Guided Sleep Meditation & Sleep Hypnosis from Sleep Cove - A Christmas Carol Part 3 - A Christmas Story Reading

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Starting point is 00:00:46 please go to sleepcove.com slash support. That's sleepcove.com slash support. If you can't support the show right now, please subscribe with a bell to get alerts on all new free content thank you have you ever gazed in wonder at the great pyramid have you marvelled at the golden face of Tudankhamun

Starting point is 00:01:16 or admired the delicate features of Queen Nefertiti if you have you'll probably like the History of Egypt podcast every week we explore tales of this ancient culture The history of Egypt is available wherever you get your podcasting fix. Come, let me introduce you to the world of ancient Egypt. Stave 3, the second of three spirits. Awaking in the middle of a prodigiously tough snore and sitting up in bed to get his thoughts together, Scrooge had no occasion to be told that the bell was again upon the stroke of one.

Starting point is 00:02:03 He felt that he was restored to consciousness. in the right nick of time, for the special purpose of holding a conference with the second messenger dispatched to him through Jacob Marley's intervention. But finding that he turned uncomfortably cold when he began to wonder which of his sharp curtains

Starting point is 00:02:23 this new specter would draw back, he put them everyone aside with his own hands and lying down again established a sharp lookout all round the bed for he wished to challenge the spirit on the moment of his appearance and did not wish to be taken by surprise and made nervous gentlemen of the free and easy sort who plume themselves on being acquainted with a move or two

Starting point is 00:02:49 and being usually equal to the time of day express this wide range of their capacity for the adventure by observing that they are good for anything from pitch and toss to manslaughter between which opposite extremes, no doubt there lies a tolerably wide and comprehensive range of subjects. Without venturing for Scrooge quite as hardly as this, I don't mind calling on you to believe that he was ready for a good, broad range of strange appearances, and that nothing between a baby and rhinoceros would have astonished him very much.

Starting point is 00:03:26 Now being prepared for almost anything, he was not by any means prepared for nothing, and consequently when the bell struck one and no shape appeared he was taken with a violent fit of trembling. Five minutes, ten minutes, a quarter of an hour went by, yet nothing came. All this time he lay upon his bed, the very core and centre of a blaze of ruddy light which streamed upon it when the clock proclaimed the hour and which being only light was more alarming than a dozen ghosts, as he was powerless to make out what it meant, or would it be at, and was sometimes apprehensive that he might be at that very moment

Starting point is 00:04:11 an interesting case of spontaneous combustion, without having the consolation of knowing it. At last, however, he began to think, as you or I would have thought at first, for it is always the person not in the prediction, Dicament, who knows what ought to have been done in it, and would unquestionably have done it too, at last. I say he began to think that the source and secret of this ghosty light might be in the adjoining room. From whence on further tracing it, it seemed to shine.

Starting point is 00:04:46 This idea, taking full possession of his mind, he got up softly and shuffled in his slippers to the door. The moment Scrooge's hand was on the lock, a strange voice called. him by his name, and bade him enter. He obeyed. It was his room, there was no doubt about it, but it had undergone a surprising transformation. The walls and ceilings were so hung with living green that it looked a perfect grove, from every part of which bright gleaming berries glistened. The crisp leaves of holly, mistletoe, and ivy reflected back the light as if so many little mirrors had been scattered there, and such a mighty blaze went roaring at the chimney as that dull petrification of a hearth had never known in Scrooge's time, or Marley's, or for many and many

Starting point is 00:05:40 a winter season gone, heaped up on the floor to form a kind of throne, were turkeys, geese, game, poultry, brawn, great joints of meat, sucking pigs, long wreaths of sausages, mince pies, plum puddings, barrels of oysters, red hot chestnuts, cherry-cheeked apples, juicy oranges, luscious pears, immense twelfth cakes, and seething bowls of punch that made the chamber dim with their delicious steam. In easy state upon the couch, there sat a Johnny Giant, glorious to see, who bore a glowing torch, in shape not unlike Plenty's horn, and held it up high up. to shield its light on Scrooge as he came peeping round the door. Come in, exclaimed the ghost. Come in and know me better man. Scrooge entered timidly and hung his head before this spirit.

