 introduction of the Cricket on the Hearth by Charles Dickens. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Jason Isbell. The Cricket on the Hearth by Charles Dickens. New York the Plattenpeck Company. 1905 by the Baker and Taylor Company. Introduction. The combined qualities of realist and the idealist, which Dickens possessed to a remarkable degree, together with his naturally jovial attitude toward life in general, seem to have given him a remarkably happy feeling towards Christmas, though the probation and hardship of his boyhood could have allowed him but little real experience with this day of days. Dickens gave his first formal expression to his Christmas thoughts in his series of small books, the first of which was the famous Christmas Carol, the one perfect chrysalid. The success of this book was immediate. Thackeray wrote of it. Who can listen to objections regarding such a book as this? It seems to be a national benefit and to every man and woman who reads it a personal kindness. This volume was put forth in a very attractive manner with illustrations by John Leach, who was the first artist to make these characters live, and his drawings were varied and spirited. They're followed upon this for others, the chimes, the cricket on the hearth, the battle of life, and the haunted man, with illustrations on their first appearances by Doyle, Necklace, and others. The five are known today as the Christmas books. Of them all the Carol is the best known and loved, and the cricket on the hearth, although third in the series, is perhaps next in point to popularity, and is especially familiar to Americans through Joseph Jefferson's characterization of Caleb Plummer. Dickens seems to have put his whole self into these glowing little stories. Whoever sees but a clever ghost story in The Christmas Carol misses its chief charm and lesson. For there is a different meaning to the movements of Scrooge and his attendant spirits, and new life is brought to Scrooge when he, running to his window, opened it and put out his head. No fog, no mist, clear, bright, jovial, stirring cold, cold piping for the blood to dance to, golden sunlight, heavenly sky, sweet, fresh air, merry bills, oh glorious, glorious! All this brightness has its attendant shadow, and deep from the childish heart comes the true note of Pathos, the ever-memorable toast of Tiny Tim. God bless us, everyone. The cricket on the hearth strikes a different note. Charmingly, poetically, the sweet chirping of the little cricket is associated with human feelings and actions, and at the crisis of the story decides the fate and fortune of the carrier and his wife. Dickens' greatest gift was characterization, and no English writer, save Shakespeare, has drawn so many and so varied characters. It would be as absurd to interpret all of these as caricatures as to deny Dickens his great and varied powers of creation. Dickens exaggerated many of his comic and satirical characters, as was his right, for caricature and satire are very closely related, while exaggeration is the very essence of comedy. But there remains a host of characters marked by humor and Pathos, yet the pictorial and presentation of Dickens' characters has ever tended toward the grotesque. The interpretations in this volume aim to eliminate the grosser phases of the caricature in favor of the more human. If the interpretations seem novel, if Scrooge be not as he has been pictured, it is because a more human Scrooge was desired, a Scrooge not wholly bad, a Scrooge of a better heart, a Scrooge to whom the resurrection described in this story was possible. It has been the illustrator's whole aim to make these people live in some form more fully consistent with their types. Section 1 of The Cricket on the Hearth by Charles Dickens. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Sage Turtle. A Cricket on the Hearth. A Fairy Tale of Home by Charles Dickens. Chirp the First. The kettle began it. Don't tell me what Mrs. Pearybingle said. I know better. Mrs. Pearybingle may leave it on record to the end of time that she couldn't say which of them began it. But I say the kettle did. I ought to know. I hope the kettle began it. Full five minutes by the little waxy-faced Dutch clock in the corner before the cricket uttered a chirp. As if the clock hadn't finished striking and the convulsive little haymaker at the top of it jerking away right and left with a scythe in front of a Moorish Palace hadn't mowed down half an acre of imaginary grass before the cricket joined in at all. Why? I am not naturally positive. Everyone knows that I wouldn't set my own opinion against the opinion of Mrs. Pearybingle unless I were quite sure on any account whatever. Nothing should induce me. But this is a question of fact and the fact is that the kettle began it at least five minutes before the cricket gave any sign of being in existence. Contradict me and I'll say ten. Let me narrate exactly how it happened. I should have proceeded to do so in my very first word but for this playing consideration. If I am to tell a story I must begin at the beginning and how is it possible to begin at the beginning without beginning at the kettle? It appeared as if there were a sort of match or trial of skill you must understand between the kettle and the cricket and this is what led to it and how it came about. Mrs. Pearybingle going out into the raw twilight and clicking over the wet stones and a pair of patents that worked innumerable rough impressions of the first proposition in Euclid all about the yard. Mrs. Pearybingle filled the kettle at the water butt, presently returning less the patents and a good deal less for they were tall and Mrs. Pearybingle was but short. She set the kettle on the fire in doing which she lost her temper or laid it for an instant for the water being uncomfortably cold and in that slippy slushy sleety part of state wherein it seems to penetrate through every kind of substance patent rings included had laid hold of Mrs. Pearybingle's toes and even splashed her legs and when we rather plume ourselves with reason to upon our legs and keep ourselves particularly neat in point of stockings we find this for the moment hard to bear besides the kettle was aggravating and obstinate it wouldn't allow itself to be adjusted on the top bar it wouldn't hear of accommodating itself kindly to the knobs of coal it would lean forward with a drunken air and dribble a very idiot of a kettle on the hearth it was quarrelsome and hissed and splattered morosely at the fire to sum up all the lid resisting Mrs. Pearybingle's fingers first of all turned topsy-turvy and then with an ingenious pertinacity deserving of a better cause died sideways in down to the very bottom of the kettle and the hull of the royal George has never made half the monstrous resistance to coming out of the water which the lid of that kettle employed against Mrs. Pearybingle before she got it up again it looked sullen and pig-headed enough even then carrying its handle with an air of defiance and cocking it spout pertly and mockingly at Mrs. Pearybingle as if it said I won't boil nothing shall induce me but Mrs. Pearybingle with restored good humor dusted her chubby little hands against each other and sat down before the kettle laughing meantime the jolly blaze up rose and fell flashing and gleaming on the little haymaker at the top of the Dutch clock until one might have thought he stood stock still before the Moorish palace and nothing was in motion but the flame he was on the move however and had his spasms to to the second all right and regular but his sufferings when the clock was going to strike were frightful to behold and when a cuckoo looked out of a trap door in the palace and gave note six times it shook him every time like a spectral voice or like something wiry plucking at his legs it was not until a violent commotion and a whirring noise among the weights and ropes below him had quite subsided that this terrified haymaker became himself again nor was he startled without reason for these rattling bony skeletons of clocks are very disconcerting in their operation and I wonder very much how any set of men but most of all how Dutchmen can have had a liking to invent them there is a popular belief that Dutchmen love broad cases and much clothing for their own lower selves and they might know better than to leave their clocks so very lank and unprotected surely now it was you observed that the kettle began to spend the evening now it was that the kettle growing mellow and musical began to have irrepressible gurglings in its throat and to indulge in short vocal snorts which it checked in the bud as if it hadn't quite made up its mind yet to be good company now it was that after two or three such vain attempts to stifle as convivial sentiments it threw off all moroseness all reserve and burst into a stream of songs so cozy and hilarious as never model in nightingale had yet formed the least idea of so plain too bless you you might have understood it like a book better than some books you and I could name perhaps with its warm breath gushing forth in a light cloud which merrily and gracefully ascended a few feet then hung about the chimney corner as zone domestic heaven it trolled its song with that strong energy of cheerfulness that its iron body hummed and stirred upon the fire and the lid itself the recently rebellious lid such as the influence of a bright example performed a sort of jig and clattered like a deaf and dumb young symbol that had never known the use of its twin brother that this song of the kettles was a song of invitation and welcome to somebody out of doors to somebody at that moment coming on toward the snug small home and the crisp fire there is no doubt whatever mrs. peary bingo knew it perfectly as she sat musing before the hearth it's a dark night sang the kettle and the rotten leaves are lying by the way and above all is mist and darkness and below all is mire and clay and there's only one relief in all the sad and murky air and i don't know that it is one for it's nothing but a glare of deep and angry crimson where the sun and wind together set a brand upon the clouds for being guilty of such weather in the widest open country is a long dull streak of black and there's whore frost on the finger post and thaw upon the track and the ice it isn't water in the water isn't free and you couldn't say that anything is what it ought to be but he's coming coming coming and here if you like the cricket did chime in with a trip trip trip of such magnitude by way of course with a voice so astoundingly disproportionate to its size as compared with the kettle size you couldn't see it that if it had then and there burst itself like an overcharged gun if it had fallen victim on the spot insured its little body into 50 pieces it would have seemed a natural and