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Marley's
Ghost bothered him exceedingly. Every time he resolved within himself, after
mature inquiry that it was all a dream, his mind flew back again, like a
strong spring released, to its first position, andpresented the same problem
to be worked all through, "Was it a dream or not?"
Scrooge
lay in this state until the chime had gone three-quarters more, when he
remembered, on a sudden, that the Ghost hadwarned him of a visitation when
the bell tolled one. He
resolved to lie awake until the hour was passed; and, considering that he
could no more go to sleep than go to heaven, this was, perhaps, the wisest
resolution in his power.
The
quarter was so long, that he was more than once convinced he must have sunk
into a doze unconsciously, and missed the clock. At length it broke upon his listening ear.
"Ding,
dong!"
"A
quarter past," said Scrooge, counting.
"Ding,
dong!"
"Half
past," said Scrooge.
"Ding,
dong!"
"A
quarter to it," said Scrooge. "Ding, dong!"
"The
hour itself," said Scrooge triumphantly, "and nothing else!"
He
spoke before the hour bell sounded, which it now did with a deep, dull,
hollow, melancholy ONE. Light
flashed up in the room upon the instant, and the curtains of his bed were
drawn.
The
curtains of his bed were drawn aside, I tell you, by a hand. Not the
curtains at his feet, nor the curtains at his back, but those to which his
face was addressed. The curtains of his bed were drawn aside; and Scrooge,
starting up into a half-recumbent attitude, found himself face to face with
the unearthly visitor who drew them: as close to it as I am now to you, and I am standing in the spirit at your elbow.
It
was a strange figure -- like a child: yet not so like a child as like an old
man, viewed through some supernatural medium, which gave him the appearance
of having receded from the view, and being diminished to a child's
proportions. Its hair, which hung about its neck and down its back, was
white as if with age; and yet the face had not a wrinkle in it, and the
tenderest bloom was on the skin. The arms were very long and muscular; the
hands the same, as if its hold were of uncommon strength. Its legs and feet,
most delicately formed, were, like those upper members, bare. It wore a
tunic of the purest white, and round its waist was bound a lustrous belt,
the sheen of which was beautiful. It held a branch of fresh green holly in
its hand; and, in singular contradiction of that wintry emblem, had its
dress trimmed with summer flowers. But the strangest thing about it was,
that from the crown of its head there sprung a bright clear jet of light, by
which all this was visible; and which was doubtless the occasion of its
using, in its duller moments, a great extinguisher for a cap, which it now
held under its arm.
Even
this, though, when Scrooge looked at it with increasing steadiness, was not
its strangest quality. For as its belt sparkled and glittered now in one
part and now in another, and what was light one instant, at another time was
dark, so the figure itself fluctuated in its distinctness: being now a thing
with one arm, now with one leg, now with twenty legs, now a pair of legs
without a head, now a head without a body: of which dissolving parts, no
outline would be visible in the dense gloom wherein they melted away. And in
the very wonder of this, it would be itself again; distinct and clear as
ever.
`Are
you the Spirit, sir, whose coming was foretold to me.' asked Scrooge.
`I
am.'
The
voice was soft and gentle. Singularly low, as if instead of being so close
beside him, it were at a distance.
`Who,
and what are you.' Scrooge demanded.
`I
am the Ghost of Christmas Past.'
`Long
Past.' inquired Scrooge: observant of its dwarfish stature.
`No.
Your past.'
Perhaps,
Scrooge could not have told anybody why, if anybody could have asked him;
but he had a special desire to see the Spirit in his cap; and begged him to
be covered.
`What.'
exclaimed the Ghost, `would you so soon put out, with worldly hands, the
light I give. Is it not enough that you are one of those whose passions made
this cap, and force me through whole trains of years to wear it low upon my
brow.'
Scrooge
reverently disclaimed all intention to offend or any knowledge of having wilfully bonneted the Spirit at any
period of his life. He then made bold to inquire what business brought him
there.
`Your
welfare.' said the Ghost.
Scrooge
expressed himself much obliged, but could not help thinking that a night of
unbroken rest would have been more conducive to that end. The Spirit must
have heard him thinking, for it said immediately:
`Your
reclamation, then. Take heed.'
