, and where the shadow of

  • the growing tree would fall.

  • He was not alone, but sat by the side of a fair young girl in a mourning

  • dress: in whose eyes there were tears, which sparkled in the light that

  • shone out of the Ghost of Christmas Past.

  • "It matters little," she said softly. "To you, very little. Another idol

  • has displaced me; and, if it can cheer and comfort you in time to come

  • as I would have tried to do, I have no just cause to grieve."

  • "What Idol has displaced you?" he rejoined.

  • "A golden one."

  • "This is the even-handed dealing of the world!" he said. "There is

  • nothing on which it is so hard as poverty; and there is nothing it

  • professes to condemn with such severity as the pursuit of wealth!"

  • "You fear the world too much," she answered gently. "All your other

  • hopes have merged into the hope of being beyond the chance of its sordid

  • reproach. I have seen your nobler aspirations fall off one by one, until

  • the master passion, Gain, engrosses you. Have I not?"

  • "What then?" he retorted. "Even if I have grown so much wiser, what

  • then? I am not changed towards you."

  • She shook her head.

  • "Am I?"

  • "Our contract is an old one. It was made when we were both poor, and

  • content to be so, until, in good season, we could improve our worldly

  • fortune by our patient industry. You _are_ changed. When it was made you

  • were another man."

  • "I was a boy," he said impatiently.

  • "Your own feeling tells you that you were not what you are," she

  • returned. "I am. That which promised happiness when we were one in heart

  • is fraught with misery now that we are two. How often and how keenly I

  • have thought of this I will not say. It is enough that I _have_ thought

  • of it, and can release you."

  • "Have I ever sought release?"

  • "In words. No. Never."

  • "In what, then?"

  • "In a changed nature; in an altered spirit; in another atmosphere of

  • life; another Hope as its great end. In everything that made my love of

  • any worth or value in your sight. If this had never been between us,"

  • said the girl, looking mildly, but with steadiness, upon him, "tell me,

  • would you seek me out and try to win me now? Ah, no!"

  • He seemed to yield to the justice of this supposition in spite of

  • himself. But he said, with a struggle, "You think not."

  • "I would gladly think otherwise if I could," she answered. "Heaven

  • knows! When _I_ have learned a Truth like this, I know how strong and

  • irresistible it must be. But if you were free to-day, to-morrow,

  • yesterday, can even I believe that you would choose a dowerless

  • girl--you who, in your very confidence with her, weigh everything by

  • Gain: or, choosing her, if for a moment you were false enough to your

  • one guiding principle to do so, do I not know that your repentance and

  • regret would surely follow? I do; and I release you. With a full heart,

  • for the love of him you once were."

  • He was about to speak; but, with her head turned from him, she resumed.

  • "You may--the memory of what is past half makes me hope you will--have

  • pain in this. A very, very brief time, and you will dismiss the

  • recollection of it gladly, as an unprofitable dream, from which it

  • happened well that you awoke. May you be happy in the life you have

  • chosen!"

  • She left him, and they parted.

  • "Spirit!" said Scrooge, "show me no more! Conduct me home. Why do you

  • delight to torture me?"

  • "One shadow more!" exclaimed the Ghost.

  • "No more!" cried Scrooge. "No more! I don't wish to see it. Show me no

  • more!"

  • But the relentless Ghost pinioned him in both his arms, and forced him

  • to observe what happened next.

  • They were in another scene and place; a room, not very large or

  • handsome, but full of comfort. Near to the winter fire sat a beautiful

  • young girl, so like that last that Scrooge believed it was the same,

  • until he saw _her_, now a comely matron, sitting opposite her daughter.

  • The noise in this room was perfectly tumultuous, for there were more

  • children there than Scrooge in his agitated state of mind could count;

  • and, unlike the celebrated herd in the poem, they were not forty

  • children conducting themselves like one, but every child was conducting

  • itself like forty. The consequences were uproarious beyond belief; but

  • no one seemed to care; on the contrary, the mother and daughter laughed

  • heartily, and enjoyed it very much; and the latter, soon beginning to

  • mingle in the sports, got pillaged by the young brigands most

  • ruthlessly. What would I not have given to be one of them! Though I

  • never could have been so rude, no, no! I wouldn't for the wealth of all

  • the world have crushed that braided hair, and torn it down; and, for the

  • precious little shoe, I wouldn't have plucked it off, God bless my soul!

  • to save my life. As to measuring her waist in sport, as they did, bold

  • young brood, I couldn't have done it; I should have expected my arm to

  • have grown round it for a punishment, and never come straight again. And

  • yet I should have dearly liked, I own, to have touched her lips; to have

  • questioned her, that she might have opened them; to have looked upon the

  • lashes of her downcast eyes, and never raised a blush; to have let loose

  • waves of hair, an inch of which would be a keepsake beyond price: in

  • short, I should have liked, I do confess, to have had the lightest

  • licence of a child, and yet to have been man enough to know its value.

  • But now a knocking at the door was heard, and such a rush immediately

  • ensued that she, with laughing face and plundered dress, was borne

  • towards it in the centre of a flushed and boisterous group, just in time

  • to greet the father, who came home attended by a man laden with

  • Christmas toys and presents. Then the shouting and the struggling, and

  • the onslaught that was made on the defenceless porter! The scaling him,

  • with chairs for ladders, to dive into his pockets, despoil him of

  • brown-paper parcels, hold on tight by his cravat, hug him round the

  • neck, pummel his back, and kick his legs in irrepressible affection! The

  • shouts of wonder and delight with which the development of every package

  • was received! The terrible announcement that the baby had been taken in

  • the act of putting a doll's frying-pan into his mouth, and was more than

  • suspected of having swallowed a fictitious turkey, glued on a wooden

  • platter! The immense relief of finding this a false alarm! The joy, and

  • gratitude, and ecstasy! They are all indescribable alike. It is enough

  • that by degrees, the children and their emotions got out of the parlour,

  • and, by one stair at a time, up to the top of the house, where they went

  • to bed, and so subsided.

  • And now Scrooge looked on more attentively than ever, when the master of

  • the house, having his daughter leaning fondly on him, sat down with her

  • and her mother at his own fireside; and when he thought that such

  • another creature, quite as graceful and as full of promise, might have

  • called him father, and been a spring-time in the haggard winter of his

  • life, his sight grew very dim indeed.

  • "Belle," said the husband, turning to his wife with a smile, "I saw an

  • old friend of yours this afternoon."

  • "Who was it?"

  • "Guess!"

  • "How can I? Tut, don't I know?" she added in the same breath, laughing

  • as he laughed. "Mr. Scrooge."

  • "Mr. Scrooge it was. I passed his office window; and as it was not shut

  • up, and he had a candle inside, I could scarcely help seeing him. His

  • partner lies upon the point of death, I hear; and there he sat alone.

  • Quite alone in the world, I do believe."

  • "Spirit!" said Scrooge in a broken voice, "remove me from this place."

  • "I told you these were shadows of the things that have been," said the

  • Ghost. "That they are what they are, do not blame me!"

  • "Remove me!" Scrooge exclaimed. "I cannot bear it!"

  • He turned upon the Ghost, and seeing that it looked upon him with a face

  • in which in some strange way there were fragments of all the faces it

  • had shown him, wrestled with it.

  • "Leave me! Take me back! Haunt me no longer!"

  • In the struggle--if that can be called a struggle in which the Ghost,

  • with no visible resistance on its own part, was undisturbed by any

  • effort of its adversary--Scrooge observed that its light was burning

  • high and bright; and dimly connecting that with its influence over him,

  • he seized the extinguisher cap, and by a sudden action pressed it down

  • upon its head.

  • The Spirit dropped beneath it, so that the extinguisher covered its

  • whole form; but, though Scrooge pressed it down with all his force, he

  • could not hide the light, which streamed from under it in an unbroken

  • flood upon the ground.

  • He was conscious of being exhausted, and overcome by an irresistible

  • drowsiness; and, further, of being in his own bedroom. He gave the cap a

  • parting squeeze, in which his hand relaxed; and had barely time to reel

  • to bed before he sank into a heavy sleep.

  • STAVE THREE

  • THE SECOND OF THE THREE SPIRITS

  • Awaking in the middle of a prodigiously tough snore, and sitting up in

  • bed to get his thoughts together, Scrooge had no occasion to be told

  • that the bell was again upon the stroke of One. He felt that he was

  • restored to consciousness in the right nick of time, for the especial

  • purpose of holding a conference with the second messenger dispatched to

  • him through Jacob Marley's intervention. But, finding that he turned

  • uncomfortably cold when he began to wonder which of his curtains this

  • new spectre would draw back, he put them every one aside with his own

  • hands, and, lying down again, established a sharp look-out all round the

  • bed. For he wished to challenge the Spirit on the moment of its

  • appearance, and did not wish to be taken by surprise and made nervous.

  • Gentlemen of the free-and-easy sort, who plume themselves on being

  • acquainted with a move or two, and being usually equal to the time of

  • day, express the wide range of their capacity for adventure by observing

  • that they are good for anything from pitch-and-toss to manslaughter;

  • between which opposite extremes, no doubt, there lies a tolerably wide

  • and comprehensive range of subjects. Without venturing for Scrooge quite

  • as hardily as this, I don't mind calling on you to believe that he was

  • ready for a good broad field of strange appearances, and that nothing

  • between a baby and a rhinoceros would have astonished him very much.

  • Now, being prepared for almost anything, he was not by any means

  • prepared for nothing; and consequently, when the bell struck One, and

  • no shape appeared, he was taken with a violent fit of trembling. Five

  • minutes, ten minutes, a quarter of an hour went by, yet nothing came.

  • All this time he lay upon his bed, the very core and centre of a blaze

  • of ruddy light, which streamed upon it when the clock proclaimed the

  • hour; and which, being only light, was more alarming than a dozen

  • ghosts, as he was powerless to make out what it meant, or would be at;

  • and was sometimes apprehensive that he might be at that very moment an

  • interesting case of spontaneous combustion, without having the

  • consolation of knowing it. At last, however, he began to think--as you

  • or I would have thought at first; for it is always the person not in the

  • predicament who knows what ought to have been done in it, and would

  • unquestionably have done it too--at last, I say, he began to think that

  • the source and secret of this ghostly light might be in the adjoining

  • room, from whence, on further tracing it, it seemed to shine. This idea

  • taking full possession of his mind, he got up softly, and shuffled in

  • his slippers to the door.

  • The moment Scrooge's hand was on the lock, a strange voice called him by

  • his name, and bade him enter. He obeyed.

  • It was his own room. There was no doubt about that. But it had undergone

  • a surprising transformation. The walls and ceiling were so hung with

  • living green, that it looked a perfect grove; from every part of which

  • bright gleaming berries glistened. The crisp leaves of holly, mistletoe,

  • and ivy reflected back the light, as if so many little mirrors had been

  • scattered there; and such a mighty blaze went roaring up the chimney as

  • that dull petrifaction of a hearth had never known in Scrooge's time, or

  • Marley's, or for many and many a winter season gone. Heaped up on the

  • floor, to form a kind of throne, were turkeys, geese, game, poultry,

  • brawn, great joints of meat, sucking-pigs, long wreaths of sausages,

  • mince-pies, plum-puddings, barrels of oysters, red-hot chestnuts,

  • cherry-cheeked apples, juicy oranges, luscious pears, immense

  • twelfth-cakes, and seething bowls of punch, that made the chamber dim

  • with their delicious steam. In easy state upon this couch there sat a

  • jolly Giant, glorious to see; who bore a glowing torch, in shape not

  • unlike Plenty's horn, and held it up, high up, to shed its light on

  • Scrooge as he came peeping round the door.