inevitable consequence for which it had expressly labored the kettle had had the last of its solo performance it persevered with undiminished ardor but the cricket took first fiddle and kept it good heaven how it chirped its shrill sharp piercing voice resounded through the house and seemed to twinkle in the outer darkness like a star there was an indescribable little trill and tremble in it at its loudest which suggested it's being carried off its legs and made to leap again by its own intense enthusiasm yet they went very well together the cricket and the kettle the burden of the song was still the same and louder louder louder still they sang it in their emulation the fair little listener for fair she was and young though something of what is called the dumpling shape but i don't myself object to that lighted a candle glanced at the haymaker on top of the clock who was getting into a pretty average crop of minutes and looked out of the window where she saw nothing owing to the darkness but her own face imaged in the glass and my opinion is and so would yours have been that she might have looked a long way and see nothing half so agreeable when she came back and sat down in her former seat the cricket and the kettle were still keeping it up with a perfect fury of competition the kettle's weak side clearly being that he didn't know when he was beat there was all the excitement of a race about it chirp chirp chirp cricket a mile ahead hum hum hum kettle making play in the distance like a great top chirp chirp chirp cricket round the corner hum hum hum kettle sticking to him in his own way no idea of giving in chirp chirp chirp cricket fresher than ever hum hum hum kettle slow and steady chirp chirp chirp cricket going in to finish him hum hum hum kettle not to be finished until at last they got so jumbled together in the hurry scurry helter skelter of the match that whether the kettle chirped and the cricket hummed or the cricket chirped and the kettle hummed or they both chirped and both hummed it would have taken a clearer head than yours or mine to have decided with anything like certainty but of this there is no doubt that the kettle and the cricket at one and the same moment and by some power of amalgamation best known to themselves sent each in his fireside song of comfort streaming into a ray of the candle that's shown out through the window and a long way down the lane and this light bursting on a certain person who on the instant approached toward it through the gloom expressed the whole thing to him literally in a twinkling and cried welcome home old fellow welcome home my boy this end attained the kettle being dead beat boiled over and was taken off the fire mrs. purey bingo then went running to the door where what with the wheels of a cart the tramp of a horse the voice of a man the tearing in and out of an excited dog and the surprising a mysterious appearance of a baby there was soon the very what's his name to play where the baby came from or how mrs. purey bingo got hold of it in that flash of time i don't know but a live baby there was and mrs. purey bingo's arms and a pretty tolerable amount of pride she seemed to have in it when she was drawn gently to the fire by a sturdy figure of a man much taller and much older than herself who had to stoop a long way down to kiss her but she was worth the trouble six foot six with the lumbago might have done it oh goodness john said mrs. p what a state you're in with the weather he was something the worst for it undeniably the thick mist hung and clots upon his eyelashes like candied thaw and between the fog and fire together there were rainbows in his very whiskers why you see dot john made answers slowly as he unrolled a shawl from about his throat and warmed his hands it ain't exactly summer weather so no wonder i wish you wouldn't call me dot john i don't like it said mrs. purey bingo pouting in a way that clearly showed she did like it very much why what else are you return john looking down upon her with a smile and giving her waist as light a squeeze as his huge hand and arm could give a dot and here he glanced at the baby a dot and carry i won't say it for fear i should spoil it but i was very near a joke i don't know as ever i was nearer he was often near to something or other very clever by his own account this lumbering slow honest john this john's so heavy but so light of spirit so rough upon the surface but so gentle at the core so dull without so quick within so solid but so good mother nature give thy children the true poetry of heart that hit itself in this poor carrier's breast he was but a carrier by the way and we can bear to have them talking prose and leading lives of prose and bear to bless thee for their company it was pleasant to see dot with her little figure and her baby in her arms a very doll of a baby glancing with a coquettish thoughtfulness of the fire and inclining her delicate little head just enough to one side to let it rest in an odd half natural half affected holy nestling an agreeable manner on the great rugged figure of the carrier it was pleasant to see him with his tender awkwardness endeavoring to adapt his rude support to her slight need and make his burly middle age a leaning staff not inappropriate to her blooming youth it was pleasant to observe how tilly slow boy waiting in the background for the baby took special cognizance though in her earliest teens of this grouping and stood with her mouth and eyes wide open and her head thrust forward taking it in as if it were air nor was it less agreeable to observe how john the carrier reference being made by dot to the aforesaid baby checked his hand when on the point of touching the infant as if he thought he might crack it and bending down surveyed it from a safe distance with a kind of puzzled pride such as an amiable mastiff might be surprised to show if he found himself one day the father of a young canary ain't he beautiful john don't he look precious in his sleep very precious said john very much so he generally is asleep amy laura john good gracious no oh said john pondering i thought his eyes was generally shut hello goodness john how you startle one it ain't right for him to turn him up in that way said the astonished carrier is it see how he's winking with both of them at once and look at his mouth why he's gasping like a golden silver fish you don't deserve to be a father you don't said dot with all the dignity of an experienced matron but how should you know what little complaints children are troubled with john you wouldn't so much as know their names you stupid fellow and when she had turned the baby over on her left arm and slapped its back as a restorative she pinched her husband's ear laughing no said john pulling off his outer coat it's very true dot i don't know much about it i only know that i've been fighting pretty stiffly with the wind tonight it's been blowing northeast straight into the cart the whole way home poor old man so it has quite mrs peri bingo instantly becoming very active here take the precious darling tilly while i make myself of some use bless it i could smother it with kissing it i could hi then good dog hi boxer boy only let me make the tea first john and then i'll help with the parcels like a busy b how doff the little and all the rest of it you know john did you ever learn how doff the little when you went to school john not quite to know it john returned i was very near at once but i should only have spoilt it i dare say laughed dot she had the blithe this little laugh you ever heard what a dear old darling of a density war john to be sure not at all disputing this position john went out to see that the boy with the lantern which had been dancing to and fro before the door and window like a will of the wisp took due care of the horse who was fatter than you would quite believe if i gave you his measure and so old that his birthday was lost in the mists of antiquity boxer feeling that his attentions were due to the family in general and must be impartially distributed dashed in and out with bewildering inconstancy now describing a circle of short barks around the horse where he was being rubbed down at the stable door now feigning to make savage rushes at his mistress and facetiously bringing himself to sudden stops now eliciting a shriek from tilly slow boy in the low nursing chair near the fire by the unexpected application of his moist nose to accountants now exhibiting an obtrusive interest in the baby now going round and round upon the hearth and lying down as if he had just established himself for the night now getting up again and taking that nothing of a fag end of a tale of his out into the weather as if he had just remembered an appointment and was off at a round trot to keep it there there's the teapot ready on the hob said dot as briskly busy as a child at play at keeping house and there's the cold knuckle of ham and there's the butter and there's the crusty loaf and all here's a clothes basket for the small parcels john if you've gotten you there where are you john don't let the dear child fall into the great tilly whatever you do it may be noted of miss slow boy in spite of her rejecting the caution with some vivacity that she had a rare and surprising talent for getting this baby into difficulties and had several times imperiled its short life in a quiet way peculiarly her own she was of a spare and straight shape this young lady and so much that her garments appeared to be in constant danger of sliding off those sharp pegs her shoulders on which they were loosely hung her costume was remarkable for the partial development on all possible occasions of some flannel vestment of a singular structure also for affording glimpses in the region of the back of a corset or a pair of stays in color a dead green being always in a state of gaping admiration at everything and absorbed the size and the perpetual contemplation of her mistresses perfections and the babies miss slow boy in her little errors of judgment may be said to have done equal honor to her head and to her heart and though these did less honor to the baby's head which they were the occasional means of bringing into contact with deal doors dressers stairwells bed posts and other foreign substances still they were the honest results of tilly slow boy's constant astonishment at finding herself so kindly treated and installed in such a comfortable home for the maternal and paternal slow boy were alike unknown to fame and tilly have been read by public charity a foundling which word though only differing from fondling by one vowel's length is very different in meaning and expresses quite another thing to have seen little mrs. peary bingle come back with her husband tugging at the closed basket and making the most strenuous exertions to do nothing at all before he carried it would