It
put out its strong hand as it spoke, and clasped him gently by the arm.
`Rise.
and walk with me.'
It
would have been in vain for Scrooge to plead that the weather and the hour
were not adapted to pedestrian purposes; that bed was warm, and the
thermometer a long way below freezing; that he was clad but lightly in his
slippers, dressing-gown, and nightcap; and that he had a cold upon him at
that time. The grasp, though gentle as a woman's hand, was
not to be resisted. He rose: but finding that the Spirit made towards the
window, clasped his robe in supplication.
`I
am mortal,' Scrooge remonstrated, `and liable to fall.'
`Bear
but a touch of my hand there,' said the Spirit, laying it upon his heart,'
and you shall be upheld in more than this.'
As
the words were spoken, they passed through the wall, and stood upon an open
country road, with fields on either hand. The city had entirely vanished.
Not a vestige of it was to be seen. The darkness and the mist had vanished
with it, for it was a clear, cold, winter day, with snow upon the ground.
`Good
Heaven!' said Scrooge, clasping his hands together, as he looked about him.
`I was bred in this place. I was a boy here.'
The
Spirit gazed upon him mildly. Its gentle touch, though it had been light and
instantaneous, appeared still present to the old man's sense of feeling. He
was conscious of a thousand odours floating in the air, each one connected
with a thousand thoughts, and hopes, and joys, and cares long, long,
forgotten.
`Your
lip is trembling,' said the Ghost. `And what is that upon your cheek.'
Scrooge
muttered, with an unusual catching in his voice, that it was a pimple; and
begged the Ghost to lead him where he would.
`You
recollect the way.' inquired the Spirit.
`Remember
it.' cried Scrooge with fervour; `I could walk it blindfold.'
`Strange
to have forgotten it for so many years.' observed the Ghost. `Let us go on.'
They
walked along the road, Scrooge recognising every gate, and post, and tree;
until a little market-town appeared in the distance, with its bridge, its
church, and winding river. Some shaggy ponies now were seen trotting towards
them with boys upon their backs, who called to other boys in country gigs
and carts, driven by farmers. All these boys were in great spirits, and
shouted to each other, until the broad fields were so full of merry music,
that the crisp air laughed to hear it.
`These
are but shadows of the things that have been,' said the Ghost. `They have no
consciousness of us.'
The
jocund travellers came on; and as they came, Scrooge knew and named them
every one. Why was he rejoiced beyond all bounds to see them. Why did his
cold eye glisten, and his heart leap up as they went past. Why was he filled
with gladness when he heard them give each other Merry Christmas, as they
parted at cross-roads and bye-ways, for their several homes. What was merry
Christmas to Scrooge. Out upon merry Christmas. What good had it ever done
to him.
`The
school is not quite deserted,' said the Ghost. `A solitary child, neglected
by his friends, is left there still.'
Scrooge
said he knew it. And he sobbed.
They
left the high-road, by a well-remembered lane, and soon approached a mansion
of dull red brick, with a little weathercock-surmounted cupola, on the roof,
and a bell hanging in it. It was a large house, but one of broken fortunes;
for the spacious offices were little used, their walls were damp and mossy,
their windows broken, and their gates decayed. Fowls clucked and strutted in
the stables; and the coach-houses and sheds were over-run with grass. Nor
was it more retentive of its ancient state, within; for entering the dreary
hall, and glancing through the open doors of many rooms, they found them
poorly furnished, cold, and vast. There was an earthy savour in the air, a
chilly bareness in the place, which associated itself somehow with too much
getting up by candle-light, and not too much to eat.
They
went, the Ghost and Scrooge, across the hall, to a door at the back of the
house. It opened before them, and disclosed a long, bare, melancholy room,
made barer still by lines of plain deal forms and desks. At one of these a
lonely boy was reading near a feeble fire; and Scrooge sat down upon a form,
and wept to see his poor forgotten self as he used to be.