Starting point is 00:06:42 He was not the dogged Scrooge he had been, and though the spirit's eyes were clear and kind, he did not like to meet them. I am the ghost of Christmas present, said the spirit. Look upon me. Scrooge reverently did so. It was clothed in one simple green row or mantle bordered with white fur. This garment hung so loosely on the figure that its capacious breast was bare as if disdaining to be warded or concealed by any artifice. Its feet observable beneath the ample folds of the garment were also bare and on its head it wore no other covering than a holly wreath. set here and there with shining icicles. Its dark brown curls were long and free,

Starting point is 00:07:33 free as its genial face, its sparkling joy, its open hand, its cheery voice, its unconstrained demeanour, and its joyful air. Girded round its middle was an antique scabbard, but no sword was in it,

Starting point is 00:07:50 and the ancient sheath was eaten up with rust. You have never seen the long, like of me before, it's glamed the spirit. Never, Scrooge made to answer it. Have you never walked forth with your younger members of my family, meaning for I am very young, my elder brothers born in these later years, pursued the phantom. I don't think I have, said Scrooge. I'm afraid I have not. Have you had many brothers' spirit? More than 1800, said the ghost. A tremendous family to provide for, muttered Scrooge. The ghost of Christmas present rose. Spirit, said Scrooge submissively. Conduct me where you will. I went forth last night on

Starting point is 00:08:41 compulsion, and I learned a lesson which is working now. Tonight, if you have ought to teach me, let me profit by it. Touch my robe. Scrooge did as he was told, and helped. And held it fast. Holly, mistletoe, red berries, ivy, turkeys, geese, game, poultry, brown, meat, pigs, sausages, oysters, pies, puddings, fruit and punch, all vanished instantly. So did the room, the fire, the ruddy glow, the hour of night, and they stood in the city streets on Christmas morning where, for the weather was severe, the people made a rough but brisk and not unpleasant kind of music in scraping the snow from the pavement in front of their dwellings and from the tops of their houses, whence it was mad delight to the boys to see it coming plumping down into

Starting point is 00:09:41 the road below and splitting into artificial little snowstorms. Their house fronts looked black enough and the windows blacker, contrasting with the smooth white sheet of snow upon the roofs, and with the dirtier snow upon the ground, which last deposit had been ploughed up in deep furrows by the heavy wheels of carts and wagons. Farrows that crossed and recrossed each other hundreds of times were the great streets branched off and made intricate channels hard to trace than the thick yellow mud and icy water. The sky was gloomy, and the shortest streets were choked up with a dingy mist,

Starting point is 00:10:23 half thawed, half frozen, whose heavier particles descended in a shower of sutty atoms if all the chimneys in Britain had, in one consent, caught fire and were blazing away to their dear heart's content. There was nothing very cheerful in the climate or the town, and yet there was an air of cheerfulness abroad that the clearest summer air and brightest summer sun might have endeavoured to diffuse in vain. For the people who were shoveling away on the housetops were jovial and full of glee, calling out to one another from the parapets,

Starting point is 00:11:02 and now and then exchanging a facetious snowball, better-natured missile, far than many a worldly jest, laughing heartily if it went right or not. not less heartily if it went wrong. The poultryous shops were still half full and the fruitiers were radiant in their glory. There were great round, pot-bellied baskets of chestnuts, shaped like the waistcoats of jolly old gentleman, lolling at the doors and tumbling out into the streets in their apolletic opulence. There were ruddy, brown-faced, broad-girthed Spanish onions, shining in the fatness of their growth like Spanish fries and winking from their shelves in wanton slinness

Starting point is 00:11:47 and the girls as they went by and glanced them early and the hung up mistletoe. There were pairs and apples clustered high in blooming pyramids there were bunches of grapes made in the shopkeeper's benevolence to dangle from conspicuous hooks that people's mouths might water gratis as they pass. while there were piles of filberts, mossy and brown, and recalling in their fragrance, ancient walks among the woods and pleasant shuffling ankle deep through withered leaves.

Starting point is 00:12:22 There were Norfolk biffins, squat and swarthy, setting off the yellow of the oranges and lemons, and in the great compactness of their juicy persons, urgently entreating and beseeching to be carried home in paper bags and eaten after dinner. The very gold and silver fish set forth among these choice fruits in a bowl, though members of a dull and stagnant bloody race appeared to know that there was something going on, and to a fish went gasping round and round their little world, in slow and passionless excitement. The grosses, oh the grosses, nearly closed with perhaps two shutters down, all one, but through those gaps such glimpses

Starting point is 00:13:09 It was not alone That the scales descending on the counter Made a merry sound Or that the twine and roller Parted company so briskly Or that the canisters were rattled up And down like juggling tricks Or even that the blended sense of tea and coffee

Starting point is 00:13:26 Was so grateful to the nose Or even that the raisins were so plentiful and rare That almonds so extremely white the sticks of cinnamon so long and straight, and the other spices so delicious, the candied fruits so caked and spotted, with malted sugar, as to make the coldest lookers-on feel faint and subsequently bilious,

Starting point is 00:13:50 nor was it that the figs were moist and pulpy, or that the French plums blushed in modest tartness through the highly decorated boxes, or that everything was good to eat, and in its Christmas dress, but the customers were also hurried and so eager in the hopeful promise of the day that they tumbled up against each other at the door, crashing their wicker baskets wildly,

