The Pickwick Papers
very much enhanced if it cost a little trouble to obtain it, screamed
and struggled, and ran into corners, and threatened and remonstrated,
and did everything but leave the room, until some of the less
adventurous gentlemen were on the point of desisting, when they all at
once found it useless to resist any longer, and submitted to be kissed
with a good grace. Mr. Winkle kissed the young lady with the black eyes,
and Mr. Snodgrass kissed Emily; and Mr. Weller, not being particular
about the form of being under the mistletoe, kissed Emma and the other
female servants, just as he caught them. As to the poor relations, they
kissed everybody, not even excepting the plainer portions of the young
lady visitors, who, in their excessive confusion, ran right under the
mistletoe, as soon as it was hung up, without knowing it! Wardle stood
with his back to the fire, surveying the whole scene, with the utmost
satisfaction; and the fat boy took the opportunity of appropriating to
his own use, and summarily devouring, a particularly fine mince-pie,
that had been carefully put by, for somebody else.
Now, the screaming had subsided, and faces were in a glow, and curls in
a tangle, and Mr. Pickwick, after kissing the old lady as before
mentioned, was standing under the mistletoe, looking with a very pleased
countenance on all that was passing around him, when the young lady with
the black eyes, after a little whispering with the other young ladies,
made a sudden dart forward, and, putting her arm round Mr. Pickwick’s
neck, saluted him affectionately on the left cheek; and before Mr.
Pickwick distinctly knew what was the matter, he was surrounded by the
whole body, and kissed by every one of them.
It was a pleasant thing to see Mr. Pickwick in the centre of the group,
now pulled this way, and then that, and first kissed on the chin, and
then on the nose, and then on the spectacles, and to hear the peals of
laughter which were raised on every side; but it was a still more
pleasant thing to see Mr. Pickwick, blinded shortly afterwards with a
silk handkerchief, falling up against the wall, and scrambling into
corners, and going through all the mysteries of blind-man’s buff, with
the utmost relish for the game, until at last he caught one of the poor
relations, and then had to evade the blind-man himself, which he did
with a nimbleness and agility that elicited the admiration and applause
of all beholders. The poor relations caught the people who they thought
would like it, and, when the game flagged, got caught themselves. When
they all tired of blind-man’s buff, there was a great game at snap-
dragon, and when fingers enough were burned with that, and all the
raisins were gone, they sat down by the huge fire of blazing logs to a
substantial supper, and a mighty bowl of wassail, something smaller than
an ordinary wash-house copper, in which the hot apples were hissing and
bubbling with a rich look, and a jolly sound, that were perfectly
irresistible.
‘This,’ said Mr. Pickwick, looking round him, ‘this is, indeed,
comfort.’ ‘Our invariable custom,’ replied Mr. Wardle. ‘Everybody sits
down with us on Christmas Eve, as you see them now--servants and all;
and here we wait, until the clock strikes twelve, to usher Christmas in,
and beguile the time with forfeits and old stories. Trundle, my boy,
rake up the fire.’
Up flew the bright sparks in myriads as the logs were stirred. The deep
red blaze sent forth a rich glow, that penetrated into the farthest
corner of the room, and cast its cheerful tint on every face.
‘Come,’ said Wardle, ‘a song--a Christmas song! I’ll give you one, in
default of a better.’
‘Bravo!’ said Mr. Pickwick.
‘Fill up,’ cried Wardle. ‘It will be two hours, good, before you see the
bottom of the bowl through the deep rich colour of the wassail; fill up
all round, and now for the song.’
Thus saying, the merry old gentleman, in a good, round, sturdy voice,
commenced without more ado--
A CHRISTMAS CAROL
‘I care not for Spring; on his fickle wing Let the blossoms and buds be
borne; He woos them amain with his treacherous rain, And he scatters
them ere the morn. An inconstant elf, he knows not himself, Nor his own
changing mind an hour, He’ll smile in your face, and, with wry grimace,
He’ll wither your youngest flower.
‘Let the Summer sun to his bright home run, He shall never be sought by
me; When he’s dimmed by a cloud I can laugh aloud And care not how sulky
he be! For his darling child is the madness wild That sports in fierce
fever’s train; And when love is too strong, it don’t last long, As many
have found to their pain.
‘A mild harvest night, by the tranquil light Of the modest and gentle
moon, Has a far sweeter sheen for me, I ween, Than the broad and
unblushing noon. But every leaf awakens my grief, As it lieth beneath
the tree; So let Autumn air be never so fair, It by no means agrees with
me.
‘But my song I troll out, for _Christmas _Stout, The hearty, the true,
and the bold; A bumper I drain, and with might and main Give three
cheers for this Christmas old! We’ll usher him in with a merry din That
shall gladden his joyous heart, And we’ll keep him up, while there’s
bite or sup, And in fellowship good, we’ll part. ‘In his fine honest
pride, he scorns to hide One jot of his hard-weather scars; They’re no
disgrace, for there’s much the same trace On the cheeks of our bravest
tars. Then again I sing till the roof doth ring And it echoes from wall
to wall--To the stout old wight, fair welcome to-night, As the King of
the Seasons all!’
This song was tumultuously applauded--for friends and dependents make a
capital audience--and the poor relations, especially, were in perfect
ecstasies of rapture. Again was the fire replenished, and again went the
wassail round.
‘How it snows!’ said one of the men, in a low tone.
