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Show J ISyliarlos Dickons J TfpM-fisted Scrooge, who didn't believe In Christmas, was visited by his dead partner one Christmas night and warned that he was forging his own chains with his selfishness. He was told that three spirits would visit htm. The first spirit showed Scrooge his former self and the THE STOKY SO FAR opportunities (or happiness which he had missed. The second spirit led him to the home of his poor clerk. Bob Cratchft. who came late for Christmas dinner because be-cause his emnlover had kent htm overtime. over-time. Asked if Tinv Tim. the Cratchifs crippled son. would live, the spirit re- WNU Service. plied that he would die unUss shadows cast by the past were changed by the future. Scrooge, who had turned down appeals for charity, who had said If people peo-ple starved it showed there was "surplus "sur-plus population." had become a repentant repent-ant man. (Now continue with the storv) He always knew where the plump sister was. INSTALLMENT FOUR It was a great surprise to Scrooge ! to hear a familiar, hearty laugh. ; Scrooge recognized it as his own nephew's. He found himself in a bright, dry, gleaming room. It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment ad-justment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly ir-resistibly contagious as laughter and good humour. Scrooge's niece, by marriage, laughed as heartily as he. And their assembled friends roared. "He said that Christmas was a humbug, as I live!" cried Scrooge's nephew. "He believed it too!" "He's a comical old fellow," said Scrooge's nephew, "that's the truth; and not so pleasant. "However, I believe his offenses carry their own punishment, and I , have nothing to say against him." ; "I'm sure he is very rich, Fred," ! hinted Scrooge's niece. "What of that, my dear!" said Scrooge's nephew. "His wealth is of no use to him." "I have no patience with him," observed Scrooge's niece. "Oh, I have!" said Scrooge's nephew. "I am sorry for him; I couldn't be argry with him if I tried. Who suffers by his ill whims! Himself, always. Here, he takes it into his head to dislike us, and he won't come and dine with us. What's the consequence? He don't lose much of a dinner." "Indeed, I think he loses a very good dinner," said Scrooge's niece. "Well! I'm very glad to hear it," said Scrooge's nephew, "because I haven't great faith in these young housekeepers. What say you, Topper? Topper had clearly got his eye upon one of Scrooge's niece's sisters, sis-ters, for he answered that a bachelor bache-lor had no right to an opinion on the subject. Whereat Scrooge's niece's sister the plump one with the lace tucker: not the one with the roses blushed. After a while they played at forfeits; for-feits; for it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child himself. Stop! There was first a game at blind-man's blind-man's buff. Of course there was. And I no more believe Topper was really blind than I believe he had eyes in his boots. My opinion is, that it was a done thing between him and Scrooge's nephew: and that the Ghost of Christmas Present knew it. The way he went after that plump sister in the lace tucker. He always knew where the plump sister was. He wouldn't catch anybody any-body else. If you had fallen up against him (as some of them did), on purpose, he would have made a feint of endeavouring to seize you, which would have been an affront to your understanding, and would instantly have sidled off in the direction di-rection of the plump sister. She often cried out that it wasn't fair; and it really was not. But when at last he caught her; when, in spite of all her silken rustlings, and her rapid flutterings past him, he got her into a corner, whence there was no escape; then his conduct was the most execrable. For his pretending iot to know her; his pretending that it was necessary to touch her headdress, head-dress, and further to assure himself him-self of her identity by pressing a certain ring upon her finger, and a certain chain about her neck; was vile, monstrous! No doubt she told him her opinion of it, when, another anoth-er blind man being in office, they were so very confidential together, behind the curtains. There might have been twenty people there, young and old. "Here is a new game," said Scrooge. "One half-hour. Spirit, ot'y one!" "it is 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 an-swering to their questions yes or no, as the case was. The brisk fire of questioning to which he was exposed, ex-posed, elicited from him that he was thinking of an animal, a live animal, rather a disagreeable animal, ani-mal, a savage animal, an animal, that growled and grunted sometimes, some-times, 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 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, 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-ogc! " Which it certainly was. Admiration Admira-tion was the universal sentiment, though some objected that the reply re-ply to "Is it a bear?" aught to have been "Yes." "Me has given us plenty of merriment. merri-ment. 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; mo-ment; and I say, 'Uncle Scrooge!' " "Uncle Scrooge!" they cried. 