{"id":16869,"date":"2021-12-04T21:00:15","date_gmt":"2021-12-05T02:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/?p=16869"},"modified":"2021-12-05T16:30:53","modified_gmt":"2021-12-05T21:30:53","slug":"08dec2021-quote-of-the-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2021\/12\/04\/08dec2021-quote-of-the-day\/","title":{"rendered":"05DEC2021 \u2013 Quote of the Day – A Christmas Carol – Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

(A little change of pace for the Christmas season.\u00a0 I’m going to run the Christmas Carol story in sections in the Quote of the Day posts.\u00a0 –\u00a0 photog)<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A CHRISTMAS CAROL (IN PROSE BEING, A Ghost Story of Christmas)<\/strong><\/p>\n

by Charles Dickens<\/strong><\/p>\n

(OCF editing – Part 1)<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

STAVE I:\u00a0 MARLEY’S GHOST<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

MARLEY was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt<\/p>\n

whatever about that. The register of his burial was<\/p>\n

signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker,<\/p>\n

and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it: and<\/p>\n

Scrooge’s name was good upon ‘Change, for anything he<\/p>\n

chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a<\/p>\n

door-nail.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know, of my<\/p>\n

own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about<\/p>\n

a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to<\/p>\n

regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery<\/p>\n

in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors<\/p>\n

is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands<\/p>\n

shall not disturb it, or the Country’s done for. You<\/p>\n

will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that<\/p>\n

Marley was as dead as a door-nail.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he did.<\/p>\n

How could it be otherwise? Scrooge and he were<\/p>\n

partners for I don’t know how many years. Scrooge<\/p>\n

was his sole executor, his sole administrator, his sole<\/p>\n

assign, his sole residuary legatee, his sole friend, and<\/p>\n

sole mourner. And even Scrooge was not so dreadfully<\/p>\n

cut up by the sad event, but that he was an excellent<\/p>\n

man of business on the very day of the funeral,<\/p>\n

and solemnised it with an undoubted bargain.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The mention of Marley’s funeral brings me back to<\/p>\n

the point I started from. There is no doubt that Marley<\/p>\n

was dead. This must be distinctly understood, or<\/p>\n

nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going<\/p>\n

to relate. If we were not perfectly convinced that<\/p>\n

Hamlet’s Father died before the play began, there<\/p>\n

would be nothing more remarkable in his taking a<\/p>\n

stroll at night, in an easterly wind, upon his own ramparts,<\/p>\n

than there would be in any other middle-aged<\/p>\n

gentleman rashly turning out after dark in a breezy<\/p>\n

spot–say Saint Paul’s Churchyard for instance–<\/p>\n

literally to astonish his son’s weak mind.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Scrooge never painted out Old Marley’s name.<\/p>\n

There it stood, years afterwards, above the warehouse<\/p>\n

door: Scrooge and Marley. The firm was known as<\/p>\n

Scrooge and Marley. Sometimes people new to the<\/p>\n

business called Scrooge Scrooge, and sometimes Marley,<\/p>\n

but he answered to both names. It was all the<\/p>\n

same to him.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grind-stone,<\/p>\n

Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping,<\/p>\n

clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint,<\/p>\n

from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire;<\/p>\n

secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. The<\/p>\n

cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed<\/p>\n

nose, shrivelled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his<\/p>\n

eyes red, his thin lips blue; and spoke out shrewdly in his<\/p>\n

grating voice. A frosty rime was on his head, and on his<\/p>\n

eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his own low<\/p>\n

temperature always about with him; he iced his office in<\/p>\n

the dog-days; and didn’t thaw it one degree at Christmas.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

External heat and cold had little influence on<\/p>\n

Scrooge. No warmth could warm, no wintry weather<\/p>\n

chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he,<\/p>\n

no falling snow was more intent upon its purpose, no<\/p>\n

pelting rain less open to entreaty. Foul weather didn’t<\/p>\n

know where to have him. The heaviest rain, and<\/p>\n

snow, and hail, and sleet, could boast of the advantage<\/p>\n

over him in only one respect. They often “came down”<\/p>\n

handsomely, and Scrooge never did.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with<\/p>\n

gladsome looks, “My dear Scrooge, how are you?<\/p>\n

When will you come to see me?” No beggars implored<\/p>\n

him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him<\/p>\n

what it was o’clock, no man or woman ever once in all<\/p>\n

his life inquired the way to such and such a place, of<\/p>\n

Scrooge. Even the blind men’s dogs appeared to<\/p>\n

know him; and when they saw him coming on, would<\/p>\n

tug their owners into doorways and up courts; and<\/p>\n

then would wag their tails as though they said, “No<\/p>\n

eye at all is better than an evil eye, dark master!”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But what did Scrooge care! It was the very thing<\/p>\n

he liked. To edge his way along the crowded paths<\/p>\n

of life, warning all human sympathy to keep its distance,<\/p>\n

was what the knowing ones call “nuts” to Scrooge.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Once upon a time–of all the good days in the year,<\/p>\n

on Christmas Eve–old Scrooge sat busy in his<\/p>\n

counting-house. It was cold, bleak, biting weather: foggy<\/p>\n

withal: and he could hear the people in the court outside,<\/p>\n

go wheezing up and down, beating their hands<\/p>\n

upon their breasts, and stamping their feet upon the<\/p>\n

pavement stones to warm them. The city clocks had<\/p>\n

only just gone three, but it was quite dark already–<\/p>\n

it had not been light all day–and candles were flaring<\/p>\n

in the windows of the neighbouring offices, like<\/p>\n

ruddy smears upon the palpable brown air. The fog<\/p>\n

came pouring in at every chink and keyhole, and was<\/p>\n

so dense without, that although the court was of the<\/p>\n

narrowest, the houses opposite were mere phantoms.<\/p>\n

To see the dingy cloud come drooping down, obscuring<\/p>\n

everything, one might have thought that Nature<\/p>\n

lived hard by, and was brewing on a large scale.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The door of Scrooge’s counting-house was open<\/p>\n

that he might keep his eye upon his clerk, who in a<\/p>\n

dismal little cell beyond, a sort of tank, was copying<\/p>\n

letters. Scrooge had a very small fire, but the clerk’s<\/p>\n

fire was so very much smaller that it looked like one<\/p>\n

coal. But he couldn’t replenish it, for Scrooge kept<\/p>\n

the coal-box in his own room; and so surely as the<\/p>\n

clerk came in with the shovel, the master predicted<\/p>\n

that it would be necessary for them to part. Wherefore<\/p>\n

the clerk put on his white comforter, and tried to<\/p>\n

warm himself at the candle; in which effort, not being<\/p>\n

a man of a strong imagination, he failed.<\/p>\n

Charles Dickens<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(A little change of pace for the Christmas season.\u00a0 I’m going to run the Christmas Carol story in sections in the Quote of the Day<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[701],"tags":[1011,1010,94,744],"class_list":["post-16869","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-quote-of-the-day","tag-a-christmas-carol","tag-charles-dickens","tag-christmas","tag-quote-of-the-day"],"yoast_head":"\n05DEC2021 \u2013 Quote of the Day - A Christmas Carol - Part 1 - Orion's Cold Fire<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2021\/12\/04\/08dec2021-quote-of-the-day\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"05DEC2021 \u2013 Quote of the Day - 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