author | hgs |
Sat, 30 Oct 2010 16:29:23 +0530 | |
changeset 108 | ca9a0fc2f082 |
parent 85 | 1efb81185f1c |
permissions | -rw-r--r-- |
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A CHRISTMAS CAROL |
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A Ghost Story of Christmas |
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by Charles Dickens |
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STAVE I: MARLEY'S GHOST |
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MARLEY was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt |
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whatever about that. The register of his burial was |
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signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, |
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and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it: and |
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Scrooge's name was good upon 'Change, for anything he |
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chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a |
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door-nail. |
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Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my |
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own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about |
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a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to |
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regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery |
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in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors |
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is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands |
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shall not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You |
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will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that |
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Marley was as dead as a door-nail. |
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Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he did. |
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How could it be otherwise? Scrooge and he were |
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partners for I don't know how many years. Scrooge |
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was his sole executor, his sole administrator, his sole |
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assign, his sole residuary legatee, his sole friend, and |
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sole mourner. And even Scrooge was not so dreadfully |
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cut up by the sad event, but that he was an excellent |
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man of business on the very day of the funeral, |
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and solemnised it with an undoubted bargain. |
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The mention of Marley's funeral brings me back to |
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the point I started from. There is no doubt that Marley |
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was dead. This must be distinctly understood, or |
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nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going |
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to relate. If we were not perfectly convinced that |
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Hamlet's Father died before the play began, there |
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would be nothing more remarkable in his taking a |
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stroll at night, in an easterly wind, upon his own ramparts, |
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than there would be in any other middle-aged |
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gentleman rashly turning out after dark in a breezy |
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spot--say Saint Paul's Churchyard for instance-- |
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literally to astonish his son's weak mind. |
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Scrooge never painted out Old Marley's name. |
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There it stood, years afterwards, above the warehouse |
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door: Scrooge and Marley. The firm was known as |
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Scrooge and Marley. Sometimes people new to the |
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business called Scrooge Scrooge, and sometimes Marley, |
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but he answered to both names. It was all the |
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same to him. |
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Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grind-stone, |
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Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, |
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clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, |
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from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; |
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secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. The |
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cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed |
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nose, shrivelled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his |
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eyes red, his thin lips blue; and spoke out shrewdly in his |
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grating voice. A frosty rime was on his head, and on his |
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eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his own low |
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temperature always about with him; he iced his office in |
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the dog-days; and didn't thaw it one degree at Christmas. |
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External heat and cold had little influence on |
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Scrooge. No warmth could warm, no wintry weather |
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chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he, |
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no falling snow was more intent upon its purpose, no |
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pelting rain less open to entreaty. Foul weather didn't |
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know where to have him. The heaviest rain, and |
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snow, and hail, and sleet, could boast of the advantage |
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over him in only one respect. They often "came down" |
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handsomely, and Scrooge never did. |
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Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with |
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gladsome looks, "My dear Scrooge, how are you? |
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When will you come to see me?" No beggars implored |
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him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him |
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what it was o'clock, no man or woman ever once in all |
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his life inquired the way to such and such a place, of |
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Scrooge. Even the blind men's dogs appeared to |
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know him; and when they saw him coming on, would |
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tug their owners into doorways and up courts; and |
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then would wag their tails as though they said, "No |
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eye at all is better than an evil eye, dark master!" |
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But what did Scrooge care! It was the very thing |
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he liked. To edge his way along the crowded paths |
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of life, warning all human sympathy to keep its distance, |
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was what the knowing ones call "nuts" to Scrooge. |
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Once upon a time--of all the good days in the year, |
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on Christmas Eve--old Scrooge sat busy in his |
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counting-house. It was cold, bleak, biting weather: foggy |
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withal: and he could hear the people in the court outside, |
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go wheezing up and down, beating their hands |
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upon their breasts, and stamping their feet upon the |
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pavement stones to warm them. The city clocks had |
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only just gone three, but it was quite dark already-- |
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it had not been light all day--and candles were flaring |
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in the windows of the neighbouring offices, like |
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ruddy smears upon the palpable brown air. The fog |
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came pouring in at every chink and keyhole, and was |
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so dense without, that although the court was of the |
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narrowest, the houses opposite were mere phantoms. |
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To see the dingy cloud come drooping down, obscuring |
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everything, one might have thought that Nature |
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lived hard by, and was brewing on a large scale. |
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The door of Scrooge's counting-house was open |
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that he might keep his eye upon his clerk, who in a |
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dismal little cell beyond, a sort of tank, was copying |
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letters. Scrooge had a very small fire, but the clerk's |
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fire was so very much smaller that it looked like one |
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coal. But he couldn't replenish it, for Scrooge kept |
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the coal-box in his own room; and so surely as the |
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clerk came in with the shovel, the master predicted |
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that it would be necessary for them to part. Wherefore |
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the clerk put on his white comforter, and tried to |
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warm himself at the candle; in which effort, not being |
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a man of a strong imagination, he failed. |
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"A merry Christmas, uncle! God save you!" cried |
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a cheerful voice. It was the voice of Scrooge's |
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nephew, who came upon him so quickly that this was |
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the first intimation he had of his approach. |
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"Bah!" said Scrooge, "Humbug!" |
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He had so heated himself with rapid walking in the |
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fog and frost, this nephew of Scrooge's, that he was |
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all in a glow; his face was ruddy and handsome; his |
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eyes sparkled, and his breath smoked again. |
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"Christmas a humbug, uncle!" said Scrooge's |
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nephew. "You don't mean that, I am sure?" |
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"I do," said Scrooge. "Merry Christmas! What |
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right have you to be merry? What reason have you |
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to be merry? You're poor enough." |
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"Come, then," returned the nephew gaily. "What |
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right have you to be dismal? What reason have you |
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to be morose? You're rich enough." |
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Scrooge having no better answer ready on the spur |
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of the moment, said, "Bah!" again; and followed it up |
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with "Humbug." |
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"Don't be cross, uncle!" said the nephew. |
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"What else can I be," returned the uncle, "when I |
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live in such a world of fools as this? Merry Christmas! |
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Out upon merry Christmas! What's Christmas |
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time to you but a time for paying bills without |
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money; a time for finding yourself a year older, but |
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not an hour richer; a time for balancing your books |
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and having every item in 'em through a round dozen |
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of months presented dead against you? If I could |
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work my will," said Scrooge indignantly, "every idiot |
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who goes about with 'Merry Christmas' on his lips, |
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should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried |
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with a stake of holly through his heart. He should!" |
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"Uncle!" pleaded the nephew. |
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"Nephew!" returned the uncle sternly, "keep Christmas |
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in your own way, and let me keep it in mine." |
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"Keep it!" repeated Scrooge's nephew. "But you |
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don't keep it." |
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"Let me leave it alone, then," said Scrooge. "Much |
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good may it do you! Much good it has ever done |
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you!" |
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"There are many things from which I might have |
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derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare |
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say," returned the nephew. "Christmas among the |
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rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas |
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time, when it has come round--apart from the |
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veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything |
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belonging to it can be apart from that--as a |
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good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant |
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time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar |
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of the year, when men and women seem by one consent |
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to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think |
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of people below them as if they really were |