1 "A merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to the old man, whatever he is!" said Scrooge's nephew. Uncle Scrooge had imperceptibly become gay and light of heart. But he and the Spirit were again upon their travels. Much they saw, ffnd far they went, and many homes they visited, but always with a happy end. The Spirit stood beside sick-beds, and they were cheerful; on foreign lands, and they were close at home; by struggling men, and they were patient in their greater hope; by poverty, and it was rich. In almshouse, alms-house, hospital, and jail, in misery's mis-ery's every refuge, where vain man in his little brief authority had not made fast the door, and barred the Spirit out, he left his blessing, and taught Scrooge his precepts. "Forgive me if I am not justified in what I ask," said Scrooge, looking look-ing intently at the Spirit's robe, "but I see something strange, and not belonging be-longing 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, ab-ject, frightful, hideous, miserable. "Spirit! are they yours?" Scrooge could say no more. "They are Man's," said the Spirit, looking down upon them. "And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased." "Have they no refuge or resource?" re-source?" 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 remem-bered the prediction of old Jacob Marley, and lifting up his eyes, beheld be-held a solemn Phantom, draped and hooded, coming. STAVE FOUR The Last of the Spirits "I am in the presence of the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come?" said Scrooge. The Spirit answered not. "Ghost of the Future!" Scrooge exclaimed, "I fear you more man any spectre I have seen. But as I know your purpose is to do me good, and as I hope to live to be another man from what I was, I am prepared pre-pared to bear you company, and do it with a thankful heart. Will you not speak to me?" It gave him no reply. The hand was pointed straight before them. "Lead on!" said Scrooge. "Lead on!" The Spirit stopped beside one little lit-tle knot of business men. "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." "What has he done with his money?" mon-ey?" asked a red-faced gentleman. "I haven't heard," said the man with the large chin, yawning again. "Left it to his company, perhaps." 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 wc make up a party and volunteer?" "I don't mind going if a lunch is provided." observed one gentleman. Another laugh. They left the busy scene, and went into an obscure part of the town, i TIktp was a low-bruwcd, beetling shop, below a pent-house roof, where iron, old rags, bottles, bones and greasy offal, were bought. Sitting Sit-ting in among the wares he dealt in, by a charcoal stove, made of old bricks, was a gray-haired rascal, nearly seventy years of age. Scrooge and the Phantom came into the presence of this man, just as a woman with a heavy bundle slunk into the shop. But she had scarcely entered, when another woman, similarly laden, came in too; and she was closely followed by a man in faded black. "Open that bundle, old Joe," she continued, "and let me know the value of it. Speak out plain. I'm not afraid to be the first, nor afraid for them to see it. We knew pretty well that we were helping ourselves, before we met here, I believe. It's no sin. Open the bundle, Joe." But the gallantry of her friends would not allow of this; and the man in faded black, mounting the breach first, produced his plunder. It was not extensive. A seal or two, a pencil-case, a pair of sleeve-buttons, sleeve-buttons, and a brooch of no great value, were all. They were severally sev-erally examined and appraised by old Joe. The laundress was next. Sheets and towels, a little wearing apparel, two old-fashioned silver teaspoons, a pair of sugar-tongs, and a few boots. "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 laugh-ing and leaning forward on her crossed arms. "Bed-curtains!" "You don't mean to say you took 'em down, rings and all, with him lying there?" said Joe. "Yes I do," replied the woman. "Don't drop that oil upon the blankets, blan-kets, now." "His blankets?" asked Joe. "Whose else's do you think?" replied re-plied the woman. "He isn't likely to take cold without 'em, I dare say. "I hope he didn't die of anything catching? Eh?" said old Joe, stopping stop-ping in his work, and looking up. "Don't you be afraid of that," returned re-turned the woman. "I an't so fond of his company that I'd loiter about him for such things, if he did." "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, 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, lay a something covered up. "If there is any person in the town, who feels emotion caused by this man's death," said Scrooge quite agonized, "show that person to me, Spirit, I beseech you!" The Phantom spread its dark robe before him for a moment, like a wing; and withdrawing it, revealed a room by daylight, where a mother and her children were. She was expecting someone. 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 is hope yet," he said. "If he relents," she said, amazed, "there is! Nothing is past hope if such a miracle has happened." "He is past mlcnting," said her husband. "He is dead." "To whom will our debt be transferred?" trans-ferred?" "I don't know. But before that time we shall be ready with the money; and even though we were not, it would be a bad fortune indeed in-deed to find so merciless a creditor in his successor. We may sleep tonight with light hearts, Caroline!" (TO Hi: COSTIMED) |