"A lonely boy"
Not
a latent echo in the house, not a squeak and scuffle from the mice behind
the panelling, not a drip from the half-thawed water-spout in the dull yard
behind, not a sigh among the leafless boughs of one despondent poplar, not
the idle swinging of an empty store-house door, no, not a clicking in the
fire, but fell upon the heart of Scrooge with a softening influence, and
gave a freer passage to his tears.
The
Spirit touched him on the arm, and pointed to his younger self, intent upon
his reading. Suddenly a man, in foreign garments: wonderfully real and
distinct to look at: stood outside the window, with an axe stuck in his
belt, and leading by the bridle an ass laden with wood.
`Why,
it's Ali Baba.' Scrooge exclaimed in ecstasy. `It's dear old honest Ali
Baba. Yes, yes, I know. One Christmas time, when yonder solitary child was
left here all alone, he did come, for the first time, just like that. Poor
boy. And Valentine,' said Scrooge,' and his wild brother, Orson; there they
go. And what's his name, who was put down in his drawers, asleep, at the
Gate of Damascus; don't you see him. And the Sultan's Groom turned upside
down by the Genii; there he is upon his head. Serve him right. I'm glad of
it. What business had he to be married to the Princess.'
To
hear Scrooge expending all the earnestness of his nature on such subjects,
in a most extraordinary voice between laughing and crying; and to see his
heightened and excited face; would have been a surprise to his business
friends in the city, indeed.
`There's
the Parrot.' cried Scrooge. `Green body and yellow tail, with a thing like a
lettuce growing out of the top of his head; there he is. Poor Robin Crusoe,
he called him, when he came home again after sailing round the island. `Poor
Robin Crusoe, where have you been, Robin Crusoe.'
The man thought he was dreaming, but he wasn't. It was the Parrot,
you know. There goes Friday, running for his life to the little creek.
Halloa. Hoop. Hallo.'
Then,
with a rapidity of transition very foreign to his usual character, he said,
in pity for his former self, `Poor boy.' and cried again.
`I
wish,' Scrooge muttered, putting his hand in his pocket, and looking about
him, after drying his eyes with his cuff: `but it's too late now.'
`What
is the matter.' asked the Spirit.
`Nothing,'
said Scrooge. `Nothing. There was a boy singing a Christmas Carol at my door
last night. I should like to have given him something: that's all.'
The
Ghost smiled thoughtfully, and waved its hand: saying as it did so, `Let us
see another Christmas.'
Scrooge's
former self grew larger at the words, and the room became a little darker and more dirty. The panels shrunk,
the windows cracked; fragments of plaster fell out of the ceiling, and the
naked laths were shown instead; but how all this was brought about, Scrooge
knew no more than you do. He only knew that it was quite correct; that
everything had happened so; that there he was, alone again, when all the
other boys had gone home for the jolly holidays.
He
was not reading now, but walking up and down despairingly.
Scrooge
looked at the Ghost, and with a mournful shaking of his head, glanced anxiously towards the door.
It
opened; and a little girl, much younger than the boy, came darting in, and
putting her arms about his neck, and often kissing him, addressed him as her
`Dear, dear brother.'
`I
have come to bring you home, dear brother.' said the child, clapping her
tiny hands, and bending down to laugh. `To bring you home, home, home.'
`Home,
little Fan.' returned the boy.
`Yes.'
said the child, brimful of glee. `Home, for good and all. Home, for ever and
ever. Father is so much kinder than he used to be, that home's like Heaven.
He spoke so gently to me one dear night when I was going to bed, that I was
not afraid to ask him once more if you might come home; and he said Yes, you
should; and sent me in a coach to bring you. And you're to be a man.' said
the child, opening her eyes,' and are never to come back here; but first,
we're to be together all the Christmas long, and have the merriest time in
all the world.'
`You
are quite a woman, little Fan.' exclaimed the boy.
She
clapped her hands and laughed, and tried to touch his head; but being too
little, laughed again, and stood on tiptoe to embrace him. Then she began to
drag him, in her childish eagerness, towards the door; and he, nothing loth
to go, accompanied her.
