trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in
the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall
not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You
will therefore permit me to repeat,
emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a
door-nail.

Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he
did. How could it be otherwise? Scrooge
and he were partners for I don't know how
many years. Scrooge was his sole
executor, his sole administrator, his sole
assign, his sole residuary legatee, his sole
friend, and sole mourner. And even
Scrooge was not so dreadfully cut up by the
sad event, but that he was an excellent man
of business on the very day of the funeral,
and solemnised it with an undoubted
bargain.

The mention of Marley's funeral brings me
back to the point I started from. There is no
doubt that Marley was dead. This must be
distinctly understood, or nothing wonderful
can come of the story I am going to relate. If
we were not perfectly convinced that
Hamlet's Father died before the play
began, there would be nothing more
remarkable in his taking a stroll at night, in
an easterly wind, upon his own ramparts,
than there would be in any other middle-
aged gentleman rashly turning out after dark
in a breezy spot say Saint Paul's
Churchyard for instance literally to astonish
his son's weak mind.

-1-

such a place, of Scrooge. Even the
blindmen's dogs appeared to know him;
and when they saw him coming on, would
tug their owners into doorways and up
courts; and then would wag their tails as
though they said, ``No eye at all is better
than an evil eye, dark master! ''

But what did Scrooge care! It was the very
thing he liked. To edge his way along the
crowded paths of life, warning all human
sympathy to keep its distance, was what the
knowing ones call nuts to Scrooge.

Once upon a time of all the good days in the
year, on Christmas Eve old Scrooge sat
busy in his counting-house. It was cold,
bleak, biting weather: foggy withal: and he
could hear the people in the court outside,
go wheezing up and down, beating their
hands upon their breasts, and stamping
their feet upon the pavement stones to
warm them. The city clocks had only just
gone three, but it was quite dark already: it
had not been light all day: and candles were
flaring in the windows of the neighbouring
offices, like ruddy smears upon the
palpable brown air. The fog came pouring
in at every chink and keyhole, and was so
dense without, that although the court was
of the narrowest, the houses opposite were
mere phantoms. To see the dingy cloud
come drooping down, obscuring
everything, one might have thought that
Nature lived hard by, and was brewing on a
large scale.

The door of Scrooge's counting-house was
open that he might keep his eye upon his
clerk, who in a dismal little cell beyond, a
sort of tank, was copying letters. Scrooge
had a very small fire, but the clerk's fire was
so very much smaller that it looked like one
coal. But he couldn't replenish it, for
Scrooge kept the coal-box in his own room;
and so surely as the clerk came in with the

-2-

for finding yourself a year older, but not an
hour richer; a time for balancing your books
and having every item in 'em through a
round dozen of months presented dead
against you? If I could work my will,'' said
Scrooge indignantly, ``every idiot who goes
about with ``Merry Christmas'' on his lips,
should be boiled with his own pudding, and
buried with a stake of holly through his heart.
He should!''

``Uncle!'' pleaded the nephew.

``Nephew!'' returned the uncle, sternly,
``keep Christmas in your own way, and let
me keep it in mine.''

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

``Let me leave it alone, then,'' said
Scrooge. ``Much good may it do you! Much
good it has ever done you!''

``There are many things from which I might
have derived good, by which I have not
profited, I dare say,'' returned the nephew:
``Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I
have always thought of Christmas time,
when it has come round apart from the
veneration due to its sacred name and
origin, if anything belonging to it can be
apart from that as a good time: a kind,
forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only
time I know of, in the long calendar of the
year, when men and women seem by one
consent to open their shut-up hearts freely,
and to think of people below them as if they
really were fellow-passengers to the grave,
and not another race of creatures bound on
other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though
it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in
my pocket, I believe that it has done me
good, and will do me good; and I say, God
bless it!''

-3-

the trial in homage to Christmas, and I'll
keep my Christmas humour to the last. So A
Merry Christmas, uncle!''

``Good afternoon!'' said Scrooge.

``And A Happy New Year!''

``Good afternoon!'' said Scrooge.

His nephew left the room without an angry
word, notwithstanding. He stopped at the
outer door to bestow the greeting of the
season on the clerk, who, cold as he was,
was warmer than Scrooge; for he returned
them cordially.

``There's another fellow,'' muttered
Scrooge; who overheard him: ``my clerk,
with fifteen shillings a week, and a wife and
family, talking about a merry Christmas. I'll
retire to Bedlam.''

This lunatic, in letting Scrooge's nephew
out, had let two other people in. They were
portly gentlemen, pleasant to behold, and
now stood, with their hats off, in Scrooge's
office. They had books and papers in their
hands, and bowed to him.

``Scrooge and Marley's, I believe,'' said
one of the gentlemen, referring to his list.
``Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr
Scrooge, or Mr Marley?''

``Mr Marley has been dead these seven
years,'' Scrooge replied. ``He died seven
years ago, this very night.''

``We have no doubt his liberality is well
represented by his surviving partner,'' said
the gentleman, presenting his credentials.

It certainly was; for they had been two
kindred spirits. At the ominous word
``liberality'', Scrooge frowned, and shook

-4-

``I wish to be left alone,'' said Scrooge.
``Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen,
that is my answer. I don't make merry myself
at Christmas and I can't afford to make idle
people merry. I help to support the
establishments I have mentioned: they cost
enough: and those who are badly off must
go there.''

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

``If they would rather die,'' said Scrooge,
``they had better do it, and decrease the
surplus population. Besides excuse me I
don't know that.''

``But you might know it,'' observed the
gentleman.

``It's not my business,'' Scrooge returned.
``It's enough for a man to understand his
own business, and not to interfere with
other people's. Mine occupies me
constantly. Good afternoon, gentlemen!''

Seeing clearly that it would be useless to
pursue their point, the gentlemen withdrew.
Scrooge resumed his labours with an
improved opinion of himself, and in a more
facetious temper than was usual with him.

Meanwhile the fog and darkness thickened
so, that people ran about with flaring links,
proffering their services to go before
horses in carriages, and conduct them on
their way. The ancient tower of a church,
whose gruff old bell was always peeping
slily down at Scrooge out of a gothic
window in the wall, became invisible, and
struck the hours and quarters in the clouds,
with tremulous vibrations afterwards as if its
teeth were chattering in its frozen head up
there. The cold became intense. In the main
street, at the corner of the court, some
labourers were repairing the gas-pipes,

-5-

Scrooge dismounted from his stool, and
tacitly admitted the fact to the expectant
clerk in the Tank, who instantly snuffed his
candle out, and put on his hat.

``You'll want all day tomorrow, I suppose?''
said Scrooge.

``If quite convenient, Sir.''

``It's not convenient,'' said Scrooge, ``and
it's not fair. If I was to stop half-a-crown for
it, you'd think yourself ill-used, I 'll be
bound?''

The clerk smiled faintly.

``And yet,'' said Scrooge, ``you don't think
me ill-used, when I pay a day's wages for
no work.''

The clerk observed that it was only once a
year.

``A poor excuse for picking a man's pocket
every twenty-fifth of December!'' said
Scrooge, buttoning his great-coat to the
chin. ``But I suppose you must have the
whole day. Be here all the earlier next
morning!''

The clerk promised that he would; and
Scrooge walked out with a growl. The office
was closed in a twinkling, and the clerk,
with the long ends of his white comforter
dangling below his waist (for he boasted no
great-coat), went down a slide on Cornhill,
at the end of a lane of boys, twenty times, in
honour of its being Christmas Eve, and then
ran home to Camden Town as hard as he
could pelt, to play at blindman's buff.

