15. "I do," said Scrooge. "Merry Christmas! What right have you to be merry? 16. "What's Christmas time to you but a time. for paying bills without money; a time for finding yourself a year older, and 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!" 17. "Uncle!" pleaded the nephew. 18. Nephew!" returned the uncle, sternly, "keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it in mine." 19. "Keep it!" repeated Scrooge's nephew. "But you don't keep it." 20. "Let me leave it alone, then," said Scrooge. "Much good may it do you! Much good it has ever done you!" 21. 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 But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas-time as a good time; a kind, forgiving, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long the rest. 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!" 22. The clerk in the bank involuntarily applauded. Becoming immediately sensible of the impropriety, he poked the fire, and extinguished the last frail spark forever. 23. "Let me hear another sound from you,” said Scrooge, "and you'll keep your Christmas by losing your situation. You're quite a powerful speaker, sir," he added, turning to his nephew. "I wonder you don't go into Parliament." 24. "Don't be angry, uncle. Come! Dine with us to-morrow." 25. Scrooge said that he would see him yes, indeed he did. 26. "But why?" cried Scrooge's nephew. "Why?" 27. "Why did Why did you get married?" said Scrooge. 28. "Because I fell in love." 29. "Because you fell in love!" growled Scrooge, as if that were the only one thing in the world more ridiculous than a merry Christmas. "Good after noon!" 30. "Nay, uncle, but you never came to see me before that happened. Why give it as a reason for not coming now?" 31. "Good afternoon," said Scrooge. 32. "I want nothing from you; I ask nothing of you; why cannot we be friends?" 33. "Good afternoon," said Scrooge. 34. “I am sorry, with all my heart, to find you so resolute. We have never had any quarrel, to which I have been a party. But I have made the trial in homage to Christmas, and I'll keep my Christmas humor to the last. So, A Merry Christmas, uncle!" 35. "Good afternoon!" said Scrooge. 36. "And A Happy New Year!" 37. "Good afternoon!" said Scrooge. 38. His nephew left the room without an angry word. CHARLES DICKENS in A Christmas Carol. LXXXVIII. THE THREE COPECKS I. Crouched low in a sordid chamber, With a cupboard of empty shelves, To comfort or help themselves, 2. Two children were left forsaken, 3. Alone in that crowded city, Which shines like an arctic star, 4. Now, Max was an urchin of seven; With the crown of her rippling ringlets, Could scarcely have reached your knees. 5. As he looked at his sister weeping, 6. He wrote on a fragment of paper, With quivering hand and soul, "Please send to me, Christ, three copecks, To purchase for Leeze a roll!" 7. Then rushed to a church, his missive As the surest mail bound Christward, 8. While he stepped upon tiptoe to reach it 9. Having read it, the good man's bosom "Ah, Christ may have heard you already! Will you come to my house, my boy?" 10. "But not without Leeze?" IO. "No, surely, We'll have a rare party of three; 11. That night, in the cosiest cottage, The orphans were safe at rest; Each sang as a callow birdling In the depths of its downy nest. 12. And the next Lord's Day, in his pulpit, The preacher so spake of these Stray lambs from the fold which Jesus 13. So recounted their guileless story, And the dullest could understand. |