A
terrible voice in the hall cried. `Bring down Master Scrooge's box, there.'
and in the hall appeared the schoolmaster himself, who glared on Master
Scrooge with a ferocious condescension, and threw him into a dreadful state
of mind by shaking hands with him. He then conveyed him and his sister into
the veriest old well of a shivering best-parlour that ever was seen, where
the maps upon the wall, and the celestial and terrestrial globes in the
windows, were waxy with cold. Here he produced a decanter of curiously light
wine, and a block of curiously heavy cake, and administered instalments of
those dainties to the young people: at the same time, sending out a meagre
servant to offer a glass of something to the postboy, who answered that he
thanked the gentleman, but if it was the same tap as he had tasted before,
he had rather not. Master Scrooge's trunk being by this time tied on to the
top of the chaise, the children bade the schoolmaster good-bye right
willingly; and getting into it, drove gaily down the garden-sweep: the quick
wheels dashing the hoar-frost and snow from off the dark leaves of the
evergreens like spray.
`Always
a delicate creature, whom a breath might have withered,' said the Ghost.
`But she had a large heart.'
`So
she had,' cried Scrooge. `You're right. I will not gainsay it, Spirit. God
forbid.'
`She
died a woman,' said the Ghost, `and had, as I think, children.'
`One
child,' Scrooge returned.
`True,'
said the Ghost. `Your nephew.'
Scrooge
seemed uneasy in his mind; and answered briefly, `Yes.'
Although
they had but that moment left the school behind them, they were now in the
busy thoroughfares of a city, where shadowy passengers passed and repassed;
where shadowy carts and coaches battle for the way, and all the strife and
tumult of a real city were. It was made plain enough, by the dressing of the
shops, that here too it was Christmas time again; but it was evening, and
the streets were lighted up.
The
Ghost stopped at a certain warehouse door, and asked Scrooge if he knew it.
`Know
it.' said Scrooge. `I was apprenticed here.'
They
went in. At sight of an old gentleman in a Welsh wig, sitting behind such a high desk, that if he had been two
inches taller he must have knocked his head against the ceiling, Scrooge
cried in great excitement:
`Why,
it's old Fezziwig. Bless his heart; it's Fezziwig alive again.'
Old
Fezziwig laid down his pen, and looked up at the clock, which pointed to the
hour of seven. He rubbed his hands; adjusted his capacious waistcoat;
laughed all over himself, from his shows to his organ of benevolence; and
called out in a comfortable, oily, rich, fat, jovial voice:
`Yo
ho, there. Ebenezer. Dick.'
Scrooge's
former self, now grown a young man, came briskly in, accompanied by his
fellow-prentice.
`Dick
Wilkins, to be sure.' said Scrooge to the Ghost. `Bless me, yes. There he
is. He was very much attached to me, was Dick. Poor Dick. Dear, dear.'
`Yo
ho, my boys.' said Fezziwig. `No more work to-night. Christmas Eve, Dick.
Christmas, Ebenezer. Let's have the shutters up,' cried old Fezziwig, with a
sharp clap of his hands,' before a man can say Jack Robinson.'
You
wouldn't believe how those two fellows went at it. They charged into the
street with the shutters -- one, two, three -- had them up in their places
-- four, five, six -- barred them and pinned then -- seven, eight, nine --
and came back before you could have got to twelve, panting like race-horses.
`Hilli-ho!'
cried old Fezziwig, skipping down from the high desk, with wonderful
agility. `Clear away, my lads, and let's have lots of room here. Hilli-ho,
Dick. Chirrup, Ebenezer.'
Clear
away. There was nothing they wouldn't have cleared away, or couldn't have
cleared away, with old Fezziwig looking on. It was done in a minute. Every
movable was packed off, as if it were dismissed from public life for
evermore; the floor was swept and watered, the lamps were trimmed, fuel was
heaped upon the fire; and the warehouse was as snug, and warm, and dry, and
bright a ball-room, as you would desire to see upon a winter's night.