Starting point is 00:14:14 and left their purchases upon the counter, and came running back to fetch them, and committed hundreds of the like mistakes in the best humour possible, while the grocer and his people were so frank and fresh that the polished hearts with which they fastened their aprons behind might have been their own. They were worn outside for general inspection and for Christmas doors to peck at if they chose. But soon the steeples called good people all to church and chapel and away they came,

Starting point is 00:14:47 flocking through the streets and their best clothes and with their gayest faces. And at the same time they emerge from scores of by-streets, lanes and nameless turnings, innumerable people carrying their dinners to the baker's shop. The sight of these poor revelers Appeared to interest the spirit very much For he stood with Scrooge beside him in a baker's doorway And taking off the covers As their bearers passed

Starting point is 00:15:14 Sprinkled incense on their dinners from his torch And it was a very uncommon kind of torch For once or twice when they were angry Words between some dinner carriers Who had jostled each other He shed a few drops of water on them From it and their good humour was restored directly,

Starting point is 00:15:35 for they said it was ashamed to quarrel upon Christmas Day, and so it was. God love it, so it was. In time the bells ceased, and the bakers were shut up, and yet there was a genial shadowing forth of all these dinners and the progress of their cooking, in the thawed blotch of wet above each baker's oven,

Starting point is 00:15:57 where the pavement smoked as if stones were cooking too. Is there a peculiar flavour in what you sprinkle from your torch? Ask Scrooge, there is, my own. Will it apply to any kind of dinner on this day? Askedrude. To any kindly given, to a poor one most. Why to a poor one most? As Scrooge, because it needs it most.

Starting point is 00:16:23 Spirit, said Scrooge after a moment's thought. I wonder you of all the beings and the main. many worlds about us should desire to cramp these people's opportunities of innocent enjoyment. I, cried the spirit, you would deprive them on their means of dining every seventh day, often the only day in which they can be said to dine at all, said Scrooge, wouldn't you? I, cried the spirit, you seek to close these places on the seventh day, said Scrooge, and it comes to the same thing. I seek, exclaimed the Spirit.

Starting point is 00:17:04 Forgive me if I am wrong. It has been done in your name, or at least of that of your family, said Scrooge. There are some upon this earth of yours, returned the Spirit, who lay claim to know us, who do their deeds of passion, pride, ill will, hatred, envy, bigotry,

Starting point is 00:17:24 and selfishness in our name, who are as strange to us and all our kith and kin as if they had never lived. Remember that and charge their doings on themselves, not us. Scrooge promised that he would, and they went on, invisible as they had been before, into the suburbs of the town. It was a remarkable quality of the ghost, which Scrooge had deserved at the bakers, that notwithstanding his gigantic size,

Starting point is 00:17:55 he could accommodate himself to any place with ease, and that he stood beneath a low roof quite as gracefully and like a supernatural creature, as it was possible he could have done in any lofty hall. And perhaps it was the pleasure the good spirit had in showing off this power of his, or else it would have been his own kind, generous hearty nature and his sympathy with all poor men that led him straight to Scrooge's clerks.

Starting point is 00:18:24 for there he went and took Scrooge with him holding to his robe and on the threshold of the door the spirit smiled and stopped to bless Bob Cratchett's dwelling with the sprinkling of his torch

Starting point is 00:18:39 think of that Bob had fifteen Bob a week himself he pocketed on Saturdays but 15 copies of his Christian name and yet the ghost of Christmas present blessed his full-room house Then up rose Mrs Cratchett, Cratchett's wife, dressed out but poorly in a twice-turned gown, but braven ribbons, which are cheap and made a goodly show for sixpence, as she laid the cloth, assisted by Belinda Cratchett, second of her daughters, also braven ribbons, while Master Peter Cratchett plunged a fork into the saucepan of potatoes and getting the corners of his monstrous shrews. shirt collar, Bob's private property conferred upon his son and heir in honour of the day.

Starting point is 00:19:31 Into his mouth, rejoiced to find himself so gallantly attired, and yearned to show his linen in the fashionable parks. And now two smaller cratches, boy and girl, came tearing in, screaming that outside the bakers they had smelt the goose, and known it for their own, and basking in luxurious thoughts of sage and onion, these young Cratchez danced about the table, and exalted Master Peter Cratchett to the skies, while he, not proud, although his collars nearly choked him, blew the fire, until the slow potatoes bubbling up knocked loudly at the saucepan lid to be let out and peeled. What has ever gotten to your precious father, then? said Mrs. Cratchit, and your brother, Tiny Tim, and Martha warned as late as last Christmas by half an hour.