  • "Come in!" exclaimed the Ghost. "Come in! and know me better, man!"

  • Scrooge entered timidly, and hung his head before this Spirit. He was

  • not the dogged Scrooge he had been; and, though the Spirit's eyes were

  • clear and kind, he did not like to meet them.

  • "I am the Ghost of Christmas Present," said the Spirit. "Look upon me!"

  • Scrooge reverently did so. It was clothed in one simple deep green robe,

  • or mantle, bordered with white fur. This garment hung so loosely on the

  • figure, that its capacious breast was bare, as if disdaining to be

  • warded or concealed by any artifice. Its feet, observable beneath the

  • ample folds of the garment, were also bare; and on its head it wore no

  • other covering than a holly wreath, set here and there with shining

  • icicles. Its dark brown curls were long and free; free as its genial

  • face, its sparkling eye, its open hand, its cheery voice, its

  • unconstrained demeanour, and its joyful air. Girded round its middle was

  • an antique scabbard; but no sword was in it, and the ancient sheath was

  • eaten up with rust.

  • "You have never seen the like of me before!" exclaimed the Spirit.

  • "Never," Scrooge made answer to it.

  • "Have never walked forth with the younger members of my family; meaning

  • (for I am very young) my elder brothers born in these later years?"

  • pursued the Phantom.

  • "I don't think I have," said Scrooge. "I am afraid I have not. Have you

  • had many brothers, Spirit?"

  • "More than eighteen hundred," said the Ghost.

  • "A tremendous family to provide for," muttered Scrooge.

  • The Ghost of Christmas Present rose.

  • "Spirit," said Scrooge submissively, "conduct me where you will. I went

  • forth last night on compulsion, and I learnt a lesson which is working

  • now. To-night, if you have aught to teach me, let me profit by it."

  • "Touch my robe!"

  • Scrooge did as he was told, and held it fast.

  • Holly, mistletoe, red berries, ivy, turkeys, geese, game, poultry,

  • brawn, meat, pigs, sausages, oysters, pies, puddings, fruit, and punch,

  • all vanished instantly. So did the room, the fire, the ruddy glow, the

  • hour of night, and they stood in the city streets on Christmas morning,

  • where (for the weather was severe) the people made a rough, but brisk

  • and not unpleasant kind of music, in scraping the snow from the pavement

  • in front of their dwellings, and from the tops of their houses, whence

  • it was mad delight to the boys to see it come plumping down into the

  • road below, and splitting into artificial little snow-storms.

  • The house-fronts looked black enough, and the windows blacker,

  • contrasting with the smooth white sheet of snow upon the roofs, and with

  • the dirtier snow upon the ground; which last deposit had been ploughed

  • up in deep furrows by the heavy wheels of carts and waggons; furrows

  • that crossed and recrossed each other hundreds of times where the great

  • streets branched off; and made intricate channels, hard to trace, in the

  • thick yellow mud and icy water. The sky was gloomy, and the shortest

  • streets were choked up with a dingy mist, half thawed, half frozen,

  • whose heavier particles descended in a shower of sooty atoms, as if all

  • the chimneys in Great Britain had, by one consent, caught fire, and were

  • blazing away to their dear hearts' content. There was nothing very

  • cheerful in the climate or the town, and yet was there an air of

  • cheerfulness abroad that the clearest summer air and brightest summer

  • sun might have endeavoured to diffuse in vain.

  • For, the people who were shovelling away on the housetops were jovial

  • and full of glee; calling out to one another from the parapets, and now

  • and then exchanging a facetious snowball--better-natured missile far

  • than many a wordy jest--laughing heartily if it went right, and not less

  • heartily if it went wrong. The poulterers' shops were still half open,

  • and the fruiterers' were radiant in their glory. There were great,

  • round, pot-bellied baskets of chestnuts, shaped like the waistcoats of

  • jolly old gentlemen, lolling at the doors, and tumbling out into the

  • street in their apoplectic opulence. There were ruddy, brown-faced,

  • broad-girthed Spanish onions, shining in the fatness of their growth

  • like Spanish Friars, and winking from their shelves in wanton slyness at

  • the girls as they went by, and glanced demurely at the hung-up

  • mistletoe. There were pears and apples clustered high in blooming

  • pyramids; there were bunches of grapes, made, in the shopkeepers'

  • benevolence, to dangle from conspicuous hooks that people's mouths might

  • water gratis as they passed; there were piles of filberts, mossy and

  • brown, recalling, in their fragrance, ancient walks among the woods, and

  • pleasant shufflings ankle deep through withered leaves; there were

  • Norfolk Biffins, squab and swarthy, setting off the yellow of the

  • oranges and lemons, and, in the great compactness of their juicy

  • persons, urgently entreating and beseeching to be carried home in paper

  • bags, and eaten after dinner. The very gold and silver fish, set forth

  • among these choice fruits in a bowl, though members of a dull and

  • stagnant-blooded race, appeared to know that there was something going

  • on; and, to a fish, went gasping round and round their little world in

  • slow and passionless excitement.

  • The Grocers'! oh, the Grocers'! nearly closed, with perhaps two shutters

  • down, or one; but through those gaps such glimpses! It was not alone

  • that the scales descending on the counter made a merry sound, or that

  • the twine and roller parted company so briskly, or that the canisters

  • were rattled up and down like juggling tricks, or even that the blended

  • scents of tea and coffee were so grateful to the nose, or even that the

  • raisins were so plentiful and rare, the almonds so extremely white, the

  • sticks of cinnamon so long and straight, the other spices so delicious,

  • the candied fruits so caked and spotted with molten sugar as to make the

  • coldest lookers-on feel faint, and subsequently bilious. Nor was it that

  • the figs were moist and pulpy, or that the French plums blushed in

  • modest tartness from their highly-decorated boxes, or that everything

  • was good to eat and in its Christmas dress; but the customers were all

  • so hurried and so eager in the hopeful promise of the day, that they

  • tumbled up against each other at the door, crashing their wicker baskets

  • wildly, and left their purchases upon the counter, and came running back

  • to fetch them, and committed hundreds of the like mistakes, in the best

  • humour possible; while the Grocer and his people were so frank and

  • fresh, that the polished hearts with which they fastened their aprons

  • behind might have been their own, worn outside for general inspection,

  • and for Christmas daws to peck at if they chose.

  • But soon the steeples called good people all to church and chapel, and

  • away they came, flocking through the streets in their best clothes, and

  • with their gayest faces. And at the same time there emerged, from scores

  • of by-streets, lanes, and nameless turnings, innumerable people,

  • carrying their dinners to the bakers' shops. The sight of these poor

  • revellers appeared to interest the Spirit very much, for he stood with

  • Scrooge beside him in a baker's doorway, and, taking off the covers as

  • their bearers passed, sprinkled incense on their dinners from his torch.

  • And it was a very uncommon kind of torch, for once or twice, when there

  • were angry words between some dinner-carriers who had jostled each

  • other, he shed a few drops of water on them from it, and their

  • good-humour was restored directly. For they said, it was a shame to

  • quarrel upon Christmas-day. And so it was! God love it, so it was!

  • In time the bells ceased, and the bakers were shut up; and yet there was

  • a genial shadowing forth of all these dinners, and the progress of their

  • cooking, in the thawed blotch of wet above each baker's oven; where the

  • pavement smoked as if its stones were cooking too.

  • "Is there a peculiar flavour in what you sprinkle from your torch?"

  • asked Scrooge.

  • "There is. My own."

  • "Would it apply to any kind of dinner on this day?" asked Scrooge.

  • "To any kindly given. To a poor one most."

  • "Why to a poor one most?" asked Scrooge.

  • "Because it needs it most."

  • "Spirit!" said Scrooge after a moment's thought. "I wonder you, of all

  • the beings in the many worlds about us, should desire to cramp these

  • people's opportunities of innocent enjoyment."

  • "I!" cried the Spirit.

  • "You would deprive them of their means of dining every seventh day,

  • often the only day on which they can be said to dine at all," said

  • Scrooge; "wouldn't you?"

  • "I!" cried the Spirit.

  • "You seek to close these places on the Seventh Day," said Scrooge. "And

  • it comes to the same thing."

  • "_I_ seek!" exclaimed the Spirit.

  • "Forgive me if I am wrong. It has been done in your name, or at least in

  • that of your family," said Scrooge.

  • "There are some upon this earth of yours," returned the Spirit, "who lay

  • claim to know us, and who do their deeds of passion, pride, ill-will,

  • hatred, envy, bigotry, and selfishness in our name, who are as strange

  • to us, and all our kith and kin, as if they had never lived. Remember

  • that, and charge their doings on themselves, not us."

  • Scrooge promised that he would; and they went on, invisible, as they

  • had been before, into the suburbs of the town. It was a remarkable

  • quality of the Ghost (which Scrooge had observed at the baker's), that,

  • notwithstanding his gigantic size, he could accommodate himself to any

  • place with ease; and that he stood beneath a low roof quite as

  • gracefully and like a supernatural creature as it was possible he could

  • have done in any lofty hall.

  • And perhaps it was the pleasure the good Spirit had in showing off this

  • power of his, or else it was his own kind, generous, hearty nature, and

  • his sympathy with all poor men, that led him straight to Scrooge's

  • clerk's; for there he went, and took Scrooge with him, holding to his

  • robe; and, on the threshold of the door, the Spirit smiled, and stopped

  • to bless Bob Cratchit's dwelling with the sprinklings of his torch.

  • Think of that! Bob had but fifteen "Bob" a week himself; he pocketed on

  • Saturdays but fifteen copies of his Christian name; and yet the Ghost of

  • Christmas Present blessed his four-roomed house!

  • Then up rose Mrs. Cratchit, Cratchit's wife, dressed out but poorly in a

  • twice-turned gown, but brave in ribbons, which are cheap, and make a

  • goodly show for sixpence; and she laid the cloth, assisted by Belinda

  • Cratchit, second of her daughters, also brave in ribbons; while Master

  • Peter Cratchit plunged a fork into the saucepan of potatoes, and,

  • getting the corners of his monstrous shirt collar (Bob's private

  • property, conferred upon his son and heir in honour of the day) into his

  • mouth, rejoiced to find himself so gallantly attired, and yearned to

  • show his linen in the fashionable Parks. And now two smaller Cratchits,

  • boy and girl, came tearing in, screaming that outside the baker's they

  • had smelt the goose, and known it for their own; and, basking in

  • luxurious thoughts of sage and onion, these young Cratchits danced about

  • the table, and exalted Master Peter Cratchit to the skies, while he (not

  • proud, although his collars nearly choked him) blew the fire, until the

  • slow potatoes, bubbling up, knocked loudly at the saucepan lid to be let

  • out and peeled.

  • "What has ever got your precious father, then?" said Mrs. Cratchit. "And

  • your brother, Tiny Tim? And Martha warn't as late last Christmas-day by

  • half an hour!"

  • "Here's Martha, mother!" said a girl, appearing as she spoke.

  • "Here's Martha, mother!" cried the two young Cratchits. "Hurrah! There's

  • _such_ a goose, Martha!"

  • "Why, bless your heart alive, my dear, how late you are!" said Mrs.

