5. My hand was on the latch, when lo! 6. Oh, the long rapture, perfect rest, 7. Then by his side, his hand in mine, 66 8. "O Death!" I cried, " if these be thine, 9. And still we talked. O'er cloudy bars 10. Then nearer to his side I drew, * * * * * 11. 'Tis true his rest this many a year Has made the village church-yard dear; 12. And oft, when other fires are low, XIII. THERE'S BUT ONE PAIR OF STOCKINGS TO MEND TO-NIGHT. ΑΝΟΝΥΜMOUS. 1. An old wife sat by her bright fireside, In an ancient chair whose creaky frame While down by her side, on the kitchen floor, 2. The good man dozed o'er the latest news, 3. But anon a misty tear-drop came So deep was the channel-so silent the stream- 4. Yet he marveled much that the cheerful light Of her eye had weary grown, And marveled he more at the tangled balls; " I have shared thy joys since our marriage vow, Conceal not from me thy sorrows now." 5. Then she spoke of the time when the basket there Was filled to the very brim, And how there remained of the goodly pile "Then wonder not at the dimmed eye-light, There's but one pair of stockings to mend to-night. 6. "I can not but think of the busy feet, 7. "For each empty nook in the basket old, 8. "'Twas said that far through the forest wild Was a land whose rivers and darkening caves 9. "Another went forth on the foaming waves 10. "Two others have gone toward the setting sun, 11. "Another-the dearest the fairest-the best Was ta'en by the angels away, And clad in a garment that waxeth not old, XIV. THE MISER. CHARLES DICKENS. 1. Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooge's name was good upon 'Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail. 2. Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the 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. 3. 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 solemnized it with an undoubted bargain. 4. Scrooge never painted out old Marley's name. There it stood, years afterwards, above the warehouse door: Scrooge and Marley. The firm was known as Scrooge and Marley. Sometimes people new to the business called Scrooge Scrooge, and sometimes Marley, but he answered to both names. It was all the same to him. 5. Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret and self-contained and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shriveled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin lips blue; and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice. A frost rime was on his head, and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his own low temperature always about with him; he iced his office in the dog-days; and didn't thaw it one degree at Christmas. 6. External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth could warm, no wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he, no falling snow was more intent upon its purpose, no pelting rain less open to entreaty. Foul weather didn't know where to have him. The heaviest rain and snow and hail and sleet could boast of the advantage over him in only one respect. They often came down handsomely, and Scrooge never did. 7. Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with gladsome looks, "My dear Scrooge, how are you? When will you come to see me?" No beggars implored him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him what it was o'clock, no man or woman ever once in all his life inquired the way to such and such a place, of Scrooge. Even the blind-men's dogs appeared to know him; and when they saw him coming on, would tug their owners into door-ways 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!'" 8. But what did Scrooge care! It was the very thing he liked. To edge his way along the crowded paths of life, |