Starting point is 00:20:25 Here's Martha Mother, said a girl, appearing as she spoke. Here's Martha Mother, cried the two young Cratchits. Hurrah, they're such a goose, Martha. Why, bless your heart alive, my dear, how late you are, said Mrs. Cratchit, kissing her a dozen times, and taking off her shawl and bonnetful her with a fiscuous seal, We yield a deal of work to finish up last night, replied the girl, and had to clear away this morning, mother. Well, never mind, so long as you are come, said Mrs Cratchit, sit ye down before the fire, my dear, and have a warm Lord bless ye. No, no, there's father coming, cried the two young Cratchets, who were everywhere at once.

Starting point is 00:21:13 Hide, Martha, hide. So Martha hid herself, and in came little. Bob, the father and at least three feet of comforter exclusively of the fringe, hanging down before him and his threadbare clothes darned up and brushed to look seasonable and tiny Tim upon his shoulder. Alas for Tiny Tim, he bore a little crutch and had his limbs supported by an iron frame. Why, where's our mother? cried Bob Cratchit looking round. Not coming, said Mrs. Cratchit. Not coming, said Bob, with a sudden declension in his high spirits, for he had been Tim's blood horse all the way from the church and had come home rampant,

Starting point is 00:22:00 not coming upon Christmas Day. Martha didn't like to see him disappointed, as if it were only a joke, so she came out prematurely from behind the closet door and ran into his arms, where the two young cratchets hustled Tiny Tim and bore him off into his own. the washhouse that he might hear the pudding singing in the copper. And how did Little Tim behave? asked Mrs. Cratchit, while she had rallied Bob on his credulity, and Bob had hugged his daughter to his heart's content. As good as gold, said Bob, and better. Somehow he gets thoughtful, and sitting by himself so much,

Starting point is 00:22:41 he thinks the strangest things you've ever heard. He told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in the church because he was a cripple and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day who made lame beggar's walk and blind men see. His active little crutch was heard upon the floor and back came Tiny Tim before another word was spoken, escorted by his brother and sister to his stool before the fire and while Bob turning up his cuffs as if poor fellow they were capable of being made more shabby, compounded some hot mixture in a jug with gin and lemons, and stirred it round and round, and put it on the hob to simmer. Master Peter, with the two ubiquitous young cratchets, went to fetch the goose, with which they soon returned in high procession. Such a bustle ensued

Starting point is 00:23:38 that you might have thought a goose, the rarest of all birds, a feathered phenomenon, to which a black swan was a matter of course, and in truth it was something very like it in the house. Mrs Cratchit made the gravy, ready beforehand and a little saucepan, hissing hot. Master Peter mashed the potatoes with incredible vigour. Miss Belinda sweetened up the apple sauce. Martha dusted the hot plates. Bob took tiny tin beside him in a tiny corner at the table,

Starting point is 00:24:13 and the two young Cratchits set chairs for everyone, not forgetting themselves, and mountain guard upon their posts, crammed spoons into their mouths, lest they should shriek for goose before their turn came to be helped. At last the dishes were set upon, and grace was said. It was succeeded by a breathless pause, as Mrs. Cratchit, looking slowly all along the carving knife, prepared to plunge it in the breast. For when she did, and when the long-expected gush of stuffing issued forth, one murmur of delight arose all around the board, and even tiny Tim, excited by the two young cratchets, beat on the table with the handle of his knife, and feebly cried, hurrah. There never was such a goose. Bob said he didn't believe there ever was such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and flavour, size and cheapness were the themes of universal admiration. Eat out by apple sauce and sauce. and mashed potatoes, it was a sufficient dinner for the whole family. Indeed, as Mrs. Cratchett said,

Starting point is 00:25:25 with great delight, surveying one small atom of a bone upon the dish, they hadn't ate it all at last. Yet everyone had enough, and the youngest Cratchits in particular were steeped in sage and onion to the eyebrows. But now the plates being changed by Miss Belinda, Mrs. Cratchett, left the room alone, too nervous to bear witness to take the pudding up. and bring it in. Suppose it should not be done enough. Suppose it should break in turning out. Suppose somebody should have got over the wall of the backyard and stolen it, while they were merry with the goose, a supposition at which the two young cratchets became livid. All sorts of horrors were supposed. Hello, a great deal of steam. The pudding was out of the copper. A smell like washing day,

Starting point is 00:26:16 but the cloth, a smell like an eating house and a pastry-cooks next door to each other, were the lawn-dresses next all to that. That was the pudding. In half a minute Mrs Cratchett entered, flushed but smilingly proud with the pudding. Like a speckled cannonball so hard and firm, blazing in half of half a quartain of ignited brandy, and bedite with Christmas holly stuck into the top.