In
came a fiddler with a music-book, and went up to the lofty desk, and made an
orchestra of it, and tuned like fifty stomach-aches. In came Mrs Fezziwig,
one vast substantial smile. In came the three Miss Fezziwigs, beaming and
lovable. In came the six young followers whose hearts they broke. In came
all the young men and women employed in the business. In came the housemaid,
with her cousin, the baker. In came the cook, with her brother's particular
friend, the milkman. In came the boy from over the way, who was suspected of
not having board enough from his master; trying to hide himself behind the
girl from next door but one, who was proved to have had her ears pulled by
her mistress. In they all came, one after another; some shyly, some boldly,
some gracefully, some awkwardly, some pushing, some pulling; in they all
came, anyhow and everyhow. Away they all went, twenty couples at once; hands
half round and back again the other way; down the middle and up again; round
and round in various stages of affectionate grouping; old top couple always
turning up in the wrong place; new top couple starting off again, as soon as
they got there; all top couples at last, and not a bottom one to help them.
When this result was brought about, old Fezziwig, clapping his hands to stop
the dance, cried out,' Well done.' and the fiddler plunged his hot face into
a pot of porter, especially provided for that purpose. But scorning rest,
upon his reappearance, he instantly began again, though there were no
dancers yet, as if the other fiddler had been carried home, exhausted,
on a shutter, and he were a bran-new man resolved to beat him out of sight,
or perish.
"Old Fezziwig"
There
were more dances, and there were forfeits, and more dances, and there was
cake, and there was negus, and there was a great piece of Cold Roast, and
there was a great piece of Cold Boiled, and there were mince-pies, and
plenty of beer. But the great effect of the evening came after the Roast and
Boiled, when the fiddler (an artful dog, mind. The sort of man who knew his
business better than you or I could have told it him.) struck up Sir Roger
de Coverley.' Then old Fezziwig
stood out to dance with Mrs Fezziwig. Top couple, too; with a good stiff
piece of work cut out for them; three or four and twenty pair of partners;
people who were not to be trifled with; people who would dance, and had no
notion of walking.
But
if they had been twice as many -- ah, four times -- old Fezziwig would have
been a match for them, and so would Mrs Fezziwig. As to her, she was worthy
to be his partner in every sense of the term. If that's not high praise,
tell me higher, and I'll use it. A positive light appeared to issue from
Fezziwig's calves. They shone in every part of the dance like moons. You
couldn't have predicted, at any given time, what would have become of them
next. And when old Fezziwig and Mrs Fezziwig had gone all through the dance;
advance and retire, both hands to your partner, bow and curtsey, corkscrew,
thread-the-needle, and back again to your place; Fezziwig cut -- cut so
deftly, that he appeared to wink with his legs, and came upon his feet again
without a stagger.
When
the clock struck eleven, this domestic ball broke up. Mr and Mrs Fezziwig
took their stations, one on either side of the door, and shaking hands with
every person individually as he or she went out, wished him or her a Merry
Christmas. When everybody had retired but the two prentices, they did the
same to them; and thus the cheerful voices died away, and the lads were left
to their beds; which were under a counter in the back-shop.
During
the whole of this time, Scrooge had acted like a man out of his wits. His
heart and soul were in the scene, and with his former self. He corroborated
everything, remembered everything, enjoyed everything, and underwent the
strangest agitation. It was not until now, when the bright faces of his
former self and Dick were turned from them, that he remembered the Ghost,
and became conscious that it was looking full upon him, while the light upon
its head burnt very clear.
`A
small matter,' said the Ghost, `to make these silly folks so full of
gratitude.'
`Small.'
echoed Scrooge.
The
Spirit signed to him to listen to the two apprentices, who were pouring out
their hearts in praise of Fezziwig: and when he had done so, said,
`Why.
Is it not. He has spent but a few pounds of your mortal money: three or four
perhaps. Is that so much that he deserves this praise.'
`It
isn't that,' said Scrooge, heated by the remark, and speaking unconsciously
like his former, not his latter, self. `It isn't that, Spirit. He has the
power to render us happy or unhappy; to make our service light or
burdensome; a pleasure or a toil. Say that his power lies in words and
looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it is impossible to add
and count them up: what then. The happiness he gives, is quite as great as
if it cost a fortune.'
He
felt the Spirit's glance, and stopped.
`What
is the matter.' asked the Ghost.
`Nothing
in particular,' said Scrooge.
`Something,
I think.' the Ghost insisted.
