A Christmas carol . f jolly old gentlemen, lolling at thedoors, and tumbling out into the street intheir apoplectic opulence. There were ruddy,brown-faced, broad-girthed Spanish Onions,shining in the fotness of their growth likeSpanish Friars ; and winking from their shelvesin wanton slyness at the girls as they wentby, and glanced demurely at the hung-upmistletoe. There were pears and apples, clus-tered high in blooming pyramids ; there werebunches of grapes, made, in the shopkeepersbenevolence, to dangle from conspicuoushooks, that peoples mouths might watergratis as they passed ; there were
A Christmas carol . f jolly old gentlemen, lolling at thedoors, and tumbling out into the street intheir apoplectic opulence. There were ruddy,brown-faced, broad-girthed Spanish Onions,shining in the fotness of their growth likeSpanish Friars ; and winking from their shelvesin wanton slyness at the girls as they wentby, and glanced demurely at the hung-upmistletoe. There were pears and apples, clus-tered high in blooming pyramids ; there werebunches of grapes, made, in the shopkeepersbenevolence, to dangle from conspicuoushooks, that peoples mouths might watergratis as they passed ; there were piles offilberts, mossy and brown, recalling, in theirfragrance, ancient walks among the woods,and pleasant shufflings ankle deep throughwithered leaves ; there were Norfolk Biffins,squab, and swarthy, setting off the yellow ofthe oranges and lemons, and, in the greatcompactness of their juicy persons, urgentlyentreating and beseeching to be carried homein paper bags and eaten after dinner. The 79 H Cbristmas Carol. very gold and silver fish, set forth amongthese choice fruits in a bowl, though mem-bers of a dull and stagnant-blooded race, ap-peared to know that there was somethinggoing on ; and, to a fish, went gasping roundand round their little world in slow and pas-sionless excitement. The Grocers ! oh the Grocers ! nearlyclosed, with perhaps two shutters down, orone ; but through those gaps such glimpses !It was not alone that the scales descending onthe counter made a merry sound, or that thetwine and roller parted company so briskly,or that the canisters were rattled up anddown like juggling tricks, or even that theblended scents of tea and coffee were sograteful to the nose, or even that the raisinswere so plentiful and rare, the almonds soextremely white, the sticks of cinnamon solong and straight, the other spices so deli-cious, the candied fruits so caked and spottedwith molten sugar as to make the coldestlookers-on feel faint and subsequently was it tha
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Keywords: ., bookauthordickenscharles1812187, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900