have amused you almost as much as it amused him it may have entertained the cricket too for anything i know but certainly it now began to chirp again vehemently hey day said john in his slow way it's merrier than ever tonight i think and it's true to bring us good fortune john it always has done so to have a cricket on the hearth is the luckiest thing in all the world john looked at her as if he had very nearly got the thought into his head that she was his cricket in chief and he quite agreed with her but it was probably one of his narrow escapes for he said nothing the first time i heard it's cheerful little note john was on that night when you brought me home when you brought me to my new home here it's the little mrs nearly a year ago you recollect john oh yes john remembered i should think so it's chirp with such a welcome to me it seems so full of promise and encouragement it seemed to say you would be kind and gentle with me and would not expect i had a fear of that john then to find an old head on the shoulders of your foolish little wife john thoughtfully padded one of the shoulders and then the head as though he would have said no no he had had no such expectation he had been quite content to take them as they were and really he had reason they were very cumbly it spoke the truth john when it seemed to say so for you have ever been i am sure the best the most considerate the most affectionate of husbands to me this has been a happy home john and i love the cricket for its sake why so do i then said the carrier so do i dot i love it for the many times i've heard it and the many thoughts its harmless music has given me sometimes in the twilight when i felt a little solitary and downhearted john before baby was here to keep me company and make the house gay when i thought how lonely you would be if i should die how lonely i should be if i could know that you had lost me dear it's chirp chirp chirp chirp upon the heart has seemed to tell me of another little voice so sweet so very dear to me before who's coming sound my trouble vanished like a dream and when i used to fear i did fear once john i was very young you know that ours might prove to be an ill-assorted marriage i being such a child and you more like my guardian than my husband and that you might not however hard you tried be able to learn to love me as you hoped and prayed you might it's chirp chirp chirp has cheered me up again and filled me with new trust and confidence i was thinking of these things tonight dear when i sat expecting you and i love the cricket for their sake and so do i repeated john but dot i hope and pray that i might learn to love you how you talk i had learned that long before i brought you here to be the cricket's little mistress dot she laid her hand an instant on his arm and looked up at him with an agitated face as if she would have told him something next moment she was down upon her knees before the basket speaking in a sprightly voice and busy with the parcels there are not many of them tonight john but i saw some goods behind the cart just now and though they give more trouble perhaps still they pay as well so we have no reason to crumble have we decides you have been delivering idea say as you came along oh yes john said a good many what's this round box a heart alive john it's a wedding cake leave a woman alone to find out that said john admiringly now a man would never have thought of it whereas it's my belief that if he was to pack a wedding cake up in a tea chest or a turnip bedstead or a pickled salmon keg or any unlikely thing a woman would be sure to find it out directly yes i called for it at the pastry cooks and it weighs i don't know what whole hundred weights tried dot making a great demonstration of trying to lift it who says it john where's it going read the writing on the other side said john why john my goodness john uh who'd have thought it john returned you never mean to say pursued dot sitting on the floor and shaking her head at him that it's gruff and tackled in the toy maker john nodded mrs peri bingo nodded also 50 times at least not in ascent in dumb and pitting amazement screwing up her lips the while with all their little force they were never made for screwing up i am clear of that and looking the good carrier through and through in her abstraction miss slow boy in the meantime who had a mechanical power of reproducing scraps of current conversation for the delectation of the baby with all the sense struck out of them and all the nouns changed into the plural number inquired aloud of that young creature was it crafts and tackletons the toy makers then and would it call it pastry cooks for wedding cakes and did its mothers know the boxes when its fathers brought them home and so on and that is really to come about said dad why she and i were girls at school together john he might have been thinking of her or nearly thinking of her perhaps as she was in that same school time he looked upon her with a thoughtful pleasure but he made no answer and he's as old as unlike her wife how many years older than you is gruff and tackleton john how many more cups of tea shall i drink tonight at one sitting than gruff and tackleton ever took in four i wonder replied john good humordly as he drew a chair to the round table and began at the cold ham as to eating i eat but little but that little i enjoy dad even this is usual sentiment at mealtimes one of his innocent delusions for his appetite was always obstinate and flatly contradicted him awoke no smile in the face of his little wife who stood among the parcels pushing the cake box slowly from her with her foot and never once looked though her eyes were cast down to upon the dating shoe she generally was so mindful of absorbed in thought she stood there heedless alike of the tea and john though he called her and wrapped the table with his knife to startle her until he rose and touched her on the arm when she looked at him for a moment and hurried to her place behind the teaboard laughing at her negligence but not as she had laughed before the manner and the music were quite changed end of chirp the first part one read by sage turtle of quirky nomads dot com section two of the cricket on the hearth by charles dickens this is a libra vox recording all libra vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit libra vox dot org recording by sage turtle the cricket on the hearth by charles dickens the cricket too had stopped somehow the room was not so cheerful as it had been nothing like it so these are all the parcels are they john she said breaking a long silence which the honest carrier had devoted to the practical illustration of one part of his favorite sentiment certainly enjoying what he ate if it couldn't be admitted that he ate but little so these are all the parcels are they john that's all said john what no i laying down his knife and fork and taking a long breath i declare i've clean forgotten the old gentleman the old gentleman in the cart said john he was asleep among the straw the last time i saw him i've very nearly remembered him twice since i came in but he went out of my head again hello there brows up that's my hearty john said these latter words outside the door wither he had hurried with the candle in his hand miss slow boy conscious of some mysterious reference to the old gentleman and connecting in her mystified imagination certain associations of a religious nature with the phrase was so disturbed that hastily rising from the low chair by the fire to seek protection near the skirt of her mistress and coming into contact as she crossed the doorway with an ancient stranger she instinctively made a charge or butted him with the only offensive instrument within her reach this instrument happening to be the baby great commotion and alarm ensued which the sagacity of boxer rather tended to increase for that good dog more thoughtful than his master had it seem been watching the old gentleman in his sleep lest he should walk off with a few young poplar trees that were tied up behind the cart and he still attended on him very closely worrying his gators in fact and making dead sets at the buttons you're such an undeniably good sleeper sir said john when tranquility was restored in the meantime the old gentleman had stood bareheaded and motionless in the center of the room that i've half a mind to ask you where the other six are only that would be a joke and i know i should spoil it very near though murmured the carrier with the chuckle very near the stranger who had long white hair good features singularly bold and well defined for an old man and dark bright penetrating eyes looked round with a smile and saluted the carrier's wife by gravely inclining his head his garb was very quaint and odd a long long way behind the time its hue was brown all over in his hand he held a great brown club or walking stick and striking this upon the floor it fell asunder and became a chair on which he sat down quite composedly there said the carrier turning to his wife that's the way i found him sitting by the roadside upright as a milestone and almost as deaf sitting in the open air john in the open air replied the carrier just at dusk carriage paid he said and gave me 18 pence then he got in and there he is he's going john i think not at all he was only going to speak if you please i was to be left till called for said the stranger mildly don't mind me with that he took a pair of spectacles from one of his large pockets and a book from another and leisurely began to read making no more of boxer than if he had been a house lamb the carrier and his wife exchanged a look of perplexity the stranger raised his head and glancing from the latter to the former said your daughter my good friend wife returned john nace said the stranger wife were john indeed observed the stranger surely very young he quietly turned over and resumed his reading but before he could have read two lines he again interrupted himself to say baby yours john gave him a gigantic nod equivalent to an answer in the affirmative delivered through a speaking trumpet girl boy roger john also very young a mrs peri bingo instantly struck in two months and three days vaccinated just six weeks ago took very finely considered by the doctor a remarkably beautiful child equal to the general run of children at five months old takes notice in a way quite wonderful may seem impossible to you but feels his legs already here the breathless little mother who had been shrieking these short sentences into the old man's ear until her pretty face was crimson held up the baby before him as a stubborn and triumphant fact while tilly slow boy with a melodious cry of catcher catcher which sounded like some unknown words adapted to a popular sneeze performed some cow like gambles around that all unconscious innocent hark he's called