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fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race |
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of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, |
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uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or |
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silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me |
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good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!" |
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The clerk in the Tank involuntarily applauded. |
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Becoming immediately sensible of the impropriety, |
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he poked the fire, and extinguished the last frail spark |
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for ever. |
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"Let me hear another sound from you," said |
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Scrooge, "and you'll keep your Christmas by losing |
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your situation! You're quite a powerful speaker, |
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sir," he added, turning to his nephew. "I wonder you |
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don't go into Parliament." |
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"Don't be angry, uncle. Come! Dine with us to-morrow." |
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Scrooge said that he would see him--yes, indeed he |
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did. He went the whole length of the expression, |
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and said that he would see him in that extremity first. |
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"But why?" cried Scrooge's nephew. "Why?" |
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"Why did you get married?" said Scrooge. |
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"Because I fell in love." |
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"Because you fell in love!" growled Scrooge, as if |
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that were the only one thing in the world more ridiculous |
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than a merry Christmas. "Good afternoon!" |
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"Nay, uncle, but you never came to see me before |
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that happened. Why give it as a reason for not |
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coming now?" |
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"Good afternoon," said Scrooge. |
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"I want nothing from you; I ask nothing of you; |
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why cannot we be friends?" |
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"Good afternoon," said Scrooge. |
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"I am sorry, with all my heart, to find you so |
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resolute. We have never had any quarrel, to which I |
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have been a party. But I have made the trial in |
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homage to Christmas, and I'll keep my Christmas |
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humour to the last. So A Merry Christmas, uncle!" |
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"Good afternoon!" said Scrooge. |
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"And A Happy New Year!" |
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"Good afternoon!" said Scrooge. |
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His nephew left the room without an angry word, |
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notwithstanding. He stopped at the outer door to |
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bestow the greetings of the season on the clerk, who, |
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cold as he was, was warmer than Scrooge; for he returned |
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them cordially. |
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"There's another fellow," muttered Scrooge; who |
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overheard him: "my clerk, with fifteen shillings a |
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week, and a wife and family, talking about a merry |
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Christmas. I'll retire to Bedlam." |
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This lunatic, in letting Scrooge's nephew out, had |
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let two other people in. They were portly gentlemen, |
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pleasant to behold, and now stood, with their hats off, |
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in Scrooge's office. They had books and papers in |
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their hands, and bowed to him. |
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"Scrooge and Marley's, I believe," said one of the |
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gentlemen, referring to his list. "Have I the pleasure |
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of addressing Mr. Scrooge, or Mr. Marley?" |
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"Mr. Marley has been dead these seven years," |
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Scrooge replied. "He died seven years ago, this very |
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night." |
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"We have no doubt his liberality is well represented |
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by his surviving partner," said the gentleman, presenting |
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his credentials. |
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It certainly was; for they had been two kindred |
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spirits. At the ominous word "liberality," Scrooge |
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frowned, and shook his head, and handed the credentials |
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back. |
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"At this festive season of the year, Mr. Scrooge," |
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said the gentleman, taking up a pen, "it is more than |
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usually desirable that we should make some slight |
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provision for the Poor and destitute, who suffer |
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greatly at the present time. Many thousands are in |
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want of common necessaries; hundreds of thousands |
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are in want of common comforts, sir." |
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"Are there no prisons?" asked Scrooge. |
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"Plenty of prisons," said the gentleman, laying down |
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the pen again. |
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"And the Union workhouses?" demanded Scrooge. |
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"Are they still in operation?" |
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"They are. Still," returned the gentleman, "I wish |
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I could say they were not." |
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"The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, |
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then?" said Scrooge. |
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"Both very busy, sir." |
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"Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, |
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that something had occurred to stop them in their |
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useful course," said Scrooge. "I'm very glad to |
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hear it." |
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"Under the impression that they scarcely furnish |
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Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude," |
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returned the gentleman, "a few of us are endeavouring |
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to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink, |
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and means of warmth. We choose this time, because |
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it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, |
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and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down |
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for?" |
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"Nothing!" Scrooge replied. |
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"You wish to be anonymous?" |
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"I wish to be left alone," said Scrooge. "Since you |
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ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. |
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I don't make merry myself at Christmas and I can't |
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afford to make idle people merry. I help to support |
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the establishments I have mentioned--they cost |
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enough; and those who are badly off must go there." |
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"Many can't go there; and many would rather die." |
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"If they would rather die," said Scrooge, "they had |
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better do it, and decrease the surplus population. |
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Besides--excuse me--I don't know that." |
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"But you might know it," observed the gentleman. |
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"It's not my business," Scrooge returned. "It's |
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enough for a man to understand his own business, and |
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not to interfere with other people's. Mine occupies |
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me constantly. Good afternoon, gentlemen!" |
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Seeing clearly that it would be useless to pursue |
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their point, the gentlemen withdrew. Scrooge resumed |
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his labours with an improved opinion of himself, |
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and in a more facetious temper than was usual |
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with him. |
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Meanwhile the fog and darkness thickened so, that |
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people ran about with flaring links, proffering their |
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services to go before horses in carriages, and conduct |
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them on their way. The ancient tower of a church, |
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whose gruff old bell was always peeping slily down |
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at Scrooge out of a Gothic window in the wall, became |
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invisible, and struck the hours and quarters in the |
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clouds, with tremulous vibrations afterwards as if |
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its teeth were chattering in its frozen head up there. |
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The cold became intense. In the main street, at the |
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corner of the court, some labourers were repairing |
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the gas-pipes, and had lighted a great fire in a brazier, |
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round which a party of ragged men and boys were |
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gathered: warming their hands and winking their |
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eyes before the blaze in rapture. The water-plug |
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being left in solitude, its overflowings sullenly congealed, |
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and turned to misanthropic ice. The brightness |
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of the shops where holly sprigs and berries |
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crackled in the lamp heat of the windows, made pale |
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faces ruddy as they passed. Poulterers' and grocers' |
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trades became a splendid joke: a glorious pageant, |
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with which it was next to impossible to believe that |
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such dull principles as bargain and sale had anything |
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to do. The Lord Mayor, in the stronghold of the |
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mighty Mansion House, gave orders to his fifty cooks |
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and butlers to keep Christmas as a Lord Mayor's |
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household should; and even the little tailor, whom he |
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had fined five shillings on the previous Monday for |
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being drunk and bloodthirsty in the streets, stirred up |
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to-morrow's pudding in his garret, while his lean |
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wife and the baby sallied out to buy the beef. |
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Foggier yet, and colder. Piercing, searching, biting |
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cold. If the good Saint Dunstan had but nipped |
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the Evil Spirit's nose with a touch of such weather |
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as that, instead of using his familiar weapons, then |
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indeed he would have roared to lusty purpose. The |
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owner of one scant young nose, gnawed and mumbled |
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by the hungry cold as bones are gnawed by dogs, |
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stooped down at Scrooge's keyhole to regale him with |
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a Christmas carol: but at the first sound of |
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"God bless you, merry gentleman! |
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May nothing you dismay!" |
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Scrooge seized the ruler with such energy of action, |
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that the singer fled in terror, leaving the keyhole to |
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the fog and even more congenial frost. |
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At length the hour of shutting up the counting-house |
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arrived. With an ill-will Scrooge dismounted from his |
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stool, and tacitly admitted the fact to the expectant |
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clerk in the Tank, who instantly snuffed his candle out, |
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and put on his hat. |
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"You'll want all day to-morrow, I suppose?" said |
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Scrooge. |
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"If quite convenient, sir." |
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"It's not convenient," said Scrooge, "and it's not |
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fair. If I was to stop half-a-crown for it, you'd |
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think yourself ill-used, I'll be bound?" |
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The clerk smiled faintly. |