Starting point is 00:26:44 Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchett said, and calmly too, that he regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs Cratchit since their marriage. Mrs Cratchett said that now the weight was off her mind. She would confess she had her doubts about the quantity of flour. Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it was at all a small pudding for a large family. It would have been flat heresy to do so.

Starting point is 00:27:14 Any Cratchett would have blushed to him. at such a thing. At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the hearth was swept, the fire was made up, the compound in the jug being tasted and considered perfect, apples and oranges were put upon the table and a shovel full of chestnuts on the fire. Then all the Cratchit family drew round the half, in what Bob Cratchett called a circle, meaning half a wand and at Bob Cratchett's elbow stood the family display of glass. two tumblers and a custard top without a handle. These held the hot stuff from the jug,

Starting point is 00:27:53 however, as well as golden goblets would have done, and Bob served it out with beaming looks, while the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and cracked noisily. Then Bob proposed, A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us all, which all the family re-echoed. God bless us everyone, said Tiny Tim, the last of all. He sat very close to his father's side upon his little stool. Bob held as withered little

Starting point is 00:28:23 hand in his, as if he loved the child and wished to keep him by his side and dreaded that he might be taken from him. Spirit, said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before. Tell me if Tiny Tim will live. I see a vacant seat, replied the ghost, in the poor, chimney corner, and a crutch without an owner, carefully preserved, if these shadows remain unaltered by the future, the child will die. No, no, said Scrooge, oh no, kind spirit, say he will be spared. If these shadows remain unaltered by the future, none other of my race, return the ghost, will find him here. What then? He will be like to die. He'd better do it, and decrease the surplus population.

Starting point is 00:29:19 Scrooge hung his head to hear his own words quoted by the spirit and was overcome with penitence and grief. Man, said the ghost, if man you be in heart, not adamant forbear that wicked can't until you have discovered what the surplus is and where it is. Will you decide what men shall live and what men shall die? It may be that in the sight of heaven you are more worthless and less fit to live than millions like this poor man's child.

Starting point is 00:29:53 Oh God, to hear the insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his hungry brothers in the dust. Scrooge bent before the ghost's rebuke and trembling cast his eyes upon the ground, but he raised them speedily on hearing his own name. "'Mr. Scrooge,' said Bob. "'I give you, Mr. Scrooge, the founder of the feast.' "'The founder of the feast, indeed,' cried Mrs. Cratchit, reddening. "'I wish I had him here. I'd give him a peace of my mind to feast upon, and I hope he would have a good appetite for it.'

Starting point is 00:30:37 "'My dear,' said Bob, the children. "'Christmas day!' "'It should be Christmas Day, I am sure,' said she. on which one drinks the health of such an odious, stingy, hard and feeling man as Mr. Scrooge. You know he is Robert. Nobody knows it better than you do, poor fellow. My dear, was Bob's mild answer, Christmas Day? I'll drink his health for your sake and the days, said Mrs. Cratchit. Not for his, long life to him, a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Starting point is 00:31:12 He'll be very merry and very happy. I have no doubt. The children drank the toast after her. It was the first of their proceedings, which had no heartiness. Tiny Tim drank it last of all, but he didn't care two pence for it. Scrooge was the ogre of the family. The mention of his name cast a dark shadow on the party, which was not dispelled for a full five minutes.

Starting point is 00:31:40 After it had passed away, they were ten times merrier than before, from the mere relief of Scrooge the baleful being done with. Bob Cratchett told them how he had a situation in his eye for Master Peter who would bring in, if obtained, full five and sixpence weekly. The two young Cratchits laughed tremendously at the idea of Peter's being a man of business and Peter himself looked thoughtfully at the fire from between his collars as if he was deliberating what particular investments he should. should favour when he came into the receipt of the bewildering income.

Starting point is 00:32:19 Martha, who was a poor apprentice at a milliners, then told them what kind of work she had to do, and how many hours she worked at a stretch, and how she meant to lie, a bed in tomorrow morning for a good long rest, tomorrow being a holiday, she passed at home. Also how she had seen a countess and her lord some days before, and how the Lord was much about as tall as Peter, at which Peter pulled up his collar so high that you couldn't have seen his head if you had been there. All this time, the chestnuts and the joke went round and round, and by and by they had a song about a lost child travelling in the snow from Tiny Tim, who had a plaintive little voice and sang it very well indeed. There was nothing of high

Starting point is 00:33:08 mark in this. There were not a handsome family, they were not well dressed, their shoes, were far from being waterproof, their clothes were scanty and Peter might have known and very likely did the inside of a pawnbrokers. But they were happy, grateful, pleased with one another and contented with the time and when they faded and looked happier yet in the bright sprinklings or the spirit's torch at parting, Scrooge had his eye upon them and especially on Tiny Tim until the last. By this time it was getting done. dark and snowing pretty heavily, and as Scrooge and the spirit went along the streets, the brightness of the roaring fires in kitchens and parlors and all sorts of rooms were wonderful.