  • Cratchit, kissing her a dozen times, and taking off her shawl and bonnet

  • for her with officious zeal.

  • "We'd a deal of work to finish up last night," replied the girl, "and

  • had to clear away this morning, mother!"

  • "Well! never mind so long as you are come," said Mrs. Cratchit. "Sit ye

  • down before the fire, my dear, and have a warm, Lord bless ye!"

  • "No, no! There's father coming," cried the two young Cratchits, who were

  • everywhere at once. "Hide, Martha, hide!"

  • So Martha hid herself, and in came little Bob, the father, with at least

  • three feet of comforter, exclusive of the fringe, hanging down before

  • him; and his threadbare clothes darned up and brushed to look

  • seasonable; and Tiny Tim upon his shoulder. Alas for Tiny Tim, he bore a

  • little crutch, and had his limbs supported by an iron frame!

  • "Why, where's our Martha?" cried Bob Cratchit, looking round.

  • "Not coming," said Mrs. Cratchit.

  • "Not coming!" said Bob with a sudden declension in his high spirits; for

  • he had been Tim's blood horse all the way from church, and had come home

  • rampant. "Not coming upon Christmas-day!"

  • Martha didn't like to see him disappointed, if it were only in joke; so

  • she came out prematurely from behind the closet door, and ran into his

  • arms, while the two young Cratchits hustled Tiny Tim, and bore him off

  • into the wash-house, that he might hear the pudding singing in the

  • copper.

  • "And how did little Tim behave?" asked Mrs. Cratchit when she had

  • rallied Bob on his credulity, and Bob had hugged his daughter to his

  • heart's content.

  • "As good as gold," said Bob, "and better. Somehow, he gets thoughtful,

  • sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever

  • heard. He told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in the

  • church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to

  • remember upon Christmas-day who made lame beggars walk and blind men

  • see."

  • Bob's voice was tremulous when he told them this, and trembled more when

  • he said that Tiny Tim was growing strong and hearty.

  • His active little crutch was heard upon the floor, and back came Tiny

  • Tim before another word was spoken, escorted by his brother and sister

  • to his stool beside the fire; and while Bob, turning up his cuffs--as

  • if, poor fellow, they were capable of being made more shabby--compounded

  • some hot mixture in a jug with gin and lemons, and stirred it round and

  • round, and put it on the hob to simmer, Master Peter and the two

  • ubiquitous young Cratchits went to fetch the goose, with which they soon

  • returned in high procession.

  • Such a bustle ensued that you might have thought a goose the rarest of

  • all birds; a feathered phenomenon, to which a black swan was a matter of

  • course--and, in truth, it was something very like it in that house. Mrs.

  • Cratchit made the gravy (ready beforehand in a little saucepan) hissing

  • hot; Master Peter mashed the potatoes with incredible vigour; Miss

  • Belinda sweetened up the apple sauce; Martha dusted the hot plates; Bob

  • took Tiny Tim beside him in a tiny corner at the table; the two young

  • Cratchits set chairs for everybody, not forgetting themselves, and,

  • mounting guard upon their posts, crammed spoons into their mouths, lest

  • they should shriek for goose before their turn came to be helped. At

  • last the dishes were set on, and grace was said. It was succeeded by a

  • breathless pause, as Mrs. Cratchit, looking slowly all along the

  • carving-knife, prepared to plunge it in the breast; but when she did,

  • and when the long-expected gush of stuffing issued forth, one murmur of

  • delight arose all round the board, and even Tiny Tim, excited by the two

  • young Cratchits, beat on the table with the handle of his knife, and

  • feebly cried Hurrah!

  • There never was such a goose. Bob said he didn't believe there ever was

  • such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and flavour, size and cheapness,

  • were the themes of universal admiration. Eked out by apple sauce and

  • mashed potatoes, it was a sufficient dinner for the whole family;

  • indeed, as Mrs. Cratchit said with great delight (surveying one small

  • atom of a bone upon the dish), they hadn't ate it all at last! Yet every

  • one had had enough, and the youngest Cratchits, in particular, were

  • steeped in sage and onion to the eyebrows! But now, the plates being

  • changed by Miss Belinda, Mrs. Cratchit left the room alone--too nervous

  • to bear witnesses--to take the pudding up, and bring it in.

  • Suppose it should not be done enough! Suppose it should break in turning

  • out! Suppose somebody should have got over the wall of the back-yard and

  • stolen it, while they were merry with the goose--a supposition at which

  • the two young Cratchits became livid! All sorts of horrors were

  • supposed.

  • Hallo! A great deal of steam! The pudding was out of the copper. A smell

  • like a washing-day! That was the cloth. A smell like an eating-house and

  • a pastrycook's next door to each other, with a laundress's next door to

  • that! That was the pudding! In half a minute Mrs. Cratchit

  • entered--flushed, but smiling proudly--with the pudding, like a speckled

  • cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern of

  • ignited brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top.

  • Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchit said, and calmly too, that he

  • regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs. Cratchit since

  • their marriage. Mrs. Cratchit said that, now the weight was off her

  • mind, she would confess she had her doubts about the quantity of flour.

  • Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it

  • was at all a small pudding for a large family. It would have been flat

  • heresy to do so. Any Cratchit would have blushed to hint at such a

  • thing.

  • At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the hearth

  • swept, and the fire made up. The compound in the jug being tasted, and

  • considered perfect, apples and oranges were put upon the table, and a

  • shovel full of chestnuts on the fire. Then all the Cratchit family drew

  • round the hearth in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a

  • one; and at Bob Cratchit's elbow stood the family display of glass. Two

  • tumblers and a custard cup without a handle.

  • These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden

  • goblets would have done; and Bob served it out with beaming looks, while

  • the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and cracked noisily. Then Bob

  • proposed:

  • "A merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us!"

  • Which all the family re-echoed.

  • "God bless us every one!" said Tiny Tim, the last of all.

  • He sat very close to his father's side, upon his little stool. Bob held

  • his withered little hand in his, as if he loved the child, and wished to

  • keep him by his side, and dreaded that he might be taken from him.

  • "Spirit," said Scrooge with an interest he had never felt before, "tell

  • me if Tiny Tim will live."

  • "I see a vacant seat," replied the Ghost, "in the poor chimney-corner,

  • and a crutch without an owner, carefully preserved. If these shadows

  • remain unaltered by the Future, the child will die."

  • "No, no," said Scrooge. "Oh, no, kind Spirit! say he will be spared."

  • "If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, none other of my

  • race," returned the Ghost, "will find him here. What then? If he be like

  • to die, he had better do it, and decrease the surplus population."

  • Scrooge hung his head to hear his own words quoted by the Spirit, and

  • was overcome with penitence and grief.

  • "Man," said the Ghost, "if man you be in heart, not adamant, forbear

  • that wicked cant until you have discovered What the surplus is, and

  • Where it is. Will you decide what men shall live, what men shall die? It

  • may be that, in the sight of Heaven, you are more worthless and less fit

  • to live than millions like this poor man's child. Oh God! to hear the

  • Insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his hungry

  • brothers in the dust!"

  • Scrooge bent before the Ghost's rebuke, and, trembling, cast his eyes

  • upon the ground. But he raised them speedily on hearing his own name.

  • "Mr. Scrooge!" said Bob. "I'll give you Mr. Scrooge, the Founder of the

  • Feast!"

  • "The Founder of the Feast, indeed!" cried Mrs. Cratchit, reddening. "I

  • wish I had him here. I'd give him a piece of my mind to feast upon, and

  • I hope he'd have a good appetite for it."

  • "My dear," said Bob, "the children! Christmas-day."

  • "It should be Christmas-day, I am sure," said she, "on which one drinks

  • the health of such an odious, stingy, hard, unfeeling man as Mr.

  • Scrooge. You know he is, Robert! Nobody knows it better than you do,

  • poor fellow!"

  • "My dear!" was Bob's mild answer. "Christmas-day."

  • "I'll drink his health for your sake and the Day's," said Mrs. Cratchit,

  • "not for his. Long life to him! A merry Christmas and a happy New Year!

  • He'll be very merry and very happy, I have no doubt!"

  • The children drank the toast after her. It was the first of their

  • proceedings which had no heartiness in it. Tiny Tim drank it last of

  • all, but he didn't care twopence for it. Scrooge was the Ogre of the

  • family. The mention of his name cast a dark shadow on the party, which

  • was not dispelled for full five minutes.

  • After it had passed away they were ten times merrier than before, from

  • the mere relief of Scrooge the Baleful being done with. Bob Cratchit

  • told them how he had a situation in his eye for Master Peter, which

  • would bring in, if obtained, full five-and-sixpence weekly. The two

  • young Cratchits laughed tremendously at the idea of Peter's being a man

  • of business; and Peter himself looked thoughtfully at the fire from

  • between his collars, as if he were deliberating what particular

  • investments he should favour when he came into the receipt of that

  • bewildering income. Martha, who was a poor apprentice at a milliner's,

  • then told them what kind of work she had to do, and how many hours she

  • worked at a stretch, and how she meant to lie abed to-morrow morning for

  • a good long rest; to-morrow being a holiday she passed at home. Also how

  • she had seen a countess and a lord some days before, and how the lord

  • "was much about as tall as Peter"; at which Peter pulled up his collars

  • so high, that you couldn't have seen his head if you had been there. All

  • this time the chestnuts and the jug went round and round; and by-and-by

  • they had a song, about a lost child travelling in the snow, from Tiny

  • Tim, who had a plaintive little voice, and sang it very well indeed.

  • There was nothing of high mark in this. They were not a handsome family;

  • they were not well dressed; their shoes were far from being waterproof;

  • their clothes were scanty; and Peter might have known, and very likely

  • did, the inside of a pawn-broker's. But they were happy, grateful,

  • pleased with one another, and contented with the time; and when they

  • faded, and looked happier yet in the bright sprinklings of the Spirit's

  • torch at parting, Scrooge had his eye upon them, and especially on Tiny

  • Tim, until the last.

  • By this time it was getting dark, and snowing pretty heavily; and as

  • Scrooge and the Spirit went along the streets, the brightness of the

  • roaring fires in kitchens, parlours, and all sorts of rooms was

  • wonderful. Here, the flickering of the blaze showed preparations for a

  • cosy dinner, with hot plates baking through and through before the fire,

  • and deep red curtains, ready to be drawn to shut out cold and darkness.

  • There, all the children of the house were running out into the snow to

  • meet their married sisters, brothers, cousins, uncles, aunts, and be the

  • first to greet them. Here, again, were shadows on the window blinds of

  • guests assembling; and there a group of handsome girls, all hooded and

  • fur-booted, and all chattering at once, tripped lightly off to some near

  • neighbour's house; where, woe upon the single man who saw them

  • enter--artful witches, well they knew it--in a glow!

  • But, if you had judged from the numbers of people on their way to

  • friendly gatherings, you might have thought that no one was at home to

  • give them welcome when they got there, instead of every house expecting

  • company, and piling up its fires half-chimney high. Blessings on it, how

  • the Ghost exulted! How it bared its breadth of breast, and opened its

  • capacious palm, and floated on, outpouring, with a generous hand, its

  • bright and harmless mirth on everything within its reach! The very

  • lamp-lighter, who ran on before, dotting the dusky street with specks of

  • light, and who was dressed to spend the evening somewhere, laughed out

  • loudly as the Spirit passed, though little kenned the lamp-lighter that

  • he had any company but Christmas.

