title: a-christmas-carol.txt.
 me higher, and I'll use it. A positive light appeared
to issue from Fezziwig's calves. They shone in every part of the dance
like moons. You couldn't have predicted, at any given time, what would
become of them next. And when old Fezziwig and Mrs. Fezziwig had gone
all through the dance; advance and retire, both hands to your partner,
bow and curtsy, cork-screw, thread-the-needle, and back again to your
place: Fezziwig 'cut'--cut so deftly, that he appeared to wink with his
legs, and came upon his feet again without a stagger.

When the clock struck eleven, this domestic ball broke up. Mr. and Mrs.
Fezziwig took their stations, one on either side the door, and, shaking
hands with every person individually as he or she went out, wished him
or her a Merry Christmas. When everybody had retired but the two
'prentices, they did the same to them; and thus the cheerful voices died
away, and the lads were left to their beds; which were under a counter
in the back-shop.

During the whole of this time Scrooge had acted like a man out of his
wits. His heart and soul were in the scene, and with his former self. He
corroborated everything, remembered everything, enjoyed everything, and
underwent the strangest agitation. It was not until now, when the bright
faces of his former self and Dick were turned from them, that he
remembered the Ghost, and became conscious that it was looking full upon
him, while the light upon its head burnt very clear.

'A small matter,' said the Ghost, 'to make these silly folks so full of
gratitude.'

'Small!' echoed Scrooge.

The Spirit signed to him to listen to the two apprentices, who were
pouring out their hearts in praise of Fezziwig; and when he had done so,
said:

'Why! Is it not? He has spent but a few pounds of your mortal money:
three or four, perhaps. Is that so much that he deserves this praise?'

'It isn't that,' said Scrooge, heated by the remark, and speaking
unconsciously like his former, not his latter self. 'It isn't that,
Spirit. He has the power to render us happy or unhappy; to make our
service light or burdensome; a pleasure or a toil. Say that his power
lies in words and looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it
is impossible to add and count 'em up: what then? The happiness he gives
is quite as great as if it cost a fortune.'

He felt the Spirit's glance, and stopped.

'What is the matter?' asked the Ghost.

'Nothing particular,' said Scrooge.

'Something, I think?' the Ghost insisted.

'No,' said Scrooge, 'no. I should like to be able to say a word or two
to my clerk just now. That's all.'

His former self turned down the lamps as he gave utterance to the wish;
and Scrooge and the Ghost again stood side by side in the open air.

'My time grows short,' observed the Spirit. 'Quick!'

This was not addressed to Scrooge, or to any one whom he could see, but
it produced an immediate effect. For again Scrooge saw himself. He was
older now; a man in the prime of life. His face had not the harsh and
rigid lines of later years; but it had begun to wear the signs of care
and avarice. There was an eager, greedy, restless motion in the eye,
which showed the passion that had taken root, and where the shadow of
the growing tree would fall.

He was not alone, but sat by the side of a fair young girl in a mourning
dress: in whose eyes there were tears, which sparkled in the light that
shone out of the Ghost of Christmas Past.

'It matters little,' she said softly. 'To you, very little. Another idol
has displaced me; and, if it can cheer and comfort you in time to come
as I would have tried to do, I have no just cause to grieve.'

'What Idol has displaced you?' he rejoined.

'A golden one.'

'This is the even-handed dealing of the world!' he said. 'There is
nothing on which it is so hard as poverty; and there is nothing it
professes to condemn with such severity as the pursuit of wealth!'

'You fear the world too much,' she answered gently. 'All your other
hopes have merged into the hope of being beyond the chance of its sordid
reproach. I have seen your nobler aspirations fall off one by one, until
the master passion, Gain, engrosses you. Have I not?'

'What then?' he retorted. 'Even if I have grown so much wiser, what
then? I am not changed towards you.'

She shook her head.

'Am I?'

'Our contract is an old one. It was made when we were both poor, and
content to be so, until, in good season, we could improve our worldly
fortune by our patient industry. You _are_ changed. When it was made you
were another man.'

'I was a boy,' he said impatiently.

'Your own feeling tells you that you were not what you are,' she
returned. 'I am. That which promised happiness when we were one in heart
is fraught with misery now that we are two. How often and how keenly I
have thought of this I will