Punch: Punch (89.1885)

304 PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI [December 26, 1885.

A CHRISTMAS CAROL

Being a few scattered staves, from a familiar Composition, rearranged
for performance, by a Distinguished Musical Amateur, during the
Holiday Season, at H-rw-rd-n.

State I.—Bendizzy's Ghost.

Schoogestone closed his door, and looked himself in. Thus secured
against interruption, he took off his collar. It required a good deal
of taking off, that collar, and as a matter-of-fact, was taken off a
good deal. Then he put on his dressing-gown, his_ slippers, and his
night-cap, and sat down before the fire, to take his gruel. He had
much to take, and he determined to take it, like a man.

The fire-place was paved all round with tiles, designed to illustrate
history, sacred and profane. There were Whliam the Conqueror,
and Joseph and his Brethren, there were Benjamin's Mess, and the
Plagues of Egypt, and Indian Empresses, and_ Dutch subjects;
hundreds of figures to attract his thoughts. Tet, if each smooth tile
had been a blank at first, with power to shape some picture on its
surface from the disjointed fragments of his thoughts, there would
have been a copy of old Bendizzy's head on every one._

" Humbug!" said Schoogestone. He heard a clanking noise, as of
a dragged chain, the sound of feet upon the stairs, coming straight to-
wards his door. " It's humbug, still! " he said, " I won't believe it."

His colour changed though, when, without a pause, it came on
through the heavy door, and stood before him—Bendizzy's Ghost.

The same face—the very same. Bendizzy, with his frontal curl,
his chin-tuft, his usual buck-like vesture, and varnished boots. The

JBendizzy's Ghost.

chain he drew was clasped about his middle. It was" made [(for
Schoogestone observed it closely) of despatch-boxes and diplomatic
protocols, of blue-books and secret agreements, of many keys of
quaint workmanship, Indian and otherwise.

Schoogestone was still incredulous, and fought against his senses.

" How now! " said he. " What do you want with me ? "

" Much I Many things have happened since we met."

Bendizzy's voice, no doubt about it.

" Who are you ? "

" In life I was your rival, Benjamin Dizzy."

"Can you—can you sit down?" asked Schoogestone, looking
doubtfully at him.

"Do you think that, like some of your living friends, I have lost
my seat?" chuckled Bendizzy, depositing himself in a chair, as
though it were as easy as sitting on a Treasury Bench.

" You don't believe in me," observed the Ghost.

"I don't," said Schoogestone. " Never did," he added, sotto voce.

" More's the pity," said the Ghost, overhearing him. " It might
have saved you some rare messes if you had."

"Humbug! I tell you—humbug:!" cried Schoogestone.

At this the Spirit raised a scornful cry, and shook its chain with a
dismal and depressing noise.

"You are fettered," said Schoogestone, trembling. "Tell me
why ? "

' I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "Is its
pattern strange to you ? Or would you know the weight and length
of the strong coil you hear .yourself ? It was full as heavy and as

long'as'this five Christmas Eves ago. You have laboured on it since.
It is a ponderous chain." Schoogestone glanced about him on the
floor. But he could seenothing. " Hear me ! " cried the Ghost, " My
time is nearly gone."

"I will," said Schoogestone. "But don't be hard upon me.
Don't be flowery, Benjamin ! Pray!"

" I have sat opposite to you, William, invisible, this many a-day."
It was not an agreeable idea. Schoogestone shivered, and wiped
the perspiration from his brow.

" That is no light part of my task," pursued the Ghost, with a
touch of his ancient irony. " I am here to-night to warn and advise
you."

" Thank 'ee," said Schoogestone, drily.

" You will be haunted," resumed the Ghost, " by Three Spirits."
" I—I think, I'd rather not,'' said Schoogestone.

"Without their visits,".said the Ghost, " you will nottake my tips
to heart. Farewell, William ! "

The apparition walked backward to the slowly opening window,
and floated out uj)on the bleak dark night.

Schoogestone followed to the window, desperate in his curiosity.
He closed the window and examined the door by which the Ghost
had entered. It was double-locked. He tried to say "Humbug!"
but stopped at the first syllable.

******

Stave II.—The First of the Thbee Spirits.

It was a strange figure—like a child in some things, like a stalwart
r<^ ^

doubtless the occasion ^

of its using, in its The First Ghost is rather put out.

duller moments, a

great extinguisher for a cap, which it now held under its arm,
" Who are you ? " Schoogestone demanded.

" I am the Ghost of Christmas Past."

"Long past ?" inquired Schoogestone.

" No. Your past."

*****

The Spirit carried him far and wide, and showed him many things.

A studious boy at a big School, a grave eloquent youth at a great

College, a singer of comic songs, the rising hope of one Party, the

ardent champion of another, the half-reluctant leader of a third. A

shifting panorama of roles long abandoned, of scenes half-forgotten.

A Senate charmed into delighted absorption by fancy-illuminated

finance,_ a multitude witched into eager enthusiasm by mellifluous

moonshine. _ And the scenes! Snow-spread wastes, a beleaguered

Citadel, an ill-led, ill-equipped, but ever victorious army. A sea of

rapt faces hotly applauding hotter denunciations of war and waste !

A battered town, a broken square, sand-wastes stained crimson with

unavailing blood! A belated expedition crawling up an ancient

stream ! A lonely, heroic, vainly-expectant figure, in a desert-city !

A shriek of treachery, a cry of despair, a wide-sounding wail of

bitter, bitter disappointment!

"I wish—I wish,'" Schoogestone muttered, putting his hand to

his eyes—" but it is too late now I

##**■*♦

"Leave me! Take me back! Haunt me no longer!" cried
Schoogestone, struggling with the Spirit. Schoogestone observed
that its light was burning high and bright. He snatched the
extinguisher-cap, and by a sudden action pressed it down upon its