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"And yet," said Scrooge, "you don't think me ill-used, |
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when I pay a day's wages for no work." |
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The clerk observed that it was only once a year. |
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"A poor excuse for picking a man's pocket every |
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twenty-fifth of December!" said Scrooge, buttoning |
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his great-coat to the chin. "But I suppose you must |
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have the whole day. Be here all the earlier next |
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morning." |
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The clerk promised that he would; and Scrooge |
|
430 |
walked out with a growl. The office was closed in a |
|
431 |
twinkling, and the clerk, with the long ends of his |
|
432 |
white comforter dangling below his waist (for he |
|
433 |
boasted no great-coat), went down a slide on Cornhill, |
|
434 |
at the end of a lane of boys, twenty times, in |
|
435 |
honour of its being Christmas Eve, and then ran home |
|
436 |
to Camden Town as hard as he could pelt, to play |
|
437 |
at blindman's-buff. |
|
438 |
||
439 |
Scrooge took his melancholy dinner in his usual |
|
440 |
melancholy tavern; and having read all the newspapers, and |
|
441 |
beguiled the rest of the evening with his |
|
442 |
banker's-book, went home to bed. He lived in |
|
443 |
chambers which had once belonged to his deceased |
|
444 |
partner. They were a gloomy suite of rooms, in a |
|
445 |
lowering pile of building up a yard, where it had so |
|
446 |
little business to be, that one could scarcely help |
|
447 |
fancying it must have run there when it was a young |
|
448 |
house, playing at hide-and-seek with other houses, |
|
449 |
and forgotten the way out again. It was old enough |
|
450 |
now, and dreary enough, for nobody lived in it but |
|
451 |
Scrooge, the other rooms being all let out as offices. |
|
452 |
The yard was so dark that even Scrooge, who knew |
|
453 |
its every stone, was fain to grope with his hands. |
|
454 |
The fog and frost so hung about the black old gateway |
|
455 |
of the house, that it seemed as if the Genius of |
|
456 |
the Weather sat in mournful meditation on the |
|
457 |
threshold. |
|
458 |
||
459 |
Now, it is a fact, that there was nothing at all |
|
460 |
particular about the knocker on the door, except that it |
|
461 |
was very large. It is also a fact, that Scrooge had |
|
462 |
seen it, night and morning, during his whole residence |
|
463 |
in that place; also that Scrooge had as little of what |
|
464 |
is called fancy about him as any man in the city of |
|
465 |
London, even including--which is a bold word--the |
|
466 |
corporation, aldermen, and livery. Let it also be |
|
467 |
borne in mind that Scrooge had not bestowed one |
|
468 |
thought on Marley, since his last mention of his |
|
469 |
seven years' dead partner that afternoon. And then |
|
470 |
let any man explain to me, if he can, how it happened |
|
471 |
that Scrooge, having his key in the lock of the door, |
|
472 |
saw in the knocker, without its undergoing any intermediate |
|
473 |
process of change--not a knocker, but Marley's face. |
|
474 |
||
475 |
Marley's face. It was not in impenetrable shadow |
|
476 |
as the other objects in the yard were, but had a |
|
477 |
dismal light about it, like a bad lobster in a dark |
|
478 |
cellar. It was not angry or ferocious, but looked |
|
479 |
at Scrooge as Marley used to look: with ghostly |
|
480 |
spectacles turned up on its ghostly forehead. The |
|
481 |
hair was curiously stirred, as if by breath or hot air; |
|
482 |
and, though the eyes were wide open, they were perfectly |
|
483 |
motionless. That, and its livid colour, made it |
|
484 |
horrible; but its horror seemed to be in spite of the |
|
485 |
face and beyond its control, rather than a part of |
|
486 |
its own expression. |
|
487 |
||
488 |
As Scrooge looked fixedly at this phenomenon, it |
|
489 |
was a knocker again. |
|
490 |
||
491 |
To say that he was not startled, or that his blood |
|
492 |
was not conscious of a terrible sensation to which it |
|
493 |
had been a stranger from infancy, would be untrue. |
|
494 |
But he put his hand upon the key he had relinquished, |
|
495 |
turned it sturdily, walked in, and lighted his candle. |
|
496 |
||
497 |
He did pause, with a moment's irresolution, before |
|
498 |
he shut the door; and he did look cautiously behind |
|
499 |
it first, as if he half expected to be terrified with the |
|
500 |
sight of Marley's pigtail sticking out into the hall. |
|
501 |
But there was nothing on the back of the door, except |
|
502 |
the screws and nuts that held the knocker on, so he |
|
503 |
said "Pooh, pooh!" and closed it with a bang. |
|
504 |
||
505 |
The sound resounded through the house like thunder. |
|
506 |
Every room above, and every cask in the wine-merchant's |
|
507 |
cellars below, appeared to have a separate peal |
|
508 |
of echoes of its own. Scrooge was not a man to |
|
509 |
be frightened by echoes. He fastened the door, and |
|
510 |
walked across the hall, and up the stairs; slowly too: |
|
511 |
trimming his candle as he went. |
|
512 |
||
513 |
You may talk vaguely about driving a coach-and-six |
|
514 |
up a good old flight of stairs, or through a bad |
|
515 |
young Act of Parliament; but I mean to say you |
|
516 |
might have got a hearse up that staircase, and taken |
|
517 |
it broadwise, with the splinter-bar towards the wall |
|
518 |
and the door towards the balustrades: and done it |
|
519 |
easy. There was plenty of width for that, and room |
|
520 |
to spare; which is perhaps the reason why Scrooge |
|
521 |
thought he saw a locomotive hearse going on before |
|
522 |
him in the gloom. Half-a-dozen gas-lamps out of |
|
523 |
the street wouldn't have lighted the entry too well, |
|
524 |
so you may suppose that it was pretty dark with |
|
525 |
Scrooge's dip. |
|
526 |
||
527 |
Up Scrooge went, not caring a button for that. |
|
528 |
Darkness is cheap, and Scrooge liked it. But before |
|
529 |
he shut his heavy door, he walked through his rooms |
|
530 |
to see that all was right. He had just enough recollection |
|
531 |
of the face to desire to do that. |
|
532 |
||
533 |
Sitting-room, bedroom, lumber-room. All as they |
|
534 |
should be. Nobody under the table, nobody under |
|
535 |
the sofa; a small fire in the grate; spoon and basin |
|
536 |
ready; and the little saucepan of gruel (Scrooge had |
|
537 |
a cold in his head) upon the hob. Nobody under the |
|
538 |
bed; nobody in the closet; nobody in his dressing-gown, |
|
539 |
which was hanging up in a suspicious attitude |
|
540 |
against the wall. Lumber-room as usual. Old fire-guard, |
|
541 |
old shoes, two fish-baskets, washing-stand on three |
|
542 |
legs, and a poker. |
|
543 |
||
544 |
Quite satisfied, he closed his door, and locked |
|
545 |
himself in; double-locked himself in, which was not his |
|
546 |
custom. Thus secured against surprise, he took off |
|
547 |
his cravat; put on his dressing-gown and slippers, and |
|
548 |
his nightcap; and sat down before the fire to take |
|
549 |
his gruel. |
|
550 |
||
551 |
It was a very low fire indeed; nothing on such a |
|
552 |
bitter night. He was obliged to sit close to it, and |
|
553 |
brood over it, before he could extract the least |
|
554 |
sensation of warmth from such a handful of fuel. |
|
555 |
The fireplace was an old one, built by some Dutch |
|
556 |
merchant long ago, and paved all round with quaint |
|
557 |
Dutch tiles, designed to illustrate the Scriptures. |
|
558 |
There were Cains and Abels, Pharaoh's daughters; |
|
559 |
Queens of Sheba, Angelic messengers descending |
|
560 |
through the air on clouds like feather-beds, Abrahams, |
|
561 |
Belshazzars, Apostles putting off to sea in butter-boats, |
|
562 |
hundreds of figures to attract his thoughts; |
|
563 |
and yet that face of Marley, seven years dead, came |
|
564 |
like the ancient Prophet's rod, and swallowed up the |
|
565 |
whole. If each smooth tile had been a blank at first, |
|
566 |
with power to shape some picture on its surface from |
|
567 |
the disjointed fragments of his thoughts, there would |
|
568 |
have been a copy of old Marley's head on every one. |
|
569 |
||
570 |
"Humbug!" said Scrooge; and walked across the |
|
571 |
room. |
|
572 |
||
573 |
After several turns, he sat down again. As he |
|
574 |
threw his head back in the chair, his glance happened |
|
575 |
to rest upon a bell, a disused bell, that hung in the |
|
576 |
room, and communicated for some purpose now forgotten |
|
577 |
with a chamber in the highest story of the |
|
578 |
building. It was with great astonishment, and with |
|
579 |
a strange, inexplicable dread, that as he looked, he |
|
580 |
saw this bell begin to swing. It swung so softly in |
|
581 |
the outset that it scarcely made a sound; but soon it |
|
582 |
rang out loudly, and so did every bell in the house. |
|
583 |
||
584 |
This might have lasted half a minute, or a minute, |
|
585 |
but it seemed an hour. The bells ceased as they had |
|
586 |
begun, together. They were succeeded by a clanking |
|
587 |
noise, deep down below; as if some person were |
|
588 |
dragging a heavy chain over the casks in the |
|
589 |
wine-merchant's cellar. Scrooge then remembered to have |
|
590 |
heard that ghosts in haunted houses were described as |
|
591 |
dragging chains. |
|
592 |
||
593 |
The cellar-door flew open with a booming sound, |
|
594 |
and then he heard the noise much louder, on the floors |
|
595 |
below; then coming up the stairs; then coming straight |
|
596 |
towards his door. |
|
597 |
||
598 |
"It's humbug still!" said Scrooge. "I won't believe it." |
|
599 |
||
600 |
His colour changed though, when, without a pause, |
|
601 |
it came on through the heavy door, and passed into |
|
602 |
the room before his eyes. Upon its coming in, the |
|
603 |
dying flame leaped up, as though it cried, "I know |
|
604 |
him; Marley's Ghost!" and fell again. |
|
605 |
||
606 |
The same face: the very same. Marley in his pigtail, |
|
607 |
usual waistcoat, tights and boots; the tassels on |
|
608 |
the latter bristling, like his pigtail, and his coat-skirts, |
|
609 |
and the hair upon his head. The chain he drew was |
|
610 |
clasped about his middle. It was long, and wound |
|
611 |
about him like a tail; and it was made (for Scrooge |
|
612 |
observed it closely) of cash-boxes, keys, padlocks, |
|
613 |
ledgers, deeds, and heavy purses wrought in steel. |
|
614 |
His body was transparent; so that Scrooge, observing him, |
|
615 |
and looking through his waistcoat, could see |
|
616 |
the two buttons on his coat behind. |
|
617 |
||
618 |
Scrooge had often heard it said that Marley had no |
|
619 |
bowels, but he had never believed it until now. |
|
620 |
||
621 |
No, nor did he believe it even now. Though he |
|
622 |
looked the phantom through and through, and saw |
|
623 |
it standing before him; though he felt the chilling |
|
624 |
influence of its death-cold eyes; and marked the very |
|
625 |
texture of the folded kerchief bound about its head |
|
626 |
and chin, which wrapper he had not observed before; |
|
627 |
he was still incredulous, and fought against his senses. |
|
628 |
||
629 |
"How now!" said Scrooge, caustic and cold as ever. |
|
630 |
"What do you want with me?" |
|
631 |
||
632 |
"Much!"--Marley's voice, no doubt about it. |
|
633 |
||
634 |
"Who are you?" |
|
635 |
||
636 |
"Ask me who I was." |
|
637 |
||
638 |
"Who were you then?" said Scrooge, raising his |
|
639 |
voice. "You're particular, for a shade." He was going |
|
640 |
to say "to a shade," but substituted this, as more |
|
641 |
appropriate. |
|
642 |
||
643 |
"In life I was your partner, Jacob Marley." |
|
644 |
||
645 |
"Can you--can you sit down?" asked Scrooge, looking |
|
646 |
doubtfully at him. |
|
647 |
||
648 |
"I can." |
|
649 |
||
650 |
"Do it, then." |
|
651 |
||
652 |
Scrooge asked the question, because he didn't know |
|
653 |
whether a ghost so transparent might find himself in |
|
654 |
a condition to take a chair; and felt that in the event |
|
655 |
of its being impossible, it might involve the necessity |
|
656 |
of an embarrassing explanation. But the ghost sat |
|
657 |
down on the opposite side of the fireplace, as if he |
|
658 |
were quite used to it. |
|
659 |
||
660 |
"You don't believe in me," observed the Ghost. |
|
661 |
||
662 |
"I don't," said Scrooge. |
|
663 |
||
664 |
"What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of |
|
665 |
your senses?" |
|
666 |
||
667 |
"I don't know," said Scrooge. |
|
668 |
||
669 |
"Why do you doubt your senses?" |
|
670 |
||
671 |
"Because," said Scrooge, "a little thing affects them. |
|
672 |
A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheats. You may |
|
673 |
be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of |
|
674 |
cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There's more of |
|
675 |
gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!" |
|
676 |
||
677 |
Scrooge was not much in the habit of cracking |
|
678 |
jokes, nor did he feel, in his heart, by any means |
|
679 |
waggish then. The truth is, that he tried to be |
|
680 |
smart, as a means of distracting his own attention, |
|
681 |
and keeping down his terror; for the spectre's voice |
|
682 |
disturbed the very marrow in his bones. |
|
683 |
||
684 |
To sit, staring at those fixed glazed eyes, in silence |
|
685 |
for a moment, would play, Scrooge felt, the very |
|
686 |
deuce with him. There was something very awful, |
|
687 |
too, in the spectre's being provided with an infernal |
|
688 |
atmosphere of its own. Scrooge could not feel it |
|
689 |
himself, but this was clearly the case; for though the |
|
690 |
Ghost sat perfectly motionless, its hair, and skirts, |
|
691 |
and tassels, were still agitated as by the hot vapour |
|
692 |
from an oven. |
|
693 |
||
694 |
"You see this toothpick?" said Scrooge, returning |
|
695 |
quickly to the charge, for the reason just assigned; |
|
696 |
and wishing, though it were only for a second, to |
|
697 |
divert the vision's stony gaze from himself. |
|
698 |
||
699 |
"I do," replied the Ghost. |
|
700 |
||
701 |
"You are not looking at it," said Scrooge. |
|
702 |
||
703 |
"But I see it," said the Ghost, "notwithstanding." |
|
704 |
||
705 |
"Well!" returned Scrooge, "I have but to swallow |
|
706 |
this, and be for the rest of my days persecuted by a |
|
707 |
legion of goblins, all of my own creation. Humbug, |
|
708 |
I tell you! humbug!" |
|
709 |
||
710 |
At this the spirit raised a frightful cry, and shook |
|
711 |
its chain with such a dismal and appalling noise, that |
|
712 |
Scrooge held on tight to his chair, to save himself |
|
713 |
from falling in a swoon. But how much greater was |
|
714 |
his horror, when the phantom taking off the bandage |
|
715 |
round its head, as if it were too warm to wear indoors, |
|
716 |
its lower jaw dropped down upon its breast! |
|
717 |
||
718 |
Scrooge fell upon his knees, and clasped his hands |
|
719 |
before his face. |
|
720 |
||
721 |
"Mercy!" he said. "Dreadful apparition, why do |
|
722 |
you trouble me?" |
|
723 |
||
724 |
"Man of the worldly mind!" replied the Ghost, "do |
|
725 |
you believe in me or not?" |
|
726 |
||
727 |
"I do," said Scrooge. "I must. But why do spirits |
|
728 |
walk the earth, and why do they come to me?" |
|
729 |
||
730 |
"It is required of every man," the Ghost returned, |
|
731 |
"that the spirit within him should walk abroad among |
|
732 |
his fellowmen, and travel far and wide; and if that |
|
733 |
spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so |
|
734 |
after death. It is doomed to wander through the |
|
735 |
world--oh, woe is me!--and witness what it cannot |
|
736 |
share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to |
|
737 |
happiness!" |
|
738 |
||
739 |
Again the spectre raised a cry, and shook its chain |
|
740 |
and wrung its shadowy hands. |
|
741 |
||
742 |
"You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling. "Tell |
|
743 |
me why?" |
|
744 |
||
745 |
"I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. |
|
746 |
"I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded |
|
747 |
it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I |
|
748 |
wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?" |
|
749 |
||
750 |
Scrooge trembled more and more. |
|
751 |
||
752 |
"Or would you know," pursued the Ghost, "the |
|
753 |
weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself? |
|
754 |
It was full as heavy and as long as this, seven |
|
755 |
Christmas Eves ago. You have laboured on it, since. |
|
756 |
It is a ponderous chain!" |
|
757 |
||
758 |
Scrooge glanced about him on the floor, in the |
|
759 |
expectation of finding himself surrounded by some fifty |
|
760 |
or sixty fathoms of iron cable: but he could see |
|
761 |
nothing. |
|
762 |
||
763 |
"Jacob," he said, imploringly. "Old Jacob Marley, |
|
764 |
tell me more. Speak comfort to me, Jacob!" |
|
765 |
||
766 |
"I have none to give," the Ghost replied. "It comes |
|
767 |
from other regions, Ebenezer Scrooge, and is conveyed |
|
768 |