  • And now, without a word of warning from the Ghost, they stood upon a

  • bleak and desert moor, where monstrous masses of rude stone were cast

  • about, as though it were the burial-place or giants; and water spread

  • itself wheresoever it listed; or would have done so, but for the frost

  • that held it prisoner; and nothing grew but moss and furze, and coarse,

  • rank grass. Down in the west the setting sun had left a streak of fiery

  • red, which glared upon the desolation for an instant, like a sullen eye,

  • and, frowning lower, lower, lower yet, was lost in the thick gloom of

  • darkest night.

  • "What place is this?" asked Scrooge.

  • "A place where Miners live, who labour in the bowels of the earth,"

  • returned the Spirit. "But they know me. See!"

  • A light shone from the window of a hut, and swiftly they advanced

  • towards it. Passing through the wall of mud and stone, they found a

  • cheerful company assembled round a glowing fire. An old, old man and

  • woman, with their children and their children's children, and another

  • generation beyond that, all decked out gaily in their holiday attire.

  • The old man, in a voice that seldom rose above the howling of the wind

  • upon the barren waste, was singing them a Christmas song; it had been a

  • very old song when he was a boy; and from time to time they all joined

  • in the chorus. So surely as they raised their voices, the old man got

  • quite blithe and loud; and, so surely as they stopped, his vigour sank

  • again.

  • The Spirit did not tarry here, but bade Scrooge hold his robe, and,

  • passing on above the moor, sped whither? Not to sea? To sea. To

  • Scrooge's horror, looking back, he saw the last of the land, a frightful

  • range of rocks, behind them; and his ears were deafened by the

  • thundering of water, as it rolled and roared, and raged among the

  • dreadful caverns it had worn, and fiercely tried to undermine the earth.

  • Built upon a dismal reef of sunken rocks, some league or so from shore,

  • on which the waters chafed and dashed, the wild year through, there

  • stood a solitary lighthouse. Great heaps of seaweed clung to its base,

  • and storm-birds--born of the wind, one might suppose, as seaweed of the

  • water--rose and fell about it, like the waves they skimmed.

  • But, even here, two men who watched the light had made a fire that

  • through the loophole in the thick stone wall shed out a ray of

  • brightness on the awful sea. Joining their horny hands over the rough

  • table at which they sat, they wished each other Merry Christmas in their

  • can of grog; and one of them, the elder too, with his face all damaged

  • and scarred with hard weather, as the figure-head of an old ship might

  • be, struck up a sturdy song that was like a gale in itself.

  • Again the Ghost sped on, above the black and heaving sea--on, on--until,

  • being far away, as he told Scrooge, from any shore, they lighted on a

  • ship. They stood beside the helmsman at the wheel, the look-out in the

  • bow, the officers who had the watch; dark, ghostly figures in their

  • several stations; but every man among them hummed a Christmas tune, or

  • had a Christmas thought, or spoke below his breath to his companion of

  • some bygone Christmas-day, with homeward hopes belonging to it. And

  • every man on board, waking or sleeping, good or bad, had had a kinder

  • word for one another on that day than on any day in the year; and had

  • shared to some extent in its festivities; and had remembered those he

  • cared for at a distance, and had known that they delighted to remember

  • him.

  • It was a great surprise to Scrooge, while listening to the moaning of

  • the wind, and thinking what a solemn thing it was to move on through the

  • lonely darkness over an unknown abyss, whose depths were secrets as

  • profound as death: it was a great surprise to Scrooge, while thus

  • engaged, to hear a hearty laugh. It was a much greater surprise to

  • Scrooge to recognise it as his own nephew's, and to find himself in a

  • bright, dry, gleaming room, with the Spirit standing smiling by his

  • side, and looking at that same nephew with approving affability!

  • "Ha, ha!" laughed Scrooge's nephew. "Ha, ha, ha!"

  • If you should happen, by any unlikely chance, to know a man more blessed

  • in a laugh than Scrooge's nephew, all I can say is, I should like to

  • know him too. Introduce him to me, and I'll cultivate his acquaintance.

  • It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that, while there

  • is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so

  • irresistibly contagious as laughter and good-humour. When Scrooge's

  • nephew laughed in this way, holding his sides, rolling his head, and

  • twisting his face into the most extravagant contortions, Scrooge's

  • niece, by marriage, laughed as heartily as he. And their assembled

  • friends, being not a bit behindhand, roared out lustily.

  • "Ha, ha! Ha, ha, ha, ha!"

  • "He said that Christmas was a humbug, as I live!" cried Scrooge's

  • nephew. "He believed it, too!"

  • "More shame for him, Fred!" said Scrooge's niece indignantly. Bless

  • those women! they never do anything by halves. They are always in

  • earnest.

  • She was very pretty; exceedingly pretty. With a dimpled,

  • surprised-looking, capital face; a ripe little mouth, that seemed made

  • to be kissed--as no doubt it was; all kinds of good little dots about

  • her chin, that melted into one another when she laughed; and the

  • sunniest pair of eyes you ever saw in any little creature's head.

  • Altogether she was what you would have called provoking, you know; but

  • satisfactory, too. Oh, perfectly satisfactory!

  • "He's a comical old fellow," said Scrooge's nephew, "that's the truth;

  • and not so pleasant as he might be. However, his offences carry their

  • own punishment, and I have nothing to say against him."

  • "I'm sure he is very rich, Fred," hinted Scrooge's niece. "At least, you

  • always tell _me_ so."

  • "What of that, my dear?" said Scrooge's nephew. "His wealth is of no use

  • to him. He don't do any good with it. He don't make himself comfortable

  • with it. He hasn't the satisfaction of thinking--ha, ha, ha!--that he is

  • ever going to benefit Us with it."

  • "I have no patience with him," observed Scrooge's niece. Scrooge's

  • niece's sisters, and all the other ladies, expressed the same opinion.

  • "Oh, I have!" said Scrooge's nephew. "I am sorry for him; I couldn't be

  • angry with him if I tried. Who suffers by his ill whims? Himself always.

  • Here he takes it into his head to dislike us, and he won't come and dine

  • with us. What's the consequence? He don't lose much of a dinner."

  • "Indeed, I think he loses a very good dinner," interrupted Scrooge's

  • niece. Everybody else said the same, and they must be allowed to have

  • been competent judges, because they had just had dinner; and, with the

  • dessert upon the table, were clustered round the fire, by lamp-light.

  • "Well! I am very glad to hear it," said Scrooge's nephew, "because I

  • haven't any great faith in these young housekeepers. What do _you_ say,

  • Topper?"

  • Topper had clearly got his eye upon one of Scrooge's niece's sisters,

  • for he answered that a bachelor was a wretched outcast, who had no right

  • to express an opinion on the subject. Whereat Scrooge's niece's

  • sister--the plump one with the lace tucker, not the one with the

  • roses--blushed.

  • "Do go on, Fred," said Scrooge's niece, clapping her hands. "He never

  • finishes what he begins to say! He is such a ridiculous fellow!"

  • Scrooge's nephew revelled in another laugh, and, as it was impossible to

  • keep the infection off, though the plump sister tried hard to do it with

  • aromatic vinegar, his example was unanimously followed.

  • "I was only going to say," said Scrooge's nephew, "that the consequence

  • of his taking a dislike to us, and not making merry with us, is, as I

  • think, that he loses some pleasant moments, which could do him no harm.

  • I am sure he loses pleasanter companions than he can find in his own

  • thoughts, either in his mouldy old office or his dusty chambers. I mean

  • to give him the same chance every year, whether he likes it or not, for

  • I pity him. He may rail at Christmas till he dies, but he can't help

  • thinking better of it--I defy him--if he finds me going there in good

  • temper, year after year, and saying, 'Uncle Scrooge, how are you?' If it

  • only puts him in the vein to leave his poor clerk fifty pounds, _that's_

  • something; and I think I shook him yesterday."

  • It was their turn to laugh, now, at the notion of his shaking Scrooge.

  • But, being thoroughly good-natured, and not much caring what they

  • laughed at, so that they laughed at any rate, he encouraged them in

  • their merriment, and passed the bottle, joyously.

  • After tea they had some music. For they were a musical family, and knew

  • what they were about when they sung a Glee or Catch, I can assure you:

  • especially Topper, who could growl away in the bass like a good one, and

  • never swell the large veins in his forehead, or get red in the face over

  • it. Scrooge's niece played well upon the harp; and played, among other

  • tunes, a simple little air (a mere nothing: you might learn to whistle

  • it in two minutes), which had been familiar to the child who fetched

  • Scrooge from the boarding-school, as he had been reminded by the Ghost

  • of Christmas Past. When this strain of music sounded, all the things

  • that Ghost had shown him came upon his mind; he softened more and more;

  • and thought that if he could have listened to it often, years ago, he

  • might have cultivated the kindnesses of life for his own happiness with

  • his own hands, without resorting to the sexton's spade that buried Jacob

  • Marley.

  • But they didn't devote the whole evening to music. After awhile they

  • played at forfeits; for it is good to be children sometimes, and never

  • better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child himself.

  • Stop! There was first a game at blindman's buff. Of course there was.

  • And I no more believe Topper was really blind than I believe he had eyes

  • in his boots. My opinion is, that it was a done thing between him and

  • Scrooge's nephew; and that the Ghost of Christmas Present knew it. The

  • way he went after that plump sister in the lace tucker was an outrage on

  • the credulity of human nature. Knocking down the fire-irons, tumbling

  • over the chairs, bumping up against the piano, smothering himself

  • amongst the curtains, wherever she went, there went he! He always knew

  • where the plump sister was. He wouldn't catch anybody else. If you had

  • fallen up against him (as some of them did) on purpose, he would have

  • made a feint of endeavouring to seize you, which would have been an

  • affront to your understanding, and would instantly have sidled off in

  • the direction of the plump sister. She often cried out that it wasn't

  • fair; and it really was not. But when, at last, he caught her; when, in

  • spite of all her silken rustlings, and her rapid flutterings past him,

  • he got her into a corner whence there was no escape, then his conduct

  • was the most execrable. For his pretending not to know her; his

  • pretending that it was necessary to touch her head-dress, and further to

  • assure himself of her identity by pressing a certain ring upon her

  • finger, and a certain chain about her neck, was vile, monstrous! No

  • doubt she told him her opinion of it when, another blind man being in

  • office, they were so very confidential together behind the curtains.

  • Scrooge's niece was not one of the blindman's buff party, but was made

  • comfortable with a large chair and a footstool, in a snug corner where

  • the Ghost and Scrooge were close behind her. But she joined in the

  • forfeits, and loved her love to admiration with all the letters of the

  • alphabet. Likewise at the game of How, When, and Where, she was very

  • great, and, to the secret joy of Scrooge's nephew, beat her sisters

  • hollow: though they were sharp girls too, as Topper could have told you.

  • There might have been twenty people there, young and old, but they all

  • played, and so did Scrooge; for, wholly forgetting, in the interest he

  • had in what was going on, that his voice made no sound in their ears, he

  • sometimes came out with his guess quite loud, and very often guessed

  • right, too, for the sharpest needle, best Whitechapel, warranted not to

  • cut in the eye, was not sharper than Scrooge; blunt as he took it in his

  • head to be.

  • The Ghost was greatly pleased to find him in this mood, and looked upon

  • him with such favour, that he begged like a boy to be allowed to stay

  • until the guests departed. But this the Spirit said could not be done.

