[251-2] Bedlam is the name of a famous asylum for lunatics, in London. In former times the treatment of the inmates was far from humane, but at the present time the management is excellent, and a large proportion of the inmates are cured.
[252-3] Workhouses are establishments where paupers are cared for, a certain amount of labor being expected from those who are able.
[252-4] In England formerly there existed a device for the punishment of prisoners which was known as the treadmill. A huge wheel, usually in the form of a long hollow cylinder, was provided with steps about its circumference, and made to revolve by the weight of the prisoner as he moved from step to step.
[253-5] Links are torches made of tow and pitch. In the days before the invention of street lights, they were in common use in England, and they are still seen during the dense London fogs.
[254-6] Saint Dunstan was an English archbishop and statesman who lived in the tenth century.
[254-7] This is one of the best-known and oftenest-sung of Christmas carols. In many parts of England, parties of men and boys go about for several nights before Christmas singing carols before people’s houses. These troops of singers are known as “waits.”
[258-8] The splinter-bar is the cross-bar of a vehicle, to which the traces of the horses are fastened.
[261-9] There is a play on the word bowels here. What Scrooge had heard said of Marley was that he had no bowels of compassion—that is, no pity.
[277-10] Scrooge sees and recognizes the heroes of the books which had been almost his only comforters in his neglected childhood.
[284-11] “Sir Roger de Coverley” is the English name for the old-fashioned country-dance which is called in the United States the “Virginia Reel.”