by other ministers, to other kinds of men. Nor |
|
769 |
can I tell you what I would. A very little more is |
|
770 |
all permitted to me. I cannot rest, I cannot stay, I |
|
771 |
cannot linger anywhere. My spirit never walked |
|
772 |
beyond our counting-house--mark me!--in life my |
|
773 |
spirit never roved beyond the narrow limits of our |
|
774 |
money-changing hole; and weary journeys lie before |
|
775 |
me!" |
|
776 |
||
777 |
It was a habit with Scrooge, whenever he became |
|
778 |
thoughtful, to put his hands in his breeches pockets. |
|
779 |
Pondering on what the Ghost had said, he did so now, |
|
780 |
but without lifting up his eyes, or getting off his |
|
781 |
knees. |
|
782 |
||
783 |
"You must have been very slow about it, Jacob," |
|
784 |
Scrooge observed, in a business-like manner, though |
|
785 |
with humility and deference. |
|
786 |
||
787 |
"Slow!" the Ghost repeated. |
|
788 |
||
789 |
"Seven years dead," mused Scrooge. "And travelling |
|
790 |
all the time!" |
|
791 |
||
792 |
"The whole time," said the Ghost. "No rest, no |
|
793 |
peace. Incessant torture of remorse." |
|
794 |
||
795 |
"You travel fast?" said Scrooge. |
|
796 |
||
797 |
"On the wings of the wind," replied the Ghost. |
|
798 |
||
799 |
"You might have got over a great quantity of |
|
800 |
ground in seven years," said Scrooge. |
|
801 |
||
802 |
The Ghost, on hearing this, set up another cry, and |
|
803 |
clanked its chain so hideously in the dead silence of |
|
804 |
the night, that the Ward would have been justified in |
|
805 |
indicting it for a nuisance. |
|
806 |
||
807 |
"Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed," cried the |
|
808 |
phantom, "not to know, that ages of incessant labour |
|
809 |
by immortal creatures, for this earth must pass into |
|
810 |
eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is |
|
811 |
all developed. Not to know that any Christian spirit |
|
812 |
working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may |
|
813 |
be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast |
|
814 |
means of usefulness. Not to know that no space of |
|
815 |
regret can make amends for one life's opportunity |
|
816 |
misused! Yet such was I! Oh! such was I!" |
|
817 |
||
818 |
"But you were always a good man of business, |
|
819 |
Jacob," faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this |
|
820 |
to himself. |
|
821 |
||
822 |
"Business!" cried the Ghost, wringing its hands |
|
823 |
again. "Mankind was my business. The common |
|
824 |
welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, |
|
825 |
and benevolence, were, all, my business. The dealings |
|
826 |
of my trade were but a drop of water in the |
|
827 |
comprehensive ocean of my business!" |
|
828 |
||
829 |
It held up its chain at arm's length, as if that were |
|
830 |
the cause of all its unavailing grief, and flung it |
|
831 |
heavily upon the ground again. |
|
832 |
||
833 |
"At this time of the rolling year," the spectre said, |
|
834 |
"I suffer most. Why did I walk through crowds of |
|
835 |
fellow-beings with my eyes turned down, and never |
|
836 |
raise them to that blessed Star which led the Wise |
|
837 |
Men to a poor abode! Were there no poor homes to |
|
838 |
which its light would have conducted me!" |
|
839 |
||
840 |
Scrooge was very much dismayed to hear the |
|
841 |
spectre going on at this rate, and began to quake |
|
842 |
exceedingly. |
|
843 |
||
844 |
"Hear me!" cried the Ghost. "My time is nearly |
|
845 |
gone." |
|
846 |
||
847 |
"I will," said Scrooge. "But don't be hard upon |
|
848 |
me! Don't be flowery, Jacob! Pray!" |
|
849 |
||
850 |
"How it is that I appear before you in a shape that |
|
851 |
you can see, I may not tell. I have sat invisible |
|
852 |
beside you many and many a day." |
|
853 |
||
854 |
It was not an agreeable idea. Scrooge shivered, |
|
855 |
and wiped the perspiration from his brow. |
|
856 |
||
857 |
"That is no light part of my penance," pursued |
|
858 |
the Ghost. "I am here to-night to warn you, that you |
|
859 |
have yet a chance and hope of escaping my fate. A |
|
860 |
chance and hope of my procuring, Ebenezer." |
|
861 |
||
862 |
"You were always a good friend to me," said |
|
863 |
Scrooge. "Thank'ee!" |
|
864 |
||
865 |
"You will be haunted," resumed the Ghost, "by |
|
866 |
Three Spirits." |
|
867 |
||
868 |
Scrooge's countenance fell almost as low as the |
|
869 |
Ghost's had done. |
|
870 |
||
871 |
"Is that the chance and hope you mentioned, |
|
872 |
Jacob?" he demanded, in a faltering voice. |
|
873 |
||
874 |
"It is." |
|
875 |
||
876 |
"I--I think I'd rather not," said Scrooge. |
|
877 |
||
878 |
"Without their visits," said the Ghost, "you cannot |
|
879 |
hope to shun the path I tread. Expect the first to-morrow, |
|
880 |
when the bell tolls One." |
|
881 |
||
882 |
"Couldn't I take 'em all at once, and have it over, |
|
883 |
Jacob?" hinted Scrooge. |
|
884 |
||
885 |
"Expect the second on the next night at the same |
|
886 |
hour. The third upon the next night when the last |
|
887 |
stroke of Twelve has ceased to vibrate. Look to see |
|
888 |
me no more; and look that, for your own sake, you |
|
889 |
remember what has passed between us!" |
|
890 |
||
891 |
When it had said these words, the spectre took its |
|
892 |
wrapper from the table, and bound it round its head, |
|
893 |
as before. Scrooge knew this, by the smart sound its |
|
894 |
teeth made, when the jaws were brought together |
|
895 |
by the bandage. He ventured to raise his eyes again, |
|
896 |
and found his supernatural visitor confronting him |
|
897 |
in an erect attitude, with its chain wound over and |
|
898 |
about its arm. |
|
899 |
||
900 |
The apparition walked backward from him; and at |
|
901 |
every step it took, the window raised itself a little, |
|
902 |
so that when the spectre reached it, it was wide open. |
|
903 |
||
904 |
It beckoned Scrooge to approach, which he did. |
|
905 |
When they were within two paces of each other, |
|
906 |
Marley's Ghost held up its hand, warning him to |
|
907 |
come no nearer. Scrooge stopped. |
|
908 |
||
909 |
Not so much in obedience, as in surprise and fear: |
|
910 |
for on the raising of the hand, he became sensible |
|
911 |
of confused noises in the air; incoherent sounds of |
|
912 |
lamentation and regret; wailings inexpressibly sorrowful and |
|
913 |
self-accusatory. The spectre, after listening for a moment, |
|
914 |
joined in the mournful dirge; and floated out upon the |
|
915 |
bleak, dark night. |
|
916 |
||
917 |
Scrooge followed to the window: desperate in his |
|
918 |
curiosity. He looked out. |
|
919 |
||
920 |
The air was filled with phantoms, wandering hither |
|
921 |
and thither in restless haste, and moaning as they |
|
922 |
went. Every one of them wore chains like Marley's |
|
923 |
Ghost; some few (they might be guilty governments) |
|
924 |
were linked together; none were free. Many had |
|
925 |
been personally known to Scrooge in their lives. He |
|
926 |
had been quite familiar with one old ghost, in a white |
|
927 |
waistcoat, with a monstrous iron safe attached to |
|
928 |
its ankle, who cried piteously at being unable to assist |
|
929 |
a wretched woman with an infant, whom it saw below, |
|
930 |
upon a door-step. The misery with them all was, |
|
931 |
clearly, that they sought to interfere, for good, in |
|
932 |
human matters, and had lost the power for ever. |
|
933 |
||
934 |
Whether these creatures faded into mist, or mist |
|
935 |
enshrouded them, he could not tell. But they and |
|
936 |
their spirit voices faded together; and the night became |
|
937 |
as it had been when he walked home. |
|
938 |
||
939 |
Scrooge closed the window, and examined the door |
|
940 |
by which the Ghost had entered. It was double-locked, |
|
941 |
as he had locked it with his own hands, and |
|
942 |
the bolts were undisturbed. He tried to say "Humbug!" |
|
943 |
but stopped at the first syllable. And being, |
|
944 |
from the emotion he had undergone, or the fatigues |
|
945 |
of the day, or his glimpse of the Invisible World, or |
|
946 |
the dull conversation of the Ghost, or the lateness of |
|
947 |
the hour, much in need of repose; went straight to |
|
948 |
bed, without undressing, and fell asleep upon the |
|
949 |
instant. |
|
950 |
||
951 |
||
952 |
STAVE II: THE FIRST OF THE THREE SPIRITS |
|
953 |
||
954 |
WHEN Scrooge awoke, it was so dark, that looking out of bed, |
|
955 |
he could scarcely distinguish the transparent window from |
|
956 |
the opaque walls of his chamber. He was endeavouring to |
|
957 |
pierce the darkness with his ferret eyes, when the chimes of a |
|
958 |
neighbouring church struck the four quarters. So he listened |
|
959 |
for the hour. |
|
960 |
||
961 |
To his great astonishment the heavy bell went on from |
|
962 |
six to seven, and from seven to eight, and regularly up to |
|
963 |
twelve; then stopped. Twelve! It was past two when he |
|
964 |
went to bed. The clock was wrong. An icicle must have |
|
965 |
got into the works. Twelve! |
|
966 |
||
967 |
He touched the spring of his repeater, to correct this most |
|
968 |
preposterous clock. Its rapid little pulse beat twelve: |
|
969 |
and stopped. |
|
970 |
||
971 |
"Why, it isn't possible," said Scrooge, "that I can have |
|
972 |
slept through a whole day and far into another night. It |
|
973 |
isn't possible that anything has happened to the sun, and |
|
974 |
this is twelve at noon!" |
|
975 |
||
976 |
The idea being an alarming one, he scrambled out of bed, |
|
977 |
and groped his way to the window. He was obliged to rub |
|
978 |
the frost off with the sleeve of his dressing-gown before he |
|
979 |
could see anything; and could see very little then. All he |
|
980 |
could make out was, that it was still very foggy and extremely |
|
981 |
cold, and that there was no noise of people running to and fro, |
|
982 |
and making a great stir, as there unquestionably would have been |
|
983 |
if night had beaten off bright day, and taken possession of the |
|
984 |
world. This was a great relief, because "three days after sight |
|
985 |
of this First of Exchange pay to Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge or his |
|
986 |
order," and so forth, would have become a mere United States' |
|
987 |
security if there were no days to count by. |
|
988 |
||
989 |
Scrooge went to bed again, and thought, and thought, and thought |
|
990 |
it over and over and over, and could make nothing of it. The more he |
|
991 |
thought, the more perplexed he was; and the more he endeavoured |
|
992 |
not to think, the more he thought. |
|
993 |
||
994 |
Marley's Ghost bothered him exceedingly. Every time he resolved |
|
995 |
within himself, after mature inquiry, that it was all a dream, his |
|
996 |
mind flew back again, like a strong spring released, to its first |
|
997 |
position, and presented the same problem to be worked all through, |
|
998 |
"Was it a dream or not?" |
|
999 |
||
1000 |
Scrooge lay in this state until the chime had gone three quarters |
|
1001 |
more, when he remembered, on a sudden, that the Ghost had warned |
|
1002 |
him of a visitation when the bell tolled one. He resolved to lie |
|
1003 |
awake until the hour was passed; and, considering that he could |
|
1004 |
no more go to sleep than go to Heaven, this was perhaps the |
|
1005 |
wisest resolution in his power. |
|
1006 |
||
1007 |
The quarter was so long, that he was more than once convinced he |
|
1008 |
must have sunk into a doze unconsciously, and missed the clock. |
|
1009 |
At length it broke upon his listening ear. |
|
1010 |
||
1011 |
"Ding, dong!" |
|
1012 |
||
1013 |
"A quarter past," said Scrooge, counting. |
|
1014 |
||
1015 |
"Ding, dong!" |
|
1016 |
||
1017 |
"Half-past!" said Scrooge. |
|
1018 |
||
1019 |
"Ding, dong!" |
|
1020 |
||
1021 |
"A quarter to it," said Scrooge. |
|
1022 |
||
1023 |
"Ding, dong!" |
|
1024 |
||
1025 |
"The hour itself," said Scrooge, triumphantly, "and nothing else!" |
|
1026 |
||
1027 |
He spoke before the hour bell sounded, which it now did with a |
|
1028 |
deep, dull, hollow, melancholy ONE. Light flashed up in the room |
|
1029 |
upon the instant, and the curtains of his bed were drawn. |
|
1030 |
||
1031 |
The curtains of his bed were drawn aside, I tell you, by a |
|
1032 |
hand. Not the curtains at his feet, nor the curtains at his |
|
1033 |
back, but those to which his face was addressed. The curtains |
|
1034 |
of his bed were drawn aside; and Scrooge, starting up into a |
|
1035 |
half-recumbent attitude, found himself face to face with the |
|
1036 |
unearthly visitor who drew them: as close to it as I am now |
|
1037 |
to you, and I am standing in the spirit at your elbow. |
|
1038 |
||
1039 |
It was a strange figure--like a child: yet not so like a |
|
1040 |
child as like an old man, viewed through some supernatural |
|
1041 |
medium, which gave him the appearance of having receded |
|
1042 |
from the view, and being diminished to a child's proportions. |
|
1043 |
Its hair, which hung about its neck and down its back, was |
|
1044 |
white as if with age; and yet the face had not a wrinkle in |
|
1045 |
it, and the tenderest bloom was on the skin. The arms were |
|
1046 |
very long and muscular; the hands the same, as if its hold |
|
1047 |
were of uncommon strength. Its legs and feet, most delicately |
|
1048 |
formed, were, like those upper members, bare. It wore a tunic |
|
1049 |
of the purest white; and round its waist was bound |
|
1050 |
a lustrous belt, the sheen of which was beautiful. It held |
|
1051 |
a branch of fresh green holly in its hand; and, in singular |
|
1052 |
contradiction of that wintry emblem, had its dress trimmed |
|
1053 |
with summer flowers. But the strangest thing about it was, |
|
1054 |
that from the crown of its head there sprung a bright clear |
|
1055 |
jet of light, by which all this was visible; and which was |
|
1056 |
doubtless the occasion of its using, in its duller moments, a |
|
1057 |
great extinguisher for a cap, which it now held under its arm. |
|
1058 |
||
1059 |
Even this, though, when Scrooge looked at it with increasing |
|
1060 |
steadiness, was not its strangest quality. For as its belt |
|
1061 |
sparkled and glittered now in one part and now in another, |
|
1062 |
and what was light one instant, at another time was dark, so |
|
1063 |
the figure itself fluctuated in its distinctness: being now a |
|
1064 |
thing with one arm, now with one leg, now with twenty legs, |
|
1065 |
now a pair of legs without a head, now a head without a |
|
1066 |
body: of which dissolving parts, no outline would be visible |
|
1067 |
in the dense gloom wherein they melted away. And in the |
|
1068 |
very wonder of this, it would be itself again; distinct and |
|
1069 |
clear as ever. |
|
1070 |
||
1071 |
"Are you the Spirit, sir, whose coming was foretold to |
|
1072 |
me?" asked Scrooge. |
|
1073 |
||
1074 |
"I am!" |
|
1075 |
||
1076 |
The voice was soft and gentle. Singularly low, as if |
|
1077 |
instead of being so close beside him, it were at a distance. |
|
1078 |
||
1079 |
"Who, and what are you?" Scrooge demanded. |
|
1080 |
||
1081 |
"I am the Ghost of Christmas Past." |
|
1082 |
||
1083 |
"Long Past?" inquired Scrooge: observant of its dwarfish |
|
1084 |
stature. |
|
1085 |
||
1086 |
"No. Your past." |
|
1087 |
||
1088 |
Perhaps, Scrooge could not have told anybody why, if |
|
1089 |
anybody could have asked him; but he had a special desire |
|
1090 |
to see the Spirit in his cap; and begged him to be covered. |
|
1091 |
||
1092 |
"What!" exclaimed the Ghost, "would you so soon put out, |
|
1093 |
with worldly hands, the light I give? Is it not enough |
|
1094 |
that you are one of those whose passions made this cap, and |
|
1095 |
force me through whole trains of years to wear it low upon |
|
1096 |
my brow!" |
|
1097 |
||
1098 |
Scrooge reverently disclaimed all intention to offend |
|
1099 |
or any knowledge of having wilfully "bonneted" the Spirit at |
|
1100 |
any period of his life. He then made bold to inquire what |
|
1101 |
business brought him there. |
|
1102 |
||
1103 |
"Your welfare!" said the Ghost. |
|
1104 |
||
1105 |
Scrooge expressed himself much obliged, but could not |
|
1106 |
help thinking that a night of unbroken rest would have been |
|
1107 |
more conducive to that end. The Spirit must have heard |
|
1108 |
him thinking, for it said immediately: |
|
1109 |
||
1110 |
"Your reclamation, then. Take heed!" |
|
1111 |
||
1112 |
It put out its strong hand as it spoke, and clasped him |
|
1113 |
gently by the arm. |
|
1114 |
||
1115 |
"Rise! and walk with me!" |
|
1116 |
||
1117 |
It would have been in vain for Scrooge to plead that the |
|
1118 |
weather and the hour were not adapted to pedestrian purposes; |
|
1119 |
that bed was warm, and the thermometer a long way below |
|
1120 |
freezing; that he was clad but lightly in his slippers, |
|
1121 |
dressing-gown, and nightcap; and that he had a cold upon him at |
|
1122 |
that time. The grasp, though gentle as a woman's hand, |
|
1123 |
was not to be resisted. He rose: but finding that the Spirit |
|
1124 |
made towards the window, clasped his robe in supplication. |
|
1125 |
||
1126 |
"I am a mortal," Scrooge remonstrated, "and liable to fall." |
|
1127 |
||
1128 |
"Bear but a touch of my hand there," said the Spirit, |
|
1129 |
laying it upon his heart, "and you shall be upheld in more |
|
1130 |
than this!" |
|
1131 |
||
