"Mr. Scrooge!" said Bob; "I'll give you Mr. Scrooge, the Founder of the feast!" by E. A. Abbey. American Household Edition (1876), fifth illustration for A Christmas Carol, "Stave Three: TheSecond of the Three Spirits." in Dickens's Christmas Stories, 10 cm x 13.3 (4 x 5 ¼ inches) (9 cm by 11.5 cm), framed, p. 28. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]
Details
- Bob Cratchit (John Dickens) raises the toast
- Mrs. Cratchit (Elizabeth Dickens) reluctantly does likewise
- Peter Cratchit (young Charles Dickens) in over-sized collar
- Belinda Cratchit and Martha Cratchit (Letitia and Fanny Dickens)
- Timothy Cratchit and the youngest Cratchit daughter (Alfred and Harriet Dickens)
Passage Illustrated: The Cratchits' Christmas Dinner
These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden goblets would have done; and Bob served it out with beaming looks, while the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and cracked noisily. Then Bob proposed:
"A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us."
Which all the family re-echoed.
"God bless us every one!" said Tiny Tim, the last of all.
He sat very close to his father's side upon his little stool. Bob held his withered little hand in his, as if he loved the child, and wished to keep him by his side, and dreaded that he might be taken from him.
"Spirit," said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before,"tell me if Tiny Tim will live."
"I see a vacant seat," replied the Ghost, "in the poorchimney-corner, and a crutch without an owner, carefully preserved. If theseshadows remain unaltered by the Future, the child will die."
"No, no," said Scrooge. "Oh, no, kind Spirit. Say he will be spared."
"If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, none other of my race," returned the Ghost, "will find him here. What then? If he be like to die, he had better do it, and decrease the surplus population."
Scrooge hung his head to hear his own words quoted by the Spirit, and was overcome with penitence and grief.
"Man," said the Ghost, "if man you be in heart, not adamant, forbear that wicked cant until you have discovered What the surplus is, and Where it is. Will you decide what men shall live, what men shall die? It may be, that in the sight of Heaven, you are more worthless and less fit to live than millions like this poor man's child. Oh God! To hear the Insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his hungry brothers in the dust."
Scrooge bent before the Ghost's rebuke, and trembling cast his eyes upon the ground. But he raised them speedily, on hearing his own name.
"Mr. Scrooge!" said Bob; "I'll give you Mr. Scrooge, the Founder of the Feast!"
"The Founder of the Feast indeed!" cried Mrs Cratchit, reddening. "I wish I had him here. I'd give him a piece of my mind to feast upon, and I hope he'd have a good appetite for it."
"My dear," said Bob, "the children. Christmas Day."
"It should be Christmas Day, I am sure," said she, "on which one drinks the health of such an odious, stingy, hard, unfeeling man as Mr. Scrooge. You know he is, Robert. Nobody knows it better than you do, poor fellow."
"My dear," was Bob's mild answer, "Christmas Day."
"I'll drink his health for your sake and the Day's," said Mrs. Cratchit, "not for his. Long life to him. A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! He'll be very merry and very happy, I have no doubt!"
