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“Well! I am very glad to hear it,” said Scrooge’s nephew, “because these I haven’t any great faith in these young housekeepers. are not much to be relied upon What do you you you say, Topper?”
Topper had clearly got his eye upon one upon one of Scrooge’s niece’s sisters, for he said answered that a bachelor was a wretched outcast, who had no right to say anything express an? opinion on the subject. Whereat a which Whereat, Scrooge’s niece’s sister—the plump one plumpest one with the lace tucker; not the one with the roses—blushed.
“Do go on, Fred,” said Scrooge’s niece, clapping her hands, ????????ly. “He never finishes what he says begins to say!” He is such a ridiculous fellow!”
Scrooge’s nephew laughed again positively roared revelled in another laugh; and as it was impossible to keep the infection off—though the plump sister tried hard to do it with a d??? smelling-bottle ? aromatic vinegar—they all did the same.his example was unanimously followed.
“I was only going to say,” said Scrooge’s nephew, “that he dis?? takes the consequence of his taking a dislike to us, and won’t make not making merry with us, very well. Thatis, as I think, that he loses some pleasant moments, companions ??which could do him no harm. I am sure he loses pleasanter companions than he can find in his own thoughts, either in his mouldy old office or his [shiver]ing dusty chambers. I ???????? ??? he would be hap I mean to give him the same chance every year, whether he likes it or not, ??? for I pity hi? ??? him. ??a thin and lean towards ??? for ??? poor, m????’s ??? He may rail at Christmas till he dies, but he can’t help thinking better of it—I defy him—if he finds me going there, in good temper, year after year, and saying Uncle Scrooge, how are you. If it only puts him in the vein to leave his poor clerk fifty pounds, that’s something. And And I think I shook him, yesterday.”
It was their turn to laugh now, and they at the idea notion of his shaking Scrooge. But being thoroughly good-natured, and not car much caring what they laughed at, so that they did laughed at any rate, he encouraged them in their merriment, and passed the bottle, joyously.
After ? After tea, they [were] had some music. Among them For they were a musical family, and knew when ? what they were about, when they sang 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 great large vein in his forehead or get red in the face over it. Among other Scrooge’s niece played well upon the Harp; and played among other tunes a little simple little air (a mere nothing; you might learn to whistle it in two [hearings] minutes) which had been familiar to the child who ??? fetched Scrooge from the boarding-school, as the he had been reminded [after] by the Ghost of Christmas Past. When he listened to this strain of music, all the sounded, all the things that Ghost had shewn him, crowded on came upon his mind; he softened, more and more; and t?? thought that if he had heard it could have listened to it often, years ago, he might have ??????????????????have heard cultivated the simple kindnesses of life, resounding in such little ??????? and shells, and on his own happiness with his own hands, ?????? not have ?????? troubled without not have needed actual Voices from the Grave to preach them. 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
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45 better than at Christmas, when its mighty founder was a child Himself. Stop! There was[??] first a game at blindman’s buff. Of course there was. And I no more believe Topper blind man was really blind than I believe he had eyes in his kneesboots. My opinion is, that it was a done thing between him and Scrooge’s nephew, and that the Ghost of Christmas Present knew it. The way he went after that plump sister in the lace tucker, was most an outrage on the credulity of human nature. Knocking down the fire irons, tumbling over the chairs, [running ?i? ??f]bumping up against the piano, [crossing] against the[wa??]smothering himself among the curtains, -[]wherever theyshe went, there went he. He always knew where the plump sister was. He wouldn’t catch anybody else. If you fellhad fallen up against him, as some of them did; and stood there; he made a feinthe would have made a feint of endeavouring to [call]seize you, which would have been an affront to your understanding; and would instantly have sidled off in the direction of the plump sister. She often cried out that it wasn’t fair; and it really wasn't not. But when heat last, he caught her; when, in spite of all her [whiskings away and rapid]silken rustlings and her rapid []flutterings past him; he fe???? hergot her into a corner whence there was no escape; then his conduct was the most execrable. For his pretending not to know her; his pretending that it was necessary to touch her head dress, and further to assure himself of her identity by pressing a certain ring upon her finger and a certain chain about her neck; was vile, monstrous![? he?as def???.] No doubt she told him[? ????? ]in plain her opinion of it, when,they after[]another blindman []being in office, []they were so very confidential together, behind the curtains. Scrooge’s niece [] [??????ed ]not[] this gamewas not one of the blindman’s buff party, but was made comfortable, inwith a large chair and a footstool, in a cornersnug corner, where the Ghost and Scrooge stoodwere close behind her. But she playedjoined in the forfeits, and loved her lord to admiration with all the letters of the alphabet. Likewise at the game of How, When, and Where, she was very great, and to the greatsecret joy of Scrooge’s nephew, beat her sisters hollow—though they were sharp girls too, as Topper knew that [enspe??]could have told you. There might have been twenty people there, young and old, but they all [do?n?]played, and so did Scrooge; for [quite?] []wholly forgetting [???????s], 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] and very often guessed right too, for he was asthe sharpestas a needle—best Whitechapel, warranted not to cut in the eye—was not sharper [??nd kn?? of ???] than Scrooge: blunt as he was, in his [[s?? ??np??]]took it in his head to be. The Ghost was greatly pleased to find him doingin thisbusiness? mood, and looked upon him with []such favor 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’s a new game,” said Scrooge. “One [minute]half hour, Spirit, only one!”