for sure enough said john there's somebody at the door open it tilly before she could reach it however it was open from without being a primitive sort of door with a latch that anyone could lift if he chose and a good many people did choose for all kinds of neighbors like to have a cheerful word or two with the carrier though he was no great talker himself being opened gave admission to a little meager thoughtful dingy faced man you seem to have made himself a great coat from the sackcloth covering of some old box for when he turned to shut the door and keep the weather out he disclosed upon the back of that garment the inscription g and t in large black capitals also the word glass in bold characters good evening john said the little man good evening ma'am good evening tilly good evening unbeknown how's baby mom boxers pretty well i hope all thriving Caleb replied dad i'm sure you need only look at the dear child for one to know that and i'm sure i need only look at you for another said Caleb he didn't look at her though he had a wandering and thoughtful eye which seemed to be always projecting itself into some other time and place no matter what he said a description which will equally apply to his voice or a john for another said Caleb or it tilly as far as that goes or certainly a boxer busy just now Caleb asked the carrier why pretty well john he returned with the distraught air of a man who is casting about for the philosopher's stone at least pretty much so there's rather a run on Noah's arcs at present i could have wished to improve on the family but i don't see how it's to be done at the price it would be a satisfaction to one's mind to make it clearer which was shams and hams which was wives flies ain't on that scale neither is compared with elephants you know oh well have you got anything in the parcel line for me john the carrier put his hand into a pocket of the coat he had taken off and brought out carefully preserved in moss and paper a tiny flower pot there it is he said adjusting it with great care not so much as a leaf damaged full of buds Caleb still eye brightened as he took it and thanked him dear Caleb said the carrier very dear at this season never mind that it would be cheap to me whatever it cost returned the little man anything else john a small box replied the carrier here you are for Caleb plumber said the little man spelling out the direction with cash with cash john i don't think it's for me with care returned the carrier looking over his shoulder where do you make out cash oh to be sure said Caleb it's all right with care yes yes that's mine it might have been with cash indeed of my dear boy in the golden south americas had lived john you loved him like a son didn't you you didn't say you did i know of course Caleb plumber with care yeah yeah it's all right it's a box of dolls eyes from my daughter's work i wish it was her own sight in a box john i wish it was or could be cried the carrier thanky said the little man you speak very hardy to think that she should never see the dolls and them staring at her so bold all day long that's where it cuts what's the damage john all damage you said john if you inquire dot very near well it's like you to say so observe the little man it's your kind way let me see i think that's all i think not said the carrier try again try again something for our governor right said Caleb after pondering a little while to be sure that's what i came for but my head's so running on the marks and things he hasn't been here has he not he returned the carrier he's too busy courting he's coming round though said Caleb for he told me to keep on the near side of the road going home and it was ten to one he'd take me up i'd better go by the buy you couldn't have the goodness to let me pinch boxer's tail or have a moment could you why Caleb what a question oh never mind ma'am said the little man he might like it perhaps there's a small order just come in for barking dogs and i should wish to go as close to natural as i could for six pence that's all never mind mom it happened opportunity that boxer without receiving the proposed stimulus began to bark with great zeal but as this implied the approach of some new visitor Caleb postponing his study from the life to a more convenient season shouldered the round box and took a hurried leave he might have spared himself the trouble for he met the visitor upon the threshold end of chirp the first part two read by sage turtle of quirky nomads com section three of the cricket on the hearth by charles dickens this is a liver box recording all liver box recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit liver box dot org recording by sage turtle the cricket on the hearth by charles dickens oh you are here are you wait a bit i'll take you home john peri bingo my service to you more of my service to your pretty wife handsomer every day better too if possible and younger use the speaker in a low voice that's the devil of it i should be astonished at your paying compliments mr tackleton said dot not with the best grace in the world but for your condition you know all about it then i have got myself to believe it somehow said dot after a hard struggle i suppose very tackleton the toy merchant pretty generally known as gruff and tackleton for that was the firm though gruff had been bought out long ago only leaving his name and as some said his nature according to its dictionary meaning in the business tackleton the toy merchant was a man whose vocation had been quite misunderstood by his parents and guardians if they had made him a money lender or a sharp attorney or a sheriff's officer or a broker he might have sewn his discontented oats in his youth and after having had the full run of himself in an ill-natured transactions might have turned out amiable at least for the sake of a little freshness and novelty but cramped and shaping in the peaceable pursuit of toy making he was a domestic ogre who had been living on children all his life and was their implacable enemy he despised all toys wouldn't have bought one for the world delighted in his malice to insinuate grim expressions onto the faces of brown paper farmers who drove pigs to market bell men who advertised lost lawyers consciences movable old ladies who darn stockings or carved pies and other like samplings of his stock and trade in appalling masks hideous hairy red-eyed Jackson boxes vampire kites demonical tumblers who wouldn't lie down and were perpetually flying forward to stare infants out of countenance his soul perfectly reveled they were his only relief and safety valve he was great in such inventions anything suggestive of a pony nightmare was delicious to him he'd even lost money and he took to that toy very kindly by getting up goblin slides from magic lanterns where on the powers of darkness were depicted as a sort of supernatural shellfish with human faces in intensifying the portraiture of giants he had sunk quite a little capital and though no painter himself he could indicate for the instruction of his artists with a piece of chalk a certain furtive leer for the countenances of these monsters which was safe to destroy the peace of mind of any young gentleman between the ages of six and eleven for the whole Christmas or mid-summer vacation what he was in toys he was as most men are in other things you may easily suppose therefore that within the great green cape which reached down to the calves of his legs there was buttoned up to the chin an uncommonly pleasant fellow and that he was about as choice a spirit and as agreeable a companion as ever stood in a pair of bullheaded looking boots with mahogany colored tops still sackleton the toy merchant was going to be married in spite of all this he was going to be married and to a young wife too a beautiful young wife he didn't look much like a bridegroom as he stood in the carrier's kitchen with a twist in his dry face and a screw in his body and his hat jerked over the bridge of his nose and his hands tucked down into the bottoms of his pockets in his whole sarcastic ill conditioned self peering out of one little corner of one little eye like the concentrated essence of any number of ravens but a bridegroom he designed to be in three days time next thursday the last day of the first month in the year that's my wedding day said tackleton did i mention that he always had one eye wide open and one eye nearly shut and that the one eye nearly shut was always the expressive eye i don't think i did that's my wedding day said tackleton rattling his money why it's our wedding day to exclaim the carrier left tackleton odd you're just such another couple just the indignation of dot at this presumptuous assertion is not to be described what next his imagination would compass the possibility of just such another baby perhaps the man was mad i say a word with you murmured tackleton nudging the carrier with his elbow and taking him a little apart you'll come to the wedding we're in the same boat you know how in the same boat inquired the carrier a little disparity you know said tackleton with another nudge you haven't spent an evening with us beforehand why demanded john astonished at this pressing hospitality why return the other that's a new way of receiving an invitation why for pleasure sociability you know and all that i thought you were never sociable said john in his plain way it's of no use to be anything but free with you i see said tackleton why then the truth is you have a what tea drinking people call a sort of comfortable appearance together you and your wife we know better you know but no we don't know better interpose john what are you talking about well we don't know better than said tackleton we'll agree that we don't as you like what does it matter i was going to say as you have that sort of appearance your company will produce a favorable effect on mrs tackleton that will be and though i don't think your good lady is very friendly to me in this matter still she can't help herself from falling into my views for there's a compactness and coziness of appearance about her that always tells even in an indifferent case you'll say you'll come we have arranged to keep our wedding day as far as that goes at home said john we have made the promise to ourselves these six months we think you see that home what's home cried tackleton four walls in a ceiling why don't you kill that cricket i would i always do i hate their noise there are four walls in a ceiling at my house come to me you kill your cricket say said john scrunchum sir returned the other setting his heel heavily on the floor you'll say you'll come it's as much in your interest as mine you know that the women should persuade each other that they're quiet and contented and couldn't be better off i know their way whatever one woman says another woman is determined to clench