The children drank the toast after her. It was the first of their proceedings which had no heartiness. [Stave Three, "The Second of the Three Spirits," 27-28]
Commentary: Anti-Malthusian Sentiments
Illustrating Dickens' story for an early-Victorian audience, John Leech had not cast Bob and Tim in central roles. His illustrations focused on Scrooge and the spirits. He did not even depict the Cratchit Christmas feast. Bob Cratchit appears in only one of his pictures (fig. 38 [Scrooge and Bob Cratchit]), a black-and-white tailpiece showing him sharing the bowl of smoking bishop with Scrooge. But later Victorian illustrators devoted themselves to the Cratchits. Three of the six illustrations E. A. Abbey produced for the American Household edition of 1876, for example, depicted the Cratchits, including a picture of the family circle dominated by Bob and his two sons as they toast "the Founder of the Feast". [PaulDavis, The Lives and Times of Ebenezer Scrooge, 83]
As Davis, notes, Dickens's denying Mrs. Cratchit even a Christian name does tend to relegate to the status of supporting character at best; certainly, she does not appear at all in Leech's original sequence or in Barnard's five woodcuts for the British Household edition, and is overshadowed by her outgoing, bustling husband in those series in which she does make an appearance: Abbey's (in which she sits well to the right-hand margin, presiding over the distaff side of the familial hearth) and Eytinge's 1867 Diamond Edition illustration (in which she welcomes home her husband, her back towards the viewer in Bob Cratchit at Home and is seen only in profile as she serves The Wonderful Christmas Pudding. Even in the deathbed scene Poor Tiny Tim! she is curiously absent, as if even Tim's imagined death is gender-restricted as yet a final opportunity for male bonding.
If Mrs. Cratchit is somewhat marginalized in Abbey's illustration, occupyingthe right-hand register with her adolescent daughter Martha, the two smallerCratchits (a boy and a girl), and Beinda, in the accompanying text Dickens letsher speak her mind (even though she is the proverbial homemaker) about the parsimonious skinflint whom the kindly Bob has just charitably dubbed "The Founder of the feast":
At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the hearth swept, and the fire made up. The compound in the jug being tasted, and considered perfect, apples and oranges were put upon the table, and a shovel-full of chestnuts on the fire. Then all the Cratchit family drew round the hearth, in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a one; and at Bob Cratchit's elbow stood the family display of glass. Two tumblers, and a custard-cup without a handle. [Stave Four, 27]
In fact, although this dialogue spills over onto the twenty-eighth page,Abbey has attempted to convey the perfect harmony and good will that prevadesthe Cratchit hearth prior to Bob's raising his tumbler. Mrs. Cratchit looksdemurely at her her husband as he pronounces the toast, and does notremonstrate with her charitable spouse.
Possibly aided by John Forster's The Life of Charles Dickens (1872, volume 1), Abbey has constructed a family gathering in the front parlour of the four-roomed house in Camden Town (shared by the real-life family of John Dickens, at 16 Bayham Street, and the fictional family of the Micawbers in DavidCopperfield) which parallels the Dickens family in the early 1820s: "There were six Dickens children then who correspond to the six Cratchits: Fanny is the eldest Cratchit, Martha; Charles is Peter; Letitia is Belinda; Frederick and Harriet are theunnamed Cratchits, also a boy an girl; and the youngest, Alfred, is Tiny Tim" (Hearn, 119).
One can see in Abbey's illustration that the artist has placed Peter immediately to the right of the father, and Tim, under Bob's protective hand, to the father's left. The little girl, sitting immediately before the fire, her back towards the viewer, would be the equivalent of Harriet Dickens. In the female-dominated right-hand register, Mrs. Cratchit (Dickens) is at the top of a parenthesis, and immediately below her are BelindaCratchit, Martha Cratchit, and the unnamed Cratchit son who corresponds to FredDickens. The faces of the three Cratchit females bear a striking similarity inprofile. The wreath above the fireplace is an interpolation implying a halo forthis blessed family. Although we cognize Bob's checkered trousers from hisinitial appearance in Abbey's series, his double-breated jacket seems to grownlonger and more stately than the short suit jacket he wears in the Cornhillsliding scene. Even though the text is explicit about the entire family'sdrinking the toast ("The children drank the toast after her" 28), in order toavoid any suggestion that the Cratchit children are imbibing an alcoholicbeverage, Abbey does not provide any of them with a tumbler: the youngest boy(right, on Belinda's lap) appears to be eating a small apple, and only the twoadults have tumblers — presumably filled with the jug of steaming punchfrom the hearth, immediately above Tiny Tim's head.