Scrooge took his melancholy dinner in his
usual melancholy tavern; and having read all
the newspapers, and beguiled the rest of
the evening with his banker's-book, went

-6-

hair was curiously stirred, as if by breath or
hot-air; and, though the eyes were wide
open, they were perfectly motionless. That,
and its livid colour, made it horrible; but its
horror seemed to be in spite of the face and
beyond its control, rather than a part of its
own expression.

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

To say that he was not startled, or that his
blood was not conscious of a terrible
sensation to which it had been a stranger
from infancy, would be untrue. But he put his
hand upon the key he had relinquished,
turned it sturdily, walked in, and lighted his
candle.

He did pause, with a moment's irresolution,
before he shut the door; and he did look
cautiously behind it first, as if he half
expected to be terrified with the sight of
Marley's pigtail sticking out into the hall. But
there was nothing on the back of the door,
except the screws and nuts that held the
knocker on, so he said ``Pooh, pooh!'' and
closed it with a bang.

The sound resounded through the house
like thunder. Every room above, and every
cask in the wine-merchant's cellars below,
appeared to have a separate peal of
echoes of its own. Scrooge was not a man
to be frightened by echoes. He fastened the
door, and walked across the hall, and up the
stairs, slowly too: trimming his candle as he
went.

You may talk vaguely about driving a coach-
and-six up a good old flight of stairs, or
through a bad young Act of Parliament; but I
mean to say you might have got a hearse up
that staircase, and taken it broadwise, with
the splinter-bar towards the wall and the
door towards the balustrades: and done it

-7-

Pharaoh's daughters, Queens of Sheba,
Angelic messengers descending through
the air on clouds like feather-beds,
Abrahams, Belshazzars, Apostles putting
off to sea in butter-boats, hundreds of
figures to attract his thoughts; and yet that
face of Marley, seven years dead, came
like the ancient Prophet's rod, and
swallowed up the whole. If each smooth tile
had been a blank at first, with power to
shape some picture on its surface from the
disjointed fragments of his thoughts, there
would have been a copy of old Marley's
head on every one.

``Humbug!'' said Scrooge; and walked
across the room.

After several turns, he sat down again. As
he threw his head back in the chair, his
glance happened to rest upon a bell, a
disused bell, that hung in the room, and
communicated for some purpose now
forgotten with a chamber in the highest story
of the building. It was with great
astonishment, and with a strange,
inexplicable dread, that as he looked, he
saw this bell begin to swing. It swung so
softly in the outset that it scarcely made a
sound; but soon it rang out loudly, and so
did every bell in the house.

This might have lasted half a minute, or a
minute, but it seemed an hour. The bells
ceased as they had begun, together. They
were succeeded by a clanking noise, deep
down below; as if some person were
dragging a heavy chain over the casks in the
wine-merchant's cellar. Scrooge then
remembered to have heard that ghosts in
haunted houses were described as
dragging chains.

The cellar-door flew open with a booming
sound, and then he heard the noise much
louder, on the floors below; then coming up

-8-

``Who are you?''

``Ask me who I was.''

``Who were you then.'' said Scrooge,
raising his voice. ``You're particular, for a
shade.'' He was going to say ``to a shade,''
but substituted this, as more appropriate.

``In life I was your partner, Jacob Marley.''

``Can you can you sit down?'' asked
Scrooge, looking doubtfully at him.

``I can.''

``Do it, then.''

Scrooge asked the question, because he
didn't know whether a ghost so transparent
might find himself in a condition to take a
chair; and felt that in the event of its being
impossible, it might involve the necessity of
an embarrassing explanation. But the ghost
sat down on the opposite side of the
fireplace, as if he were quite used to it.

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

``I don't,'' said Scrooge.

``What evidence would you have of my
reality beyond that of your senses?''

``I don't know,'' said Scrooge.

``Why do you doubt your senses?''

``Because,'' said Scrooge, ``a little thing
affects them. A slight disorder of the
stomach makes them cheats. You may be
an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard,
a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an
underdone potato. There's more of gravy
than of grave about you, whatever you are!''

-9-

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

``Mercy!'' he said. ``Dreadful apparition,
why do you trouble me?''

``Man of the worldly mind!'' replied the
Ghost, ``do you believe in me or not?''

``I do,'' said Scrooge. ``I must. But why do
spirits walk the earth, and why do they come
to me?''

``It is required of every man,'' the Ghost
returned, ``that the spirit within him should
walk abroad among his fellow-men, and
travel far and wide; and if that spirit goes
not forth in life, it is condemned to do so
after death. It is doomed to wander through
the world oh, woe is me! and witness what it
cannot share, but might have shared on
earth, and turned to happiness!''

Again the spectre raised a cry, and shook
its chain, and wrung its shadowy hands.

``You are fettered,'' said Scrooge,
trembling. ``Tell me why?''

``I wear the chain I forged in life,'' replied
the Ghost. ``I made it link by link, and yard by
yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and
of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern
strange to you?''

Scrooge trembled more and more.

``Or would you know,'' pursued the Ghost,
``the weight and length of the strong coil you
bear yourself? It was full as heavy and as
long as this, seven Christmas Eves ago.
You have laboured on it, since. It is a
ponderous chain!''

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

-10-

The Ghost, on hearing this, set up another
cry, and clanked its chain so hideously in the
dead silence of the night, that the Ward
would have been justified in indicting it for a
nuisance.

``Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed,''
cried the phantom, ``not to know, that ages
of incessant labour by immortal creatures,
for this earth must pass into eternity before
the good of which it is susceptible is all
developed. Not to know that any Christian
spirit working kindly in its little sphere,
whatever it may be, will find its mortal life
too short for its vast means of usefulness.
Not to know that no space of regret can
make amends for one life's opportunities
misused! Yet such was I! Oh! such was I!''

``But you were always a good man of
business, Jacob,'' faultered Scrooge, who
now began to apply this to himself.

``Business!'' cried the Ghost, wringing its
hands again. ``Mankind was my business.
The common welfare was my business;
charity, mercy, forbearance, and
benevolence, were, all, my business. The
dealings of my trade were but a drop of
water in the comprehensive ocean of my
business!''

It held up its chain at arm's length, as if that
were the cause of all its unavailing grief,
and flung it heavily upon the ground again.

``At this time of the rolling year,'' the spectre
said, ``I suffer most. Why did I walk through
crowds of fellow-beings with my eyes
turned down, and never raise them to that
blessed Star which led the Wise Men to a
poor abode? Were there no poor homes to
which its light would have conducted me!''

Scrooge was very much dismayed to hear
the spectre going on at this rate, and began

-11-

over, Jacob?'' hinted Scrooge.

``Expect the second on the next night at the
same hour. The third upon the next night
when the last stroke of Twelve has ceased
to vibrate. Look to see me no more; and
look that, for your own sake, you remember
what has passed between us.''

When it had said these words, the spectre
took its wrapper from the table, and bound it
round its head, as before. Scrooge knew
this, by the smart sound its teeth made,
when the jaws were brought together by the
bandage. He ventured to raise his eyes
again, and found his supernatural visitor
confronting him in an erect attitude, with its
chain wound over and about its arm.

The apparition walked backward from him;
and at every step it took, the window raised
itself a little, so that when the spectre
reached it, it was wide open.

It beckoned Scrooge to approach, which he
did. When they were within two paces of
each other, Marley's Ghost held up its hand,
warning him to come no nearer. Scrooge
stopped.