`No,'
said Scrooge,' No. I should like to be able to say a word or two to my clerk
just now. That's all.'
His
former self turned down the lamps as he gave utterance to the wish; and
Scrooge and the Ghost again stood side by side in the open air.
`My
time grows short,' observed the Spirit. `Quick.'
This
was not addressed to Scrooge, or to any one whom he could see, but it
produced an immediate effect. For again Scrooge saw himself. He was older
now; a man in the prime of life. His face had not the harsh and rigid lines
of later years; but it had begun to wear the signs of care and avarice.
There was an eager, greedy, restless motion in the eye, which showed the
passion that had taken root, and where the shadow of the growing tree would
fall.
He
was not alone, but sat by the side of a fair young girl in a mourning-dress:
in whose eyes there were tears, which sparkled in the light that shone out
of the Ghost of Christmas Past.
`It
matters little,' she said, softly. `To you, very little. Another idol has
displaced me; and if it can cheer and comfort you in time to come, as I
would have tried to do, I have no just cause to grieve.'
`What
Idol has displaced you.' he rejoined.
`A
golden one.'
`This
is the even-handed dealing of the world.' he said. `There is nothing on
which it is so hard as poverty; and there is nothing it professes to condemn
with such severity as the pursuit of wealth.'
`You
fear the world too much,' she answered, gently. `All your other hopes have
merged into the hope of being beyond the chance of its sordid reproach. I
have seen your nobler aspirations fall off one by one, until the
master-passion, Gain, engrosses you. Have I not.'
`What
then.' he retorted. `Even if I have grown so much wiser, what then. I am not
changed towards you.'
She
shook her head.
`Am
I.'
`Our
contract is an old one. It was made when we were both poor and content to be
so, until, in good season, we could improve our worldly fortune by our
patient industry. You are changed. When it was made, you were another man.'
`I
was a boy,' he said impatiently.
`Your
own feeling tells you that you were not what you are,' she returned. `I am.
That which promised happiness when we were one in heart, is fraught with
misery now that we are two. How often and how keenly I have thought of this,
I will not say. It is enough that I have thought of it, and can release
you.'
`Have
I ever sought release.'
`In
words. No. Never.'
`In
what, then.'
`In
a changed nature; in an altered spirit; in another atmosphere of life;
another Hope as its great end. In everything that made my love of any worth
or value in your sight. If this had never been between us,' said the girl,
looking mildly, but with steadiness, upon him;' tell me, would you seek me
out and try to win me now. Ah, no.'
He
seemed to yield to the justice of this supposition, in spite of himself. But
he said with a struggle,' You think not.'
`I
would gladly think otherwise if I could,' she answered, `Heaven knows. When
I have learned a Truth like this, I know how strong and irresistible it must
be. But if you were free to-day, to-morrow, yesterday, can even I believe
that you would choose a dowerless girl -- you who, in your very confidence
with her, weigh everything by Gain: or, choosing her, if for a moment you
were false enough to your one guiding principle to do so, do I not know that
your repentance and regret would surely follow. I do; and I release you.
With a full heart, for the love of him you once were.'
He
was about to speak; but with her head turned from him, she resumed.
`You
may -- the memory of what is past half makes me hope you will -- have pain
in this. A very, very brief time, and you will dismiss the recollection of
it, gladly, as an unprofitable dream, from which it happened well that you
awoke. May you be happy in the life you have chosen.'
She
left him, and they parted.
`Spirit.'
said Scrooge,' show me no more. Conduct me home. Why do you delight to
torture me.'
`One
shadow more.' exclaimed the Ghost.
`No
more.' cried Scrooge. `No more, I don't wish to see it. Show me no more.'
But
the relentless Ghost pinioned him in both his arms, and forced him to
observe what happened next.
