A WORD IN SEASON.
They have a superstition in the East,
That Allah, written on a piece of paper,
Is better unction than can come of priest,
Of rolling incense, and of lighted taper:
Holding, that any scrap which bears that name
In any characters its front impress'd on,
Shall help the finder thro' the purging flame,
And give his toasted feet a place to rest on.
Accordingly, they make a mighty fuss
With every wretched tract and fierce oration,
And hoard the leaves—for they are not, like us
A highly civilized and thinking nation:
And, always stooping in the miry ways
To look for matter of this earthly leaven,
They seldom, in their dust-exploring days,
Have any leisure to look up to Heaven.
So have I known a country on the earth
Where darkness sat upon the living waters,
And brutal ignorance, and toil, and dearth
Were the hard portion of its sons and daughters:
And yet, where they who should have oped the door
Of charity and light, for all men's finding
Squabbled for words upon the altar-floor,
And rent The Book, in struggles for the binding.
The gentlest man among those pious Turks
God's living image ruthlessly defaces;
Their best High-Churchman, with no faith in works,
Bowstrings the Virtues in the market-places.
The Christian Pariah, whom both sects curse
(They curse all other men, and curse each other),
Walks thro' the world, not very much the worse,
Does all the good he can, and loves his brother.
[68] C. D. to Professor Felton (1st Sept. 1843), in Atlantic Monthly for July 1871.
[69] "After a period of 27 years, from a single school of five small infants, the work has grown into a cluster of some 300 schools, an aggregate of nearly 30,000 children, and a body of 3000 voluntary teachers, most of them the sons and daughters of toil. . . . Of more than 300,000 children which, on the most moderate calculation, we have a right to conclude have passed through these schools since their commencement, I venture to affirm that more than 100,000 of both sexes have been placed out in various ways, in emigration, in the marine, in trades, and in domestic service. For many consecutive years I have contributed prizes to thousands of the scholars; and let no one omit to call to mind what these children were, whence they came, and whither they were going without this merciful intervention. They would have been added to the perilous swarm of the wild, the lawless, the wretched, and the ignorant, instead of being, as by God's blessing they are, decent and comfortable, earning an honest livelihood, and adorning the community to which they belong." Letter of Lord Shaftesbury in the Times of the 13th of November, 1871.
[70] Chuffey. Sydney Smith had written to Dickens on the appearance of his fourth number (early in April): "Chuffey is admirable. . . . I never read a finer piece of writing: it is deeply pathetic and affecting."
[71] It may interest the reader, and be something of a curiosity of literature, if I give the expenses of the first edition of 6000, and of the 7000 more which constituted the five following editions, with the profit of the remaining 2000 which completed the sale of fifteen thousand:
| CHRISTMAS CAROL. | ||||
| 1st Edition, 6000 No. | ||||
| 1843. | £ | s. | d. | |
| Dec. | Printing | 74 | 2 | 9 |
| Paper | 89 | 2 | 0 | |
| Drawings and Engravings | 49 | 18 | 0 | |
| Two Steel Plates | 1 | 4 | 0 | |
| Printing Plates | 15 | 17 | 6 | |
| Paper for do | 7 | 12 | 0 | |
| Colouring Plates | 120 | 0 | 0 | |
| Binding | 180 | 0 | 0 | |
| Incidents and Advertising | 168 | 7 | 8 | |
| Commission | 99 | 4 | 6 | |
| ——————— | ||||
| £805 | 8 | 5 | ||
| ============== | ||||
| 2nd to the 7th Edition, making 7000 Copies. | ||||
| 1844. | £ | s. | d. | |
| Jan. | Printing | 58 | 18 | 0 |
| Paper | 103 | 19 | 0 | |
| Printing Plates | 17 | 10 | 0 | |
| Paper | 8 | 17 | 4 | |
| Colouring Plates | 140 | 0 | 0 | |
| Binding | 199 | 18 | 2 | |
| Incidents and Advertising | 83 | 5 | 8 | |
| Commission | 107 | 18 | 10 | |
| —————— | ||||
| £720 | 7 | 0 | ||
| ============= | ||||