Not so much in obedience, as in surprise
and fear: for on the raising of the hand, he
became sensible of confused noises in the
air; incoherent sounds of lamentation and
regret; wailings inexpressibly sorrowful and
self-accusatory. The spectre, after listening
for a moment, joined in the mournful dirge;
and floated out upon the bleak, dark night.

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

The air was filled with phantoms,
wandering hither and thither in restless
haste, and moaning as they went. Every one
of them wore chains like Marley's Ghost;

-12-

went on from six to seven, and from seven
to eight, and regularly up to twelve; then
stopped. Twelve! It was past two when he
went to bed. The clock was wrong. An icicle
must have got into the works. Twelve!

He touched the spring of his repeater, to
correct this most preposterous clock. Its
rapid little pulse beat twelve: and stopped.

``Why, it isn't possible,'' said Scrooge,
``that I can have slept through a whole day
and far into another night. It isn't possible
that anything has happened to the sun, and
this is twelve at noon!''

The idea being an alarming one, he
scrambled out of bed, and groped his way
to the window. He was obliged to rub the
frost off with the sleeve of his dressing-
gown before he could see anything; and
could see very little then. All he could make
out was, that it was still very foggy and
extremely cold, and that there was no noise
of people running to and fro, and making a
great stir, as there unquestionably would
have been if night had beaten off bright day,
and taken possession of the world. This
was a great relief, because ``three days
after sight of this First of Exchange pay to
Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge or his order,'' and
so forth, would have become a mere United
States' security if there were no days to
count by.

Scrooge went to be again, and thought, and
1 thought, and thought it over and over, and
could make nothing of it. The more he
thought, the more perplexed he was; and
the more he endeavoured not to think, the
more he thought Marley's Ghost bothered
him exceedingly. Every time he resolved
within himself, after mature inquiry, that it
was all a dream, his mind flew back, like a
strong spring released, to its first position,
and presented the same problem to be

-13-

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

-14-

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

-15-

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.

Not a latent echo in the house, not a squeak

-16-

sailing round the island. ``Poor Robin
Crusoe, where have you been, Robin
Crusoe?'' The man thought he was
dreaming, but he wasn't. It was the Parrot,
you know. There goes Friday, running for
his life to the little creek! Halloa! Hoop!
Halloo!''

Then, with a rapidity of transition very
foreign to his usual character, he said, in
pity for his former self, ``Poor boy!'' and
cried again.

``I wish,'' Scrooge muttered, putting his
hand in his pocket, and looking about him,
after drying his eyes with his cuff: ``but it's
too late now.''

``What is the matter?'' asked the Spirit.

``Nothing,'' said Scrooge. ``Nothing. There
was a boy singing a Christmas Carol at my
door last night. I should like to have given
him something: that's all.''

The Ghost smiled thoughtfully, and waved
its hand: saying as it did so, ``Let us see
another Christmas!''

Scrooge's former self grew larger at the
words, and the room became a little darker
and more dirty. The panels shrunk, the
windows cracked; fragments of plaster fell
out of the ceiling, and the naked laths were
shown instead; but how all this was brought
about, Scrooge knew no more than you do.
He only knew that it was quite correct; that
everything had happened so; that there he
was, alone again, when all the other boys
had gone home for the jolly holidays.

He was not reading now, but walking up
and down despairingly. Scrooge looked at
the Ghost, and with a mournful shaking of
his head, glanced anxiously towards the
door.

-17-

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

-18-

You wouldn't believe how those two fellows
went at it! They charged into the street with
the shutters one, two, three had 'em up in
their places four, five, six barred 'em and
pinned 'em seven, eight, nine and came
back before you could have got to twelve,
panting like race-horses.

``Hilli-ho!'' cried old Fezziwig, skipping
down from the high desk, with wonderful
agility. ``Clear away, my lads, and let's have
lots of room here! Hilli-ho, Dick! Chirrup,
Ebenezer!''

Clear away! There was nothing they
wouldn't have cleared away, or couldn't
have cleared away, with old Fezziwig
looking on. It was done in a minute. Every
movable was packed off, as if it were
dismissed from public life for evermore; the
floor was swept and watered, the lamps
were trimmed, fuel was heaped upon the
fire; and the warehouse was as snug, and
warm, and dry, and bright a ball-room, as
you would desire to see upon a winter's
night.

In came a fiddler with a music-book, and
went up to the lofty desk, and made an
orchestra of it, and tuned like fifty 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 nother; some shyly,
some boldly, some gracefully, some

-19-

that's not high praise, tell me higher, and I'll
use it. A positive light appeared to issue
from Fezziwig's calves. They shone in every
part of the dance like moons. You couldn't
have predicted, at any given time, what
would become of 'em next. And when old
Fezziwig and Mrs. Fezziwig had gone all
through the dance; advance and retire, hold
hands with 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

-20-

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?''

-21-

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

-22-

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.''

-23-

thoughts together, Scrooge had no
occasion to be told that the bell was again
upon the stroke of One. He felt that he was
restored to consciousness in the right nick
of time, for the especial purpose of holding
a conference with the second messenger
despatched to him through Jacob Marley's
intervention. But, finding that he turned
uncomfortably cold when he began to
wonder which of his curtains this new
spectre would draw back, he put them every
one aside with his own hands; and lying
down again, established a sharp look-out
all round the bed. For he wished to
challenge the Spirit on the moment of its
appearance, and did not wish to be taken
by surprise, and made nervous.

Gentlemen of the free-and-easy sort, who
plume themselves on being acquainted with
a move or two, and being usually equal to
the time-of-day, express the wide range of
their capacity for adventure by observing
that they are good for anything from pitch-
and-toss to manslaughter; between which
opposite extremes, no doubt, there lies a
tolerably wide and comprehensive range of
subjects. Without venturing for Scrooge
quite as hardily as this, I don't mind calling
on you to believe that he was ready for a
good broad field of strange appearances,
and that nothing between a baby and
rhinoceros would have astonished him very
much.

Now, being prepared for almost anything,
he was not by any means prepared for
nothing; and, consequently, when the Bell
struck One, and no shape appeared, he
was taken with a violent fit of trembling. Five
minutes, ten minutes, a quater of an hour
went by, yet nothing came. All this time, he
lay upon his bed, the very core and centre of
a blaze of ruddy light, which streamed upon
it when the clock proclaimed the hour; and
which, being only light, was more alarming

-24-

sat a jolly Giant, glorious to see: who bore a
glowing torch, in shape not unlike Plenty's
horn, and held it up, high up, to shed its light
on Scrooge, as he came peeping round the
door.

``Come in!'' exclaimed the Ghost. ``Come
in. and know me better, man!''

Scrooge entered timidly, and hung his head
before this Spirit. He was not the dogged
Scrooge he had been; and though the
Spirit's eyes were clear and kind, he did not
like to meet them.

``I am the Ghost of Christmas Present,''
said the Spirit. ``Look upon me!''

Scrooge reverently did so. It was clothed in
one simple green robe, or mantle, bordered
with white fur. This garment hung so loosely
on the figure, that its capacious breast was
bare, as if disdaining to be warded or
concealed by any artifice. Its feet,
observable beneath the ample folds of the
garment, were also bare; and on its head it
wore no other covering than a holly wreath,
set here and there with shining icicles. Its
dark brown curls were long and free: free as
its genial face, its sparkling eye, its open
hand, its cheery voice, its unconstrained
demeanour, and its joyful air. Girded round
its middle was an antique scabbard; but no
sword was in it, and the ancient sheath was
eaten up with rust.

``You have never seen the like of me
before!'' exclaimed the Spirit.

``Never,'' Scrooge made answer to it.