Starting point is 00:33:55 Here the flickering of the blaze showed preparations for a cozy dinner, with hot plates baking through and through before the fire, and deep red curtains ready to be drawn to shut out cold and darkness. There all the children of the house were running out into the snow to meet their marriage. sisters, brothers, cousins, uncles, aunts, and to be the first to greet them. Here again were shadows on the window-blind, of guests assembling, and there were a group of handsome girls, all hooded and fur-booted, and nor chattering at once, tripped lightly off to some near neighbour's house, where, woe upon the single man who saw the mentor, artful witches well they

Starting point is 00:34:39 knew it, in a glow. But, if you were judged from the numbers of the number of the house, where, we'll people on their way to friendly gatherings, you might have thought that no one was at home to give their welcome when they got there. Instead of every house expecting company and piling up its fires, half chimney high, blessings on it how the ghost exalted, how it bared its breadth of breast and opened its capacious palm and floated on outpouring with a generous hand its bright and harmless mirth on everything within its reach. The very lamplighter who ran on before, dotting the dusky street with specks of light, and who dressed to spend the evening somewhere, laughed out loudly as the spirit passed,

Starting point is 00:35:27 though little kend the lamp-lighter that he had any company but Christmas. And now, without a word of warning from the ghost, they stood upon a bleak and desert moor, where monstrous masses of rude stone were cast about, as though it were the burial place of giants, and water spread itself wherever so it listed, or would have done so, but for the frost that held it prisoner, and nothing grew but moss and furs, and coarse-ranked grass.

Starting point is 00:36:00 Down in the west the setting sun had left a streak of fiery red, which glared upon the desolation for an instant like a sullen eye, and frowning lower, lower yet, was lost in the thick gloom of darkest night. Where is this place? As Scrooge. A place where miners live, who labour in the bowels of the earth,

Starting point is 00:36:25 return the spirit, but they know me, see. A light shone from the window of a hut, and swiftly they advanced towards it, passing through the wall of mud and stone and found a cheerful comfort, assembled round a glowing fire. An old, old man and a woman with their children and their children's children and another generation beyond that, all decked out gaily in their holiday attire.

Starting point is 00:36:54 The old man, in a voice that seldom rose above the howling of the wind upon the barren waist, was singing them a Christmas song. It had been a very old song when he was a boy. From time to time they all joined in the chorus. so surely as they raised their voices the old man got quite blithe and loud and so surely as they stopped his vigour sank again the spirit did not tarry here but bade scrooge hold his robe and passing above the moor sped whither not to see to see de scrooge's horror looking back he saw the last of the land a frightful range of rocks behind him and his ears were deafened by the thundering of water, as if it rolled and roared and raged among the dreadful caverns it had worn, and fiercely tried to undermine the earth. Built upon a dismal reef of sunken rocks, some league or so from shore, on which the waters chafed and dashed, the wild deer through, there stood a solitary lighthouse. Great heaps of seaweed clung to its base, and stormbirds

Starting point is 00:38:09 born of the wind, one might suppose, a sea-weed of the water rose and fell about it, like the waves they skimmed. But even here, two men who watched the light had made a fire, that through the loophole in the thick stone wall shed out a ray of brightness on the awful sea. Joining their horny hands over the rough table and which they sat,

Starting point is 00:38:34 they wished each other Merry Christmas in their can of grog and wot. One of them, the elder two, with his face all damaged and scarred with hard weather, as the figurehead of an old ship might be, struck up a sturdy song that was like a gale in itself. Again the ghosts sped up above the bleak and black sea, on and on being far away as he told Scrooge from any shore they lighted on a ship. They stood beside the helsman at the wheel, the lookout in the bow, the officers who had the watch, dark ghostly figures in their several stations,

Starting point is 00:39:18 but every man among them hummed a Christmas tune, or had a Christmas thought, or spoke below his breath to his companion of some bygone Christmas day, with homeward hopes belonging to it, and every man on board, waking or sleeping, good or bad, who had a kind of word,

Starting point is 00:39:36 for another on that day, then on any day in the year, and had shared to some extent in its festivities, and had remembered those he cared for at a distance, and he had known that they were delighted to remember him. It was a great surprise to Scrooge, while listening to the moaning of the wind, and thinking what a solemn thing it was to move on through the lonely darkness over an unknown abyss, the depths were secrets as profound as death. It was a great surprise to Scrooge, while thus engaged, to hear a hearty laugh. It was much greater surprise to Scrooge to recognise it as his own nephews and to find himself in a bright, dry, gleaming room,

Starting point is 00:40:22 with a spirit standing smiling by his side, and looking at the same nephew with a provingly affability. Ha ha, ha, laughed Scrooge's nephew. If you should happen by any likely chance to know a man more blessed and a laugh than Scrooge's nephew, all I can say is I should like to know him too, introduce him to me, and I'll cultivate his acquaintance. It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, and while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there's nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humour. When Scrooge's nephew laughed in this way, holding his sides, rolling his head and twisting his face into the most extravagant contortions, Scrooge's niece, by marriage, laughed as heartily as he.