They
were in another scene and place; a room, not very large or handsome, but
full of comfort. Near to the winter fire sat a beautiful young girl, so like
that last that Scrooge believed it was the same, until he saw her, now a
comely matron, sitting opposite her daughter. The noise in this room was
perfectly tumultuous, for there were more children there, than Scrooge in
his agitated state of mind could count; and, unlike the celebrated herd in
the poem, they were not forty children conducting themselves like one, but
every child was conducting itself like forty. The consequences were
uproarious beyond belief; but no one seemed to care; on the contrary, the
mother and daughter laughed heartily, and enjoyed it very much; and the
latter, soon beginning to mingle in the sports, got pillaged by the young
brigands most ruthlessly. What would I not have given to one of them. Though
I never could have been so rude, no, no. I wouldn't for the wealth of all
the world have crushed that braided hair, and torn it down; and for the
precious little shoe, I wouldn't have plucked it off, God bless my soul. to
save my life. As to measuring her waist in sport, as they did, bold young
brood, I couldn't have done it; I should have expected my arm to have grown
round it for a punishment, and never come straight again. And yet I should
have dearly liked, I own, to have touched her lips; to have questioned her,
that she might have opened them; to have looked upon the lashes of her
downcast eyes, and never raised a blush; to have let loose waves of hair, an
inch of which would be a keepsake beyond price: in short, I should have
liked, I do confess, to have had the lightest licence of a child, and yet to
have been man enough to know its value.
But
now a knocking at the door was heard, and such a rush immediately ensued
that she with laughing face and plundered dress was borne towards it the
centre of a flushed and boisterous group, just in time to greet the father,
who came home attended by a man laden with Christmas toys and presents. Then
the shouting and the struggling, and the onslaught that was made on the
defenceless porter. The scaling him with chairs for ladders to dive into his
pockets, despoil him of brown-paper parcels, hold on tight by his cravat,
hug him round his neck, pommel his back, and kick his legs in irrepressible
affection. The shouts of wonder and delight with which the development of
every package was received. The terrible announcement that the baby had been
taken in the act of putting a doll's frying-pan into his mouth, and was more
than suspected of having swallowed a fictitious turkey, glued on a wooden
platter. The immense relief of finding this a false alarm. The joy, and
gratitude, and ecstasy. They are all indescribable alike. It is enough that
by degrees the children and their emotions got out of the parlour, and by
one stair at a time, up to the top of the house; where they went to bed, and
so subsided.
And
now Scrooge looked on more attentively than ever, when the master of the
house, having his daughter leaning fondly on him, sat down with her and her
mother at his own fireside; and when he thought that such another creature,
quite as graceful and as full of promise, might have called him father, and
been a spring-time in the haggard winter of his life, his sight grew very
dim indeed.
`Belle,'
said the husband, turning to his wife with a smile,' I saw an old friend of
yours this afternoon.'
`Who
was it.'
`Guess.'
`How
can I. Tut, don't I know.' she added in the same breath, laughing as he
laughed. `Mr Scrooge.'
`Mr
Scrooge it was. I passed his office window; and as it was not shut up, and
he had a candle inside, I could scarcely help seeing him. His partner lies
upon the point of death, I hear; and there he sat alone. Quite alone in the
world, I do believe.'
`Spirit.'
said Scrooge in a broken voice,' remove me from this place.'
`I
told you these were shadows of the things that have been,' said the Ghost.
`That they are what they are, do not blame me.'
`Remove
me.' Scrooge exclaimed,' I cannot bear it.'
He
turned upon the Ghost, and seeing that it looked upon him with a face, in
which in some strange way there were fragments of all the faces it had shown
him, wrestled with it.
`Leave
me. Take me back. Haunt me no longer.'
In
the struggle, if that can be called a struggle in which the Ghost with no
visible resistance on its own part was undisturbed by any effort of its
adversary, Scrooge observed that its light was burning high and bright; and
dimly connecting that with its influence over him, he seized the
extinguisher-cap, and by a sudden action pressed it down upon its head.
"The struggle"
The
Spirit dropped beneath it, so that the extinguisher covered its whole form;
but though Scrooge pressed it down with all his force, he could not hide the
light, which streamed from under it, in an unbroken flood upon the ground.
He
was conscious of being exhausted, and overcome by an irresistible
drowsiness; and, further, of being in his own bedroom.
He gave the cap a parting squeeze, in which his hand relaxed; and had
barely time to reel to bed, before he sank into a heavy sleep.
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