always there's that spirit of emulation among them sir that if your wife says to my wife i'm the happiest woman in the world and mine's the best husband in the world and i doubt on him my wife will say the same to yours or more and half believe it do you mean to say she don't then ask the carrier don't cried tackleton with a short sharp laugh don't what the carrier had some faint idea of adding dote upon you but happening to meet the half closed eye as it twinkled upon him over the turned up collar of the cape which was within an ace of poking it out he felt it's such an unlikely part in parcel of anything to be doted on that he substituted that she don't believe it ah you dog you're joking said tackleton but the carrier though slow to understand the full drift of his meaning eyed him in such a serious manner that he was obliged to be a little more explanatory i have the humor said tackleton holding up the fingers of his left hand and tapping the forefinger to imply there i am tackleton to wit i have the humor sir to marry a young wife and a pretty wife here he wrapped his little finger to express the bride not sparingly but sharply with a sense of power i'm able to gratify that humor and i do it's my whim but now look here he pointed to where dot was sitting thoughtfully before the fire leaning her dimpled chin upon her hand and watching the bright plays the carrier looked at her and then at him and then at her and then at him again she honors and obeys no doubt you know said tackleton and that as i'm not a man of sentiment is quite enough for me but do you think there's anything more in it i think observe the carrier that i should chuck any man out of window who said there wasn't exactly so return the other with an unusual alacrity of a scent to be sure dallas he would of course i'm a certain of it good night pleasant dreams the carrier was puzzled and made uncomfortable and uncertain in spite of himself he couldn't help showing it in his manner good night my dear friend said tackleton compassionately i'm off or exactly alike in reality i see you won't give us tomorrow evening well next day you go out visiting i know i'll meet you there and bring my wife that is to be it'll do her good you're agreeable thank you what's that it was a loud cry from the carrier's wife a loud sharp sudden cry that made the room ring like a glass vessel she had risen from her seat and stood like one transfixed by terror and surprise the stranger had advanced toward the fire to warm himself and stood within a short stride of her chair but quite still dot cried the carrier mary darling what's the matter they were all about her in a moment calip who had been dozing on the cake box in the first imperfect recovery of a suspended presence of mind seized miss slowboy by the hair of her head but immediately apologized mary exclaimed the carrier supporting her in his arms are you ill what is it tell me dear she only answered by beating her hands together and falling into a wild fit of laughter then sinking from his grasp upon the ground she covered her face with her apron and wept bitterly and then she laughed again and then she cried again and then she said how cold she was and suffered him to lead her to the fire where she sat down as before the old man standing as before quite still i'm better john she said i'm quite well now i john but john was on the other side of her why turn her face toward the strange old gentleman as if addressing him was her brain wandering only a fancy john dear a kind of shock a something coming suddenly before my eyes i don't know what it was it's quite gone quite gone i'm glad it's gone murmured tackleton turning the expressive eye all around the room i wonder where it's gone and what it was calib come here who's that with the gray hair i don't know sir return calib in a whisper never seen him before in all my life a beautiful figure for a nutcracker quite a new model with a screw jaw opening down into his waistcoat he'd be lovely not ugly enough said tackleton or for a firebox either observe calib in deep contemplation what a model unscrew his head to put the matches in turn him heels upwards for the light and what a firebox a gentleman's mentorship just as he stands not half ugly enough said tackleton nothing in him at all come bring that box all right now i hope oh quite gone quite gone said the little woman waving him hurriedly away good night good night said tackleton good night john peri bingo take care how you carry that box calib let it fall in all murder you dark as pitch and weather worse than ever a good night so with another sharp look around the room he went out at the door followed by calib with the wedding cake on his head the carrier had been so much astounded by his little wife and so busily engaged in soothing and tending her that he had scarcely been conscious of the stranger's presence until now when he again stood there their only guest he don't belong to them you see said john i must give him a hint to go i beg your pardon friend said the old gentleman advancing to him the more so as i fear your wife has not been well but the attendant whom i infirmity he touched his ears and shook his head renders almost indispensable not having arrived i fear there must be some mistake the bad night which made the shelter of your comfortable cart may i never have a worse so acceptable is still as bad as ever would you in your kindness suffer me to rent a bed here yes yes cried dot yes certainly oh said the carrier surprised by the rapidity of this consent well i don't object but i'm still not quite sure that hush she interrupted dear john why he's still in death urged john i know he is but yes sir certainly yes certainly i'll make him up a bed directly john as she hurried off to do it the flutter of her spirits and the agitation of her manner were so strange that the carrier stood looking after her quite confounded say that some others make it up a bed then cried miss slow boy to the baby and sit its hair girl brown and curly when its caps was lifted off and frightened it up brushes pets are sitting by the fires with that unaccountable attraction of the mind at trifles which is often incidental to a state of doubt and confusion the carrier as he walked slowly to and fro found himself mentally repeating even these absurd words many times so many times that he got them by heart and was still conning them over and over like a lesson when tilly after administering as much friction to the little bald head with her hand as she thought wholesome according to the practice of nurses had once more tied the baby's cap on unfrightened it a precious pets are sitting by the fires what frighten taught i wonder muse the carrier pacing to and fro he scouted from his heart the insinuations of the toy merchant and yet they filled him with a vague indefinite uneasiness for tackleton was quick and sly and he had that painful sense himself of being a man of slow perception that a broken hint was always worrying to him he certainly had no intention in his mind of linking anything that tackleton had said with the unusual conduct of his wife but the two subjects of reflection came into his mind together and he could not keep them asunder the bed was soon made ready and the visitor declining all refreshment but a cup of tea retired then dot quite well again she said quite well again arranged the great chair in the chimney corner for her husband filled his pipe and gave it to him and took her usual little stool beside him on the hearth she always would sit on that little stool i think she must have had a kind of notion that it was a coaxing weeviling little stool she was out and out the very best filler of a pipe i should say in the four quarters of the club to see her put that chubby little finger in the bowl then blow down the pipe to clear the tube and when she had done so effect to think that there was really something in the tube and blow a dozen times and hold it to her eye like a telescope with a most provoking twist in her capital little face as she looked down it it was quite a brilliant thing as to the tobacco she was perfect mistress of the subject and her lighting of the pipe with a wisp of paper when the carrier had it in his mouth going so very near his nose and yet not scorching it was art high art and the cricket and the kettle turning up again acknowledged it the bright fire blazing up again acknowledged it the little mower on the clock in his unheated work acknowledged it the carrier in his smoothing forehead and expanding face acknowledged it the readiest of all and as he somberly and thoughtfully puffed at his old pipe and as the dutch clock ticked and as the red fire gleamed and as the cricket chirped that genius of his hearth and home for such the cricket was came out in fairy shape into the room and summoned many forms of home about him dots of all ages and all sizes filled the chamber dots who were merry children running on before him gathering flowers in the fields coy dots half shrinking from half yielding to the pleading of his own rough image newly married dots alighting at the door and taking wondering possession of the household keys motherly little dots attended by fictitious slow boys bearing babies to be christened matronly dots still young and blooming watching dots of daughters as they danced at rustic balls fat dots encircled and beset by troops of rosy grandchildren withered dots who leaned on sticks and tottered as they crept along old carriers to appeared with blind old boxers lying at their feet and newer carts with younger drivers peary bingo brothers on the tilt and sick old carriers tended by the gentlest hands and graves of dead and gone old carriers green in the church yard and as the cricket showed him all these things he saw them plainly though his eyes were fixed upon the fire the carrier's heart grew light and happy and he thanked his household gods with all his might and cared no more for gruff and tackleton than you do but what was that young figure of a man which the same fairy cricket set so near her stool and which remained there singly and alone why did it linger still so near her with its arm upon the chimney piece ever repeating married and not to me oh dot oh failing dot there is no place for it in all your husband's visions why has its shadow fallen on his hearth and of chirp the first part three read by sage turtle of quirky nomads dot com section four of the cricket on the hearth by charles dickens this is a lever vox recording all lever vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit lever vox dot org the cricket on the hearth by charles dickens chirp the second kaleb plumber and his blind daughter lived all alone by themselves as the story books say and my blessing with yours to back it i hope on the story books for saying anything in this work a day world kaleb plumber and his