``Have never walked forth with the younger
members of my family; meaning (for I am
very young) my elder brothers born in these
later years?'' pursued the Phantom.

-25-

where the great streets branched off; and
made intricate channels, hard to trace in the
thick yellow mud and icy water. The sky was
gloomy, and the shortest streets were
choked up with a dingy mist, half thawed,
half frozen, whose heavier particles
descended in shower of sooty atoms, as if
all the chimneys in Great Britain had, by one
consent, caught fire, and were blazing
away to their dear hearts' content. There
was nothing very cheerful in the climate or
the town, and yet was there an air of
cheerfulness abroad that the clearest
summer air and brightest summer sun might
have endeavoured to diffuse in vain.

For the people who were shovelling away
on the housetops were jovial and full of
glee; calling out to one another from the
parapets, and now and then exchanging a
facetious snowball better-natured missile
far than many a wordy jest laughing heartily
if it went right and not less heartily if it went
wrong. The poulterers' shops were still half
open, and the fruiterers' were radiant in
their glory. There were great, round, pot-
bellied baskets of chesnuts, shaped like the
waistcoats of jolly old gentlemen, lolling at
the doors, and tumbling out into the street in
their apoplectic opulence. There were
ruddy, brown-faced, broad-girthed
Spanish Onions, shining in the fatness of
their growth like Spanish Friars, and
winking from their shelves in wanton
slyness at the girls as they went by, and
glanced demurely at the hung-up mistletoe.
There were pears and apples, clustered
high in blooming pyramids; there were
bunches of grapes, made, in the
shopkeepers' benevolence to dangle from
conspicuous hooks, that people's mouths
might water gratis as they passed; there
were piles of filberts, mossy and brown,
recalling, in their fragrance, ancient walks
among the woods, and pleasant shufflings
ankle deep through withered leaves; there

-26-

been their own, worn outside for general
inspection, and for Christmas daws to peck
at if they chose.

But soon the steeples called good people
all, to church and chapel, and away they
came, flocking through the streets in their
best clothes, and with their gayest faces.
And at the same time there emerged from
scores of bye-streets, lanes, and nameless
turnings, innumerable people, carrying their
dinners to the baker' shops. The sight of
these poor revellers appeared to interest
the Spirit very much, for he stood with
Scrooge beside him in a baker's doorway,
and taking off the covers as their bearers
passed, sprinkled incense on their dinners
from his torch. And it was a very uncommon
kind of torch, for once or twice when there
were angry words between some dinner-
carriers who had jostled each other, he
shed a few drops of water on them from it,
and their good humour was restored
directly. For they said, it was a shame to
quarrel upon Christmas Day. And so it was!
God love it, so it was!

In time the bells ceased, and the bakers'
were shut up; and yet there was a genial
shadowing forth of all these dinners and the
progress of their cooking, in the thawed
blotch of wet above each baker's oven;
where the pavement smoked as if its stones
were cooking too.

``Is there a peculiar flavour in what you
sprinkle from your torch?'' asked Scrooge.

``There is. My own.''

``Would it apply to any kind of dinner on this
day?'' asked Scrooge.

``To any kindly given. To a poor one most.''

``Why to a poor one most?'' asked Scrooge.

-27-

done in any lofty hall.

And perhaps it was the pleasure the good
Spirit had in showing off this power of his,
or else it was his own kind, generous,
hearty nature, and his sympathy with all poor
men, that led him straight to Scrooge's
clerk's; for there he went, and took Scrooge
with him, holding to his robe; and on the
threshold of the door the Spirit smiled, and
stopped to bless Bob Cratchit's dwelling
with the sprinkling of his torch. Think of that!
Bob had but fifteen bob a-week himself; he
pocketed on Saturdays but fifteen copies of
his Christian name; and yet the Ghost of
Christmas Present blessed his four-
roomed house!

Then up rose Mrs Cratchit, Cratchit's wife,
dressed out but poorly in a twice-turned
gown, but brave in ribbons, which are
cheap and make a goodly show for
sixpence; and she laid the cloth, assisted by
Belinda Cratchit, second of her daughters,
also brave in ribbons; while Master Peter
Cratchit plunged a fork into the saucepan of
potatoes, and getting the corners of his
monstrous shirt collar (Bob's private
property, conferred upon his son and heir in
honour of the day) into his mouth, rejoiced
to find himself so gallantly attired, and
yearned to show his linen in the fashionable
Parks. And now two smaller Cratchits, boy
and girl, came tearing in, screaming that
outside the baker's they had smelt the
goose, and known it for their own; and
basking in luxurious thoughts of sage-and-
onion, these young Cratchits danced about
the table, and exalted Master Peter Cratchit
to the skies, while he (not proud, although
his collars nearly choked him) blew the fire,
until the slow potatoes bubbling up,
knocked loudly at the saucepan-lid to be let
out and peeled.

``What has ever got your precious father

-28-

been Tim's blood horse all the way from
church, and had come home rampant. ``Not
coming upon Christmas Day!''

Martha didn't like to see him disappointed,
if it were only in joke; so she came out
prematurely from behind the closet door,
and ran into his arms, while the two young
Cratchits hustled Tiny Tim, and bore him off
into the wash-house, that he might hear the
pudding singing in the copper.

``And how did little Tim behave?'' asked
Mrs Cratchit, when she had rallied Bob on
his credulity and Bob had hugged his
daughter to his heart's content.

``As good as gold,'' said Bob, ``and better.
Somehow he gets thoughtful, sitting by
himself so much, and thinks the strangest
things you ever heard. He told me, coming
home, that he hoped the people saw him in
the church, because he was a cripple, and it
might be pleasant to them to remember
upon Christmas Day, who made lame
beggars walk, and blind men see.''

Bob's voice was tremulous when he told
them this, and trembled more when he said
that Tiny Tim was growing strong and
hearty.

His active little crutch was heard upon the
floor, and back came Tiny Tim before
another word was spoken, escorted by his
brother and sister to his stool before the
fire; and while Bob, turning up his cuffs as
if, poor fellow, they were capable of being
made more shabby compounded some hot
mixture in a jug with gin and lemons, and
stirred it round and round and put it on the
hob to simmer; Master Peter, and the two
ubiquitous young Cratchits went to fetch the
goose, with which they soon returned in
high procession.

-29-

Suppose it should not be done enough!
Suppose it should break in turning out!
Suppose somebody should have got over
the wall of the back-yard, and stolen it,
while they were merry with the goose: a
supposition at which the two young
Cratchits became livid! All sorts of horrors
were supposed.

Hallo! A great deal of steam! The pudding
was out of the copper. A smell like a
washing-day! That was the cloth. A smell
like an eating-house and a pastrycook's
next door to each other, with a laundress's
next door to that! That was the pudding. In
half a minute Mrs Cratchit entered: flushed,
but smiling proudly: with the pudding, like a
speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm,
blazing in half of half-a-quartern of ignited
brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly
stuck into the top.

Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchit
said, and calmly too, that he regarded it as
the greatest success achieved by Mrs
Cratchit since their marriage. Mrs Cratchit
said that now the weight was off her mind,
she would confess she had had her doubts
about the quantity of flour. Everybody had
something to say about it, but nobody said
or thought it was at all a small pudding for a
large family. It would have been flat heresy
to do so. Any Cratchit would have blushed to
hint at such a thing.