  • "Here is a new game," said Scrooge. "One half-hour, Spirit, only one!"

  • It was a game called Yes and No, where Scrooge's nephew had to think of

  • something, and the rest must find out what; he only answering to their

  • questions yes or no, as the case was. The brisk fire of questioning to

  • which he was exposed elicited from him that he was thinking of an

  • animal, a live animal, rather a disagreeable animal, a savage animal, an

  • animal that growled and grunted sometimes, and talked sometimes, and

  • lived in London, and walked about the streets, and wasn't made a show

  • of, and wasn't led by anybody, and didn't live in a menagerie, and was

  • never killed in a market, and was not a horse, or an ass, or a cow, or a

  • bull, or a tiger, or a dog, or a pig, or a cat, or a bear. At every

  • fresh question that was put to him, this nephew burst into a fresh roar

  • of laughter; and was so inexpressibly tickled, that he was obliged to

  • get up off the sofa, and stamp. At last the plump sister, falling into a

  • similar state, cried out:

  • "I have found it out! I know what it is, Fred! I know what it is!"

  • "What is it?" cried Fred.

  • "It's your uncle Scro-o-o-o-oge!"

  • Which it certainly was. Admiration was the universal sentiment, though

  • some objected that the reply to "Is it a bear?" ought to have been

  • "Yes": inasmuch as an answer in the negative was sufficient to have

  • diverted their thoughts from Mr. Scrooge, supposing they had ever had

  • any tendency that way.

  • "He has given us plenty of merriment, I am sure," said Fred, "and it

  • would be ungrateful not to drink his health. Here is a glass of mulled

  • wine ready to our hand at the moment; and I say, 'Uncle Scrooge!'"

  • "Well! Uncle Scrooge!" they cried.

  • "A merry Christmas and a happy New Year to the old man, whatever he is!"

  • said Scrooge's nephew. "He wouldn't take it from me, but may he have it

  • nevertheless. Uncle Scrooge!"

  • Uncle Scrooge had imperceptibly become so gay and light of heart, that

  • he would have pledged the unconscious company in return, and thanked

  • them in an inaudible speech, if the Ghost had given him time. But the

  • whole scene passed off in the breath of the last word spoken by his

  • nephew; and he and the Spirit were again upon their travels.

  • Much they saw, and far they went, and many homes they visited, but

  • always with a happy end. The Spirit stood beside sick-beds, and they

  • were cheerful; on foreign lands, and they were close at home; by

  • struggling men, and they were patient in their greater hope; by poverty,

  • and it was rich. In almshouse, hospital, and gaol, in misery's every

  • refuge, where vain man in his little brief authority had not made fast

  • the door, and barred the Spirit out, he left his blessing, and taught

  • Scrooge his precepts.

  • It was a long night, if it were only a night; but Scrooge had his doubts

  • of this, because the Christmas holidays appeared to be condensed into

  • the space of time they passed together. It was strange, too, that, while

  • Scrooge remained unaltered in his outward form, the Ghost grew older,

  • clearly older. Scrooge had observed this change, but never spoke of it,

  • until they left a children's Twelfth-Night party, when, looking at the

  • Spirit as they stood together in an open place, he noticed that its hair

  • was grey.

  • "Are spirits' lives so short?" asked Scrooge.

  • "My life upon this globe is very brief," replied the Ghost. "It ends

  • to-night."

  • "To-night!" cried Scrooge.

  • "To-night at midnight. Hark! The time is drawing near."

  • The chimes were ringing the three-quarters past eleven at that moment.

  • "Forgive me if I am not justified in what I ask," said Scrooge, looking

  • intently at the Spirit's robe, "but I see something strange, and not

  • belonging to yourself, protruding from your skirts. Is it a foot or a

  • claw?"

  • "It might be a claw, for the flesh there is upon it," was the Spirit's

  • sorrowful reply. "Look here."

  • From the foldings of its robe it brought two children; wretched, abject,

  • frightful, hideous, miserable. They knelt down at its feet, and clung

  • upon the outside of its garment.

  • "Oh, Man! look here! Look, look, down here!" exclaimed the Ghost.

  • They were a boy and girl. Yellow, meagre, ragged, scowling, wolfish; but

  • prostrate, too, in their humility. Where graceful youth should have

  • filled their features out, and touched them with its freshest tints, a

  • stale and shrivelled hand, like that of age, had pinched, and twisted

  • them, and pulled them into shreds. Where angels might have sat

  • enthroned, devils lurked, and glared out menacing. No change, no

  • degradation, no perversion of humanity, in any grade, through all the

  • mysteries of wonderful creation, has monsters half so horrible and

  • dread.

  • Scrooge started back, appalled. Having them shown to him in this way, he

  • tried to say they were fine children, but the words choked themselves,

  • rather than be parties to a lie of such enormous magnitude.

  • "Spirit! are they yours?" Scrooge could say no more.

  • "They are Man's," said the Spirit, looking down upon them. "And they

  • cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This

  • girl is Want. Beware of them both, and all of their degree, but most of

  • all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom,

  • unless the writing be erased. Deny it!" cried the Spirit, stretching out

  • its hand towards the city. "Slander those who tell it ye! Admit it for

  • your factious purposes, and make it worse! And bide the end!"

  • "Have they no refuge or resource?" cried Scrooge.

  • "Are there no prisons?" said the Spirit, turning on him for the last

  • time with his own words. "Are there no workhouses?"

  • The bell struck Twelve.

  • Scrooge looked about him for the Ghost, and saw it not. As the last

  • stroke ceased to vibrate, he remembered the prediction of old Jacob

  • Marley, and, lifting up his eyes, beheld a solemn Phantom, draped and

  • hooded, coming like a mist along the ground towards him.

  • STAVE FOUR

  • THE LAST OF THE SPIRITS

  • The Phantom slowly, gravely, silently approached. When it came near him,

  • Scrooge bent down upon his knee; for in the very air through which this

  • Spirit moved it seemed to scatter gloom and mystery.

  • It was shrouded in a deep black garment, which concealed its head, its

  • face, its form, and left nothing of it visible, save one outstretched

  • hand. But for this, it would have been difficult to detach its figure

  • from the night, and separate it from the darkness by which it was

  • surrounded.

  • He felt that it was tall and stately when it came beside him, and that

  • its mysterious presence filled him with a solemn dread. He knew no more,

  • for the Spirit neither spoke nor moved.

  • "I am in the presence of the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come?" said

  • Scrooge.

  • The Spirit answered not, but pointed onward with its hand.

  • "You are about to show me shadows of the things that have not happened,

  • but will happen in the time before us," Scrooge pursued. "Is that so,

  • Spirit?"

  • The upper portion of the garment was contracted for an instant in its

  • folds, as if the Spirit had inclined its head. That was the only answer

  • he received.

  • Although well used to ghostly company by this time, Scrooge feared the

  • silent shape so much that his legs trembled beneath him, and he found

  • that he could hardly stand when he prepared to follow it. The Spirit

  • paused a moment, as observing his condition, and giving him time to

  • recover.

  • But Scrooge was all the worse for this. It thrilled him with a vague

  • uncertain horror to know that, behind the dusky shroud, there were

  • ghostly eyes intently fixed upon him, while he, though he stretched his

  • own to the utmost, could see nothing but a spectral hand and one great

  • heap of black.

  • "Ghost of the Future!" he exclaimed, "I fear you more than any spectre I

  • have seen. But, as I know your purpose is to do me good, and as I hope

  • to live to be another man from what I was, I am prepared to bear you

  • company, and do it with a thankful heart. Will you not speak to me?"

  • It gave him no reply. The hand was pointed straight before them.

  • "Lead on!" said Scrooge. "Lead on! The night is waning fast, and it is

  • precious time to me, I know. Lead on, Spirit!"

  • The phantom moved away as it had come towards him. Scrooge followed in

  • the shadow of its dress, which bore him up, he thought, and carried him

  • along.

  • They scarcely seemed to enter the City; for the City rather seemed to

  • spring up about them, and encompass them of its own act. But there they

  • were in the heart of it; on 'Change, amongst the merchants; who hurried

  • up and down, and chinked the money in their pockets, and conversed in

  • groups, and looked at their watches, and trifled thoughtfully with their

  • great gold seals; and so forth, as Scrooge had seen them often.

  • The Spirit stopped beside one little knot of business men. Observing

  • that the hand was pointed to them, Scrooge advanced to listen to their

  • talk.

  • "No," said a great fat man with a monstrous chin, "I don't know much

  • about it either way. I only know he's dead."

  • "When did he die?" inquired another.

  • "Last night, I believe."

  • "Why, what was the matter with him?" asked a third, taking a vast

  • quantity of snuff out of a very large snuff-box. "I thought he'd never

  • die."

  • "God knows," said the first with a yawn.

  • "What has he done with his money?" asked a red-faced gentleman with a

  • pendulous excrescence on the end of his nose, that shook like the gills

  • of a turkey-cock.

  • "I haven't heard," said the man with the large chin, yawning again.

  • "Left it to his company, perhaps. He hasn't left it to _me_. That's all

  • I know."

  • This pleasantry was received with a general laugh.

  • "It's likely to be a very cheap funeral," said the same speaker; "for,

  • upon my life, I don't know of anybody to go to it. Suppose we make up a

  • party, and volunteer?"

  • "I don't mind going if a lunch is provided," observed the gentleman with

  • the excrescence on his nose. "But I must be fed if I make one."

  • Another laugh.

  • "Well, I am the most disinterested among you, after all," said the first

  • speaker, "for I never wear black gloves, and I never eat lunch. But I'll

  • offer to go if anybody else will. When I come to think of it, I'm not at

  • all sure that I wasn't his most particular friend; for we used to stop

  • and speak whenever we met. Bye, bye!"

  • Speakers and listeners strolled away, and mixed with other groups.

  • Scrooge knew the men, and looked towards the Spirit for an explanation.

  • The Phantom glided on into a street. Its finger pointed to two persons

  • meeting. Scrooge listened again, thinking that the explanation might lie

  • here.

  • He knew these men, also, perfectly. They were men of business: very

  • wealthy, and of great importance. He had made a point always of standing

  • well in their esteem: in a business point of view, that is; strictly in

  • a business point of view.

  • "How are you?" said one.

  • "How are you?" returned the other.

  • "Well!" said the first. "Old Scratch has got his own at last, hey?"

  • "So I am told," returned the second. "Cold, isn't it?"

  • "Seasonable for Christmas-time. You are not a skater, I suppose?"

  • "No. No. Something else to think of. Good morning!"

  • Not another word. That was their meeting, their conversation, and their

  • parting.

  • Scrooge was at first inclined to be surprised that the Spirit should

  • attach importance to conversations apparently so trivial; but, feeling

  • assured that they must have some hidden purpose, he set himself to

  • consider what it was likely to be. They could scarcely be supposed to

  • have any bearing on the death of Jacob, his old partner, for that was

  • Past, and this Ghost's province was the Future. Nor could he think of

  • any one immediately connected with himself, to whom he could apply them.

  • But nothing doubting that, to whomsoever they applied, they had some

  • latent moral for his own improvement, he resolved to treasure up every

  • word he heard, and everything he saw; and especially to observe the

  • shadow of himself when it appeared. For he had an expectation that the

  • conduct of his future self would give him the clue he missed, and would

  • render the solution of these riddles easy.