1132 |
As the words were spoken, they passed through the wall, |
|
1133 |
and stood upon an open country road, with fields on either |
|
1134 |
hand. The city had entirely vanished. Not a vestige of it |
|
1135 |
was to be seen. The darkness and the mist had vanished |
|
1136 |
with it, for it was a clear, cold, winter day, with snow upon |
|
1137 |
the ground. |
|
1138 |
||
1139 |
"Good Heaven!" said Scrooge, clasping his hands together, |
|
1140 |
as he looked about him. "I was bred in this place. I was |
|
1141 |
a boy here!" |
|
1142 |
||
1143 |
The Spirit gazed upon him mildly. Its gentle touch, |
|
1144 |
though it had been light and instantaneous, appeared still |
|
1145 |
present to the old man's sense of feeling. He was conscious |
|
1146 |
of a thousand odours floating in the air, each one connected |
|
1147 |
with a thousand thoughts, and hopes, and joys, and cares |
|
1148 |
long, long, forgotten! |
|
1149 |
||
1150 |
"Your lip is trembling," said the Ghost. "And what is |
|
1151 |
that upon your cheek?" |
|
1152 |
||
1153 |
Scrooge muttered, with an unusual catching in his voice, |
|
1154 |
that it was a pimple; and begged the Ghost to lead him |
|
1155 |
where he would. |
|
1156 |
||
1157 |
"You recollect the way?" inquired the Spirit. |
|
1158 |
||
1159 |
"Remember it!" cried Scrooge with fervour; "I could |
|
1160 |
walk it blindfold." |
|
1161 |
||
1162 |
"Strange to have forgotten it for so many years!" observed |
|
1163 |
the Ghost. "Let us go on." |
|
1164 |
||
1165 |
They walked along the road, Scrooge recognising every |
|
1166 |
gate, and post, and tree; until a little market-town appeared |
|
1167 |
in the distance, with its bridge, its church, and winding river. |
|
1168 |
Some ponies now were seen trotting towards them |
|
1169 |
with boys upon their backs, who called to other boys in |
|
1170 |
country gigs and carts, driven by farmers. All these boys |
|
1171 |
were in great spirits, and shouted to each other, until the |
|
1172 |
broad fields were so full of merry music, that the crisp air |
|
1173 |
laughed to hear it! |
|
1174 |
||
1175 |
"These are but shadows of the things that have been," said |
|
1176 |
the Ghost. "They have no consciousness of us." |
|
1177 |
||
1178 |
The jocund travellers came on; and as they came, Scrooge |
|
1179 |
knew and named them every one. Why was he rejoiced beyond |
|
1180 |
all bounds to see them! Why did his cold eye glisten, and |
|
1181 |
his heart leap up as they went past! Why was he filled |
|
1182 |
with gladness when he heard them give each other Merry |
|
1183 |
Christmas, as they parted at cross-roads and bye-ways, for |
|
1184 |
their several homes! What was merry Christmas to Scrooge? |
|
1185 |
Out upon merry Christmas! What good had it ever done |
|
1186 |
to him? |
|
1187 |
||
1188 |
"The school is not quite deserted," said the Ghost. "A |
|
1189 |
solitary child, neglected by his friends, is left there still." |
|
1190 |
||
1191 |
Scrooge said he knew it. And he sobbed. |
|
1192 |
||
1193 |
They left the high-road, by a well-remembered lane, and |
|
1194 |
soon approached a mansion of dull red brick, with a little |
|
1195 |
weathercock-surmounted cupola, on the roof, and a bell |
|
1196 |
hanging in it. It was a large house, but one of broken |
|
1197 |
fortunes; for the spacious offices were little used, their walls |
|
1198 |
were damp and mossy, their windows broken, and their |
|
1199 |
gates decayed. Fowls clucked and strutted in the stables; |
|
1200 |
and the coach-houses and sheds were over-run with grass. |
|
1201 |
Nor was it more retentive of its ancient state, within; for |
|
1202 |
entering the dreary hall, and glancing through the open |
|
1203 |
doors of many rooms, they found them poorly furnished, |
|
1204 |
cold, and vast. There was an earthy savour in the air, a |
|
1205 |
chilly bareness in the place, which associated itself somehow |
|
1206 |
with too much getting up by candle-light, and not too |
|
1207 |
much to eat. |
|
1208 |
||
1209 |
They went, the Ghost and Scrooge, across the hall, to a |
|
1210 |
door at the back of the house. It opened before them, and |
|
1211 |
disclosed a long, bare, melancholy room, made barer still by |
|
1212 |
lines of plain deal forms and desks. At one of these a lonely |
|
1213 |
boy was reading near a feeble fire; and Scrooge sat down |
|
1214 |
upon a form, and wept to see his poor forgotten self as he |
|
1215 |
used to be. |
|
1216 |
||
1217 |
Not a latent echo in the house, not a squeak and scuffle |
|
1218 |
from the mice behind the panelling, not a drip from the |
|
1219 |
half-thawed water-spout in the dull yard behind, not a sigh among |
|
1220 |
the leafless boughs of one despondent poplar, not the idle |
|
1221 |
swinging of an empty store-house door, no, not a clicking in |
|
1222 |
the fire, but fell upon the heart of Scrooge with a softening |
|
1223 |
influence, and gave a freer passage to his tears. |
|
1224 |
||
1225 |
The Spirit touched him on the arm, and pointed to his |
|
1226 |
younger self, intent upon his reading. Suddenly a man, in |
|
1227 |
foreign garments: wonderfully real and distinct to look at: |
|
1228 |
stood outside the window, with an axe stuck in his belt, and |
|
1229 |
leading by the bridle an ass laden with wood. |
|
1230 |
||
1231 |
"Why, it's Ali Baba!" Scrooge exclaimed in ecstasy. "It's |
|
1232 |
dear old honest Ali Baba! Yes, yes, I know! One Christmas |
|
1233 |
time, when yonder solitary child was left here all alone, |
|
1234 |
he did come, for the first time, just like that. Poor boy! And |
|
1235 |
Valentine," said Scrooge, "and his wild brother, Orson; there |
|
1236 |
they go! And what's his name, who was put down in his |
|
1237 |
drawers, asleep, at the Gate of Damascus; don't you see him! |
|
1238 |
And the Sultan's Groom turned upside down by the Genii; |
|
1239 |
there he is upon his head! Serve him right. I'm glad of it. |
|
1240 |
What business had he to be married to the Princess!" |
|
1241 |
||
1242 |
To hear Scrooge expending all the earnestness of his nature |
|
1243 |
on such subjects, in a most extraordinary voice between |
|
1244 |
laughing and crying; and to see his heightened and excited |
|
1245 |
face; would have been a surprise to his business friends in |
|
1246 |
the city, indeed. |
|
1247 |
||
1248 |
"There's the Parrot!" cried Scrooge. "Green body and |
|
1249 |
yellow tail, with a thing like a lettuce growing out of the |
|
1250 |
top of his head; there he is! Poor Robin Crusoe, he called |
|
1251 |
him, when he came home again after sailing round the |
|
1252 |
island. 'Poor Robin Crusoe, where have you been, Robin |
|
1253 |
Crusoe?' The man thought he was dreaming, but he wasn't. |
|
1254 |
It was the Parrot, you know. There goes Friday, running |
|
1255 |
for his life to the little creek! Halloa! Hoop! Halloo!" |
|
1256 |
||
1257 |
Then, with a rapidity of transition very foreign to his |
|
1258 |
usual character, he said, in pity for his former self, "Poor |
|
1259 |
boy!" and cried again. |
|
1260 |
||
1261 |
"I wish," Scrooge muttered, putting his hand in his |
|
1262 |
pocket, and looking about him, after drying his eyes with his |
|
1263 |
cuff: "but it's too late now." |
|
1264 |
||
1265 |
"What is the matter?" asked the Spirit. |
|
1266 |
||
1267 |
"Nothing," said Scrooge. "Nothing. There was a boy |
|
1268 |
singing a Christmas Carol at my door last night. I should |
|
1269 |
like to have given him something: that's all." |
|
1270 |
||
1271 |
The Ghost smiled thoughtfully, and waved its hand: |
|
1272 |
saying as it did so, "Let us see another Christmas!" |
|
1273 |
||
1274 |
Scrooge's former self grew larger at the words, and the |
|
1275 |
room became a little darker and more dirty. The panels shrunk, |
|
1276 |
the windows cracked; fragments of plaster fell out of the |
|
1277 |
ceiling, and the naked laths were shown instead; but how |
|
1278 |
all this was brought about, Scrooge knew no more than you |
|
1279 |
do. He only knew that it was quite correct; that everything |
|
1280 |
had happened so; that there he was, alone again, when all |
|
1281 |
the other boys had gone home for the jolly holidays. |
|
1282 |
||
1283 |
He was not reading now, but walking up and down despairingly. |
|
1284 |
Scrooge looked at the Ghost, and with a mournful shaking of |
|
1285 |
his head, glanced anxiously towards the door. |
|
1286 |
||
1287 |
It opened; and a little girl, much younger than the boy, |
|
1288 |
came darting in, and putting her arms about his neck, and |
|
1289 |
often kissing him, addressed him as her "Dear, dear |
|
1290 |
brother." |
|
1291 |
||
1292 |
"I have come to bring you home, dear brother!" said the |
|
1293 |
child, clapping her tiny hands, and bending down to laugh. |
|
1294 |
"To bring you home, home, home!" |
|
1295 |
||
1296 |
"Home, little Fan?" returned the boy. |
|
1297 |
||
1298 |
"Yes!" said the child, brimful of glee. "Home, for good |
|
1299 |
and all. Home, for ever and ever. Father is so much kinder |
|
1300 |
than he used to be, that home's like Heaven! He spoke so |
|
1301 |
gently to me one dear night when I was going to bed, that |
|
1302 |
I was not afraid to ask him once more if you might come |
|
1303 |
home; and he said Yes, you should; and sent me in a coach |
|
1304 |
to bring you. And you're to be a man!" said the child, |
|
1305 |
opening her eyes, "and are never to come back here; but |
|
1306 |
first, we're to be together all the Christmas long, and have |
|
1307 |
the merriest time in all the world." |
|
1308 |
||
1309 |
"You are quite a woman, little Fan!" exclaimed the boy. |
|
1310 |
||
1311 |
She clapped her hands and laughed, and tried to touch his |
|
1312 |
head; but being too little, laughed again, and stood on |
|
1313 |
tiptoe to embrace him. Then she began to drag him, in her |
|
1314 |
childish eagerness, towards the door; and he, nothing loth to |
|
1315 |
go, accompanied her. |
|
1316 |
||
1317 |
A terrible voice in the hall cried, "Bring down Master |
|
1318 |
Scrooge's box, there!" and in the hall appeared the schoolmaster |
|
1319 |
himself, who glared on Master Scrooge with a ferocious |
|
1320 |
condescension, and threw him into a dreadful state of mind |
|
1321 |
by shaking hands with him. He then conveyed him and his |
|
1322 |
sister into the veriest old well of a shivering best-parlour that |
|
1323 |
ever was seen, where the maps upon the wall, and the celestial |
|
1324 |
and terrestrial globes in the windows, were waxy with cold. |
|
1325 |
Here he produced a decanter of curiously light wine, and a |
|
1326 |
block of curiously heavy cake, and administered instalments |
|
1327 |
of those dainties to the young people: at the same time, |
|
1328 |
sending out a meagre servant to offer a glass of "something" |
|
1329 |
to the postboy, who answered that he thanked the gentleman, |
|
1330 |
but if it was the same tap as he had tasted before, he had |
|
1331 |
rather not. Master Scrooge's trunk being by this time tied |
|
1332 |
on to the top of the chaise, the children bade the schoolmaster |
|
1333 |
good-bye right willingly; and getting into it, drove |
|
1334 |
gaily down the garden-sweep: the quick wheels dashing the |
|
1335 |
hoar-frost and snow from off the dark leaves of the evergreens |
|
1336 |
like spray. |
|
1337 |
||
1338 |
"Always a delicate creature, whom a breath might have |
|
1339 |
withered," said the Ghost. "But she had a large heart!" |
|
1340 |
||
1341 |
"So she had," cried Scrooge. "You're right. I will not |
|
1342 |
gainsay it, Spirit. God forbid!" |
|
1343 |
||
1344 |
"She died a woman," said the Ghost, "and had, as I think, |
|
1345 |
children." |
|
1346 |
||
1347 |
"One child," Scrooge returned. |
|
1348 |
||
1349 |
"True," said the Ghost. "Your nephew!" |
|
1350 |
||
1351 |
Scrooge seemed uneasy in his mind; and answered briefly, |
|
1352 |
"Yes." |
|
1353 |
||
1354 |
Although they had but that moment left the school behind |
|
1355 |
them, they were now in the busy thoroughfares of a city, |
|
1356 |
where shadowy passengers passed and repassed; where shadowy |
|
1357 |
carts and coaches battled for the way, and all the strife and |
|
1358 |
tumult of a real city were. It was made plain enough, by |
|
1359 |
the dressing of the shops, that here too it was Christmas |
|
1360 |
time again; but it was evening, and the streets were |
|
1361 |
lighted up. |
|
1362 |
||
1363 |
The Ghost stopped at a certain warehouse door, and asked |
|
1364 |
Scrooge if he knew it. |
|
1365 |
||
1366 |
"Know it!" said Scrooge. "Was I apprenticed here!" |
|
1367 |
||
1368 |
They went in. At sight of an old gentleman in a Welsh |
|
1369 |
wig, sitting behind such a high desk, that if he had been two |
|
1370 |
inches taller he must have knocked his head against the |
|
1371 |
ceiling, Scrooge cried in great excitement: |
|
1372 |
||
1373 |
"Why, it's old Fezziwig! Bless his heart; it's Fezziwig |
|
1374 |
alive again!" |
|
1375 |
||
1376 |
Old Fezziwig laid down his pen, and looked up at the |
|
1377 |
clock, which pointed to the hour of seven. He rubbed his |
|
1378 |
hands; adjusted his capacious waistcoat; laughed all over |
|
1379 |
himself, from his shoes to his organ of benevolence; and |
|
1380 |
called out in a comfortable, oily, rich, fat, jovial voice: |
|
1381 |
||
1382 |
"Yo ho, there! Ebenezer! Dick!" |
|
1383 |
||
1384 |
Scrooge's former self, now grown a young man, came briskly |
|
1385 |
in, accompanied by his fellow-'prentice. |
|
1386 |
||
1387 |
"Dick Wilkins, to be sure!" said Scrooge to the Ghost. |
|
1388 |
"Bless me, yes. There he is. He was very much attached |
|
1389 |
to me, was Dick. Poor Dick! Dear, dear!" |
|
1390 |
||
1391 |
"Yo ho, my boys!" said Fezziwig. "No more work to-night. |
|
1392 |
Christmas Eve, Dick. Christmas, Ebenezer! Let's |
|
1393 |
have the shutters up," cried old Fezziwig, with a sharp clap |
|
1394 |
of his hands, "before a man can say Jack Robinson!" |
|
1395 |
||
1396 |
You wouldn't believe how those two fellows went at it! |
|
1397 |
They charged into the street with the shutters--one, two, |
|
1398 |
three--had 'em up in their places--four, five, six--barred |
|
1399 |
'em and pinned 'em--seven, eight, nine--and came back |
|
1400 |
before you could have got to twelve, panting like race-horses. |
|
1401 |
||
1402 |
"Hilli-ho!" cried old Fezziwig, skipping down from the |
|
1403 |
high desk, with wonderful agility. "Clear away, my lads, |
|
1404 |
and let's have lots of room here! Hilli-ho, Dick! Chirrup, |
|
1405 |
Ebenezer!" |
|
1406 |
||
1407 |
Clear away! There was nothing they wouldn't have cleared |
|
1408 |
away, or couldn't have cleared away, with old Fezziwig looking |
|
1409 |
on. It was done in a minute. Every movable was packed off, as if |
|
1410 |
it were dismissed from public life for evermore; the floor was |
|
1411 |
swept and watered, the lamps were trimmed, fuel was heaped upon |
|
1412 |
the fire; and the warehouse was as snug, and warm, and dry, and |
|
1413 |
bright a ball-room, as you would desire to see upon a winter's |
|
1414 |
night. |
|
1415 |
||
1416 |
In came a fiddler with a music-book, and went up to the |
|
1417 |
lofty desk, and made an orchestra of it, and tuned like fifty |
|
1418 |
stomach-aches. In came Mrs. Fezziwig, one vast substantial |
|
1419 |
smile. In came the three Miss Fezziwigs, beaming and |
|
1420 |
lovable. In came the six young followers whose hearts they |
|
1421 |
broke. In came all the young men and women employed in |
|
1422 |
the business. In came the housemaid, with her cousin, the |
|
1423 |
baker. In came the cook, with her brother's particular friend, |
|
1424 |
the milkman. In came the boy from over the way, who was |
|
1425 |
suspected of not having board enough from his master; trying |
|
1426 |
to hide himself behind the girl from next door but one, who |
|
1427 |
was proved to have had her ears pulled by her mistress. |
|
1428 |
In they all came, one after another; some shyly, some boldly, |
|
1429 |
some gracefully, some awkwardly, some pushing, some pulling; |
|
1430 |
in they all came, anyhow and everyhow. Away they all went, |
|
1431 |
twenty couple at once; hands half round and back again |
|
1432 |
the other way; down the middle and up again; round |
|
1433 |
and round in various stages of affectionate grouping; old |
|
1434 |
top couple always turning up in the wrong place; new top |
|
1435 |
couple starting off again, as soon as they got there; all top |
|
1436 |
couples at last, and not a bottom one to help them! When |
|
1437 |
this result was brought about, old Fezziwig, clapping his |
|
1438 |
hands to stop the dance, cried out, "Well done!" and the |
|
1439 |
fiddler plunged his hot face into a pot of porter, especially |
|
1440 |
provided for that purpose. But scorning rest, upon his |
|
1441 |
reappearance, he instantly began again, though there were no |
|
1442 |
dancers yet, as if the other fiddler had been carried home, |
|
1443 |
exhausted, on a shutter, and he were a bran-new man |
|
1444 |
resolved to beat him out of sight, or perish. |
|
1445 |
||
1446 |
There were more dances, and there were forfeits, and more |
|
1447 |
dances, and there was cake, and there was negus, and there |
|
1448 |
was a great piece of Cold Roast, and there was a great piece |
|
1449 |
of Cold Boiled, and there were mince-pies, and plenty of beer. |
|
1450 |
But the great effect of the evening came after the Roast |
|
1451 |
and Boiled, when the fiddler (an artful dog, mind! The sort |
|
1452 |