‘Snows, does it?’ said Wardle.
‘Rough, cold night, Sir,’ replied the man; ‘and there’s a wind got up,
that drifts it across the fields, in a thick white cloud.’
‘What does Jem say?’ inquired the old lady. ‘There ain’t anything the
matter, is there?’
‘No, no, mother,’ replied Wardle; ‘he says there’s a snowdrift, and a
wind that’s piercing cold. I should know that, by the way it rumbles in
the chimney.’
‘Ah!’ said the old lady, ‘there was just such a wind, and just such a
fall of snow, a good many years back, I recollect--just five years
before your poor father died. It was a Christmas Eve, too; and I
remember that on that very night he told us the story about the goblins
that carried away old Gabriel Grub.’
‘The story about what?’ said Mr. Pickwick.
‘Oh, nothing, nothing,’ replied Wardle. ‘About an old sexton, that the
good people down here suppose to have been carried away by goblins.’
‘Suppose!’ ejaculated the old lady. ‘Is there anybody hardy enough to
disbelieve it? Suppose! Haven’t you heard ever since you were a child,
that he _was _carried away by the goblins, and don’t you know he was?’
‘Very well, mother, he was, if you like,’ said Wardle laughing. ‘He
_was_ carried away by goblins, Pickwick; and there’s an end of the
matter.’
‘No, no,’ said Mr. Pickwick, ‘not an end of it, I assure you; for I must
hear how, and why, and all about it.’
Wardle smiled, as every head was bent forward to hear, and filling out
the wassail with no stinted hand, nodded a health to Mr. Pickwick, and
began as follows--
But bless our editorial heart, what a long chapter we have been betrayed
into! We had quite forgotten all such petty restrictions as chapters, we
solemnly declare. So here goes, to give the goblin a fair start in a new
one. A clear stage and no favour for the goblins, ladies and gentlemen,
if you please.
CHAPTER XXIX. THE STORY OF THE GOBLINS WHO STOLE A SEXTON
‘In an old abbey town, down in this part of the country, a long, long
while ago--so long, that the story must be a true one, because our
great-grandfathers implicitly believed it--there officiated as sexton
and grave-digger in the churchyard, one Gabriel Grub. It by no means
follows that because a man is a sexton, and constantly surrounded by the
emblems of mortality, therefore he should be a morose and melancholy
man; your undertakers are the merriest fellows in the world; and I once
had the honour of being on intimate terms with a mute, who in private
life, and off duty, was as comical and jocose a little fellow as ever
chirped out a devil-may-care song, without a hitch in his memory, or
drained off a good stiff glass without stopping for breath. But
notwithstanding these precedents to the contrary, Gabriel Grub was an
ill-conditioned, cross-grained, surly fellow--a morose and lonely man,
who consorted with nobody but himself, and an old wicker bottle which
fitted into his large deep waistcoat pocket--and who eyed each merry
face, as it passed him by, with such a deep scowl of malice and ill-
humour, as it was difficult to meet without feeling something the worse
for.
‘A little before twilight, one Christmas Eve, Gabriel shouldered his
spade, lighted his lantern, and betook himself towards the old
churchyard; for he had got a grave to finish by next morning, and,
feeling very low, he thought it might raise his spirits, perhaps, if he
went on with his work at once. As he went his way, up the ancient
street, he saw the cheerful light of the blazing fires gleam through the
old casements, and heard the loud laugh and the cheerful shouts of those
who were assembled around them; he marked the bustling preparations for
next day’s cheer, and smelled the numerous savoury odours consequent
thereupon, as they steamed up from the kitchen windows in clouds. All
this was gall and wormwood to the heart of Gabriel Grub; and when groups
of children bounded out of the houses, tripped across the road, and were
met, before they could knock at the opposite door, by half a dozen
curly-headed little rascals who crowded round them as they flocked
upstairs to spend the evening in their Christmas games, Gabriel smiled
grimly, and clutched the handle of his spade with a firmer grasp, as he
thought of measles, scarlet fever, thrush, whooping-cough, and a good
many other sources of consolation besides.
‘In this happy frame of mind, Gabriel strode along, returning a short,
sullen growl to the good-humoured greetings of such of his neighbours as
now and then passed him, until he turned into the dark lane which led to
the churchyard. Now, Gabriel had been looking forward to reaching the
dark lane, because it was, generally speaking, a nice, gloomy, mournful
place, into which the townspeople did not much care to go, except in
broad daylight, and when the sun was shining; consequently, he was not a
little indignant to hear a young urchin roaring out some jolly song
about a merry Christmas, in this very sanctuary which had been called
Coffin Lane ever since the days of the old abbey, and the time of the
shaven-headed monks. As Gabriel walked on, and the voice drew nearer, he
found it proceeded from a small boy, who was hurrying along, to join one
of the little parties in the old street, and who, partly to keep himself
company, and partly to prepare himself for the occasion, was shouting
out the song at the highest pitch of his lungs. So Gabriel waited until
the boy came up, and then dodged him into a corner, and rapped him over
the head with his lantern five or six times, just to teach him to
modulate his voice. And as the boy hurried away with his hand to his
head, singing quite a different sort of tune, Gabriel Grub chuckled very
heartily to himself, and entered the churchyard, locking the gate behind
him.
‘He took off his coat, set down his lantern, and getting into the
unfinished grave, worked at it for an hour or so with right good-will.