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It was a game called Yes and No, where Scrooge’s nephew had to think of some¬thing, 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 dis¬agreeable 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 inex¬pressibly tickled that he was obliged to get up, off the sofa, and stamp. At last the plump sister, falling into a similar state, cried out:
“I have found it out. I know what it is, Fred! I know what it is!”
“What is it!” cried Fred.
“It’s your Uncle Scro-o-o-o-oge!”
Which it certainly was. Admiration was the universal sentiment, though some objected that the reply to “Is it a Bear?” ought to have been “Yes,” inasmuch as an answer in the negative, was sufficient to have diverted their thoughts from Mr. Scrooge, supposing that they had ever had any tendency that way.
“He has given us plenty of merriment, I am sure,” said Fred, “and it would be ungrateful not to drink his health. Here is a glass of mulled wine, ready to our hand at the moment; and I say ‘Uncle Scrooge!’”
“Well! Uncle Scrooge!” they cried.
“A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to the old man, whatever he is!” said Scrooge’s nephew. “He wouldn’t take it from me, but may he have it, never¬theless. Uncle Scrooge!”
Uncle Scrooge had imperceptibly become so gay and light of heart, that he would have pledged the unconscious company in return, and thanked them in an inaudi¬ble speech, if the Ghost had given him time. But the whole scene passed off, in the breath of the last word spoken by his nephew; and he and the Spirit were again upon their travels.
Much they saw, and far they went, and many homes they visited, but always with a happy end. The Spirit stood beside sick beds, and they were cheerful; on foreign lands, and they were close at home; by struggling men, and they were pa¬tient, in their greater hope; by Poverty, and it was rich. In almshouse
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Hospital, and Jail, in misery’s every refuge, where vain man in his little brief au¬thority 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 Holydays 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 tonight.”
“Tonight!” cried Scrooge.
“Tonight 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 it again—it’s a foot! Not 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, fright¬ful, hideous, miserable. They knelt down at its feet, and clung upon the outside of its garment.
“Oh Man! look here. Look, look down here!” exclaimed the Ghost.
They were a boy and a girl. Yellow, meagre, ragged, scowling, wolfish but pros¬trate too in their humility. Where graceful youth should have filled their features out, and touched them with its freshest tints, a stale and shrivelled hand, like that of age, had pinched and twisted them and pulled them into shreds. Where angels might have sat enthroned, devils lurked, and glared out menacing. No change, no degradation, no perversion of humanity, in any grade through all the mysteries of wonderful creation, has monsters half so horrible and dread.
Scrooge started back, appalled. Having them shewn to him in this way, he tried to say, they were fine
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children, but the words choked themselves, rather than be parties to a lie of such enormous magnitude.
“Spirit! are they yours?” Scrooge made shift to askcould say no more.
“They are Man’s,” said the Spirit, looking down upon them. “And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see fearful to hold that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it!” cried the Spirit, stretching out its hand towards the city. “Slander those who tell it ye! Admit it for your factious purposes, and make it worse! And bide the end!”
“Have they no refuge or resource?” cried Scrooge.
“Are there no Prisons?” said the Spirit, turning on him for the last time with his own words. “Are there no workhouses?”
The bell struck Twelve.
Scrooge looked about him for the Ghost, and saw it not. As the last stroke ceased to vibrate he remembered the prediction of old Jacob Marley, and lifting up his eyes, beheld a solemn phantom, draped and hooded, corning, like a mist along the ground, towards him.