Starting point is 00:41:16 And their assembled friends, being not a bit behindhand, roared out lustily. Ha ha ha ha ha. He said that Christmas was a humbug, as I live, cried Scrooge's nephew. He believed it too. more shame for him, Fred, said Scrooge's niece indignantly. Bless those women, they never do anything by halves. They are always in earnest. She was very pretty, exceedingly pretty,

Starting point is 00:41:45 with a dimpled, surprised-looking capital face, a ripe little mouth that seemed made to be kissed, and in no doubt it was, all kinds of good little dots about her chin that melted into one another when she laughed and the sunniest pair of eyes you ever saw in any little creature's head. Altogether, she was what you would have called provokingly, you know, but satisfactory too. Oh, perfectly satisfactory.

Starting point is 00:42:13 He's a comical old fellow, said Scrooge's nephew. That's the truth, and not so pleasant as he might be, and whether his offences carry their own punishment. I have nothing to say against him. I'm sure he's very rich, Fred, hinted Scrooge's niece, At least you always tell me so. What of that, my dear, said Scrooge's nephew. His wealth is of no use to him.

Starting point is 00:42:38 He don't do any good with it. He don't make himself comfortable with it. He hasn't the satisfaction of thinking, ha, ha, ha, ha, that he is ever going to benefit us with it. I have no patience with him, observed Scrooge's niece. Scrooge's niece's sisters and all the other ladies expressed the same opinion. Oh, I have, said Scrooge's nephew.

Starting point is 00:43:03 I am sorry for him. I couldn't be angry 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 this. What's the consequence? He don't lose much of a dinner. Indeed, I think he loses a very good dinner,

Starting point is 00:43:25 interrupted Scrooge's niece. everyone else said the same, and they must be allowed to have been competent judges because they had just had dinner, and with a dessert upon the table, were clustered round the fire by lamplight. Well, I'm very glad to hear it, said Scrooge's nephew, because I hadn't great faith in these young housekeepers. What do you say, Topper? Topper had clearly got his eye upon one of Scrooge's niece's sisters, for he answered

Starting point is 00:43:54 that a bachelor was a wretched outcast who had no right to express 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 don't go on Fred

Starting point is 00:44:09 said Scrooge's niece clapping her hands he never finishes what he begins to say he's such a ridiculous fellow Scrooge's nephew reveled in another laugh and as it was impossible to keep the infection off though the plump

Starting point is 00:44:24 sister tried hard to with aromatic vinegar. His example was unanimously followed. I was only going to say, said Scrooge's nephew, that the consequences of taking a dislike to us and not making merry with us is, as I think, that he loses some pleasant moments, which could do him no harm. I am sure he loses pleasanter companions that he can find in his own thoughts, either in his mouldy old office or his dusty chambers. I mean to give him the same chance every year, whether he likes it or not, for I pity him. 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 pure clerk 50 pounds,

Starting point is 00:45:15 that's something, and I think I shook him yesterday. It was there turn to laugh now at the notion of his shaking scrooge, but being thoroughly good-natured and not much caring what they laughed at, so they laughed at any rate. He encouraged them in their merriment, and passed the bottle joyously. After tea they had some music, for they were a musical family, and they knew what they were about, and they sung 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 large veins in his forehead or get red in the face over it. Scrooge's niece played well upon the harp and played among other tunes a simple little air, a mere nothing you might learn to whistle in two minutes, which had been familiar to the child

Starting point is 00:46:08 who fetch Scrooge from the boarding school as he'd been reminded by the ghost of Christmas past. When this strain of music sounded, all the things the ghost had shown. him came upon his mind. He softened more and more and thought if he could have listened to it often years ago he might have cultivated the kindness of life for his own happiness with his own hands without resorting to the sexton spade that buried Jacob Marley. And 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 better than at Christmas, when its mighty founder was a child himself. There was first a game at Blimeon's Buff. Of course there was,

Starting point is 00:46:56 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 plumped sister in the lace tucker was a little bit of, an outrage on the credulity of human nature, knocking down the fire irons, tumbling over the chairs, bumping against the piano, smothering himself among the curtains. Wherever she went, there he went. He always knew where the plump sister was.