Scanned image and text byPhilip V. Allingham. Formatting and linking by George P. Landow. [You may use these images (including the details) without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the image and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]
Bibliography
Guiliano, Edward, and Philip Collins, eds. AChristmas Carol. The Annotated Dickens. Vol. 1.New York: Clarkson N. Potter, 1986.
Davis, Paul. Charles Dickens A to Z: The EssentialReference to His Life and Work. New York: Facts On File, 1998.
_______. The Lives and Times of Ebenezer Scrooge. New Haven and London: Yale U. P., 1990.
Dickens, Charles. ChristmasBooks. Il. Fred Barnard. The Household Edition. London: Chapmanand Hall, 1878.
---. ChristmasStories. Il. E. A. Abbey. The Household Edition. New York: Harperand Brothers, 1876.
Guida, Fred. "A Christmas Carol" and ItsAdaptations. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2000.
Hearn, Michael Patrick. The AnnotatedChristmas Carol, il. John Leech. New York: Avenel, 1976.
Parker, David. Christmas and CharlesDickens. New York: AMS Press, 2005.
VictorianWeb Illus-trationCharlesDickens E. A.Abbey NextCreated 20 November 2012Last modified 5 February 2021
FAQs
While Cratchit's family curses Scrooge for his stinginess, however, Cratchit says he feels sorry for his employer, and insists that they toast his health. After Scrooge decides to change his ways on Christmas Day, he anonymously sends a Christmas turkey to Cratchit for his family's dinner.
What was Scrooge full name? ›
Ebenezer Scrooge, fictional character, the miserly protagonist of Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol (1843). Despite his transformation at the end of the story, the character is remembered as the embittered miser and not as the reformed sinner, and “Scrooge” has entered the English language as a synonym for a miser.
Is Ebenezer Scrooge rich or poor? ›
In Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol, Ebenezer Scrooge learns that he is not truly rich. Since young adulthood Scrooge has clung to money alone, which led to him losing his joy in living, and in return he becomes a "squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner" (Dickens 1358).
How is Scrooge described in the beginning of the chapter? ›
Scrooge is not just a grumpy old man – he is a “squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner”. Dickens fills this first Stave with superlative and vivid descriptions of Scrooge's miserly character and in so doing sets him up for quite a transformation.
Does Scrooge have a child? ›
When his beloved sister Fan came to take him home one Christmas, this became Scrooge's one happy childhood memory. She later died after giving birth to Fred.
How much did Scrooge pay Bob Cratchit? ›
In Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol, Ebenezer Scrooge paid his clerk Bob Cratchit 15 shillings a week.
Is Belle Fezziwig's daughter? ›
However, Belle eventually breaks off their engagement after Scrooge's obsession with money eclipses his love for her. Fezziwig is mentioned as having three daughters; although their names are not revealed, it is possible that Belle is one of his daughters.
How old was Scrooge when he died? ›
Redditor themightyheptagon explains that because the Charles Dickens story was published in 1843, and the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come shows Scrooge his death one year later, "presumably" of old age, you can probably assume Scrooge is around 60 years old when the story happens.
Does Scrooge have a last name? ›
Most people are familiar with Charles Dicken's A Christmas Carol and the central character Scrooge, but not many will know that Ebenezer Scrooge was based on an Edinburgh worthy and Scottish surname.
Was Scrooge a Millionaire? ›
The sum of Scrooge's wealth is unclear. According to Barks' The Second Richest Duck as noted by a Time article, Scrooge is worth "one multiplujillion, nine obsquatumatillion, six hundred twenty-three dollars and sixty-two cents".
Scrooge had long stilled his conscience with the thought that the suffering of poor families and children was not his problem. He dutifully paid taxes to support the institutions that handled such matters, resolving not to concern himself any further with it.
How much money does Scrooge have? ›
Unfortunately, their estimate of his worth—a paltry $65.4 billion—seems just a little low, and they don't present any of their research or calculations for fact-checking. The people over at the Billfold used calculus and the average height of a duck to deduce that Scrooge is worth between $31.2 and $210 billion.