At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was
cleared, the hearth swept, and the fire
made up. The compound in the jug being
tasted, and considered perfect, apples and
oranges were put upon the table, and a
shovel-full of chesnuts on the fire. Then all
the Cratchit family drew round the hearth, in
what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning
half a one; and at Bob Cratchit's elbow
stood the family display of glass; two
tumblers, and a custard-cup without a

-30-

``Man,'' said the Ghost, ``if man you be in
heart, not adamant, forbear that wicked
cant until you have discovered What the
surplus is, and Where it is. Will you decide
what men shall live, what men shall die? It
may be, that in the sight of Heaven, you are
more worthless and less fit to live than
millions like this poor man's child. Oh God!
to hear the Insect on the leaf pronouncing on
the too much life among his hungry brothers
in the dust!''

Scrooge bent before the Ghost's rebuke,
and trembling cast his eyes upon the
ground. But he raised them speedily, on
hearing his own name.

``Mr Scrooge!'' said Bob; ``I'll give you Mr
Scrooge, the Founder of the Feast!''

``The Founder of the Feast indeed!'' cried
Mrs Cratchit, reddening. ``I wish I had him
here. I'd give him a piece of my mind to
feast upon, and I hope he'd have a good
appetite for it.''

``My dear,'' said Bob, ``the children;
Christmas Day.''

``It should be Christmas Day, I am sure,''
said she, ``on which one drinks the health of
such an odious, stingy, hard, unfeeling man
as Mr Scrooge. You know he is, Robert!
Nobody knows it better than you do, poor
fellow!''

``My dear,'' was Bob's mild answer,
``Christmas Day.''

``I'll drink his health for your sake and the
Day's,''said Mrs Cratchit, ``not for his.
Long life to him. A merry Christmas and a
happy new year! He'll be very merry and
very happy, I have no doubt!''

The children drank the toast after her. It was

-31-

and when they faded, and looked happier
yet in the bright sprinklings of the Spirit's
torch at parting, Scrooge had his eye upon
them, and especially on Tiny Tim, until the
last.

By this time it was getting dark, and
snowing pretty heavily; and as Scrooge and
the Spirit went along the streets, the
brightness of the roaring fires in kitchens,
parlours, and all sorts of rooms, was
wonderful. Here, the flickering of the blaze
showed preparations for a cosy dinner, with
hot plates baking through and through
before the fire, and deep red curtains,
ready to be drawn to shut out cold and
darkness. There all the children of the house
were running out into the snow to meet their
married sisters, brothers, cousins, uncles,
aunts, and be the first to greet them. Here,
again, were shadows on the window-blind
of guests assembling; and there a group of
handsome girls, all hooded and fur-booted,
and all chattering at once, tripped lightly off
to some near neighbour's house; where,
woe upon the single man who saw them
enter artful witches, well they knew it in a
glow!

But, if you had judged from the numbers of
people on their way to friendly gatherings,
you might have thought that no one was at
home to give them welcome when they got
there, instead of every house expecting
company, and piling up its fires half-
chimney high. Blessings on it, how the
Ghost exulted! How it bared its breadth of
breast, and opened its capacious palm,
and floated on, outpouring, with a generous
hand, its bright and harmless mirth on
everything within its reach! The very
lamplighter, who ran on before, dotting the
dusky street with specks of light, and who
was dressed to spend the evening
somewhere, laughed out loudly as the Spirit
passed: though little kenned the lamplighter

-32-

of rocks, behind them; and his ears were
deafened by the thundering of water, as it
rolled, and roared, and raged among the
dreadful caverns it had worn, and fiercely
tried to undermine the earth.

Built upon a dismal reef of sunken rocks,
some league or so from shore, on which the
waters chafed and dashed, the wild year
through, there stood a solitary lighthouse.
Great heaps of sea-weed clung to its base,
and storm-birds born of the wind one might
suppose, as sea-weed of the water rose
and fell about it, like the waves they
skimmed.

But even here, two men who watched the
light had made a fire, that through the
loophole in the thick stone wall shed out a
ray of brightness on the awful sea. Joining
their horny hands over the rough table at
which they sat, they wished each other
Merry Christmas in their can of grog; and
one of them: the elder, too, with his face all
damaged and scarred with hard weather,
as the figure-head of an old ship might be:
struck up a sturdy song that was like a Gale
in itself.

Again the Ghost sped on, above the black
and heaving sea on, on until, being far
away, as he told Scrooge, from any shore,
they lighted on a ship. They stood beside
the helmsman at the wheel, the look-out in
the bow, the officers who had the watch;
dark, ghostly figures in their several
stations; but every man among them
hummed a Christmas tune, or had a
Christmas thought, or spoke below his
breath to his companion of some bygone
Christmas Day, with homeward hopes
belonging to it. And every man on board,
waking or sleeping, good or bad, had had a
kinder word for another on that day than on
any day in the year; and had shared to some
extent in its festivities; and had

-33-

believed it too!''

``More shame for him, Fred!'' said
Scrooge's niece, indignantly. Bless those
women; they never do anything by halves.
They are always in earnest.

She was very pretty: exceedingly pretty. With
a dimpled, surprised-looking, capital face;
a ripe little mouth, that seemed made to be
kissed as no doubt it was; all kinds of good
little dots about her chin, that melted into
one another when she laughed; and the
sunniest pair of eyes you ever saw in any
little creature's head. Altogether she was
what you would have called provoking, you
know; but satisfactory, too. Oh, perfectly
satisfactory!

``He's a comical old fellow,'' said
Scrooge's nephew, ``that's the truth: and
not so pleasant as he might be. However,
his offences carry their own punishment,
and I have nothing to say against him.''

``I'm sure he is very rich, Fred,'' hinted
Scrooge's niece. ``At least you always tell
me so.''

``What of that, my dear!'' said Scrooge's
nephew. ``His wealth is of no use to him. He
don't do any good with it. He don't make
himself comfortable with it. He hasn't the
satisfaction of thinking ha, ha, ha! that he is
ever going to benefit Us with it.''

``I have no patience with him,'' observed
Scrooge's niece. Scrooge's niece's
sisters, and all the other ladies, expressed
the same opinion.

``Oh, I have!'' said Scrooge's nephew. ``I
am sorry for him; I couldn't be angry with
him if I tried. Who suffers by his ill whims?
Himself, always. Here, he takes it into his
head to dislike us, and he won't come and

-34-

Christmas till he dies, but he can't help
thinking better of it I defy him if he finds me
going there, in good temper, year after
year, and saying Uncle Scrooge, how are
you? If it only puts him in the vein to leave his
poor clerk fifty pounds, that's something;
and I think I shook him yesterday.''

It was their turn to laugh now at the notion of
his shaking Scrooge. But being thoroughly
good-natured, and not much caring what
they laughed at, so that they laughed at any
rate, he encouraged them in their
merriment, and passed the bottle joyously.

After tea, they had some music. For they
were a musical family, and knew what they
were about, when they sung a Glee or
Catch, I can assure you: especially Topper,
who could growl away in the bass like a
good one, and never swell the large veins in
his forehead, or get red in the face over it.
Scrooge's niece played well upon the harp;
and played among other tunes a simple little
air (a mere nothing: you might learn to
whistle it in two minutes), which had been
familiar to the child who fetched Scrooge
from the boarding-school, as he had been
reminded by the Ghost of Christmas Past.
When this strain of music sounded, all the
things that Ghost had shown him, came
upon his mind; he softened more and more;
and thought that if he could have listened to
it often, years ago, he might have cultivated
the kindnesses of life for his own happiness
with his own hands, without resorting to the
sexton's spade that buried Jacob Marley.