of man who knew his business better than you or I could |
|
1453 |
have told it him!) struck up "Sir Roger de Coverley." Then |
|
1454 |
old Fezziwig stood out to dance with Mrs. Fezziwig. Top |
|
1455 |
couple, too; with a good stiff piece of work cut out for them; |
|
1456 |
three or four and twenty pair of partners; people who were |
|
1457 |
not to be trifled with; people who would dance, and had no |
|
1458 |
notion of walking. |
|
1459 |
||
1460 |
But if they had been twice as many--ah, four times--old |
|
1461 |
Fezziwig would have been a match for them, and so would |
|
1462 |
Mrs. Fezziwig. As to her, she was worthy to be his partner |
|
1463 |
in every sense of the term. If that's not high praise, tell me |
|
1464 |
higher, and I'll use it. A positive light appeared to issue |
|
1465 |
from Fezziwig's calves. They shone in every part of the |
|
1466 |
dance like moons. You couldn't have predicted, at any given |
|
1467 |
time, what would have become of them next. And when old |
|
1468 |
Fezziwig and Mrs. Fezziwig had gone all through the dance; |
|
1469 |
advance and retire, both hands to your partner, bow and |
|
1470 |
curtsey, corkscrew, thread-the-needle, and back again to |
|
1471 |
your place; Fezziwig "cut"--cut so deftly, that he appeared |
|
1472 |
to wink with his legs, and came upon his feet again without |
|
1473 |
a stagger. |
|
1474 |
||
1475 |
When the clock struck eleven, this domestic ball broke up. |
|
1476 |
Mr. and Mrs. Fezziwig took their stations, one on either side |
|
1477 |
of the door, and shaking hands with every person individually |
|
1478 |
as he or she went out, wished him or her a Merry Christmas. |
|
1479 |
When everybody had retired but the two 'prentices, they did |
|
1480 |
the same to them; and thus the cheerful voices died away, |
|
1481 |
and the lads were left to their beds; which were under a |
|
1482 |
counter in the back-shop. |
|
1483 |
||
1484 |
During the whole of this time, Scrooge had acted like a |
|
1485 |
man out of his wits. His heart and soul were in the scene, |
|
1486 |
and with his former self. He corroborated everything, |
|
1487 |
remembered everything, enjoyed everything, and underwent |
|
1488 |
the strangest agitation. It was not until now, when the |
|
1489 |
bright faces of his former self and Dick were turned from |
|
1490 |
them, that he remembered the Ghost, and became conscious |
|
1491 |
that it was looking full upon him, while the light upon its |
|
1492 |
head burnt very clear. |
|
1493 |
||
1494 |
"A small matter," said the Ghost, "to make these silly |
|
1495 |
folks so full of gratitude." |
|
1496 |
||
1497 |
"Small!" echoed Scrooge. |
|
1498 |
||
1499 |
The Spirit signed to him to listen to the two apprentices, |
|
1500 |
who were pouring out their hearts in praise of Fezziwig: |
|
1501 |
and when he had done so, said, |
|
1502 |
||
1503 |
"Why! Is it not? He has spent but a few pounds of |
|
1504 |
your mortal money: three or four perhaps. Is that so |
|
1505 |
much that he deserves this praise?" |
|
1506 |
||
1507 |
"It isn't that," said Scrooge, heated by the remark, and |
|
1508 |
speaking unconsciously like his former, not his latter, self. |
|
1509 |
"It isn't that, Spirit. He has the power to render us happy |
|
1510 |
or unhappy; to make our service light or burdensome; a |
|
1511 |
pleasure or a toil. Say that his power lies in words and |
|
1512 |
looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it is |
|
1513 |
impossible to add and count 'em up: what then? The happiness |
|
1514 |
he gives, is quite as great as if it cost a fortune." |
|
1515 |
||
1516 |
He felt the Spirit's glance, and stopped. |
|
1517 |
||
1518 |
"What is the matter?" asked the Ghost. |
|
1519 |
||
1520 |
"Nothing particular," said Scrooge. |
|
1521 |
||
1522 |
"Something, I think?" the Ghost insisted. |
|
1523 |
||
1524 |
"No," said Scrooge, "No. I should like to be able to say |
|
1525 |
a word or two to my clerk just now. That's all." |
|
1526 |
||
1527 |
His former self turned down the lamps as he gave utterance |
|
1528 |
to the wish; and Scrooge and the Ghost again stood side by |
|
1529 |
side in the open air. |
|
1530 |
||
1531 |
"My time grows short," observed the Spirit. "Quick!" |
|
1532 |
||
1533 |
This was not addressed to Scrooge, or to any one whom he |
|
1534 |
could see, but it produced an immediate effect. For again |
|
1535 |
Scrooge saw himself. He was older now; a man in the prime |
|
1536 |
of life. His face had not the harsh and rigid lines of later |
|
1537 |
years; but it had begun to wear the signs of care and avarice. |
|
1538 |
There was an eager, greedy, restless motion in the eye, which |
|
1539 |
showed the passion that had taken root, and where the |
|
1540 |
shadow of the growing tree would fall. |
|
1541 |
||
1542 |
He was not alone, but sat by the side of a fair young |
|
1543 |
girl in a mourning-dress: in whose eyes there were tears, |
|
1544 |
which sparkled in the light that shone out of the Ghost of |
|
1545 |
Christmas Past. |
|
1546 |
||
1547 |
"It matters little," she said, softly. "To you, very little. |
|
1548 |
Another idol has displaced me; and if it can cheer and comfort |
|
1549 |
you in time to come, as I would have tried to do, I have |
|
1550 |
no just cause to grieve." |
|
1551 |
||
1552 |
"What Idol has displaced you?" he rejoined. |
|
1553 |
||
1554 |
"A golden one." |
|
1555 |
||
1556 |
"This is the even-handed dealing of the world!" he said. |
|
1557 |
"There is nothing on which it is so hard as poverty; and |
|
1558 |
there is nothing it professes to condemn with such severity |
|
1559 |
as the pursuit of wealth!" |
|
1560 |
||
1561 |
"You fear the world too much," she answered, gently. |
|
1562 |
"All your other hopes have merged into the hope of being |
|
1563 |
beyond the chance of its sordid reproach. I have seen your |
|
1564 |
nobler aspirations fall off one by one, until the master-passion, |
|
1565 |
Gain, engrosses you. Have I not?" |
|
1566 |
||
1567 |
"What then?" he retorted. "Even if I have grown so |
|
1568 |
much wiser, what then? I am not changed towards you." |
|
1569 |
||
1570 |
She shook her head. |
|
1571 |
||
1572 |
"Am I?" |
|
1573 |
||
1574 |
"Our contract is an old one. It was made when we were |
|
1575 |
both poor and content to be so, until, in good season, we could |
|
1576 |
improve our worldly fortune by our patient industry. You |
|
1577 |
are changed. When it was made, you were another man." |
|
1578 |
||
1579 |
"I was a boy," he said impatiently. |
|
1580 |
||
1581 |
"Your own feeling tells you that you were not what you |
|
1582 |
are," she returned. "I am. That which promised happiness |
|
1583 |
when we were one in heart, is fraught with misery now that |
|
1584 |
we are two. How often and how keenly I have thought of |
|
1585 |
this, I will not say. It is enough that I have thought of it, |
|
1586 |
and can release you." |
|
1587 |
||
1588 |
"Have I ever sought release?" |
|
1589 |
||
1590 |
"In words. No. Never." |
|
1591 |
||
1592 |
"In what, then?" |
|
1593 |
||
1594 |
"In a changed nature; in an altered spirit; in another |
|
1595 |
atmosphere of life; another Hope as its great end. In |
|
1596 |
everything that made my love of any worth or value in your |
|
1597 |
sight. If this had never been between us," said the girl, |
|
1598 |
looking mildly, but with steadiness, upon him; "tell me, |
|
1599 |
would you seek me out and try to win me now? Ah, no!" |
|
1600 |
||
1601 |
He seemed to yield to the justice of this supposition, in |
|
1602 |
spite of himself. But he said with a struggle, "You think |
|
1603 |
not." |
|
1604 |
||
1605 |
"I would gladly think otherwise if I could," she answered, |
|
1606 |
"Heaven knows! When I have learned a Truth like this, |
|
1607 |
I know how strong and irresistible it must be. But if you |
|
1608 |
were free to-day, to-morrow, yesterday, can even I believe |
|
1609 |
that you would choose a dowerless girl--you who, in your |
|
1610 |
very confidence with her, weigh everything by Gain: or, |
|
1611 |
choosing her, if for a moment you were false enough to your |
|
1612 |
one guiding principle to do so, do I not know that your |
|
1613 |
repentance and regret would surely follow? I do; and I |
|
1614 |
release you. With a full heart, for the love of him you |
|
1615 |
once were." |
|
1616 |
||
1617 |
He was about to speak; but with her head turned from |
|
1618 |
him, she resumed. |
|
1619 |
||
1620 |
"You may--the memory of what is past half makes me |
|
1621 |
hope you will--have pain in this. A very, very brief time, |
|
1622 |
and you will dismiss the recollection of it, gladly, as an |
|
1623 |
unprofitable dream, from which it happened well that you |
|
1624 |
awoke. May you be happy in the life you have chosen!" |
|
1625 |
||
1626 |
She left him, and they parted. |
|
1627 |
||
1628 |
"Spirit!" said Scrooge, "show me no more! Conduct |
|
1629 |
me home. Why do you delight to torture me?" |
|
1630 |
||
1631 |
"One shadow more!" exclaimed the Ghost. |
|
1632 |
||
1633 |
"No more!" cried Scrooge. "No more. I don't wish to |
|
1634 |
see it. Show me no more!" |
|
1635 |
||
1636 |
But the relentless Ghost pinioned him in both his arms, |
|
1637 |
and forced him to observe what happened next. |
|
1638 |
||
1639 |
They were in another scene and place; a room, not very |
|
1640 |
large or handsome, but full of comfort. Near to the winter |
|
1641 |
fire sat a beautiful young girl, so like that last that Scrooge |
|
1642 |
believed it was the same, until he saw her, now a comely |
|
1643 |
matron, sitting opposite her daughter. The noise in this |
|
1644 |
room was perfectly tumultuous, for there were more children |
|
1645 |
there, than Scrooge in his agitated state of mind could count; |
|
1646 |
and, unlike the celebrated herd in the poem, they were not |
|
1647 |
forty children conducting themselves like one, but every |
|
1648 |
child was conducting itself like forty. The consequences |
|
1649 |
were uproarious beyond belief; but no one seemed to care; |
|
1650 |
on the contrary, the mother and daughter laughed heartily, |
|
1651 |
and enjoyed it very much; and the latter, soon beginning to |
|
1652 |
mingle in the sports, got pillaged by the young brigands |
|
1653 |
most ruthlessly. What would I not have given to be one of |
|
1654 |
them! Though I never could have been so rude, no, no! I |
|
1655 |
wouldn't for the wealth of all the world have crushed that |
|
1656 |
braided hair, and torn it down; and for the precious little |
|
1657 |
shoe, I wouldn't have plucked it off, God bless my soul! to |
|
1658 |
save my life. As to measuring her waist in sport, as they |
|
1659 |
did, bold young brood, I couldn't have done it; I should |
|
1660 |
have expected my arm to have grown round it for a punishment, |
|
1661 |
and never come straight again. And yet I should |
|
1662 |
have dearly liked, I own, to have touched her lips; to have |
|
1663 |
questioned her, that she might have opened them; to have |
|
1664 |
looked upon the lashes of her downcast eyes, and never |
|
1665 |
raised a blush; to have let loose waves of hair, an inch of |
|
1666 |
which would be a keepsake beyond price: in short, I should |
|
1667 |
have liked, I do confess, to have had the lightest licence |
|
1668 |
of a child, and yet to have been man enough to know its |
|
1669 |
value. |
|
1670 |
||
1671 |
But now a knocking at the door was heard, and such a |
|
1672 |
rush immediately ensued that she with laughing face and |
|
1673 |
plundered dress was borne towards it the centre of a flushed |
|
1674 |
and boisterous group, just in time to greet the father, who |
|
1675 |
came home attended by a man laden with Christmas toys |
|
1676 |
and presents. Then the shouting and the struggling, and |
|
1677 |
the onslaught that was made on the defenceless porter! |
|
1678 |
The scaling him with chairs for ladders to dive into his |
|
1679 |
pockets, despoil him of brown-paper parcels, hold on tight |
|
1680 |
by his cravat, hug him round his neck, pommel his back, |
|
1681 |
and kick his legs in irrepressible affection! The shouts of |
|
1682 |
wonder and delight with which the development of every |
|
1683 |
package was received! The terrible announcement that the |
|
1684 |
baby had been taken in the act of putting a doll's frying-pan |
|
1685 |
into his mouth, and was more than suspected of having |
|
1686 |
swallowed a fictitious turkey, glued on a wooden platter! |
|
1687 |
The immense relief of finding this a false alarm! The joy, |
|
1688 |
and gratitude, and ecstasy! They are all indescribable alike. |
|
1689 |
It is enough that by degrees the children and their emotions |
|
1690 |
got out of the parlour, and by one stair at a time, up to the |
|
1691 |
top of the house; where they went to bed, and so subsided. |
|
1692 |
||
1693 |
And now Scrooge looked on more attentively than ever, |
|
1694 |
when the master of the house, having his daughter leaning |
|
1695 |
fondly on him, sat down with her and her mother at his |
|
1696 |
own fireside; and when he thought that such another |
|
1697 |
creature, quite as graceful and as full of promise, might |
|
1698 |
have called him father, and been a spring-time in the |
|
1699 |
haggard winter of his life, his sight grew very dim indeed. |
|
1700 |
||
1701 |
"Belle," said the husband, turning to his wife with a |
|
1702 |
smile, "I saw an old friend of yours this afternoon." |
|
1703 |
||
1704 |
"Who was it?" |
|
1705 |
||
1706 |
"Guess!" |
|
1707 |
||
1708 |
"How can I? Tut, don't I know?" she added in the |
|
1709 |
same breath, laughing as he laughed. "Mr. Scrooge." |
|
1710 |
||
1711 |
"Mr. Scrooge it was. I passed his office window; and as |
|
1712 |
it was not shut up, and he had a candle inside, I could |
|
1713 |
scarcely help seeing him. His partner lies upon the point |
|
1714 |
of death, I hear; and there he sat alone. Quite alone in |
|
1715 |
the world, I do believe." |
|
1716 |
||
1717 |
"Spirit!" said Scrooge in a broken voice, "remove me |
|
1718 |
from this place." |
|
1719 |
||
1720 |
"I told you these were shadows of the things that have |
|
1721 |
been," said the Ghost. "That they are what they are, do |
|
1722 |
not blame me!" |
|
1723 |
||
1724 |
"Remove me!" Scrooge exclaimed, "I cannot bear it!" |
|
1725 |
||
1726 |
He turned upon the Ghost, and seeing that it looked upon |
|
1727 |
him with a face, in which in some strange way there were |
|
1728 |
fragments of all the faces it had shown him, wrestled with it. |
|
1729 |
||
1730 |
"Leave me! Take me back. Haunt me no longer!" |
|
1731 |
||
1732 |
In the struggle, if that can be called a struggle in which |
|
1733 |
the Ghost with no visible resistance on its own part was |
|
1734 |
undisturbed by any effort of its adversary, Scrooge observed |
|
1735 |
that its light was burning high and bright; and dimly |
|
1736 |
connecting that with its influence over him, he seized the |
|
1737 |
extinguisher-cap, and by a sudden action pressed it down |
|
1738 |
upon its head. |
|
1739 |
||
1740 |
The Spirit dropped beneath it, so that the extinguisher |
|
1741 |
covered its whole form; but though Scrooge pressed it down |
|
1742 |
with all his force, he could not hide the light: which streamed |
|
1743 |
from under it, in an unbroken flood upon the ground. |
|
1744 |
||
1745 |
He was conscious of being exhausted, and overcome by an |
|
1746 |
irresistible drowsiness; and, further, of being in his own |
|
1747 |
bedroom. He gave the cap a parting squeeze, in which his hand |
|
1748 |
relaxed; and had barely time to reel to bed, before he sank |
|
1749 |
into a heavy sleep. |
|
1750 |
||
1751 |
||
1752 |
STAVE III: THE SECOND OF THE THREE SPIRITS |
|
1753 |
||
1754 |
AWAKING in the middle of a prodigiously tough snore, and |
|
1755 |
sitting up in bed to get his thoughts together, Scrooge had |
|
1756 |
no occasion to be told that the bell was again upon the |
|
1757 |
stroke of One. He felt that he was restored to consciousness |
|
1758 |
in the right nick of time, for the especial purpose of holding |
|
1759 |
a conference with the second messenger despatched to him |
|
1760 |
through Jacob Marley's intervention. But finding that he |
|
1761 |
turned uncomfortably cold when he began to wonder which |
|
1762 |
of his curtains this new spectre would draw back, he put |
|
1763 |
them every one aside with his own hands; and lying down |
|
1764 |
again, established a sharp look-out all round the bed. For |
|
1765 |
he wished to challenge the Spirit on the moment of its |
|
1766 |
appearance, and did not wish to be taken by surprise, and |
|
1767 |
made nervous. |
|
1768 |
||
1769 |
Gentlemen of the free-and-easy sort, who plume themselves |
|
1770 |
on being acquainted with a move or two, and being usually |
|
1771 |
equal to the time-of-day, express the wide range of their |
|
1772 |
capacity for adventure by observing that they are good for |
|
1773 |
anything from pitch-and-toss to manslaughter; between which |
|
1774 |
opposite extremes, no doubt, there lies a tolerably wide and |
|
1775 |
comprehensive range of subjects. Without venturing for |
|
1776 |
Scrooge quite as hardily as this, I don't mind calling on you |
|
1777 |
to believe that he was ready for a good broad field of |
|
1778 |
strange appearances, and that nothing between a baby and |
|
1779 |
rhinoceros would have astonished him very much. |
|
1780 |
||
1781 |
Now, being prepared for almost anything, he was not by |
|
1782 |
any means prepared for nothing; and, consequently, when the |