What does Bob ask Scrooge for at the beginning? ›
He proposes a toast to Scrooge even on Christmas Day. "I'll give you Mr. Scrooge, the Founder of the Feast!" Scrooge is too miserly to offer his clerk a decent wage, but Cratchit is generous enough to be grateful to his boss.
What is Scrooge famous line? ›
Scrooge: “Bah, humbug!”
What are 3 character traits that describe Scrooge? ›
Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol
- Miserable.
- Tight-fisted.
- Redeemed by the end.
In Charles Dickens' Christmas Carol, the Ghost of Christmas past shows us the young Ebenezer engaged to be married to Belle. Troubled over the cost of the wedding, he repeatedly delays it, which leads Belle eventually to call off the engagement and marry another.
Did Scrooge ever get married? ›
Personal Data: Ebenezer Scrooge is an approximately 50-year-old Caucasian male. He is single and has never been married.
Who did Scrooge break up with? ›
The Ghost shows Scrooge himself as a young man with his fiancée, Belle. Young Scrooge's face already reveals his love of money. Belle breaks their engagement because she says Scrooge loves money more than he loves her. The Ghost shows Scrooge that Belle has married someone else and has a loving family and a happy life.
How much is 5 bob worth today? ›
Sadly, they haven't said it since 1971. It wasn't shillings or a quarter of a pound 💷. Current equivalent is 25p.
How much is a bob worth? ›
A 'bob' was the slang word for a Shilling, which was worth 12 old pennies. Following decimilisation in 1971, a Shilling was worth 5 new pence. The old 'ten bob note' (10 shillings) was the equivalent of 5 Florins, or 4 Half Crowns, or 2 Crowns. After decimilisation, it was worth 50p.
In the story, Scrooge comes back north with his nephew Donald, looking for gold he left there in the late 1800s. Later on, stories were added to the mythos, explaining how he began amassing his fortune by striking gold in the area during the Klondike Gold Rush.
Why did Scrooge like Fezziwig? ›
Fezziwig was a cheerful man who mentors Scrooge with kindness and generosity, and shows great affection towards his employees. Years later when Scrooge is master himself, he revisits Fezziwig as the ghost of Christmas Past.
Is Fezziwig alive? ›
Scrooge beholds him joyfully and exclaims, "Why, it's old Fezziwig! Bless his heart; it's Fezziwig alive again!" This line is also the only clue that Fezziwig is now, presumably, dead. There is no other reference made to the cause and time of his death.
What happened to Scrooge's wife? ›
Belle broke off their engagement after Scrooge became consumed with greed and the lust for wealth. She later married another man.
Who died in A Christmas Carol? ›
A Christmas Carol opens on a bleak, cold Christmas Eve in London, seven years after the death of Ebenezer Scrooge's business partner, Jacob Marley.
What mental disorder does Scrooge have? ›
Afterwards, he is a changed person. Commentators pondering Ebenezer Scrooge's experience in Dickens's A Christmas Carol generally ascribe it to a nightmare. Some suggest that Dickens was accurately depicting psychiatric disorder in Scrooge: a brief psychotic episode3 or Lewy body dementia.
Was there a real life Scrooge? ›
The other inspiration for Scrooge is likely to have been John Elwes (1714-1789), the MP for Berkshire who was born in to a prestigious and wealthy family of reputed skinflints. Unusually for a miser, Elwes could be affable, considerate and generous with his cash.
What's Santa's last name? ›
Contents. Santa Claus—otherwise known as Saint Nicholas or Kris Kringle—has a long history steeped in Christmas traditions.
Is Ebenezer a real name? ›
Ebenezer, less commonly spelled Ebenezar, is a male given name of Hebrew origin meaning "stone of the help" (derived from the phrase Eben ha-Ezer). The name is sometimes abbreviated as Eben.