  • He looked about in that very place for his own image, but another man

  • stood in his accustomed corner, and, though the clock pointed to his

  • usual time of day for being there, he saw no likeness of himself among

  • the multitudes that poured in through the Porch. It gave him little

  • surprise, however; for he had been revolving in his mind a change of

  • life, and thought and hoped he saw his new-born resolutions carried out

  • in this.

  • Quiet and dark, beside him stood the Phantom, with its outstretched

  • hand. When he roused himself from his thoughtful quest, he fancied, from

  • the turn of the hand, and its situation in reference to himself, that

  • the Unseen Eyes were looking at him keenly. It made him shudder, and

  • feel very cold.

  • They left the busy scene, and went into an obscure part of the town,

  • where Scrooge had never penetrated before, although he recognised its

  • situation and its bad repute. The ways were foul and narrow; the shops

  • and houses wretched; the people half naked, drunken, slipshod, ugly.

  • Alleys and archways, like so many cesspools, disgorged their offences of

  • smell, and dirt, and life upon the straggling streets; and the whole

  • quarter reeked with crime, with filth and misery.

  • Far in this den of infamous resort, there was a low-browed, beetling

  • shop, below a pent-house roof, where iron, old rags, bottles, bones, and

  • greasy offal were bought. Upon the floor within were piled up heaps of

  • rusty keys, nails, chains, hinges, files, scales, weights, and refuse

  • iron of all kinds. Secrets that few would like to scrutinise were bred

  • and hidden in mountains of unseemly rags, masses of corrupted fat, and

  • sepulchres of bones. Sitting in among the wares he dealt in, by a

  • charcoal stove made of old bricks, was a grey-haired rascal, nearly

  • seventy years of age, who had screened himself from the cold air without

  • by a frouzy curtaining of miscellaneous tatters hung upon a line, and

  • smoked his pipe in all the luxury of calm retirement.

  • Scrooge and the Phantom came into the presence of this man, just as a

  • woman with a heavy bundle slunk into the shop. But she had scarcely

  • entered, when another woman, similarly laden, came in too, and she was

  • closely followed by a man in faded black, who was no less startled by

  • the sight of them than they had been upon the recognition of each other.

  • After a short period of blank astonishment, in which the old man with

  • the pipe had joined them, they all three burst into a laugh.

  • "Let the charwoman alone to be the first!" cried she who had entered

  • first. "Let the laundress alone to be the second; and let the

  • undertaker's man alone to be the third. Look here, old Joe, here's a

  • chance! If we haven't all three met here without meaning it!"

  • "You couldn't have met in a better place," said old Joe, removing his

  • pipe from his mouth. "Come into the parlour. You were made free of it

  • long ago, you know; and the other two an't strangers. Stop till I shut

  • the door of the shop. Ah! How it skreeks! There an't such a rusty bit of

  • metal in the place as its own hinges, I believe; and I'm sure there's no

  • such old bones here as mine. Ha! ha! We're all suitable to our calling,

  • we're well matched. Come into the parlour. Come into the parlour."

  • The parlour was the space behind the screen of rags. The old man raked

  • the fire together with an old stair-rod, and, having trimmed his smoky

  • lamp (for it was night) with the stem of his pipe, put it into his mouth

  • again.

  • While he did this, the woman who had already spoken threw her bundle on

  • the floor, and sat down in a flaunting manner on a stool; crossing her

  • elbows on her knees, and looking with a bold defiance at the other two.

  • "What odds, then? What odds, Mrs. Dilber?" said the woman. "Every person

  • has a right to take care of themselves. _He_ always did!"

  • "That's true, indeed!" said the laundress. "No man more so."

  • "Why, then, don't stand staring as if you was afraid, woman! Who's the

  • wiser? We're not going to pick holes in each other's coats, I suppose?"

  • "No, indeed!" said Mrs. Dilber and the man together. "We should hope

  • not."

  • "Very well, then!" cried the woman. "That's enough. Who's the worse for

  • the loss of a few things like these? Not a dead man, I suppose?"

  • "No, indeed," said Mrs. Dilber, laughing.

  • "If he wanted to keep 'em after he was dead, a wicked old screw,"

  • pursued the woman, "why wasn't he natural in his lifetime? If he had

  • been, he'd have had somebody to look after him when he was struck with

  • Death, instead of lying gasping out his last there, alone by himself."

  • "It's the truest word that ever was spoke," said Mrs. Dilber, "It's a

  • judgment on him."

  • "I wish it was a little heavier judgment," replied the woman; "and it

  • should have been, you may depend upon it, if I could have laid my hands

  • on anything else. Open that bundle, old Joe, and let me know the value

  • of it. Speak out plain. I'm not afraid to be the first, nor afraid for

  • them to see it. We knew pretty well that we were helping ourselves

  • before we met here, I believe. It's no sin. Open the bundle, Joe."

  • But the gallantry of her friends would not allow of this; and the man in

  • faded black, mounting the breach first, produced _his_ plunder. It was

  • not extensive. A seal or two, a pencil-case, a pair of sleeve-buttons,

  • and a brooch of no great value, were all. They were severally examined

  • and appraised by old Joe, who chalked the sums he was disposed to give

  • for each upon the wall, and added them up into a total when he found

  • that there was nothing more to come.

  • "That's your account," said Joe, "and I wouldn't give another sixpence,

  • if I was to be boiled for not doing it. Who's next?"

  • Mrs. Dilber was next. Sheets and towels, a little wearing apparel, two

  • old-fashioned silver tea-spoons, a pair of sugar-tongs, and a few boots.

  • Her account was stated on the wall in the same manner.

  • "I always give too much to ladies. It's a weakness of mine, and that's

  • the way I ruin myself," said old Joe. "That's your account. If you asked

  • me for another penny, and made it an open question, I'd repent of being

  • so liberal, and knock off half-a-crown."

  • "And now undo _my_ bundle, Joe," said the first woman.

  • Joe went down on his knees for the greater convenience of opening it,

  • and, having unfastened a great many knots, dragged out a large heavy

  • roll of some dark stuff.

  • "What do you call this?" said Joe. "Bed-curtains?"

  • "Ah!" returned the woman, laughing and leaning forward on her crossed

  • arms. "Bed-curtains!"

  • "You don't mean to say you took 'em down, rings and all, with him lying

  • there?" said Joe.

  • "Yes, I do," replied the woman. "Why not?"

  • "You were born to make your fortune," said Joe, "and you'll certainly do

  • it."

  • "I certainly shan't hold my hand, when I can get anything in it by

  • reaching it out, for the sake of such a man as He was, I promise you,

  • Joe," returned the woman coolly. "Don't drop that oil upon the blankets,

  • now."

  • "His blankets?" asked Joe.

  • "Whose else's do you think?" replied the woman. "He isn't likely to take

  • cold without 'em, I dare say."

  • "I hope he didn't die of anything catching? Eh?" said old Joe, stopping

  • in his work, and looking up.

  • "Don't you be afraid of that," returned the woman. "I an't so fond of

  • his company that I'd loiter about him for such things, if he did. Ah!

  • You may look through that shirt till your eyes ache; but you won't find

  • a hole in it, nor a threadbare place. It's the best he had, and a fine

  • one too. They'd have wasted it, if it hadn't been for me."

  • "What do you call wasting of it?" asked old Joe.

  • "Putting it on him to be buried in, to be sure," replied the woman with

  • a laugh. "Somebody was fool enough to do it, but I took it off again. If

  • calico an't good enough for such a purpose, it isn't good enough for

  • anything. It's quite as becoming to the body. He can't look uglier than

  • he did in that one."

  • Scrooge listened to this dialogue in horror. As they sat grouped about

  • their spoil, in the scanty light afforded by the old man's lamp, he

  • viewed them with a detestation and disgust which could hardly have been

  • greater, though they had been obscene demons, marketing the corpse

  • itself.

  • "Ha, ha!" laughed the same woman when old Joe, producing a flannel bag

  • with money in it, told out their several gains upon the ground. "This is

  • the end of it, you see! He frightened every one away from him when he

  • was alive, to profit us when he was dead! Ha, ha, ha!"

  • "Spirit!" said Scrooge, shuddering from head to foot. "I see, I see. The

  • case of this unhappy man might be my own. My life tends that way now.

  • Merciful Heaven, what is this?"

  • He recoiled in terror, for the scene had changed, and now he almost

  • touched a bed: a bare, uncurtained bed: on which, beneath a ragged

  • sheet, there lay a something covered up, which, though it was dumb,

  • announced itself in awful language.

  • The room was very dark, too dark to be observed with any accuracy,

  • though Scrooge glanced round it in obedience to a secret impulse,

  • anxious to know what kind of room it was. A pale light, rising in the

  • outer air, fell straight upon the bed: and on it, plundered and bereft,

  • unwatched, unwept, uncared for, was the body of this man.

  • Scrooge glanced towards the Phantom. Its steady hand was pointed to the

  • head. The cover was so carelessly adjusted that the slightest raising of

  • it, the motion of a finger upon Scrooge's part, would have disclosed the

  • face. He thought of it, felt how easy it would be to do, and longed to

  • do it; but had no more power to withdraw the veil than to dismiss the

  • spectre at his side.

  • Oh, cold, cold, rigid, dreadful Death, set up thine altar here, and

  • dress it with such terrors as thou hast at thy command: for this is thy

  • dominion! But of the loved, revered, and honoured head thou canst not

  • turn one hair to thy dread purposes, or make one feature odious. It is

  • not that the hand is heavy, and will fall down when released; it is not

  • that the heart and pulse are still; but that the hand WAS open,

  • generous, and true; the heart brave, warm, and tender; and the pulse a

  • man's. Strike, Shadow, strike! And see his good deeds springing from the

  • wound, to sow the world with life immortal!

  • No voice pronounced these words in Scrooge's ears, and yet he heard them

  • when he looked upon the bed. He thought, if this man could be raised up

  • now, what would be his foremost thoughts? Avarice, hard dealing, griping

  • cares? They have brought him to a rich end, truly!

  • He lay, in the dark, empty house, with not a man, a woman, or a child to

  • say he was kind to me in this or that, and for the memory of one kind

  • word I will be kind to him. A cat was tearing at the door, and there was

  • a sound of gnawing rats beneath the hearth-stone. What _they_ wanted in

  • the room of death, and why they were so restless and disturbed, Scrooge

  • did not dare to think.

  • "Spirit!" he said, "this is a fearful place. In leaving it, I shall not

  • leave its lesson, trust me. Let us go!"

  • Still the Ghost pointed with an unmoved finger to the head.

  • "I understand you," Scrooge returned, "and I would do it if I could. But

  • I have not the power, Spirit. I have not the power."

  • Again it seemed to look upon him.

  • "If there is any person in the town who feels emotion caused by this

  • man's death," said Scrooge, quite agonised, "show that person to me,

  • Spirit! I beseech you."

  • The Phantom spread its dark robe before him for a moment, like a wing;

  • and, withdrawing it, revealed a room by daylight, where a mother and her

  • children were.

  • She was expecting some one, and with anxious eagerness; for she walked

  • up and down the room; started at every sound; looked out from the

  • window; glanced at the clock; tried, but in vain, to work with her

  • needle; and could hardly bear the voices of her children in their play.

  • At length the long-expected knock was heard. She hurried to the door,

  • and met her husband; a man whose face was careworn and depressed, though

  • he was young. There was a remarkable expression in it now; a kind of

  • serious delight of which he felt ashamed, and which he struggled to

  • repress.