blind daughter lived all alone by themselves in a little cracked nutshell of a wooden house which was in truth no better than a pimple on the prominent red brick nose of gruff and tackleton the premises of gruff and tackleton were the great feature of the street but you might have knocked down kaleb plumber's dwelling with a hammer or two and carried off the pieces in a cart if anyone had done the dwelling house of kaleb plumber the honor to miss it after such an inroad it would have been no doubt to commend its demolition as a fast improvement it stuck to the premises of gruff and tackleton like a barnacle to a ship's keel or a snail to a door or a little bunch of toad stools to the stem of a tree but it was the germ from which the full grown trunk of gruff and tackleton had sprung and under its crazy roof the gruff before last had in a small way made toys for a generation of old boys and girls who had played with them and found them out and broken them and gone to sleep i have said that Caleb and his poor blind daughter lived here i should have said that Caleb lived here and his poor blind daughter somewhere else in an enchanted home of Caleb's furnishing where scarcity and shabbiness were not and trouble never entered Caleb was no sorcerer but in the only magic art that still remains to us the magic of devoted deathless love nature had been the mistress of his study and from her teaching all the wonder came the blind girl never knew that ceilings were discolored walls blotched and bare of plaster here and there high crevices unstopped and widening every day beams moldering and tending downward the blind girl never knew that iron was rusting wood rotting paper peeling off the size and shape and true proportions of the dwelling withering away the blind girl never knew that ugly shapes of delft and earthenware were on the board that sorrow and faint heartedness were in the house that Caleb's scanty hairs were turning grayer and more gray before her sightless face the blind girl never knew they had a master cold exacting and uninterested never knew that tackleton was tackleton in short but lived in the belief of an eccentric humorist who loved to have his jest with them and who while he was the guardian of their lives disdained to hear one word of thankfulness and all was Caleb's doing all the doing of her simple father but he too had a cricket on his hearth and listening sadly to its music when the motherless blind child was very young that spirit had inspired him with the thought that even her great deprivation might be almost changed into a blessing for all the cricket tribe are potent spirits even though the people who hold the converse with them do not know it which is frequently the case and there are not in the unseen world voices more gentle and more true that may be so implicitly relied on or that are so certain to give none but tenderest council as the voices in which the spirits of the fireside and the hearth address themselves to humankind Caleb and his daughter were at work together in their usual working room which served them for their ordinary living room as well and a strange place it was there were houses in it finished and unfinished for dolls of all stations in life suburban tenements for dolls of moderate means kitchens and single apartments for dolls of the lower classes capital town residences for dolls of highest state some of these establishments were already furnished according to estimate with a view to the convenience of dolls of limited income others could be fitted in the most expensive scale at a moment's notice from whole shelves of chairs and tables sofas bedsteads and upholstery the nobility and gentry and public in general for whose accommodation these tenements were designed lay here and there in baskets staring straight up at the ceiling but in denoting their degrees in society and confining them to their respective stations which experience shows to be lamentably difficult in real life the makers of these dolls had far improved on nature who is often forward and perverse for they not resting in such arbitrary marks of satin cotton print and bits of rag had superpatted striking personal differences which allowed for no mistake thus the doll lady of distinction had wax limbs of perfect symmetry but only she and her peers the next grade in the social scale being made of leather and the next of course linen stuff as to the common people they had just so many matches out of tinder boxes for their arms and legs and there they were established in their sphere at once beyond the possibility of getting out of it there were various other samples of his handy craft besides dolls in Caleb Plummer's room there were Noah's arcs in which the birds and beasts were an uncommonly tight fit I assure you though they could be crammed in anyhow at the roof and rattled and shaken into the smallest compass by a bold poetical license most of these Noah's arcs had knockers on the doors inconsistent appendages perhaps as suggestive of morning callers and a postman yet a pleasant finish to the outside of the building there were scores of melancholy little carts which when the wheels went round performed most doleful music many small fiddles drums and other instruments of torture no end of cannon shields swords spears and guns there were little tumblers in red breeches incessantly swarming up high obstacles red tape and coming down head first on the other side and there were innumerable old gentlemen of respectable not to say venerable appearance insanely flying over horizontal pegs inserted for the purpose in their own street doors there were beasts of all sorts horses in particular of every breed from the spotted barrel on four pegs with a small tiffet for a mane to the thoroughbred rocker on his highest metal as it would have been hard to count the dozens upon dozens of grotesque figures that were ever ready to commit all sorts of absurdities on the turning of a handle so it would have been no easy task to mention any human folly vice or weakness that had not its type immediate or remote in Caleb plumber's room and not in an exaggerated form for very little handles will move men and women to as strange performances as any toy was ever made to undertake in the midst of all these objects Caleb and his daughter sat at work the blind girl busy as a doll's dressmaker Caleb painting and glazing the four-pair front of a desirable family mansion the care imprinted in the lines of Caleb's face and his absorbed and dreamy manner which would have sat well on some alchemist or obstru student were at first sight in odd contrast to his occupation and the trivialities about him but trivial things invented and pursued for bread become very serious matters of fact and apart from this consideration I am not at all prepared to say myself that if Caleb had been a lord chamberlain or a member of parliament or a lawyer or even a great speculator he would have dealt in toys one wit less whimsical well I have a very great doubt whether they could have been as harmless so you were out in the rain last night father in your beautiful new great coat said Caleb's daughter in my beautiful new great coat answered Caleb glancing towards a clothesline in the room on which the set cloth garment previously described was carefully hung up to dry how glad I am you bought it father and of such a tailor to say Caleb quite a fashionable tailor it's too good for me the blind girl rested from her work and laughed with delight too good father what can be too good for you I'm half ashamed to wear it though say Caleb watching the effect of what he said upon her brightening face upon my word when I hear the boys and people behind me say oh la there's a swell I don't know which way to look and when the beggar wouldn't go away last night and when I said I was a very common man said no your honor bless your honor don't say that I was quite ashamed I really felt as if I hadn't a right to wear it happy blind girl how merry she was in her exultation I see you father she said clasping her hands as plainly as if I had the eyes I never want when you are with me a blue coat bright blue said Caleb yes yes bright blue exclaimed the girl treating up her radiant face the color I can just remember in the blessed sky you told me it was blue before a bright blue made loose to the figure suggested Caleb yes loose to the figure cried the blind girl laughing heartily and in it you dear father with your merry eye your smiling face your free step and your dark hair looking so young and handsome hola hola said Caleb I shall be vain presently I think you are already cried the blind girl pointing at him in her glee I know you father haha I found you out you see how different the picture in her mind from Caleb as he sat observing her she had spoken of his free step she was right in that for years and years he had never once crossed that threshold at his own slow pace but with a footfall counterfitted for her ear and never had he when his heart was heaviest forgotten the light tread that was to render hers so cheerful and courageous heaven knows but I think Caleb's vague bewilderment of manner may have half originated in his having confused himself about himself and everything around him for the love of his blind daughter how could the little man be otherwise than bewildered after laboring for so many years to destroy his own identity and that of all the objects that had any bearing on it there we are said Caleb falling back a pace or two to form the better judgment of his work as near the real thing as six pence worth a half pence is to six pence what a pity that the whole front of the house opens at once if there was only a staircase in it now and regular doors to the rooms to go in at but that's the worst of my calling I'm always diluting myself and swindling myself you're speaking quite softly are you not tired father tired echo Caleb with a great burst of animation what should tire me Bertha I was never tired what does it mean to give the greater force to his words he checked himself in an involuntary imitation of two half length stretching and yawning figures on the mantle shelf who are represented in one eternal state of weariness from the waist upwards and hummed a fragment of a song it was a baccanalian song something about a sparkling bowl he sang it with an assumption of a devil may care voice that made his face a thousand times more meager and more thoughtful than ever what you're singing are you said tackleton putting his head in at the door go it I can't sing nobody would have suspected him of it he hadn't but is generally termed a singing face by any means I can't afford to sing said tackleton I'm glad you can I hope you can afford to work too hardly time for both I should think if only you could see him Bertha how he's winking at me whispered Caleb such a man to joke you'd think