But they didn't devote the whole evening to
music. After a while they played at forfeits;
for it is good to be children sometimes, and
never better than at at Christmas, when its
mighty Founder was a child himself. Stop!
There was first a game at blind-man's buff.
Of course there was. And I no more believe
Topper was really blind than I believe he had

-35-

you. There might have been twenty people
there, young and old, but they all played,
and so did Scrooge; for, wholly forgetting in
the interest he had in what was going on,
that his voice made no sound in their ears,
he sometimes came out with his guess
quite loud, and vey often guessed quite
right, too; for the sharpest needle, best
Whitechapel, warranted not to cut in the eye,
was not sharper than Scrooge; blunt as he
took it in his head to be.

The Ghost was greatly pleased to find him
in this mood, and looked upon him with such
favour, that he begged like a boy to be
allowed to stay until the guests departed.
But this the Spirit said could not be done.

``Here is a new game,'' said Scrooge.
``One half hour, Spirit, only one!''

It was a Game called Yes and No, where
Scrooge's nephew had to think of
something, and the rest must find out what;
he only answering to their questions yes or
no, as the case was. The brisk fire of
questioning to which he was exposed,
elicited from him that he was thinking of an
animal, a live animal, rather a disagreeable
animal, a savage animal, an animal that
growled and grunted sometimes, and
talked sometimes, and lived in London, and
walked about the streets, and wasn't made
a show of, and wasn't led by anybody, and
didn't live in a menagerie, and was never
killed in a market, and was not a horse, or
an ass, or a cow, or a bull, or a tiger, or a
dog, or a pig, or a cat, or a bear. At every
fresh question that was put to him, this
nephew burst into a fresh roar of laughter;
and was so inexpressibly tickled, that he
was obliged to get up off the sofa and
stamp. At last the plump sister, falling into a
similar state, cried out:

``I have found it out! I know what it is, Fred! I

-36-

had not made fast the door and barred the
Spirit out, he left his blessing, and taught
Scrooge his precepts.

It was a long night, if it were only a night; but
Scrooge had his doubts of this, because
the Christmas Holidays appeared to be
condensed into the space of time they
passed together. It was strange, too, that
while Scrooge remained unaltered in his
outward form, the Ghost grew older, clearly
older. Scrooge had observed this change,
but never spoke of it, until they left a
children's Twelfth Night party, when,
looking at the Spirit as they stood together
in an open place, he noticed that its hair
was grey.

``Are spirits' lives so short?'' asked
Scrooge.

``My life upon this globe, is very brief,''
replied the Ghost. ``It ends to-night.''

``To-night!'' cried Scrooge.

``To-night at midnight. Hark! The time is
drawing near.''

The chimes were ringing the three quarters
past eleven at that moment.

``Forgive me if I am not justified in what I
ask,'' said Scrooge, looking intently at the
Spirit's robe, ``but I see something strange,
and not belonging to yourself, protruding
from your skirts. Is it a foot or a claw!''

``It might be a claw, for the flesh there is
upon it,'' was the Spirit's sorrowful reply.
``Look here.''

From the foldings of its robe, it brought two
children; wretched, abject, frightful,
hideous, miserable. They knelt down at its
feet, and clung upon the outside of its

-37-

turning on him for the last time with his own
words. ``Are there no workhouses?''

The bell struck twelve.

Scrooge looked about him for the Ghost,
and saw it not. As the last stroke ceased to
vibrate, he remembered the prediction of
old Jacob Marley, and lifting up his eyes,
beheld a solemn Phantom, draped and
hooded, coming, like a mist along the
ground, towards him.

Chapter 4 The Last of the Spirits

The Phantom slowly, gravely, silently
approached. When it came, Scrooge bent
down upon his knee; for in the very air
through which this Spirit moved it seemed
to scatter gloom and mystery.

It was shrouded in a deep black garment,
which concealed its head, its face, its form,
and left nothing of it visible save one
outstretched hand. But for this it would have
been difficult to detach its figure from the
night, and separate it from the darkness by
which it was surrounded.

He felt that it was tall and stately when it
came beside him, and that its mysterious
presence filled him with a solemn dread. He
knew no more, for the Spirit neither spoke
nor moved.

``I am in the presence of the Ghost of
Christmas Yet To Come?'' said Scrooge.

The Spirit answered not, but pointed
onward with its hand.

``You are about to show me shadows of the
things that have not happened, but will
happen in the time before us,'' Scrooge
pursued. ``Is that so, Spirit?''

-38-

hurried up and down, and chinked the
money in their pockets, and conversed in
groups, and looked at their watches, and
trifled thoughtfully with their great gold
seals; and so forth, as Scrooge had seen
them often.

The Spirit stopped beside one little knot of
business men. Observing that the hand was
pointed to them, Scrooge advanced to
listen to their talk.

``No,'' said a great fat man with a
monstrous chin, ``I don't know much about
it, either way. I only know he's dead.''

``When did he die?'' inquired another.

``Last night, I believe.''

``Why, what was the matter with him?''
asked a third, taking a vast quantity of snuff
out of a very large snuff-box. ``I thought he'd
never die.''

``God knows,'' said the first, with a yawn.

``What has he done with his money?'' asked
a red-faced gentleman with a pendulous
excrescence on the end of his nose, that
shook like the gills of a turkey-cock.

``I haven't heard,'' said the man with the
large chin, yawning again. ``Left it to his
Company, perhaps. He hasn't left it to me.
That's all I know.''

This pleasantry was received with a general
laugh.

``It's likely to be a very cheap funeral,'' said
the same speaker; ``for upon my life I don't
know of anybody to go to it. Suppose we
make up a party and volunteer?''

``I don't mind going if a lunch is provided,''

-39-

morning!''

Not another word. That was their meeting,
their conversation, and their parting.

Scrooge was at first inclined to be
surprised that the Spirit should attach
importance to conversations apparently so
trivial; but feeling assured that they must
have some hidden purpose, he set himself
to consider what it was likely to be. They
could scarcely be supposed to have any
bearing on the death of Jacob, his old
partner, for that was Past, and this Ghost's
province was the Future. Nor could he think
of any one immediately connected with
himself, to whom he could apply them. But
nothing doubting that to whomsoever they
applied they had some latent moral for his
own improvement, he resolved to treasure
up every word he heard, and everything he
saw; and especially to observe the shadow
of himself when it appeared. For he had an
expectation that the conduct of his future
self would give him the clue he missed, and
would render the solution of these riddles
easy.

He looked about in that very place for his
own image; but another man stood in his
accustomed corner, and though the clock
pointed to his usual time of day for being
there, he saw no likeness of himself among
the multitudes that poured in through the
Porch. It gave him little surprise, however;
for he had been revolving in his mind a
change of life, and thought and hoped he
saw his new-born resolutions carried out in
this.

Quiet and dark, beside him stood the
Phantom, with its outstretched hand. When
he roused himself from his thoughtful quest,
he fancied from the turn of the hand, and its
situation in reference to himself, that the
Unseen Eyes were looking at him keenly. It

-40-

all three burst into a laugh.

``Let the charwoman alone to be the first!''
cried she who had entered first. ``Let the
laundress alone to be the second; and let
the undertaker's man alone to be the third.
Look here, old Joe, here's a chance! If we
haven't all three met here without meaning
it!''

``You couldn't have met in a better place,''
said old Joe, removing his pipe from his
mouth. ``Come into the parlour. You were
made free of it long ago, you know; and the
other two an't strangers. Stop till I shut the
door of the shop. Ah! How it skreeks! There
an't such a rusty bit of metal in the place as
its own hinges, I believe; and I'm sure
there's no such old bones here, as mine.
Ha, ha! We're all suitable to our calling,
we're well matched. Come into the parlour.
Come into the parlour.''