  • He sat down to the dinner that had been hoarding for him by the fire,

  • and, when she asked him faintly what news (which was not until after a

  • long silence), he appeared embarrassed how to answer.

  • "Is it good," she said, "or bad?" to help him.

  • "Bad," he answered.

  • "We are quite ruined?"

  • "No. There is hope yet, Caroline."

  • "If _he_ relents," she said, amazed, "there is! Nothing is past hope, if

  • such a miracle has happened."

  • "He is past relenting," said her husband. "He is dead."

  • She was a mild and patient creature, if her face spoke truth; but she

  • was thankful in her soul to hear it, and she said so with clasped hands.

  • She prayed forgiveness the next moment, and was sorry; but the first was

  • the emotion of her heart.

  • "What the half-drunken woman, whom I told you of last night, said to me

  • when I tried to see him and obtain a week's delay, and what I thought

  • was a mere excuse to avoid me, turns out to have been quite true. He was

  • not only very ill, but dying, then."

  • "To whom will our debt be transferred?"

  • "I don't know. But, before that time, we shall be ready with the money;

  • and, even though we were not, it would be bad fortune indeed to find so

  • merciless a creditor in his successor. We may sleep to-night with light

  • hearts, Caroline!"

  • Yes. Soften it as they would, their hearts were lighter. The children's

  • faces, hushed and clustered round to hear what they so little

  • understood, were brighter; and it was a happier house for this man's

  • death! The only emotion that the Ghost could show him, caused by the

  • event, was one of pleasure.

  • "Let me see some tenderness connected with a death," said Scrooge; "or

  • that dark chamber, Spirit, which we left just now, will be for ever

  • present to me."

  • The Ghost conducted him through several streets familiar to his feet;

  • and, as they went along, Scrooge looked here and there to find himself,

  • but nowhere was he to be seen. They entered poor Bob Cratchit's

  • house,--the dwelling he had visited before,--and found the mother and

  • the children seated round the fire.

  • Quiet. Very quiet. The noisy little Cratchits were as still as statues

  • in one corner, and sat looking up at Peter, who had a book before him.

  • The mother and her daughters were engaged in sewing. But surely they

  • were very quiet!

  • "'And he took a child, and set him in the midst of them.'"

  • Where had Scrooge heard those words? He had not dreamed them. The boy

  • must have read them out, as he and the Spirit crossed the threshold. Why

  • did he not go on?

  • The mother laid her work upon the table, and put her hand up to her

  • face.

  • "The colour hurts my eyes," she said.

  • The colour? Ah, poor Tiny Tim!

  • "They're better now again," said Cratchit's wife. "It makes them weak by

  • candle-light; and I wouldn't show weak eyes to your father, when he

  • comes home, for the world. It must be near his time."

  • "Past it rather," Peter answered, shutting up his book. "But I think he

  • has walked a little slower than he used, these few last evenings,

  • mother."

  • They were very quiet again. At last she said, and in a steady, cheerful

  • voice, that only faltered once:

  • "I have known him walk with--I have known him walk with Tiny Tim upon

  • his shoulder very fast indeed."

  • "And so have I," cried Peter. "Often."

  • "And so have I," exclaimed another. So had all.

  • "But he was very light to carry," she resumed, intent upon her work,

  • "and his father loved him so, that it was no trouble: no trouble. And

  • there is your father at the door!"

  • She hurried out to meet him; and little Bob in his comforter--he had

  • need of it, poor fellow--came in. His tea was ready for him on the hob,

  • and they all tried who should help him to it most. Then the two young

  • Cratchits got upon his knees, and laid, each child, a little cheek

  • against his face, as if they said, "Don't mind it, father. Don't be

  • grieved!"

  • Bob was very cheerful with them, and spoke pleasantly to all the family.

  • He looked at the work upon the table, and praised the industry and speed

  • of Mrs. Cratchit and the girls. They would be done long before Sunday,

  • he said.

  • "Sunday! You went to-day, then, Robert?" said his wife.

  • "Yes, my dear," returned Bob. "I wish you could have gone. It would have

  • done you good to see how green a place it is. But you'll see it often. I

  • promised him that I would walk there on a Sunday. My little, little

  • child!" cried Bob. "My little child!"

  • He broke down all at once. He couldn't help it. If he could have helped

  • it, he and his child would have been farther apart, perhaps, than they

  • were.

  • He left the room, and went up-stairs into the room above, which was

  • lighted cheerfully, and hung with Christmas. There was a chair set close

  • beside the child, and there were signs of some one having been there

  • lately. Poor Bob sat down in it, and, when he had thought a little and

  • composed himself, he kissed the little face. He was reconciled to what

  • had happened, and went down again quite happy.

  • They drew about the fire, and talked; the girls and mother working

  • still. Bob told them of the extraordinary kindness of Mr. Scrooge's

  • nephew, whom he had scarcely seen but once, and who, meeting him in the

  • street that day, and seeing that he looked a little--"just a little

  • down, you know," said Bob, inquired what had happened to distress him.

  • "On which," said Bob, "for he is the pleasantest-spoken gentleman you

  • ever heard, I told him. 'I am heartily sorry for it, Mr. Cratchit,' he

  • said, 'and heartily sorry for your good wife.' By-the-bye, how he ever

  • knew _that_ I don't know."

  • "Knew what, my dear?"

  • "Why, that you were a good wife," replied Bob.

  • "Everybody knows that," said Peter.

  • "Very well observed, my boy!" cried Bob. "I hope they do. 'Heartily

  • sorry,' he said, 'for your good wife. If I can be of service to you in

  • any way,' he said, giving me his card, 'that's where I live. Pray come

  • to me.' Now, it wasn't," cried Bob, "for the sake of anything he might

  • be able to do for us, so much as for his kind way, that this was quite

  • delightful. It really seemed as if he had known our Tiny Tim, and felt

  • with us."

  • "I'm sure he's a good soul!" said Mrs. Cratchit.

  • "You would be sure of it, my dear," returned Bob, "if you saw and spoke

  • to him. I shouldn't be at all surprised--mark what I say!--if he got

  • Peter a better situation."

  • "Only hear that, Peter," said Mrs. Cratchit.

  • "And then," cried one of the girls, "Peter will be keeping company with

  • some one, and setting up for himself."

  • "Get along with you!" retorted Peter, grinning.

  • "It's just as likely as not," said Bob, "one of these days; though

  • there's plenty of time for that, my dear. But, however and whenever we

  • part from one another, I am sure we shall none of us forget poor Tiny

  • Tim--shall we--or this first parting that there was among us?"

  • "Never, father!" cried they all.

  • "And I know," said Bob, "I know, my dears, that when we recollect how

  • patient and how mild he was, although he was a little, little child, we

  • shall not quarrel easily among ourselves, and forget poor Tiny Tim in

  • doing it."

  • "No, never, father!" they all cried again.

  • "I am very happy," said little Bob, "I am very happy!"

  • Mrs. Cratchit kissed him, his daughters kissed him, the two young

  • Cratchits kissed him, and Peter and himself shook hands. Spirit of Tiny

  • Tim, thy childish essence was from God!

  • "Spectre," said Scrooge, "something informs me that our parting moment

  • is at hand. I know it, but I know not how. Tell me what man that was

  • whom we saw lying dead?"

  • The Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come conveyed him, as before--though at a

  • different time, he thought: indeed, there seemed no order in these

  • latter visions, save that they were in the Future--into the resorts of

  • business men, but showed him not himself. Indeed, the Spirit did not

  • stay for anything, but went straight on, as to the end just now desired,

  • until besought by Scrooge to tarry for a moment.

  • "This court," said Scrooge, "through which we hurry now, is where my

  • place of occupation is, and has been for a length of time. I see the

  • house. Let me behold what I shall be in days to come."

  • The Spirit stopped; the hand was pointed elsewhere.

  • "The house is yonder," Scrooge exclaimed. "Why do you point away?"

  • The inexorable finger underwent no change.

  • Scrooge hastened to the window of his office, and looked in. It was an

  • office still, but not his. The furniture was not the same, and the

  • figure in the chair was not himself. The Phantom pointed as before.

  • He joined it once again, and, wondering why and whither he had gone,

  • accompanied it until they reached an iron gate. He paused to look round

  • before entering.

  • A churchyard. Here, then, the wretched man, whose name he had now to

  • learn, lay underneath the ground. It was a worthy place. Walled in by

  • houses; overrun by grass and weeds, the growth of vegetation's death,

  • not life; choked up with too much burying; fat with repleted appetite. A

  • worthy place!

  • The Spirit stood among the graves, and pointed down to One. He advanced

  • towards it trembling. The Phantom was exactly as it had been, but he

  • dreaded that he saw new meaning in its solemn shape.

  • "Before I draw nearer to that stone to which you point," said Scrooge,

  • "answer me one question. Are these the shadows of the things that Will

  • be, or are they shadows of the things that May be only?"

  • Still the Ghost pointed downward to the grave by which it stood.

  • "Men's courses will foreshadow certain ends, to which, if persevered in,

  • they must lead," said Scrooge. "But if the courses be departed from, the

  • ends will change. Say it is thus with what you show me!"

  • The Spirit was immovable as ever.

  • Scrooge crept towards it, trembling as he went; and, following the

  • finger, read upon the stone of the neglected grave his own name,

  • EBENEZER SCROOGE.

  • "Am _I_ that man who lay upon the bed?" he cried upon his knees.

  • The finger pointed from the grave to him, and back again.

  • "No, Spirit! Oh no, no!"

  • The finger still was there.

  • "Spirit!" he cried, tight clutching at its robe, "hear me! I am not the

  • man I was. I will not be the man I must have been but for this

  • intercourse. Why show me this, if I am past all hope?"

  • For the first time the hand appeared to shake.

  • "Good Spirit," he pursued, as down upon the ground he fell before it:

  • "your nature intercedes for me, and pities me. Assure me that I yet may

  • change these shadows you have shown me by an altered life?"

  • The kind hand trembled.

  • "I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I

  • will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all

  • Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they

  • teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone!"

  • In his agony, he caught the spectral hand. It sought to free itself, but

  • he was strong in his entreaty, and detained it. The Spirit, stronger

  • yet, repulsed him.

  • Holding up his hands in a last prayer to have his fate reversed, he saw

  • an alteration in the Phantom's hood and dress. It shrunk, collapsed, and

  • dwindled down into a bedpost.

  • STAVE FIVE

  • THE END OF IT

  • Yes! and the bedpost was his own. The bed was his own, the room was his

  • own. Best and happiest of all, the Time before him was his own, to make

  • amends in!

  • "I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future!" Scrooge repeated

  • as he scrambled out of bed. "The Spirits of all Three shall strive

  • within me. Oh, Jacob Marley! Heaven and the Christmas Time be praised

  • for this! I say it on my knees, old Jacob; on my knees!"

  • He was so fluttered and so glowing with his good intentions, that his

  • broken voice would scarcely answer to his call. He had been sobbing

  • violently in his conflict with the Spirit, and his face was wet with

  • tears.

  • "They are not torn down," cried Scrooge, folding one of his bed-curtains

  • in his arms, "they are not torn down, rings and all. They are here--I am

  • here--the shadows of the things that would have been may be dispelled.

  • They will be. I know they will!"

  • His hands were busy with his garments all this time; turning them inside

  • out, putting them on upside down, tearing them, mislaying them, making

  • them parties to every kind of extravagance.