if you didn't know him he was in earnest wouldn't you now the blind girl smiled and nodded the bird that can sing and won't sing must be made to sing they say rumble tackleton what about the owl that can't sing and ought to sing and will sing is there anything that he should be made to do the extent to which he's winking at this moment whispered Caleb to his daughter oh my gracious always Mary and light hearted with us cried the smiling Bertha oh you're there are you said tackleton poor idiot he really did believe she was an idiot and he founded the belief I can't say whether consciously or not upon her being fond of him well and being there how are you said tackleton in his grudging way oh well quite well and as happy as even you can wish me to be as happy as you would make the whole world if you could poor idiot mother tackleton no gleam of reason not a gleam the blind girl took his hand and kissed it held it for a moment in her own two hands and later cheek against it tenderly before releasing it there was such unspeakable affection and such fervent gratitude in the act that tackleton himself was moved to say in a milder growl than usual what's the matter now I stood it close beside my pillow when I went to sleep last night and remembered it in my dreams and when the day broke and the glorious red son the red son father red in the morning and the evening's Bertha said poor Caleb with a woeful glance at his employer when it rose and the bright light I almost feared to strike myself against in walking came into the room I turned the little tree towards it and blessed heaven for making things so precious and blessed you for sending them to me bedlam broke loose said tackleton under his breath we shall arrive at the straight waistcoat and muffler soon we're getting on Caleb with his lands hooked loosely in each other stared vacantly before him while his daughter spoke as if he really were uncertain I believe he was whether tackleton had done anything to deserve her thanks or not if he could have been a perfectly free agent at that moment required on pain of death to kick the toy merchant or fall at his feet according to his merits I believe it would have been an even chance which course he would have taken yet Caleb knew that with his own hands he had brought the little rose tree home for her so carefully and that with his own lips he had forged the innocent deception which should help to keep her from suspecting how much how very much he every day denied himself that she might be happier Bertha said tackleton assuming for the nonce a little cordiality come here oh I can come straight to you you needn't guide me she rejoined shall I tell you a secret bertha if you will she answered eagerly how bright the darkened face how adorned with light the listening head this is the day on which little what's her name the spoiled child purie bingles wife pays her regular visit to you makes her fantastic picnic here ain't it said tackleton with a strong expression of distaste for the whole concern yes replied bertha this is the day now I thought so said tackleton I should like to join the party do you hear that father cried the blind girl in ecstasy yes yes I hear it murmur Caleb with the fixed look of a sleepwalker but I don't believe it it's one of my lies I've no doubt you see I I want to bring the purie bingles a little more into company with May Fielding said tackleton I'm going to be married to me married cried the blind girl starting from him she's such a confounded idiot mother tackleton that I was afraid she'd never comprehend me ah bertha married church parson clerk beetle glass coach bells breakfast ride cake favors marrow bone cleavers and all the rest of the tomfoolery a wedding you know a wedding don't you know what a wedding is I know replied the blind girl in a gentle tone I understand do you mother tackleton it's more than I expected well on that account I want to join the party and to bring me and her mother I'll send in a little something or rather before the afternoon a cold leg of mutton or some comfortable trifle of that sort you'll expect me yes she answered and she drooped her head and turned away and so stood with her hands crossed musing I don't think you will let her tackle 10 looking at her for you seem to have forgotten all about it already Caleb I may venture to Sam here I suppose that Caleb sir take care she don't forget what I've been saying to her she never forgets returned Caleb it's one of the few things she ain't clever in every man thinks his own geese swans observed the toy merchant with a shrug poor devil having delivered himself of which remark with infinite contempt old gruff and tackleton withdrew end of section four section five of the cricket on the hearth by Charles Dickens this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org the cricket on the hearth by Charles Dickens Bertha remained where he had left her lost in meditation the gaiety had vanished from her downcast face and it was very sad three or four times she shook her head as if bewailing some remembrance or some loss but her sorrowful reflections found no vent in words it was not until Caleb had been occupied some time and yoking a team of horses to a wagon by the summery process of nailing the harness to the vital parts of their bodies that she drew near to his working stool and sitting down beside him said father I am lonely in the dark I want my eyes my patient willing eyes here they are said Caleb always ready they are more yours than mine Bertha any hour in the four and twenty what shall your eyes do for you dear look around the room father all right said Caleb no sooner said than done Bertha tell me about it it's much the same as usual said Caleb homely but very snug the gay colors on the walls the bright flowers on the plates and dishes the shining wood where there are beams or panels the general cheerfulness and neatness of the building make it very pretty cheerful and neat it was wherever Bertha's hands could busy themselves but nowhere else were cheerfulness and neatness possible in the old crazy shed which Caleb's fancy had so transformed you have your working dress on and are not so gallant as when you wear your handsome coat said Bertha touching him not quite so gallant answer Caleb pretty brisk though father said the blind girl drawing close to his side and stealing one arm around his neck tell me something about me is she very fair she is indeed said Caleb and she was indeed it was quite a rare thing to Caleb not to have to draw on his invention her hair is dark said Bertha pensively darker than mine her voice is sweet and musical I know I've often loved to hear it her shape there's not a dolls in all the room to equal it said Caleb and her eyes he stopped her bertha had drawn closer around his neck and from the arm that clung about him came a warning pressure that he understood too well he coughed a moment hammered for a moment and then fell back upon the song about the sparkling bowl his infallible resource in all such difficulties our friend father our benefactor I am never tired you know of hearing about him now was I ever she said hastily of course not said Caleb and with reason ah with how much reason cried the blind girl with such fervency that Caleb though his modus were so pure could not endure to meet her face but dropped his eyes as if she could have read in them his innocent deceit tell me again about him dear father said bertha many times again his face is benevolent kind and tender honest and true I'm sure it is the manly heart that tries to cloak all favors with a show of roughness and unwillingness beats in its every look and glance and makes it noble said Caleb in his quiet desperation and makes it noble cried the blind girl he is older than me father yes said Caleb reluctantly he is a little older than me but that don't signify oh father yes to be his patient companion in infirmity and age to be his gentle nurse and sickness and his constant friend in suffering and sorrow to know no weariness in working for his sake to watch him tend him sit beside his bed and talk to him awake and pray for him asleep what privileges these would be what opportunities for proving all her truth and her devotion to him would she do all this dear father no doubt of it said Caleb I love her father I can love her from my soul exclaimed the blind girl and saying so she laid her poor blind face on Caleb's shoulder and so wept and wept that he was almost sorry to have brought that tearful happiness upon her in the meantime there had been a pretty sharp commotion of John Peary Bengals for a little Mrs. Peary Bengal naturally couldn't think of going anywhere without the baby and they get the baby underway took time not that there was much of the baby speaking of it as a thing of weight and measure but there was a vast deal to do about and about it and it all had to be done by easy stages for instance when the baby was got by hook and by crook to a certain point of dressing and you might have rationally supposed that another touch or two would finish him off and then turn him out a tip top baby challenging the world he was unexpectedly extinguished in the flannel cap and hustled off to bed where he simmered so to speak between two blankets for the best part of an hour from this state of inaction he was then recalled shining very much and roaring violently to partake of well I'd rather say if you'll permit me to speak generally of a slightly past after which you went to sleep again Mrs. Peary Bengal took advantage of this interval to make herself as smart in a small way as ever you saw anybody in all your life and during the same short truce Miss Slowboy insinuated herself into a Spencer of a fashion so surprising and ingenious that it had no connection with herself or anything else in the universe but was a shrunken dog seared independent fact pursuing its lonely course without the least regard to anybody by this time the baby being all alive again was invested by the united efforts of Mrs. Peary Bengal and Miss Slowboy with a cream colored mantle for its body and a sort of nankine raised pie for its head and so in course of time they all three got down to the door where the old horse had already taken more than the full of value of his day's toll out of the turnpike trust by tearing up the road with his impatient autographs and when boxer might be dimly seen in the remote perspective standing looking back and tempting him to come on without orders as to a chair or anything of that kind for helping Mrs. Peary Bengal into the cart you know very little of John if you think that was necessary before you could have seen him lift her from the ground there she was in her place fresh and rosy saying John how can you think of Tilly if I might be allowed to mention a young lady's legs on any terms I would observe of Miss Slowboys that