Starting point is 00:47:33 He wouldn't catch anybody 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 been sidled off in the direction 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 her silking rustlings and her rapid flutterings past him, he got into a corner whence there was no escape, then his conduct was the most excreable. For his pretending not to know her, his pretending that it was necessary to touch her headdress, and further to assure himself

Starting point is 00:48:15 of her identity by pressing a curtain ring upon her finger and a certain chain around her neck was vile, monstrous. No doubt, she told him her opinion of it, when, another blind man being in office, they were so very confidential together behind the curtains. Scrooge's niece was not one of the blind man buff's party, but was made comfortable with a large chair and a footstall in a snug corner where the ghost and Scrooge were close behind her. But she joined in the forfeits and loved her love 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 secret joy of Scrooge's nephew beat her sister's hollow, though they were sharp girls too, as Topper would have told

Starting point is 00:49:02 you. There might have been 20 people there, young and old, but they all played, and so did Scrooge, but wholly forgetting in the interest he had in what was going on, that his voice made no sound in their ears, he sometimes came out with a guest quite loud, and very often quite right too. For the sharpest needle, best white chapel, warranted not to cut in the eye, was not sharper than Scrooge blunt as he took in his head to be. The ghost was greatly pleased to find him in this mood, and looked upon him with such favour 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 is a new game, said Scrooge.

Starting point is 00:49:46 Only half an hour, spirit. Only one. It was a game called yes and no, where Scrooge's nephew had to think of something and the rest might find out what. He only answering to their questions yes or no, as the case was. The brisk fire of the questioning

Starting point is 00:50:03 to which he was exposed elicited from him that he was thinking of an animal, a live animal, rather than a disagreeable animal, a savage animal, an animal that growled and grunted sometimes and talked sometimes and lived in London and walked about the streets

Starting point is 00:50:21 and wasn't made a show off and wasn't led by anybody and didn't live in a maranjury and was never killed in a market and was not a horse or an ass or a bull or a cow or a tiger or a dog or a pig or a cat or a bear

Starting point is 00:50:38 and 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, falling into a similar state, cried out, I found it out, I know what it is, Fred, I know what it is. What is it? cried Fred. It's your uncle Scrooge, 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 insomuch as an answer in the negative was sufficient to have diverted thy thoughts from mr scrooge supposing they had ever had any tendency that way

Starting point is 00:51:26 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 all 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 nevertheless. Uncle Scrooge had imperceptibly become so gay and light of heart

Starting point is 00:52:01 that he would have pledged the unconscious company in return and thanks them in an audible 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 street. struggling men, and they were patient in their greater hope, by poverty, and it was rich.

Starting point is 00:52:40 In armhouse, hospital and jail, in miseries every refuge, where vain men, in his little authority, had 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 dance of this, because the Christmas holidays 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 12th night party when looking at the spirit, as they stood together in an open place, he noticed that its hair was grey.

Starting point is 00:53:28 Are Spirit's life so short, as 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 the moment. Forgive me if I'm not justified in what I ask, said Scrooge, looking intently at the Spirit's robe. but I see something strange and not belonging to yourself protruding from your skirts. Is it a foot or a claw?

Starting point is 00:54:07 It might be a claw for the flesh there is upon it, said the spirit's soulful reply, Look here. From the foldings of its robe, it brought two children, wretched, object, frightful, hideous and miserable. They knelt down at its feet and clung upon them. the outside of its garment. Oh man, look here, look here down here, exclaimed the ghost. There was a boy and girl, yellow meagre, ragged, scowling, wolfish, but prostrate too in their

Starting point is 00:54:44 humidity, where graceful youth should have filled their features out and touched them with its freshest tints, a stale and shriveled hand like that of age, had pinched, twisted them and pulled them into shreds. Where angels might have sat and throned, 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 shown to him in this way, he tried to say they were fine children, but the words choked themselves, rather than be parties to her life such enormous magnitude. Spirit, are they yours? Scrooge could say no more. They are man's,

Starting point is 00:55:41 said the spirit, looking down upon them, and they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy's ignorance. This girl is want. Beware them both and all their degree. But most of all, beware this boy, for his brow I have seen 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 fictitious purposes, and make it worse, and bide the end. Have you no refuge or resource? cried Scrooge. Are there no prisons? said the spirit. turning on him for the last time with his own words.

Starting point is 00:56:29 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, draught and hooded, coming like a mist along the ground. towards him.

Guided Sleep Meditation & Sleep Hypnosis from Sleep Cove - A Christmas Carol Part 3 - A Christmas Story Reading

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