|
1783 |
Bell struck One, and no shape appeared, he was taken with a |
|
1784 |
violent fit of trembling. Five minutes, ten minutes, a quarter |
|
1785 |
of an hour went by, yet nothing came. All this time, he lay |
|
1786 |
upon his bed, the very core and centre of a blaze of ruddy |
|
1787 |
light, which streamed upon it when the clock proclaimed the |
|
1788 |
hour; and which, being only light, was more alarming than |
|
1789 |
a dozen ghosts, as he was powerless to make out what it |
|
1790 |
meant, or would be at; and was sometimes apprehensive |
|
1791 |
that he might be at that very moment an interesting case of |
|
1792 |
spontaneous combustion, without having the consolation of |
|
1793 |
knowing it. At last, however, he began to think--as you or |
|
1794 |
I would have thought at first; for it is always the person not |
|
1795 |
in the predicament who knows what ought to have been done |
|
1796 |
in it, and would unquestionably have done it too--at last, I |
|
1797 |
say, he began to think that the source and secret of this |
|
1798 |
ghostly light might be in the adjoining room, from whence, |
|
1799 |
on further tracing it, it seemed to shine. This idea taking |
|
1800 |
full possession of his mind, he got up softly and shuffled in |
|
1801 |
his slippers to the door. |
|
1802 |
||
1803 |
The moment Scrooge's hand was on the lock, a strange |
|
1804 |
voice called him by his name, and bade him enter. He |
|
1805 |
obeyed. |
|
1806 |
||
1807 |
It was his own room. There was no doubt about that. |
|
1808 |
But it had undergone a surprising transformation. The walls |
|
1809 |
and ceiling were so hung with living green, that it looked a |
|
1810 |
perfect grove; from every part of which, bright gleaming |
|
1811 |
berries glistened. The crisp leaves of holly, mistletoe, and |
|
1812 |
ivy reflected back the light, as if so many little mirrors had |
|
1813 |
been scattered there; and such a mighty blaze went roaring |
|
1814 |
up the chimney, as that dull petrification of a hearth had |
|
1815 |
never known in Scrooge's time, or Marley's, or for many and |
|
1816 |
many a winter season gone. Heaped up on the floor, to form |
|
1817 |
a kind of throne, were turkeys, geese, game, poultry, brawn, |
|
1818 |
great joints of meat, sucking-pigs, long wreaths of sausages, |
|
1819 |
mince-pies, plum-puddings, barrels of oysters, red-hot chestnuts, |
|
1820 |
cherry-cheeked apples, juicy oranges, luscious pears, |
|
1821 |
immense twelfth-cakes, and seething bowls of punch, that |
|
1822 |
made the chamber dim with their delicious steam. In easy |
|
1823 |
state upon this couch, there sat a jolly Giant, glorious to |
|
1824 |
see; who bore a glowing torch, in shape not unlike Plenty's |
|
1825 |
horn, and held it up, high up, to shed its light on Scrooge, |
|
1826 |
as he came peeping round the door. |
|
1827 |
||
1828 |
"Come in!" exclaimed the Ghost. "Come in! and know |
|
1829 |
me better, man!" |
|
1830 |
||
1831 |
Scrooge entered timidly, and hung his head before this |
|
1832 |
Spirit. He was not the dogged Scrooge he had been; and |
|
1833 |
though the Spirit's eyes were clear and kind, he did not like |
|
1834 |
to meet them. |
|
1835 |
||
1836 |
"I am the Ghost of Christmas Present," said the Spirit. |
|
1837 |
"Look upon me!" |
|
1838 |
||
1839 |
Scrooge reverently did so. It was clothed in one simple |
|
1840 |
green robe, or mantle, bordered with white fur. This garment |
|
1841 |
hung so loosely on the figure, that its capacious breast was |
|
1842 |
bare, as if disdaining to be warded or concealed by any |
|
1843 |
artifice. Its feet, observable beneath the ample folds of the |
|
1844 |
garment, were also bare; and on its head it wore no other |
|
1845 |
covering than a holly wreath, set here and there with shining |
|
1846 |
icicles. Its dark brown curls were long and free; free as its |
|
1847 |
genial face, its sparkling eye, its open hand, its cheery voice, |
|
1848 |
its unconstrained demeanour, and its joyful air. Girded |
|
1849 |
round its middle was an antique scabbard; but no sword |
|
1850 |
was in it, and the ancient sheath was eaten up with rust. |
|
1851 |
||
1852 |
"You have never seen the like of me before!" exclaimed |
|
1853 |
the Spirit. |
|
1854 |
||
1855 |
"Never," Scrooge made answer to it. |
|
1856 |
||
1857 |
"Have never walked forth with the younger members of |
|
1858 |
my family; meaning (for I am very young) my elder brothers |
|
1859 |
born in these later years?" pursued the Phantom. |
|
1860 |
||
1861 |
"I don't think I have," said Scrooge. "I am afraid I have |
|
1862 |
not. Have you had many brothers, Spirit?" |
|
1863 |
||
1864 |
"More than eighteen hundred," said the Ghost. |
|
1865 |
||
1866 |
"A tremendous family to provide for!" muttered Scrooge. |
|
1867 |
||
1868 |
The Ghost of Christmas Present rose. |
|
1869 |
||
1870 |
"Spirit," said Scrooge submissively, "conduct me where |
|
1871 |
you will. I went forth last night on compulsion, and I learnt |
|
1872 |
a lesson which is working now. To-night, if you have aught |
|
1873 |
to teach me, let me profit by it." |
|
1874 |
||
1875 |
"Touch my robe!" |
|
1876 |
||
1877 |
Scrooge did as he was told, and held it fast. |
|
1878 |
||
1879 |
Holly, mistletoe, red berries, ivy, turkeys, geese, game, |
|
1880 |
poultry, brawn, meat, pigs, sausages, oysters, pies, puddings, |
|
1881 |
fruit, and punch, all vanished instantly. So did the room, |
|
1882 |
the fire, the ruddy glow, the hour of night, and they stood |
|
1883 |
in the city streets on Christmas morning, where (for the |
|
1884 |
weather was severe) the people made a rough, but brisk and |
|
1885 |
not unpleasant kind of music, in scraping the snow from the |
|
1886 |
pavement in front of their dwellings, and from the tops of |
|
1887 |
their houses, whence it was mad delight to the boys to see |
|
1888 |
it come plumping down into the road below, and splitting |
|
1889 |
into artificial little snow-storms. |
|
1890 |
||
1891 |
The house fronts looked black enough, and the windows |
|
1892 |
blacker, contrasting with the smooth white sheet of snow |
|
1893 |
upon the roofs, and with the dirtier snow upon the ground; |
|
1894 |
which last deposit had been ploughed up in deep furrows by |
|
1895 |
the heavy wheels of carts and waggons; furrows that crossed |
|
1896 |
and re-crossed each other hundreds of times where the great |
|
1897 |
streets branched off; and made intricate channels, hard to trace |
|
1898 |
in the thick yellow mud and icy water. The sky was gloomy, |
|
1899 |
and the shortest streets were choked up with a dingy mist, |
|
1900 |
half thawed, half frozen, whose heavier particles descended |
|
1901 |
in a shower of sooty atoms, as if all the chimneys in Great |
|
1902 |
Britain had, by one consent, caught fire, and were blazing away |
|
1903 |
to their dear hearts' content. There was nothing very cheerful |
|
1904 |
in the climate or the town, and yet was there an air of |
|
1905 |
cheerfulness abroad that the clearest summer air and brightest |
|
1906 |
summer sun might have endeavoured to diffuse in vain. |
|
1907 |
||
1908 |
For, the people who were shovelling away on the housetops |
|
1909 |
were jovial and full of glee; calling out to one another |
|
1910 |
from the parapets, and now and then exchanging a facetious |
|
1911 |
snowball--better-natured missile far than many a wordy jest-- |
|
1912 |
laughing heartily if it went right and not less heartily if it |
|
1913 |
went wrong. The poulterers' shops were still half open, and the |
|
1914 |
fruiterers' were radiant in their glory. There were great, round, |
|
1915 |
pot-bellied baskets of chestnuts, shaped like the waistcoats |
|
1916 |
of jolly old gentlemen, lolling at the doors, and tumbling out |
|
1917 |
into the street in their apoplectic opulence. There were |
|
1918 |
ruddy, brown-faced, broad-girthed Spanish Onions, shining in |
|
1919 |
the fatness of their growth like Spanish Friars, and winking |
|
1920 |
from their shelves in wanton slyness at the girls as they went |
|
1921 |
by, and glanced demurely at the hung-up mistletoe. There were |
|
1922 |
pears and apples, clustered high in blooming pyramids; there |
|
1923 |
were bunches of grapes, made, in the shopkeepers' benevolence |
|
1924 |
to dangle from conspicuous hooks, that people's mouths might |
|
1925 |
water gratis as they passed; there were piles of filberts, mossy |
|
1926 |
and brown, recalling, in their fragrance, ancient walks among |
|
1927 |
the woods, and pleasant shufflings ankle deep through withered |
|
1928 |
leaves; there were Norfolk Biffins, squat and swarthy, setting |
|
1929 |
off the yellow of the oranges and lemons, and, in the great |
|
1930 |
compactness of their juicy persons, urgently entreating and |
|
1931 |
beseeching to be carried home in paper bags and eaten after |
|
1932 |
dinner. The very gold and silver fish, set forth among |
|
1933 |
these choice fruits in a bowl, though members of a dull and |
|
1934 |
stagnant-blooded race, appeared to know that there was |
|
1935 |
something going on; and, to a fish, went gasping round and |
|
1936 |
round their little world in slow and passionless excitement. |
|
1937 |
||
1938 |
The Grocers'! oh, the Grocers'! nearly closed, with perhaps |
|
1939 |
two shutters down, or one; but through those gaps such |
|
1940 |
glimpses! It was not alone that the scales descending on the |
|
1941 |
counter made a merry sound, or that the twine and roller |
|
1942 |
parted company so briskly, or that the canisters were rattled |
|
1943 |
up and down like juggling tricks, or even that the blended |
|
1944 |
scents of tea and coffee were so grateful to the nose, or even |
|
1945 |
that the raisins were so plentiful and rare, the almonds so |
|
1946 |
extremely white, the sticks of cinnamon so long and straight, |
|
1947 |
the other spices so delicious, the candied fruits so caked and |
|
1948 |
spotted with molten sugar as to make the coldest lookers-on |
|
1949 |
feel faint and subsequently bilious. Nor was it that the figs |
|
1950 |
were moist and pulpy, or that the French plums blushed in |
|
1951 |
modest tartness from their highly-decorated boxes, or that |
|
1952 |
everything was good to eat and in its Christmas dress; but |
|
1953 |
the customers were all so hurried and so eager in the hopeful |
|
1954 |
promise of the day, that they tumbled up against each other |
|
1955 |
at the door, crashing their wicker baskets wildly, and left |
|
1956 |
their purchases upon the counter, and came running back to |
|
1957 |
fetch them, and committed hundreds of the like mistakes, in |
|
1958 |
the best humour possible; while the Grocer and his people |
|
1959 |
were so frank and fresh that the polished hearts with which |
|
1960 |
they fastened their aprons behind might have been their own, |
|
1961 |
worn outside for general inspection, and for Christmas daws |
|
1962 |
to peck at if they chose. |
|
1963 |
||
1964 |
But soon the steeples called good people all, to church and |
|
1965 |
chapel, and away they came, flocking through the streets in |
|
1966 |
their best clothes, and with their gayest faces. And at the |
|
1967 |
same time there emerged from scores of bye-streets, lanes, and |
|
1968 |
nameless turnings, innumerable people, carrying their dinners |
|
1969 |
to the bakers' shops. The sight of these poor revellers |
|
1970 |
appeared to interest the Spirit very much, for he stood with |
|
1971 |
Scrooge beside him in a baker's doorway, and taking off the |
|
1972 |
covers as their bearers passed, sprinkled incense on their |
|
1973 |
dinners from his torch. And it was a very uncommon kind |
|
1974 |
of torch, for once or twice when there were angry words |
|
1975 |
between some dinner-carriers who had jostled each other, he |
|
1976 |
shed a few drops of water on them from it, and their good |
|
1977 |
humour was restored directly. For they said, it was a shame |
|
1978 |
to quarrel upon Christmas Day. And so it was! God love |
|
1979 |
it, so it was! |
|
1980 |
||
1981 |
In time the bells ceased, and the bakers were shut up; and |
|
1982 |
yet there was a genial shadowing forth of all these dinners |
|
1983 |
and the progress of their cooking, in the thawed blotch of |
|
1984 |
wet above each baker's oven; where the pavement smoked as |
|
1985 |
if its stones were cooking too. |
|
1986 |
||
1987 |
"Is there a peculiar flavour in what you sprinkle from |
|
1988 |
your torch?" asked Scrooge. |
|
1989 |
||
1990 |
"There is. My own." |
|
1991 |
||
1992 |
"Would it apply to any kind of dinner on this day?" |
|
1993 |
asked Scrooge. |
|
1994 |
||
1995 |
"To any kindly given. To a poor one most." |
|
1996 |
||
1997 |
"Why to a poor one most?" asked Scrooge. |
|
1998 |
||
1999 |
"Because it needs it most." |
|
2000 |
||
2001 |
"Spirit," said Scrooge, after a moment's thought, "I wonder |
|
2002 |
you, of all the beings in the many worlds about us, should |
|
2003 |
desire to cramp these people's opportunities of innocent |
|
2004 |
enjoyment." |
|
2005 |
||
2006 |
"I!" cried the Spirit. |
|
2007 |
||
2008 |
"You would deprive them of their means of dining every |
|
2009 |
seventh day, often the only day on which they can be said |
|
2010 |
to dine at all," said Scrooge. "Wouldn't you?" |
|
2011 |
||
2012 |
"I!" cried the Spirit. |
|
2013 |
||
2014 |
"You seek to close these places on the Seventh Day?" said |
|
2015 |
Scrooge. "And it comes to the same thing." |
|
2016 |
||
2017 |
"I seek!" exclaimed the Spirit. |
|
2018 |
||
2019 |
"Forgive me if I am wrong. It has been done in your |
|
2020 |
name, or at least in that of your family," said Scrooge. |
|
2021 |
||
2022 |
"There are some upon this earth of yours," returned the Spirit, |
|
2023 |
"who lay claim to know us, and who do their deeds of passion, |
|
2024 |
pride, ill-will, hatred, envy, bigotry, and selfishness |
|
2025 |
in our name, who are as strange to us and all our kith and |
|
2026 |
kin, as if they had never lived. Remember that, and charge |
|
2027 |
their doings on themselves, not us." |
|
2028 |
||
2029 |
Scrooge promised that he would; and they went on, |
|
2030 |
invisible, as they had been before, into the suburbs of the |
|
2031 |
town. It was a remarkable quality of the Ghost (which |
|
2032 |
Scrooge had observed at the baker's), that notwithstanding |
|
2033 |
his gigantic size, he could accommodate himself to any place |
|
2034 |
with ease; and that he stood beneath a low roof quite as |
|
2035 |
gracefully and like a supernatural creature, as it was possible |
|
2036 |
he could have done in any lofty hall. |
|
2037 |
||
2038 |
And perhaps it was the pleasure the good Spirit had in |
|
2039 |
showing off this power of his, or else it was his own kind, |
|
2040 |
generous, hearty nature, and his sympathy with all poor |
|
2041 |
men, that led him straight to Scrooge's clerk's; for there he |
|
2042 |
went, and took Scrooge with him, holding to his robe; and |
|
2043 |
on the threshold of the door the Spirit smiled, and stopped |
|
2044 |
to bless Bob Cratchit's dwelling with the sprinkling of his |
|
2045 |
torch. Think of that! Bob had but fifteen "Bob" a-week |
|
2046 |
himself; he pocketed on Saturdays but fifteen copies of his |
|
2047 |
Christian name; and yet the Ghost of Christmas Present |
|
2048 |
blessed his four-roomed house! |
|
2049 |
||
2050 |
Then up rose Mrs. Cratchit, Cratchit's wife, dressed out |
|
2051 |
but poorly in a twice-turned gown, but brave in ribbons, |
|
2052 |
which are cheap and make a goodly show for sixpence; and |
|
2053 |
she laid the cloth, assisted by Belinda Cratchit, second of |
|
2054 |
her daughters, also brave in ribbons; while Master Peter |
|
2055 |
Cratchit plunged a fork into the saucepan of potatoes, and |
|
2056 |
getting the corners of his monstrous shirt collar (Bob's private |
|
2057 |
property, conferred upon his son and heir in honour of the |
|
2058 |
day) into his mouth, rejoiced to find himself so gallantly |
|
2059 |
attired, and yearned to show his linen in the fashionable Parks. |
|
2060 |
And now two smaller Cratchits, boy and girl, came tearing |
|
2061 |
in, screaming that outside the baker's they had smelt the |
|
2062 |
goose, and known it for their own; and basking in luxurious |
|
2063 |
thoughts of sage and onion, these young Cratchits danced |
|
2064 |
about the table, and exalted Master Peter Cratchit to the |
|
2065 |
skies, while he (not proud, although his collars nearly choked |
|
2066 |
him) blew the fire, until the slow potatoes bubbling up, |
|
2067 |
knocked loudly at the saucepan-lid to be let out and |
|
2068 |
peeled. |
|
2069 |
||
2070 |
"What has ever got your precious father then?" said Mrs. |
|
2071 |
Cratchit. "And your brother, Tiny Tim! And Martha |
|
2072 |
warn't as late last Christmas Day by half-an-hour?" |
|
2073 |
||
2074 |
"Here's Martha, mother!" said a girl, appearing as she |
|
2075 |
spoke. |
|
2076 |
||
2077 |
"Here's Martha, mother!" cried the two young Cratchits. |
|
2078 |
"Hurrah! There's such a goose, Martha!" |
|
2079 |
||
2080 |
"Why, bless your heart alive, my dear, how late you are!" |
|
2081 |
said Mrs. Cratchit, kissing her a dozen times, and taking off |
|
2082 |
her shawl and bonnet for her with officious zeal. |
|
2083 |
||
2084 |
"We'd a deal of work to finish up last night," replied the |
|
2085 |
girl, "and had to clear away this morning, mother!" |
|
2086 |
||
2087 |
"Well! Never mind so long as you are come," said Mrs. |
|
2088 |