Who is Scrooges dad? ›
Franklin Scrooge is the posthumous main antagonist of the 2019 British television miniseries A Christmas Carol, which is based on the 1843 novella of the same name by the late Charles Dickens. He is Ebenezer and Lottie Scrooge's abusive father, who is responsible for much of the former's cruelty and misanthropy.
His 'future tombstone' states he was born in 1786. That means Scrooge was 57 years old during most of the film, and was 50 years old when Marley died in 1836.
Where is Scrooge buried? ›
Bah Humbug! In the graveyard of St Chad's Church in Shrewsbury lies the grave of Ebenzer Scrooge.
Who was the very first Scrooge? ›
Hicks appears as Ebenezer Scrooge, the miser who hates Christmas. It was the first sound version of the Charles Dickens classic A Christmas Carol, not counting a 1928 short subject that now appears to be lost.
...
Scrooge (1935 film)
We are told that Bob Cratchit kept his family on 15 shillings a week (equivalent to about £63 today or £3276 per year… although as everyone was earning substantially less in real terms, this should be scaled up to a more reasonable £30,000).
Why is Scrooge obsessed with money? ›
He says 'There is nothing on which it is so hard as poverty'. This shows us that being poor at this time was really bad, like we see with the Cratchits and the other poor people. It shows us Scrooge is really scared of being poor and so he got obsessed with getting rich.
How much was half a crown in 1843? ›
The Tower Mint in London struck 455,000 half crowns in 1843, the year Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol. Each showed a young Queen Victoria on the obverse. The half crown (2 shillings, 6 pence) was the equivalent of about 60 cents in U.S. coin at the time.
How rich is Santa? ›
The Forbes Fictional Fifteen
| Rank | Name | Net Worth |
|---|
| 1. | Santa Claus | $ ∞ |
| 2. | Richie Rich | 24.7 billion |
| 3. | Oliver "Daddy" Warbucks | 10 billion |
| 4. | Scrooge McDuck | 8.2 billion |
11 more rowsSep 13, 2002
Donald Duck's net worth is unknown, and although his Uncle Scrooge McDuck has a net worth of up to $45 billion Scrooge disinherited Donald from receiving any part of his fortune.
Does Scrooge have a dog? ›
Scrooge has a dog named "Debit" in this animated musical movie. In other movie versions, he does not have a dog, because it was not one of the characters in Charles Dickens' original novel.
What did Scrooge give to Bob at the end of the story? ›
He sends a turkey to the Cratchits and gives Bob a raise, atoning for his previous bitterness toward his clerk in Stave One.
“I wish I had him here. I'd give him a piece of my mind to feast upon, and I hope he'd have a good appetite for it.”
What does Bob say about Scrooge? ›
"Mr. Scrooge!" said Bob; "I'll give you Mr. Scrooge, the Founder of the feast!" — fifth illustration by E. A. Abbey for Dickens's "Christmas Stories" (1876)
What is the most famous line in A Christmas Carol? ›
Scrooge's nephew, Fred, visits and invites Scrooge to his Christmas party, and two men stop in and ask for a charitable contribution. Scrooge reacts viciously, spouting his famous line “Bah, humbug!” That night, Scrooge is surprised to receive a visitation from the ghost of his dead partner, Jacob Marley.
What is Scrooge's favorite word? ›
Humbug!, the catchphrase of the miserly main character Ebenezer Scrooge. Scrooge's bah is an exclamation of contempt or annoyance. Since then, bah humbug has come to invoke Scrooge's (initial) grouchy attitude toward Christmas in other contexts.
Why is it called Scrooge? ›
Most agree that Dickens based Scrooge on scrouging – an archaic word with a multitude of “squeezing, crushing, crowding” meanings – likely based on the Old English scruze, “to squeeze or compress.” Dickens first used scrouging (spelled scrowding) in his fourth novel, The Old Curiosity Shop, using it to describe a ...
