Page:The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club.djvu/371

299 THE PICKWICK CLITB.

299

Wartlle smiled, as every head was bent forward to bear ; and fillings out the wassail with no stinted hand, nodded a health to Mr. Pickwick, and began as follows —

But bless our editorial heart, what a long chapter we have been )etrayed into ! We had quite forgotten all such petty restrictions as chapters, we solemnly declare. So here goes, to give the goblin a fair ttart in a new one. A clear stage and no favour for the goblins, ladies md gentlemen, if you please.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

THE STORY OF THE GOBLINS WHO STOLE A SEXTON.

' In an old abbey town, down in this part of the country, a long, long while ago — so long, that the story must be a true one, because [our great grandfathers implicitly believed it — there officiated as sexton land grave-digger in the church-yard, one Gabriel Grub. It by no lineans follows that because a man is a sexton, and constantly sur- pounded by emblems of mortality, therefore he should be a morose and lelancholy man ; your undertakers are the merriest fellows in the f'orid, and I once had the honour of being on intimate terms with a [mute, who in private life, and off duty, was as comical and jocose a little fellow as ever chirped out a devil-may-care song, without a hitch [in his memory, or drained off a good stiff glass of grog without stopping for breath. But notwithstanding these precedents to the contrary, Ga- )riel Grub was an ill-conditioned, cross-grained, surly fellow — a morose land lonely man, who consorted with nobody but himself, and an old dicker bottle which fitted into his large deep waistcoat pocket; and who iyed each merry face as it passed him by, with such a deep scowl of lalice and ill-humour, as it was diflScult to meet without feeling some- thing the wor^e for.

spade, lighted his lantern, and betook himself towards the old church- rard, for he had got a grave to finish by next morning, and feeling very low he thought it might raise his spirits perhaps, if he went on with his rork at once. As he wended his way, up the ancient stree't, he saw the iheerful light of the blazing fires gleam through the old casements, md heard the loud laugh and the cheerful shouts of those who were ssembled around them ; he marked the bustling preparations for next lay's good cheer, and smelt the numerous savoury odours consequent thereupon, as they steamed up from the kitchen windows in clouds. All this was gall and wormwood to the heart of Gabriel Grub ; and as groups »f children, bounded out of the houses, tripped across the road, and i^ere met, before they could knock at the opposite door, by half a dozen curly-headed little rascals who crowded round them as they flocked up stairs to spend the evening in their Christmas games, Gabriel smiled grimly, and clutched the handle of his spade with a firmer grasp, as he
 * ' A little b^^fore twilight one Christmas eve, Gabriel shouldered his