  • "I don't know what to do!" cried Scrooge, laughing and crying in the

  • same breath; and making a perfect Laocoön of himself with his stockings.

  • "I am as light as a feather, I am as happy as an angel, I am as merry as

  • a school-boy. I am as giddy as a drunken man. A merry Christmas to

  • everybody! A happy New Year to all the world! Hallo here! Whoop!

  • Hallo!"

  • He had frisked into the sitting-room, and was now standing there:

  • perfectly winded.

  • "There's the saucepan that the gruel was in!" cried Scrooge, starting

  • off again, and going round the fire-place. "There's the door by which

  • the Ghost of Jacob Marley entered! There's the corner where the Ghost of

  • Christmas Present sat! There's the window where I saw the wandering

  • Spirits! It's all right, it's all true, it all happened. Ha, ha, ha!"

  • Really, for a man who had been out of practice for so many years, it was

  • a splendid laugh, a most illustrious laugh. The father of a long, long

  • line of brilliant laughs!

  • "I don't know what day of the month it is," said Scrooge. "I don't know

  • how long I have been among the Spirits. I don't know anything. I'm quite

  • a baby. Never mind. I don't care. I'd rather be a baby. Hallo! Whoop!

  • Hallo here!"

  • He was checked in his transports by the churches ringing out the

  • lustiest peals he had ever heard. Clash, clash, hammer; ding, dong,

  • bell! Bell, dong, ding; hammer, clang, clash! Oh, glorious, glorious!

  • Running to the window, he opened it, and put out his head. No fog, no

  • mist; clear, bright, jovial, stirring, cold; cold, piping for the blood

  • to dance to; Golden sun-light; Heavenly sky; sweet fresh air; merry

  • bells. Oh, glorious! Glorious!

  • "What's to-day?" cried Scrooge, calling downward to a boy in Sunday

  • clothes, who perhaps had loitered in to look about him.

  • "EH?" returned the boy with all his might of wonder.

  • "What's to-day, my fine fellow?" said Scrooge.

  • "To-day!" replied the boy. "Why, CHRISTMAS DAY."

  • "It's Christmas Day!" said Scrooge to himself. "I haven't missed it. The

  • Spirits have done it all in one night. They can do anything they like.

  • Of course they can. Of course they can. Hallo, my fine fellow!"

  • "Hallo!" returned the boy.

  • "Do you know the Poulterer's in the next street but one, at the corner?"

  • Scrooge inquired.

  • "I should hope I did," replied the lad.

  • "An intelligent boy!" said Scrooge. "A remarkable boy! Do you know

  • whether they've sold the prize Turkey that was hanging up there?--Not

  • the little prize Turkey: the big one?"

  • "What! the one as big as me?" returned the boy.

  • "What a delightful boy!" said Scrooge. "It's a pleasure to talk to him.

  • Yes, my buck!"

  • "It's hanging there now," replied the boy.

  • "Is it?" said Scrooge. "Go and buy it."

  • "Walk-ER!" exclaimed the boy.

  • "No, no," said Scrooge, "I am in earnest. Go and buy it, and tell 'em to

  • bring it here, that I may give them the directions where to take it.

  • Come back with the man, and I'll give you a shilling. Come back with him

  • in less than five minutes, and I'll give you half-a-crown!"

  • The boy was off like a shot. He must have had a steady hand at a trigger

  • who could have got a shot off half so fast.

  • "I'll send it to Bob Cratchit's," whispered Scrooge, rubbing his hands,

  • and splitting with a laugh. "He shan't know who sends it. It's twice the

  • size of Tiny Tim. Joe Miller never made such a joke as sending it to

  • Bob's will be!"

  • The hand in which he wrote the address was not a steady one; but write

  • it he did, somehow, and went down-stairs to open the street-door, ready

  • for the coming of the poulterer's man. As he stood there, waiting his

  • arrival, the knocker caught his eye.

  • "I shall love it as long as I live!" cried Scrooge, patting it with his

  • hand. "I scarcely ever looked at it before. What an honest expression it

  • has in its face! It's a wonderful knocker!--Here's the Turkey. Hallo!

  • Whoop! How are you? Merry Christmas!"

  • It _was_ a Turkey! He never could have stood upon his legs, that bird.

  • He would have snapped 'em short off in a minute, like sticks of

  • sealing-wax.

  • "Why, it's impossible to carry that to Camden Town," said Scrooge. "You

  • must have a cab."

  • The chuckle with which he said this, and the chuckle with which he paid

  • for the Turkey, and the chuckle with which he paid for the cab, and the

  • chuckle with which he recompensed the boy, were only to be exceeded by

  • the chuckle with which he sat down breathless in his chair again, and

  • chuckled till he cried.

  • Shaving was not an easy task, for his hand continued to shake very much;

  • and shaving requires attention, even when you don't dance while you are

  • at it. But, if he had cut the end of his nose off, he would have put a

  • piece of sticking-plaster over it, and been quite satisfied.

  • He dressed himself "all in his best," and at last got out into the

  • streets. The people were by this time pouring forth, as he had seen them

  • with the Ghost of Christmas Present; and, walking with his hands behind

  • him, Scrooge regarded every one with a delighted smile. He looked so

  • irresistibly pleasant, in a word, that three or four good-humoured

  • fellows said, "Good morning, sir! A merry Christmas to you!" And Scrooge

  • said often afterwards that, of all the blithe sounds he had ever heard,

  • those were the blithest in his ears.

  • He had not gone far when, coming on towards him, he beheld the portly

  • gentleman who had walked into his counting-house the day before, and

  • said, "Scrooge and Marley's, I believe?" It sent a pang across his heart

  • to think how this old gentleman would look upon him when they met; but

  • he knew what path lay straight before him, and he took it.

  • "My dear sir," said Scrooge, quickening his pace, and taking the old

  • gentleman by both his hands, "how do you do? I hope you succeeded

  • yesterday. It was very kind of you. A merry Christmas to you, sir!"

  • "Mr. Scrooge?"

  • "Yes," said Scrooge. "That is my name, and I fear it may not be pleasant

  • to you. Allow me to ask your pardon. And will you have the goodness----"

  • Here Scrooge whispered in his ear.

  • "Lord bless me!" cried the gentleman, as if his breath were taken away.

  • "My dear Mr. Scrooge, are you serious?"

  • "If you please," said Scrooge. "Not a farthing less. A great many

  • back-payments are included in it, I assure you. Will you do me that

  • favour?"

  • "My dear sir," said the other, shaking hands with him, "I don't know

  • what to say to such munifi----"

  • "Don't say anything, please," retorted Scrooge. "Come and see me. Will

  • you come and see me?"

  • "I will!" cried the old gentleman. And it was clear he meant to do it.

  • "Thankee," said Scrooge. "I am much obliged to you. I thank you fifty

  • times. Bless you!"

  • He went to church, and walked about the streets, and watched the people

  • hurrying to and fro, and patted the children on the head, and questioned

  • beggars, and looked down into the kitchens of houses, and up to the

  • windows; and found that everything could yield him pleasure. He had

  • never dreamed that any walk--that anything--could give him so much

  • happiness. In the afternoon he turned his steps towards his nephew's

  • house.

  • He passed the door a dozen times before he had the courage to go up and

  • knock. But he made a dash, and did it.

  • "Is your master at home, my dear?" said Scrooge to the girl. Nice girl!

  • Very.

  • "Yes sir."

  • "Where is he, my love?" said Scrooge.

  • "He's in the dining-room, sir, along with mistress. I'll show you

  • up-stairs, if you please."

  • "Thankee. He knows me," said Scrooge, with his hand already on the

  • dining-room lock. "I'll go in here, my dear."

  • He turned it gently, and sidled his face in round the door. They were

  • looking at the table (which was spread out in great array); for these

  • young housekeepers are always nervous on such points, and like to see

  • that everything is right.

  • "Fred!" said Scrooge.

  • Dear heart alive, how his niece by marriage started! Scrooge had

  • forgotten, for the moment, about her sitting in the corner with the

  • footstool, or he wouldn't have done it on any account.

  • "Why, bless my soul!" cried Fred, "who's that?"

  • "It's I. Your uncle Scrooge. I have come to dinner. Will you let me in,

  • Fred?"

  • Let him in! It is a mercy he didn't shake his arm off. He was at home in

  • five minutes. Nothing could be heartier. His niece looked just the same.

  • So did Topper when _he_ came. So did the plump sister when _she_ came.

  • So did every one when _they_ came. Wonderful party, wonderful games,

  • wonderful unanimity, won-der-ful happiness!

  • But he was early at the office next morning. Oh, he was early there! If

  • he could only be there first, and catch Bob Cratchit coming late! That

  • was the thing he had set his heart upon.

  • And he did it; yes, he did! The clock struck nine. No Bob. A quarter

  • past. No Bob. He was full eighteen minutes and a half behind his time.

  • Scrooge sat with his door wide open, that he might see him come into the

  • tank.

  • His hat was off before he opened the door; his comforter too. He was on

  • his stool in a jiffy; driving away with his pen, as if he were trying to

  • overtake nine o'clock.

  • "Hallo!" growled Scrooge in his accustomed voice as near as he could

  • feign it. "What do you mean by coming here at this time of day?"

  • "I am very sorry, sir," said Bob. "I _am_ behind my time."

  • "You are!" repeated Scrooge. "Yes. I think you are. Step this way, sir,

  • if you please."

  • "It's only once a year, sir," pleaded Bob, appearing from the tank. "It

  • shall not be repeated. I was making rather merry yesterday, sir."

  • "Now, I'll tell you what, my friend," said Scrooge. "I am not going to

  • stand this sort of thing any longer. And therefore," he continued,

  • leaping from his stool, and giving Bob such a dig in the waistcoat that

  • he staggered back into the tank again: "and therefore I am about to

  • raise your salary!"

  • Bob trembled, and got a little nearer to the ruler. He had a momentary

  • idea of knocking Scrooge down with it, holding him, and calling to the

  • people in the court for help and a strait-waistcoat.

  • "A merry Christmas, Bob!" said Scrooge with an earnestness that could

  • not be mistaken, as he clapped him on the back. "A merrier Christmas,

  • Bob, my good fellow, than I have given you for many a year! I'll raise

  • your salary, and endeavour to assist your struggling family, and we will

  • discuss your affairs this very afternoon, over a Christmas bowl of

  • smoking bishop, Bob! Make up the fires and buy another coal-scuttle

  • before you dot another i, Bob Cratchit!"

  • * * * * *

  • Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more;

  • and to Tiny Tim, who did NOT die, he was a second father. He became as

  • good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man as the good old City

  • knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough in the good old

  • world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them

  • laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that

  • nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did

  • not have their fill of laughter in the outset; and, knowing that such as

  • these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they

  • should wrinkle up their eyes in grins as have the malady in less

  • attractive forms. His own heart laughed: and that was quite enough for

  • him.

  • He had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived upon the

  • Total-Abstinence Principle ever afterwards; and it was always said of

  • him that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed

  • the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as

  • Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!

  • Read by Greg Wagland

  • A Magpie Audio Production

A Magpie Audio Production

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A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens Audiobook with subtitles and a warm fire. Read by Greg Wagland.（A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens Audiobook with subtitles and a warm fire. Read by Greg Wagland.）

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    林宜悉 に公開 2023 年 07 月 27 日
動画の中の単語