What type of character is Bob Cratchit? ›
Dickens depicts him as a loving father and husband, which could be interpreted as an idealisation of the lower class. Despite his poor wages and cruel employer, Bob Cratchit remains grateful and compassionate, celebrating Christmas in a way that the significantly richer Scrooge never could.
What does Bob Cratchit represent? ›
In the extract, Dickens uses Bob Cratchit to symbolise the poor working conditions of the working classes in the Victorian era. Bob's office is referred to by the noun 'Tank' which has obvious connotations of claustrophobia, imprisonment and containment.
What two similes are used to describe Scrooge? ›
Evidence and explanation of the language used
| How? |
|---|
| Clear narrative voice | Dickens uses a narrative voice that offers opinions on the characters. For example 'Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge!' |
| Simile | When Dickens first presents Scrooge he describes him as 'Hard and sharp as flint'. |
3 more rowsAfter Scrooge has his change of heart, he decides to buy the Cratchits a more luxurious meal instead: a turkey. In this post, we'll take a look at the turkey, how it became part of English cuisine, and especially how it became a standard meal at holiday time. One theory is that Dickens himself popularized the turkey.
What is the purpose of Bob Cratchit? ›
In the extract, Dickens uses Bob Cratchit to symbolise the poor working conditions of the working classes in the Victorian era. Bob's office is referred to by the noun 'Tank' which has obvious connotations of claustrophobia, imprisonment and containment.
Bob Cratchit is Scrooge's clerk and works in unpleasant conditions without complaint. He obeys Scrooge's rules and is timid about asking to go home to his family early on Christmas Eve.
Who does Scrooge tell Bob Cratchit he will assist? ›
2. Scrooge sends a huge turkey to Bob Cratchit's family and gives Bob Cratchit a pay raise to assist his family.
What was Scrooge's gift to Bob Cratchit? ›
The origins of this ritual can be traced back to the generous act of one Ebenezer Scrooge, the reformed miser who on Christmas Day gave a grand turkey to his overworked clerk, Cratchit, in Charles Dickens' 1843 novella A Christmas Carol.
Why does Bob toast Scrooge? ›
Answers 1. At the dinner, Mrs. Cratchit curses Scrooge, but her husband reminds her that it is Christmas. He makes a toast to Scrooge for providing their meager dinner.
What do Bob and the Cratchit family Symbolise? ›
The Cratchit family – The Cratchits give us an insight into what life was like for poor in Victorian. Despite their poverty and ill-health (Tiny Tim) they embody the Christmas spirit with their optimistic outlook and strong sense of family.
How does Bob Cratchit represent poverty? ›
The Cratchits are regarded as Dickens's face of the poor in this novella: They are living on the edge as Bob Cratchit can only just afford all the family's needs. Mrs Cratchit's ribbons might be a luxury but they are also a symbol of her desperation to make her dress look new and respectable.
How is Bob Cratchit forgiving? ›
Bob is a prime example of the virtues of Christmas and provides the antidote to Scrooge. He is also a symbol of forgiveness – he toasts to Scrooge, despite his horrible work conditions, and in the face of Scrooge's eventual remorse, is open and accepting rather than bitter.
How much did Bob Cratchit make in US dollars? ›
"Time for your annual reminder that, according to A Christmas Carol, Bob Cratchit makes 15 shillings a week. Adjusted for inflation, that's $530.27/wk, $27,574/yr, or $13.50/hr. "Most Americans on minimum wage earn less than a Dickensian allegory for destitution."
What does Bob Cratchit look like? ›
Bob Cratchit is described as physically small in stature. He is a poor man who is supporting his large family on the pittance he earns from his employment at Scrooge's London "counting-house", or accounting firm.
How many hours did Bob Cratchit work for Scrooge? ›
Bob works six days a week, for at least eight hours a day. Yes, Scrooge reluctantly gives Bob Christmas day off, but, for our purposes, we will assume no days off but Sundays. For the first 40 hours of the week, Bob is entitled to at least the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour, or $290.