The parlour was the space behind the
screen of rags. The old man raked the fire
together with an old stair-rod, and having
trimmed his smoky lamp (for it was night),
with the stem of his pipe, put it in his mouth
again.

While he did this, the woman who had
already spoken threw her bundle on the
floor, and sat down in a flaunting manner on
a stool; crossing her elbows on her knees,
and looking with a bold defiance at the other
two.

``What odds then! What odds, Mrs Dilber?''
said the woman. ``Every person has a right
to take care of themselves. He always did!''

``That's true, indeed!'' said the laundress.
``No man more so.''

``Why then, don't stand staring as if you was
afraid, woman; who's the wiser? We're not

-41-

to come.

``That's your account,'' said Joe, ``and I
wouldn't give another sixpence, if I was to
be boiled for not doing it. Who's next?''

Mrs Dilber was next. Sheets and towels, a
little wearing apparel, two old-fashioned
silver teaspoons, a pair of sugar-tongs,
and a few boots. Her account was stated on
the wall in the same manner.

``I always give too much to ladies. It's a
weakness of mine, and that's the way I ruin
myself,'' said old Joe. ``That's your
account. If you asked me for another penny,
and made it an open question, I'd repent of
being so liberal and knock off half-a-
crown.''

``And now undo my bundle, Joe,'' said the
first woman.

Joe went down on his knees for the greater
convenience of opening it, and having
unfastened a great many knots, dragged
out a large and heavy roll of some dark stuff.

``What do you call this.'' said Joe. ``Bed-
curtains!''

``Ah!'' returned the woman, laughing and
leaning forward on her crossed arms.
``Bed-curtains!''

``You don't mean to say you took them
down, rings and all, with him lying there?''
said Joe.

``Yes I do,'' replied the woman. ``Why not?''

``You were born to make your fortune,'' said
Joe, ``and you'll certainly do it.''

``I certainly shan't hold my hand, when I can
get anything in it by reaching it out, for the

-42-

ground. ``This is the end of it, you see! He
frightened every one away from him when
he was alive, to profit us when he was
dead! Ha, ha, ha!''

``Spirit!'' said Scrooge, shuddering from
head to foot. ``I see, I see. The case of this
unhappy man might be my own. My life
tends that way, now. Merciful Heaven, what
is this!''

He recoiled in terror, for the scene had
changed, and now he almost touched a
bed: a bare, uncurtained bed: on which,
beneath a ragged sheet, there lay a
something covered up, which, though it was
dumb, announced itself in awful language.

The room was very dark, too dark to be
observed with any accuracy, though
Scrooge glanced round it in obedience to a
secret impulse, anxious to know what kind
of room it was. A pale light, rising in the
outer air, fell straight upon the bed; and on
it, plundered and bereft, unwatched,
unwept, uncared for, was the body of this
man.

Scrooge glanced towards the Phantom. Its
steady hand was pointed to the head. The
cover was so carelessly adjusted that the
slightest raising of it, the motion of a finger
upon Scrooge's part, would have disclosed
the face. He thought of it, felt how easy it
would be to do, and longed to do it; but had
no more power to withdraw the veil than to
dismiss the spectre at his side.

Oh cold, cold, rigid, dreadful Death, set up
thine altar here, and dress it with such
terrors as thou hast at thy command: for this
is thy dominion! But of the loved, revered,
and honoured head, thou canst not turn one
hair to thy dread purposes, or make one
feature odious. It is not that the hand is
heavy and will fall down when released; it is

-43-

where a mother and her children were.

She was expecting some one, and with
anxious eagerness; for she walked up and
down the room; started at every sound;
looked out from the window; glanced at the
clock; tried, but in vain, to work with her
needle; and could hardly bear the voices of
the children in their play.

At length the long-expected knock was
heard. She hurried to the door, and met her
husband; a man whose face was careworn
and depressed, though he was young.
There was a remarkable expression in it
now; a kind of serious delight of which he
felt ashamed, and which he struggled to
repress.

He sat down to the dinner that had been
boarding for him by the fire; and when she
asked him faintly what news (which was not
until after a long silence), he appeared
embarrassed how to answer.

``Is it good.'' she said, ``or bad?'' to help
him.

``Bad,'' he answered.

``We are quite ruined?''

``No. There is hope yet, Caroline.''

``If he relents,'' she said, amazed, ``there
is. Nothing is past hope, if such a miracle
has happened.''

``He is past relenting,'' said her husband.
``He is dead.''

She was a mild and patient creature if her
face spoke truth; but she was thankful in her
soul to hear it, and she said so, with
clasped hands. She prayed forgiveness the
next moment, and was sorry; but the first