Cratchit. "Sit ye down before the fire, my dear, and have |
|
2089 |
a warm, Lord bless ye!" |
|
2090 |
||
2091 |
"No, no! There's father coming," cried the two young |
|
2092 |
Cratchits, who were everywhere at once. "Hide, Martha, |
|
2093 |
hide!" |
|
2094 |
||
2095 |
So Martha hid herself, and in came little Bob, the father, |
|
2096 |
with at least three feet of comforter exclusive of the fringe, |
|
2097 |
hanging down before him; and his threadbare clothes darned |
|
2098 |
up and brushed, to look seasonable; and Tiny Tim upon his |
|
2099 |
shoulder. Alas for Tiny Tim, he bore a little crutch, and |
|
2100 |
had his limbs supported by an iron frame! |
|
2101 |
||
2102 |
"Why, where's our Martha?" cried Bob Cratchit, looking |
|
2103 |
round. |
|
2104 |
||
2105 |
"Not coming," said Mrs. Cratchit. |
|
2106 |
||
2107 |
"Not coming!" said Bob, with a sudden declension in his |
|
2108 |
high spirits; for he had been Tim's blood horse all the way |
|
2109 |
from church, and had come home rampant. "Not coming |
|
2110 |
upon Christmas Day!" |
|
2111 |
||
2112 |
Martha didn't like to see him disappointed, if it were only |
|
2113 |
in joke; so she came out prematurely from behind the closet |
|
2114 |
door, and ran into his arms, while the two young Cratchits |
|
2115 |
hustled Tiny Tim, and bore him off into the wash-house, |
|
2116 |
that he might hear the pudding singing in the copper. |
|
2117 |
||
2118 |
"And how did little Tim behave?" asked Mrs. Cratchit, |
|
2119 |
when she had rallied Bob on his credulity, and Bob had |
|
2120 |
hugged his daughter to his heart's content. |
|
2121 |
||
2122 |
"As good as gold," said Bob, "and better. Somehow he |
|
2123 |
gets thoughtful, sitting by himself so much, and thinks the |
|
2124 |
strangest things you ever heard. He told me, coming home, |
|
2125 |
that he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he |
|
2126 |
was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember |
|
2127 |
upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind |
|
2128 |
men see." |
|
2129 |
||
2130 |
Bob's voice was tremulous when he told them this, and |
|
2131 |
trembled more when he said that Tiny Tim was growing |
|
2132 |
strong and hearty. |
|
2133 |
||
2134 |
His active little crutch was heard upon the floor, and back |
|
2135 |
came Tiny Tim before another word was spoken, escorted by |
|
2136 |
his brother and sister to his stool before the fire; and while |
|
2137 |
Bob, turning up his cuffs--as if, poor fellow, they were |
|
2138 |
capable of being made more shabby--compounded some hot |
|
2139 |
mixture in a jug with gin and lemons, and stirred it round |
|
2140 |
and round and put it on the hob to simmer; Master Peter, |
|
2141 |
and the two ubiquitous young Cratchits went to fetch the |
|
2142 |
goose, with which they soon returned in high procession. |
|
2143 |
||
2144 |
Such a bustle ensued that you might have thought a goose |
|
2145 |
the rarest of all birds; a feathered phenomenon, to which a |
|
2146 |
black swan was a matter of course--and in truth it was |
|
2147 |
something very like it in that house. Mrs. Cratchit made |
|
2148 |
the gravy (ready beforehand in a little saucepan) hissing hot; |
|
2149 |
Master Peter mashed the potatoes with incredible vigour; |
|
2150 |
Miss Belinda sweetened up the apple-sauce; Martha dusted |
|
2151 |
the hot plates; Bob took Tiny Tim beside him in a tiny |
|
2152 |
corner at the table; the two young Cratchits set chairs for |
|
2153 |
everybody, not forgetting themselves, and mounting guard |
|
2154 |
upon their posts, crammed spoons into their mouths, lest |
|
2155 |
they should shriek for goose before their turn came to be |
|
2156 |
helped. At last the dishes were set on, and grace was |
|
2157 |
said. It was succeeded by a breathless pause, as Mrs. |
|
2158 |
Cratchit, looking slowly all along the carving-knife, prepared |
|
2159 |
to plunge it in the breast; but when she did, and when the |
|
2160 |
long expected gush of stuffing issued forth, one murmur of |
|
2161 |
delight arose all round the board, and even Tiny Tim, |
|
2162 |
excited by the two young Cratchits, beat on the table with |
|
2163 |
the handle of his knife, and feebly cried Hurrah! |
|
2164 |
||
2165 |
There never was such a goose. Bob said he didn't believe |
|
2166 |
there ever was such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and |
|
2167 |
flavour, size and cheapness, were the themes of universal |
|
2168 |
admiration. Eked out by apple-sauce and mashed potatoes, |
|
2169 |
it was a sufficient dinner for the whole family; indeed, as |
|
2170 |
Mrs. Cratchit said with great delight (surveying one small |
|
2171 |
atom of a bone upon the dish), they hadn't ate it all at |
|
2172 |
last! Yet every one had had enough, and the youngest |
|
2173 |
Cratchits in particular, were steeped in sage and onion to |
|
2174 |
the eyebrows! But now, the plates being changed by Miss |
|
2175 |
Belinda, Mrs. Cratchit left the room alone--too nervous to |
|
2176 |
bear witnesses--to take the pudding up and bring it in. |
|
2177 |
||
2178 |
Suppose it should not be done enough! Suppose it should |
|
2179 |
break in turning out! Suppose somebody should have got |
|
2180 |
over the wall of the back-yard, and stolen it, while they |
|
2181 |
were merry with the goose--a supposition at which the two |
|
2182 |
young Cratchits became livid! All sorts of horrors were |
|
2183 |
supposed. |
|
2184 |
||
2185 |
Hallo! A great deal of steam! The pudding was out of |
|
2186 |
the copper. A smell like a washing-day! That was the |
|
2187 |
cloth. A smell like an eating-house and a pastrycook's next |
|
2188 |
door to each other, with a laundress's next door to that! |
|
2189 |
That was the pudding! In half a minute Mrs. Cratchit |
|
2190 |
entered--flushed, but smiling proudly--with the pudding, |
|
2191 |
like a speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half |
|
2192 |
of half-a-quartern of ignited brandy, and bedight with |
|
2193 |
Christmas holly stuck into the top. |
|
2194 |
||
2195 |
Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchit said, and calmly |
|
2196 |
too, that he regarded it as the greatest success achieved by |
|
2197 |
Mrs. Cratchit since their marriage. Mrs. Cratchit said that |
|
2198 |
now the weight was off her mind, she would confess she had |
|
2199 |
had her doubts about the quantity of flour. Everybody had |
|
2200 |
something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it |
|
2201 |
was at all a small pudding for a large family. It would have |
|
2202 |
been flat heresy to do so. Any Cratchit would have blushed |
|
2203 |
to hint at such a thing. |
|
2204 |
||
2205 |
At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the |
|
2206 |
hearth swept, and the fire made up. The compound in the |
|
2207 |
jug being tasted, and considered perfect, apples and oranges |
|
2208 |
were put upon the table, and a shovel-full of chestnuts on the |
|
2209 |
fire. Then all the Cratchit family drew round the hearth, in |
|
2210 |
what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a one; and |
|
2211 |
at Bob Cratchit's elbow stood the family display of glass. |
|
2212 |
Two tumblers, and a custard-cup without a handle. |
|
2213 |
||
2214 |
These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as |
|
2215 |
golden goblets would have done; and Bob served it out with |
|
2216 |
beaming looks, while the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and |
|
2217 |
cracked noisily. Then Bob proposed: |
|
2218 |
||
2219 |
"A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us!" |
|
2220 |
||
2221 |
Which all the family re-echoed. |
|
2222 |
||
2223 |
"God bless us every one!" said Tiny Tim, the last of all. |
|
2224 |
||
2225 |
He sat very close to his father's side upon his little |
|
2226 |
stool. Bob held his withered little hand in his, as if he |
|
2227 |
loved the child, and wished to keep him by his side, and |
|
2228 |
dreaded that he might be taken from him. |
|
2229 |
||
2230 |
"Spirit," said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt |
|
2231 |
before, "tell me if Tiny Tim will live." |
|
2232 |
||
2233 |
"I see a vacant seat," replied the Ghost, "in the poor |
|
2234 |
chimney-corner, and a crutch without an owner, carefully |
|
2235 |
preserved. If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, |
|
2236 |
the child will die." |
|
2237 |
||
2238 |
"No, no," said Scrooge. "Oh, no, kind Spirit! say he |
|
2239 |
will be spared." |
|
2240 |
||
2241 |
"If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, none |
|
2242 |
other of my race," returned the Ghost, "will find him here. |
|
2243 |
What then? If he be like to die, he had better do it, and |
|
2244 |
decrease the surplus population." |
|
2245 |
||
2246 |
Scrooge hung his head to hear his own words quoted by |
|
2247 |
the Spirit, and was overcome with penitence and grief. |
|
2248 |
||
2249 |
"Man," said the Ghost, "if man you be in heart, not |
|
2250 |
adamant, forbear that wicked cant until you have discovered |
|
2251 |
What the surplus is, and Where it is. Will you decide what |
|
2252 |
men shall live, what men shall die? It may be, that in the |
|
2253 |
sight of Heaven, you are more worthless and less fit to live |
|
2254 |
than millions like this poor man's child. Oh God! to hear |
|
2255 |
the Insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life |
|
2256 |
among his hungry brothers in the dust!" |
|
2257 |
||
2258 |
Scrooge bent before the Ghost's rebuke, and trembling cast |
|
2259 |
his eyes upon the ground. But he raised them speedily, on |
|
2260 |
hearing his own name. |
|
2261 |
||
2262 |
"Mr. Scrooge!" said Bob; "I'll give you Mr. Scrooge, the |
|
2263 |
Founder of the Feast!" |
|
2264 |
||
2265 |
"The Founder of the Feast indeed!" cried Mrs. Cratchit, |
|
2266 |
reddening. "I wish I had him here. I'd give him a piece |
|
2267 |
of my mind to feast upon, and I hope he'd have a good |
|
2268 |
appetite for it." |
|
2269 |
||
2270 |
"My dear," said Bob, "the children! Christmas Day." |
|
2271 |
||
2272 |
"It should be Christmas Day, I am sure," said she, "on |
|
2273 |
which one drinks the health of such an odious, stingy, hard, |
|
2274 |
unfeeling man as Mr. Scrooge. You know he is, Robert! |
|
2275 |
Nobody knows it better than you do, poor fellow!" |
|
2276 |
||
2277 |
"My dear," was Bob's mild answer, "Christmas Day." |
|
2278 |
||
2279 |
"I'll drink his health for your sake and the Day's," said |
|
2280 |
Mrs. Cratchit, "not for his. Long life to him! A merry |
|
2281 |
Christmas and a happy new year! He'll be very merry and |
|
2282 |
very happy, I have no doubt!" |
|
2283 |
||
2284 |
The children drank the toast after her. It was the first of |
|
2285 |
their proceedings which had no heartiness. Tiny Tim drank |
|
2286 |
it last of all, but he didn't care twopence for it. Scrooge |
|
2287 |
was the Ogre of the family. The mention of his name cast |
|
2288 |
a dark shadow on the party, which was not dispelled for full |
|
2289 |
five minutes. |
|
2290 |
||
2291 |
After it had passed away, they were ten times merrier than |
|
2292 |
before, from the mere relief of Scrooge the Baleful being done |
|
2293 |
with. Bob Cratchit told them how he had a situation in his |
|
2294 |
eye for Master Peter, which would bring in, if obtained, full |
|
2295 |
five-and-sixpence weekly. The two young Cratchits laughed |
|
2296 |
tremendously at the idea of Peter's being a man of business; |
|
2297 |
and Peter himself looked thoughtfully at the fire from |
|
2298 |
between his collars, as if he were deliberating what particular |
|
2299 |
investments he should favour when he came into the receipt |
|
2300 |
of that bewildering income. Martha, who was a poor |
|
2301 |
apprentice at a milliner's, then told them what kind of work |
|
2302 |
she had to do, and how many hours she worked at a stretch, |
|
2303 |
and how she meant to lie abed to-morrow morning for a |
|
2304 |
good long rest; to-morrow being a holiday she passed at |
|
2305 |
home. Also how she had seen a countess and a lord some |
|
2306 |
days before, and how the lord "was much about as tall as |
|
2307 |
Peter;" at which Peter pulled up his collars so high that you |
|
2308 |
couldn't have seen his head if you had been there. All this |
|
2309 |
time the chestnuts and the jug went round and round; and |
|
2310 |
by-and-bye they had a song, about a lost child travelling in |
|
2311 |
the snow, from Tiny Tim, who had a plaintive little voice, |
|
2312 |
and sang it very well indeed. |
|
2313 |
||
2314 |
There was nothing of high mark in this. They were not |
|
2315 |
a handsome family; they were not well dressed; their shoes |
|
2316 |
were far from being water-proof; their clothes were scanty; |
|
2317 |
and Peter might have known, and very likely did, the inside |
|
2318 |
of a pawnbroker's. But, they were happy, grateful, pleased |
|
2319 |
with one another, and contented with the time; and when |
|
2320 |
they faded, and looked happier yet in the bright sprinklings |
|
2321 |
of the Spirit's torch at parting, Scrooge had his eye upon |
|
2322 |
them, and especially on Tiny Tim, until the last. |
|
2323 |
||
2324 |
By this time it was getting dark, and snowing pretty |
|
2325 |
heavily; and as Scrooge and the Spirit went along the streets, |
|
2326 |
the brightness of the roaring fires in kitchens, parlours, and |
|
2327 |
all sorts of rooms, was wonderful. Here, the flickering of |
|
2328 |
the blaze showed preparations for a cosy dinner, with hot |
|
2329 |
plates baking through and through before the fire, and deep |
|
2330 |
red curtains, ready to be drawn to shut out cold and darkness. |
|
2331 |
There all the children of the house were running out |
|
2332 |
into the snow to meet their married sisters, brothers, cousins, |
|
2333 |
uncles, aunts, and be the first to greet them. Here, again, |
|
2334 |
were shadows on the window-blind of guests assembling; and |
|
2335 |
there a group of handsome girls, all hooded and fur-booted, |
|
2336 |
and all chattering at once, tripped lightly off to some near |
|
2337 |
neighbour's house; where, woe upon the single man who saw |
|
2338 |
them enter--artful witches, well they knew it--in a glow! |
|
2339 |
||
2340 |
But, if you had judged from the numbers of people on |
|
2341 |
their way to friendly gatherings, you might have thought |
|
2342 |
that no one was at home to give them welcome when they |
|
2343 |
got there, instead of every house expecting company, and |
|
2344 |
piling up its fires half-chimney high. Blessings on it, how |
|
2345 |
the Ghost exulted! How it bared its breadth of breast, and |
|
2346 |
opened its capacious palm, and floated on, outpouring, with |
|
2347 |
a generous hand, its bright and harmless mirth on everything |
|
2348 |
within its reach! The very lamplighter, who ran on before, |
|
2349 |
dotting the dusky street with specks of light, and who was |
|
2350 |
dressed to spend the evening somewhere, laughed out loudly |
|
2351 |
as the Spirit passed, though little kenned the lamplighter |
|
2352 |
that he had any company but Christmas! |
|
2353 |
||
2354 |
And now, without a word of warning from the Ghost, they |
|
2355 |
stood upon a bleak and desert moor, where monstrous masses |
|
2356 |
of rude stone were cast about, as though it were the burial-place |
|
2357 |
of giants; and water spread itself wheresoever it listed, |
|
2358 |
or would have done so, but for the frost that held it prisoner; |
|
2359 |
and nothing grew but moss and furze, and coarse rank grass. |
|
2360 |
Down in the west the setting sun had left a streak of fiery |
|
2361 |
red, which glared upon the desolation for an instant, like a |
|
2362 |
sullen eye, and frowning lower, lower, lower yet, was lost in |
|
2363 |
the thick gloom of darkest night. |
|
2364 |
||
2365 |
"What place is this?" asked Scrooge. |
|
2366 |
||
2367 |
"A place where Miners live, who labour in the bowels of |
|
2368 |
the earth," returned the Spirit. "But they know me. See!" |
|
2369 |
||
2370 |
A light shone from the window of a hut, and swiftly they |
|
2371 |
advanced towards it. Passing through the wall of mud and |
|
2372 |
stone, they found a cheerful company assembled round a |
|
2373 |
glowing fire. An old, old man and woman, with their |
|
2374 |
children and their children's children, and another generation |
|
2375 |
beyond that, all decked out gaily in their holiday attire. |
|
2376 |
The old man, in a voice that seldom rose above the howling |
|
2377 |
of the wind upon the barren waste, was singing them a |
|
2378 |
Christmas song--it had been a very old song when he was a |
|
2379 |
boy--and from time to time they all joined in the chorus. |
|
2380 |
So surely as they raised their voices, the old man got quite |
|
2381 |
blithe and loud; and so surely as they stopped, his vigour |
|
2382 |
sank again. |
|
2383 |
||
2384 |
The Spirit did not tarry here, but bade Scrooge hold his |
|
2385 |
robe, and passing on above the moor, sped--whither? Not |
|
2386 |
to sea? To sea. To Scrooge's horror, looking back, he saw |
|
2387 |
the last of the land, a frightful range of rocks, behind them; |
|
2388 |
and his ears were deafened by the thundering of water, as it |
|
2389 |
rolled and roared, and raged among the dreadful caverns it |
|
8
35751d3474b7
Revision: 200935
Dremov Kirill (Nokia-D-MSW/Tampere) <kirill.dremov@nokia.com>
parents:
diff
changeset
|
2390 |
had worn, and fiercely tried to undermine the earth. |