st. When this strain of music
sounded, all the things that Ghost had shown him, came upon his mind;
he softened more and more; and thought that if he could have listened
to it often, years ago, he might have cultivated the kindnesses of
life for his own happiness with his own hands, without resorting to
the sexton's spade that buried Jacob Marley.

But 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

[Illustration: Original manuscript of Page 44.]

better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child himself.
Stop! There was first a game at blindman's buff. Of course there was.
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 plump sister in the lace tucker, was an
outrage on the credulity of human nature. Knocking down the
fire-irons, tumbling over the chairs, bumping up against the piano,
smothering himself among the curtains, wherever she went, there went
he. He always knew where the plump sister was. He wouldn't catch
anybody else. If you had fallen up against him, as some of them did,
and stood there; he would have made a feint of endeavouring to seize
you, which would have been an affront to your understanding; and would
instantly have 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 all her silken rustlings,
and her rapid flutterings past him, he got her into a corner whence
there was no escape; then his conduct was the most execrable. For his
pretending not to know her; his pretending that it was necessary to
touch her head-dress, and further to assure himself of her identity by
pressing a certain ring upon her finger, and a certain chain about 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's buff party, but was
made comfortable with a large chair and a footstool, 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 a