The Chimes

The Chimes

The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Chimes, by Charles Dickens (#8 in our series by
Charles Dickens)
Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the copyright laws for
your country before downloading or redistributing this or any other Project Gutenberg
eBook.
This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project Gutenberg file.
Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the header without written permission.
Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the eBook and Project
Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is important information about your
specific rights and restrictions in how the file may be used. You can also find out about
how to make a donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved.
**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!*****
Title: The Chimes
Author: Charles Dickens
Release Date: September, 1996 [EBook #653] [This file was first posted on October 16,
1996] [Most recently updated: September 8, 2002]
Edition: 10
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE CHIMES ***

Transcribed from Charles Scribner's Sons "Works of Charles Dickens" edition by David
Price, email [email protected]

THE CHIMES

CHAPTER I
--First Quarter.

Here are not many people--and as it is desirable that a story- teller and a story-reader
should establish a mutual understanding as soon as possible, I beg it to be noticed that I
confine this observation neither to young people nor to little people, but extend it to all
conditions of people: little and big, young and old: yet growing up, or already growing
down again--there are not, I say, many people who would care to sleep in a church. I
don't mean at sermon-time in warm weather (when the thing has actually been done, once
or twice), but in the night, and alone. A great multitude of persons will be violently
astonished, I know, by this position, in the broad bold Day. But it applies to Night. It
must be argued by night, and I will undertake to maintain it successfully on any gusty
winter's night appointed for the purpose, with any one opponent chosen from the rest,
who will meet me singly in an old churchyard, before an old church-door; and will
previously empower me to lock him in, if needful to his satisfaction, until morning.
For the night-wind has a dismal trick of wandering round and round a building of that
sort, and moaning as it goes; and of trying, with its unseen hand, the windows and the
doors; and seeking out some crevices by which to enter. And when it has got in; as one
not finding what it seeks, whatever that may be, it wails and howls to issue forth again:
and not content with stalking through the aisles, and gliding round and round the pillars,
and tempting the deep organ, soars up to the roof, and strives to rend the rafters: then
flings itself despairingly upon the stones below, and passes, muttering, into the vaults.
Anon, it comes up stealthily, and creeps along the walls, seeming to read, in whispers, the
Inscriptions sacred to the Dead. At some of these, it breaks out shrilly, as with laughter;
and at others, moans and cries as if it were lamenting. It has a ghostly sound too,
lingering within the altar; where it seems to chaunt, in its wild way, of Wrong and
Murder done, and false Gods worshipped, in defiance of the Tables of the Law, which
look so fair and smooth, but are so flawed and broken. Ugh! Heaven preserve us, sitting
snugly round the fire! It has an awful voice, that wind at Midnight, singing in a church!
But, high up in the steeple! There the foul blast roars and whistles! High up in the steeple,
where it is free to come and go through many an airy arch and loophole, and to twist and
twine itself about the giddy stair, and twirl the groaning weathercock, and make the very
tower shake and shiver! High up in the steeple, where the belfry is, and iron rails are
ragged with rust, and sheets of lead and copper, shrivelled by the changing weather,
crackle and heave beneath the unaccustomed tread; and birds stuff shabby nests into
corners of old oaken joists and beams; and dust grows old and grey; and speckled spiders,
indolent and fat with long security, swing idly to and fro in the vibration of the bells, and

never loose their hold upon their thread-spun castles in the air, or climb up sailor-like in
quick alarm, or drop upon the ground and ply a