there was a fatality about them which rendered them singularly liable to be grazed and that she never affected the smallest assent or decent without recording the circumstances upon them with a notch as Robinson Crusoe marked the days on his wooden calendar but as this might be considered ungentile I'll think of it John you've got the basket with the veal and hand pie and things and the bottles of beer ass dot if you haven't you must turn around again this very minute you're a nice little article return the carrier to be talking about turning around after keeping me a full quarter of an hour behind my time I'm sorry for it John so dot and a great bustle but I really could not think of going to Bertha's I would not do it John on any account without the veal and hand pie and things and the bottles of beer way this monosyllable was addressed to the horse who didn't mind it at all oh do way John said Mrs. Peary Bingle please it'll be time enough to do that return John when I begin to leave things behind me the basket safe enough what a hard-hearted monster you must be John not to have said so at once and save me such a turn I declare I wouldn't go to Bertha's without the veal and hand pie and things and the bottles of beer for any money regularly once a fortnight ever since we have been married John we have made our little picnic there if anything was to go wrong with it I should think we were never to be lucky again it was a kind thought in the first instance so the carrier and I honor you for it little woman why dear John replied dot turning very red don't talk about honoring me good gracious by the by observe the carrier that old gentleman again so visibly and instantly embarrassed he's an odd fish so the carrier looking straight along the road before them I can't make him out I don't believe there's any harm in him not at all I'm I'm sure there's none at all yes so the carrier with his eyes attracted to her face by the great earnestness of her manner I am glad you feel so certain of it because it's a confirmation to me it's curious that he should have taken it into his head to ask leave to go on lodging with us ain't it things come about so strangely so very strangely she rejoined in a low voice scarcely audible however he's a good natured old gentleman said John and pays like a gentleman and I think his word is to be relied upon like a gentleman's I had quite a long talk with him this morning he can hear me better already he says as he gets more used to my voice he told me a great deal about himself and I told him a great deal about myself and a rare a lot of questions he asked me I gave him information about my having two beats you know in my business one day to the right from our house and back again another day to the left from her house and back again for he's a stranger and don't know the names of places around here and he seemed quite pleased why then I shall be returning home tonight you're away he says when I thought you'd be coming in an exactly opposite direction that's capital I may trouble you for another lift perhaps but I'll engage not to fall so sound asleep again he was sound asleep sure dot what are you thinking of thinking of John I was listening to you oh that's all right said here in this carrier I was afraid from the look on your face that I had gone rambling on so long as to set you thinking about something else I was very near it I'll be bound dot made no reply they jogged on for some little time in silence but it was not easy to remain silent very long in John Peary bingles cart for everybody on the road has something to say though it might only be how are you and indeed it was very often nothing else still to give that back again with the right spirit of gorgeality required not merely a nod and a smile but as wholesome an action of the lungs with all as a great long-winded parliamentary speech sometimes passengers on foot or horseback plotted on a little way beside the cart for the express purpose of having a chat and then there was a great deal to be said on both sides then boxer gave occasion to more good-natured recognitions of and by the carrier than half a dozen Christians could have done everybody knew him all along the road especially the fouls and pigs who when they saw him approaching with his body all on one side and his ears pricked up inquisitively and that knob of a tail making the most of itself in the air immediately withdrew into remote back settlements without waiting for the honor of a nearer acquaintance he had business elsewhere going down all the turnings looking into all the wells bolting in and out of all the cottages dashing into the midst of the dame schools fluttering all the pigeons magnifying the tails of all the cats and trotting into the public houses like a regular customer wherever he went somebody or other might have been heard to say oh la here's boxer and out came that somebody forthwith accompanied by at least two or three others some buddies to give john period bingle and his wife good day the packages and parcels for the air and cart were numerous and there were many stoppages to take them in and give them out which were not by any means the worst parts of the journey some people were so full of expectation about their parcels and other people were so full of wonder about their parcels and other people were so full of inexhaustible directions about their parcels and john had such a lively interest in all the parcels that it was as good as a play likewise there were articles to carry which required to be considered and discussed and in reference to the adjustment and disposition of which councils had to be holden to the carrier and the sender at which boxer usually assisted in short fits of the closest attention and long fits of tearing round and round the assembled sages and barking himself horse of all these little incidents dot was the amused and open eyed spectatris from her chair in the cart and as she sat there looking on a charming little portrait framed to admiration by the tilt there was no lack of nudging and glancing and whisperings and envying among the younger men and this delighted john the carrier beyond measure for he was proud to have his little wife admired knowing that she didn't mind it that if anything she really liked it perhaps the trip was a little foggy to be sure in the january weather and was raw and cold but who cared for such trifles not dot decidedly not till a slow boy for she deemed sitting in the cart on any terms to be the highest point of human joys the crowning circumstance of earthly hope not the baby i'll be sworn for it's not in baby nature to be warmer or more sound asleep though its capacity is great in both respects then that blessed young purie bingo was all the way you couldn't see very far in the fog of course but you could see a great deal it's astonishing how much you may see in a thicker fog than that if you will only take the trouble to look for it why even to sit watching for the fairy rings in the fields and for the patches of whore frost still lingering in the shade near hedges and by trees was a pleasant occupation to make no mention of the unexpected shapes in which the trees themselves came starting out of the mist and glided into it again the hedges were tangled and bare and waved a multitude of blighted garlands in the wind but there was no discouragement in this it was agreeable to contemplate for it made the fireside warmer in possession and the summer greener in expectancy the river looked chilly but it was in motion and moving at a good pace which was a great point the canal was rather slow and torpid that must be admitted never mind it would freeze the sooner when the frost set fairly in and then there would be skating and sliding and the heavy old barges frozen up somewhere near a wharf with smoke their rusty iron chimney pipes all day and have a lazy time of it in one place there was a great mound of weeds or stubble burning and they watched the fire so white in the daytime flaring through the fog with only here and there a dash of red in it until in consequence as she observed of the smoke getting up her nose miss slow boy choked she could do anything of that sort on the smallest provocation and woke the baby who wouldn't go to sleep again but boxer who was in advance of them some quarter of a mile or so had already passed the outposts of the town and gained the corner of the street where Caleb and his daughter lived and long before they had reached the door he and the blind girl were on the pavement waiting to receive them boxer by the way made certain delicate distinctions of his own in his communication with Bertha which persuade me fully that he knew her to be blind he never sought to attract her attention by looking at her as he often did with other people but touched her invariably what experience he could ever have had of blind people or blind dogs I don't know he never lived with a blind master nor had Mr. Boxer the elder nor Mrs. Boxer nor any of his respectable family on either side ever been visited with blindness that I am aware of he may have found it out for himself perhaps but he had got hold of it somehow and therefore he had hold of Bertha too by the skirt and kept hold until Mrs. Puribingle and the baby and Miss Slowboy and the basket were all got safely within doors May Fielding was already come and so was her mother a little quarrelous chip of an old lady with a peevish face who in right of having preserved a waist like a bed post was supposed to be a most transcendent figure and who in consequence of having one spoon better off or of laboring under an impression that she might have been if something had happened which never did happen and seem to have never been particularly likely to come to pass but it's all the same was a very genteel and patronizing indeed Grafin Tackleton was also there doing the agreeable with the evident sensation of being as perfectly at home and as unquestionably in his own element as a fresh young salmon on the top of the Great Pyramid May my dear old friend cried running up to meet her what a happiness to see you her old friend was to the full as hearty and as glad as she and it really was if you'll believe me quite a pleasant sight to see them embrace Tackleton was a man of taste beyond all question may was very pretty you know sometimes when you are used to a pretty face how when it comes into contact and comparison with another pretty face it seems for the moment to be homely and faded and hardly to deserve the high opinion you have of it now this was not at all the case either with dot or may for maize face set off dots and dots face set off maize so naturally and agreeably that as John Perry Bingo was very near saying when he came into the room they ought to have been born sisters which was the only improvement you could have suggested end of section five