-44-

````And he took a child, and set him in the
midst of them.''''

Where had Scrooge heard those words? He
had not dreamed them. The boy must have
read them out, as he and the Spirit crossed
the threshold. Why did he not go on?

The mother laid her work upon the table,
and put her hand up to her face.

``The colour hurts my eyes,'' she said.

The colour? Ah, poor Tiny Tim!

``They're better now again,'' said Cratchit's
wife. ``It makes them weak by candle-light;
and I wouldn't show weak eyes to your
father when he comes home, for the world.
It must be near his time.''

``Past it rather,'' Peter answered, shutting
up his book. ``But I think he has walked a
little slower than he used, these few last
evenings, mother.''

They were very quiet again. At last she said,
and in a steady, cheerful voice, that only
faultered once:

``I have known him walk with I have known
him walk with Tiny Tim upon his shoulder,
very fast indeed.''

``And so have I,'' cried Peter. ``Often.''

``And so have I!'' exclaimed another. So
had all.

``But he was very light to carry,'' she
resumed, intent upon her work, ``and his
father loved him so, that it was no trouble:
no trouble. And there is your father at the
door!''

She hurried out to meet him; and little Bob in

-45-

street that day, and seeing that he looked a
little ``just a little down you know,'' said
Bob, inquired what had happened to
distress him. ``On which,'' said Bob, ``for
he is the pleasantest-spoken gentleman
you ever heard, I told him. ``I am heartily
sorry for it, Mr Cratchit,'' he said, ``and
heartily sorry for your good wife.'' By the
bye, how he ever knew that, I don't know.''

``Knew what, my dear?''

``Why, that you were a good wife,'' replied
Bob.

``Everybody knows that.'' said Peter.

``Very well observed, my boy.'' cried Bob.
``I hope they do. ``Heartily sorry,'' he said,
``for your good wife. If I can be of service to
you in any way,'' he said, giving me his
card, ``that's where I live. Pray come to
me.'' Now, it wasn't,'' cried Bob, ``for the
sake of anything he might be able to do for
us, so much as for his kind way, that this
was quite delightful. It really seemed as if he
had known our Tiny Tim, and felt with us.''

``I'm sure he's a good soul!'' said Mrs
Cratchit.

``You would be surer of it, my dear,''
returned Bob, ``if you saw and spoke to
him. I shouldn't be at all surprised, mark
what I say, if he got Peter a better
situation.''

``Only hear that, Peter,'' said Mrs Cratchit.

``And then,'' cried one of the girls, ``Peter
will be keeping company with some one,
and setting up for himself.''

``Get along with you!'' retorted Peter,
grinning.

-46-

which we hurry now, is where my place of
occupation is, and has been for a length of
time. I see the house. Let me behold what I
shall be, in days to come.''

The Spirit stopped; the hand was pointed
elsewhere.

``The house is yonder,'' Scrooge
exclaimed. ``Why do you point away?''

The inexorable finger underwent no change.

Scrooge hastened to the window of his
office, and looked in. It was an office still,
but not his. The furniture was not the same,
and the figure in the chair was not himself.
The Phantom pointed as before.

He joined it once again, and wondering
why and whither he had gone,
accompanied it until they reached an iron
gate. He paused to look round before
entering.

A churchyard. Here, then, the wretched man
whose name he had now to learn, lay
underneath the ground. It was a worthy
place. Walled in by houses; overrun by grass
and weeds, the growth of vegetation's
death, not life; choked up with too much
burying; fat with repleted appetite. A worthy
place!

The Spirit stood among the graves, and
pointed down to One. He advanced
towards it trembling. The Phantom was
exactly as it had been, but he dreaded that
he saw new meaning in its solemn shape.

``Before I draw nearer to that stone to which
you point,'' said Scrooge, ``answer me one
question. Are these the shadows of the
things that Will be, or are they shadows of
things that May be, only?''

-47-

all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut
out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I
may sponge away the writing on this
stone!''

In his agony, he caught the spectral hand. It
sought to free itself, but he was strong in his
entreaty, and detained it. The Spirit,
stronger yet, repulsed him.

Holding up his hands in a last prayer to have
his fate reversed, he saw an alteration in the
Phantom's hood and dress. It shrunk,
collapsed, and dwindled down into a
bedpost.

Chapter 5 The End of it

Yes! and the bedpost was his own. The bed
was his own, the room was his own. Best
and happiest of all, the time before him was
his own, to make amends in!

``I will live in the Past, the Present, and the
Future!'' Scrooge repeated, as he
scrambled out of bed. ``The Spirits of all
Three shall strive within me. Oh Jacob
Marley! Heaven, and the Christmas Time
be praised for this! I say it on my knees, old
Jacob; on my knees!''

He was so fluttered and so glowing with his
good intentions, that his broken voice would
scarcely answer to his call. He had been
sobbing violently in his conflict with the
Spirit, and his face was wet with tears.

``They are not torn down,'' cried Scrooge,
folding one of his bed-curtains in his arms,
``they are not torn down, rings and all. They
are here: I am here: the shadows of the
things that would have been, may be
dispelled. They will be. I know they will!''

His hands were busy with his garments all
this time: turning them inside out, putting

-48-

put out his stirring, cold cold, piping for the
blood to dance to; Golden sunlight;
Heavenly sky; sweet fresh air; merry bells.
Oh, glorious. Glorious!

``What's to-day?'' cried Scrooge, calling
downward to a boy in Sunday clothes, who
perhaps had loitered in to look about him.

``Eh? '' returned the boy, with all his might
of wonder.

``What's to-day, my fine fellow?'' said
Scrooge.

``To-day?'' replied the boy. ``Why,
Christmas Day.''

``It's Christmas Day!'' said Scrooge to
himself. ``I haven 't missed it. The Spirits
have done it all in one night. They can do
anything they like. Of course they can. Of
course they can. Hallo, my fine fellow!''

``Hallo!'' returned the boy

``Do you know the Poulterer's, in the next
street but one, at the corner?'' Scrooge
inquired.

``I should hope I did,'' replied the lad.

``An intelligent boy!'' said Scrooge. ``A
remarkable boy! Do you know whether
they've sold the prize Turkey that was
hanging up there? Not the little prize Turkey;
the big one?''

``What, the one as big as me?'' returned the
boy.

``What a delightful boy!'' said Scrooge. ``It's
a pleasure to talk to him. Yes, my buck!''

``It's hanging there now,'' replied the boy.

-49-

recompensed the boy, were only to be
exceeded by the chuckle with which he sat
down breathless in his chair again, and
chuckled till he cried.

Shaving was not an easy task, for his hand
continued to shake very much; and shaving
requires attention, even when you don't
dance while you are at it. But if he had cut
the end of his nose off, he would have put a
piece of sticking-plaister over it, and been
quite satisfied.

He dressed himself all in his best, and at
last got out into the streets. The people were
by this time pouring forth, as he had seen
them with the Ghost of Christmas Present;
and walking with his hands behind him,
Scrooge regarded every one with a
delighted smile. He looked so irresistibly
pleasant, in a word, that three or four good-
humoured fellows said, ``Good morning,
sir! A merry Christmas to you!'' And
Scrooge said often afterwards, that of all
the blithe sounds he had ever heard, those
were the blithest in his ears.

He had not gone far, when coming on
towards him he beheld the portly
gentleman, who had walked into his
counting-house the day before, and said,
``Scrooge and Marley's, I believe?'' It sent
a pang across his heart to think how this old
gentleman would look upon him when they
met; but he knew what path lay straight
before him, and he took it.

``My dear sir,'' said Scrooge, quickening
his pace, and taking the old gentleman by
both his hands. ``How do you do? I hope you
succeeded yesterday. It was very kind of
you. A merry Christmas to you, sir!''

``Mr Scrooge?''

``Yes,'' said Scrooge. ``That is my name,

-50-

``Yes, sir.''

``Where is he, my love?'' said Scrooge.

``He's in the dining-room, sir, along with
mistress. I'll show you up-stairs, if you
please.''

``Thank 'ee. He knows me,'' said Scrooge,
with his hand already on the dining-room
lock. ``I'll go in here, my dear.''

He turned it gently, and sidled his face in,
round the door. They were looking at the
table (which was spread out in great array);
for these young housekeepers are always
nervous on such points, and like to see that
everything is right.

``Fred!'' said Scrooge.

Dear heart alive, how his niece by marriage
started! Scrooge had forgotten, for the
moment, about her sitting in the corner with
the footstool, or he wouldn't have done it, on
any account.

``Why bless my soul!'' cried Fred, ``who's
that?''

``It's I. Your uncle Scrooge. I have come to
dinner. Will you let me in, Fred?''

Let him in! It is a mercy he didn't shake his
arm off. He was at home in five minutes.
Nothing could be heartier. His niece looked
just the same. So did Topper when he
came. So did the plump sister when she
came. So did every one when they came.
Wonderful party, wonderful games,
wonderful unanimity, won-der-ful
happiness!

But he was early at the office next morning.
Oh, he was early there. If he could only be
there first, and catch Bob Cratchit coming

-51-

``A merry Christmas, Bob!'' said Scrooge,
with an earnestness that could not be
mistaken, as he clapped him on the back.
``A merrier Christmas, Bob, my good
fellow, than I have given you for many a
year! I'll raise your salary, and endeavour to
assist your struggling family, and we will
discuss your affairs this very afternoon,
over a Christmas bowl of smoking bishop,
Bob! Make up the fires, and buy another
coal-scuttle before you dot another i, Bob
Cratchit.''

Scrooge was better than his word. He did it
all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who
did not die, he was a second father. He
became as good a friend, as good a
master, and as good a man, as the good
old city knew, or any other good old city,
town, or borough, in the good old world.
Some people laughed to see the alteration
in him, but he let them laugh, and little
heeded them; for he was wise enough to
know that nothing ever happened on this
globe, for good, at which some people did
not have their fill of laughter in the outset;
and knowing that such as these would be
blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that
they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as
have the malady in less attractive forms. His
own heart laughed: and that was quite
enough for him.

He had no further intercourse with Spirits,
but lived upon the Total Abstinence
Principle, ever afterwards; and it was
always said of him, that he knew how to
keep Christmas well, if any man alive
possessed the knowledge. May that be truly
said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim
observed, God Bless Us, Every One!

-52-