Сверчок за очагом

УДК 
372.8
ББК 
81.2 Англ-93
Д 45

ISBN 978-5-9925-1140-6.

 
Диккенс, Чарльз.
Д45 
Сверчок за очагом : книга для чтения на английском языке. — Санкт-Петербург : КАРО, 
2016. — 160 с. — (Classical Literature).

ISBN 978-5-9925-1140-6.

Предлагаем вниманию читателей рождественскую повесть классика английской и мировой литературы Ч. Диккенса 
«Сверчок за очагом».
В большом уютном доме, где все проникнуто согласием и 
любовью, неожиданно появляется некий загадочный странник. 
В дом его привел сам хозяин — почтовый возчик Джон, подобравший промерзшего старика на дороге. В доме поселилась 
тревога. Чувствуют ее и прелестная хозяйка Мэри, которую 
муж называет Крошкой, и юная нянька Тилли, и невидимый 
для всех, но постоянно присутствующий добрый дух и хранитель домашнего очага Сверчок. Начинается почти детективная 
история, которая может привести к ужасной несправедливости. 
Но добро сильно, хотя порой и наивно. Мудрый Сверчок не 
позволит «погаснуть очагу». На пороге Рождество, а в рождественскую ночь каких только чудес не случается...
Предлагаем вниманию читателей текст повести с комментариями и словарем.
УДК 372.8
ББК 81.2 Англ-93

© КАРО, 2016

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Chapter 1

Chirp the First

The kettle began it! Don’t tell me what Mrs. 
Peerybingle said. I know better. Mrs. Peerybingle 
may leave it on record to the end of time that she 
couldn’t say which of them began it; but, I say the 
kettle did. I ought to know, I hope! Th e kettle began 
it, full fi ve minutes by the little waxy-faced Dutch 
clock in the corner, before the Cricket uttered 
a chirp.
As if the clock hadn’t finished striking, and 
the con vulsive little Haymaker at the top of it, jerking away right and left  with a scythe in front of a 
Moorish Palace, hadn’t mowed down half an acre of 
imaginary grass before the Cricket joined in at all!
Why, I am not naturally positive. Every one 
knows that. I wouldn’t set my own opinion against 
the opinion of Mrs. Peerybingle, unless I were 
quite sure, on any account whatever. Nothing 
should induce me. But, this is a question of fact. 
And the fact is, that the kettle began it, at least fi ve 

minutes before the Cricket gave any sign of being in 
existence. Contradict me, and I’ll say ten.
Let me narrate exactly how it happened. I should 
have proceeded to do so in my very fi rst word, but 
for this plain consideration — if I am to tell a story 
I must begin at the beginning; and how is it possible 
to begin at the beginning, without beginning at the 
kettle?
It appeared as if there were a sort of match, or 
trial of skill, you must understand, between the 
kettle and the Cricket. And this is what led to it, and 
how it came about.
Mrs. Peerybingle, going out into the raw twilight, 
and clicking over the wet stones in a pair of pattens 
that worked innumerable rough impressions of 
the fi rst proposition in Euclid all about the yard — 
Mrs. Peerybingle fi lled the kettle at the water-butt. 
Presently returning, less the pattens (and a good 
deal less, for they were tall and Mrs. Peerybingle 
was but short), she set the kettle on the fi re. In 
doing which she lost her temper1, or mislaid it 
for an instant; for, the water being uncomfortably 
cold, and in that slippy, slushy, sleety sort of state 
wherein it seems to penetrate through every kind of 
substance, patten rings included — had laid hold of 

1 lost her temper — (разг.) разозлилась

Mrs. Peerybingle’s toes, and even splashed her legs. 
And when we rather plume ourselves (with reason 
too) upon our legs, and keep ourselves particularly neat in point of stockings, we fi nd this, for the 
moment, hard to bear.
Besides, the kettle was aggravating and obstinate. 
It wouldn’t allow itself to be adjusted on the top bar; 
it wouldn’t hear of accommodating itself kindly 
to the knobs of coal; it would lean forward with a 
drunken air, and dribble, a very idiot of a kettle, 
on the hearth. It was quarrelsome, and hissed and 
spluttered morosely at the fi re. To sum up all, the 
lid, resisting Mrs. Peerybingle’s fi ngers, fi rst of all 
turned topsy-turvy, and then, with an ingenious 
pertinacity deserving of a better cause, dived sideways in — down to the very bottom of the kettle. 
And the hull of the Royal George has never made 
half the monstrous resistance to coming out of the 
water, which the lid of that kettle employed against 
Mrs. Peerybingle, before she got it up again.
It looked sullen and pig-headed enough, even 
then; carrying its handle with an air of defi ance, 
and cocking its spout pertly and mockingly at Mrs. 
Peerybingle, as if it said, ‘I won’t boil. Nothing shall 
induce me!’
But Mrs. Peerybingle, with restored good humour, 
dusted her chubby little hands against each other, 

and sat down before the kettle, laughing. Meantime, 
the jolly blaze uprose and fell, fl ashing and gleaming 
on the little Haymaker at the top of the Dutch clock, 
until one might have thought he stood stock still 
before the Moorish Palace, and nothing was in 
motion but the fl ame.
He was on the move, however; and had his 
spasms, two to the second, all right and regular. But, 
his suff erings when the clock was going to strike, 
were frightful to behold; and, when a Cuckoo looked 
out of a trap-door in the Palace, and gave note six 
times, it shook him, each time, like a spectral voice — 
or like a something wiry, plucking at his legs.
It was not until a violent commotion and a whirring noise among the weights and ropes below him 
had quite subsided, that this terrifi ed Haymaker 
became himself again. Nor was he startled without 
reason; for these rattling, bony skeletons of clocks 
are very disconcerting in their operation, and I 
wonder very much how any set of men, but most of 
all how Dutchmen, can have had a liking to invent 
them. Th ere is a popular belief that Dutchmen love 
broad cases and much clothing for their own lower 
selves; and they might know better than to leave 
their clocks so very lank and unprotected, surely.
Now it was, you observe, that the kettle began 
to spend the evening. Now it was, that the kettle, 

growing mellow and musical, began to have 
irrepressible gurglings in its throat, and to indulge 
in short vocal snorts, which it checked in the bud, 
as if it hadn’t quite made up its mind yet, to be good 
company. Now it was, that aft er two or three such 
vain attempts to stifl e its convivial sentiments, it 
threw off  all moroseness, all reserve, and burst into 
a stream of song so cosy and hilarious, as never 
maudlin nightingale yet formed the least idea of.
So plain too! Bless you, you might have understood it like a book — better than some books 
you and I could name, perhaps. With its warm 
breath gushing forth in a light cloud which merrily 
and gracefully ascended a few feet, then hung 
about the chimney-corner as its own domestic 
Heaven, it trolled its song with that strong energy 
of cheerfulness, that its iron body hummed and 
stirred upon the fi re; and the lid itself, the recently 
rebellious lid — such is the infl uence of a bright 
example — performed a sort of jig, and clattered 
like a deaf and dumb young cymbal that had never 
known the use of its twin brother.
That this song of the kettle’s was a song of 
invitation and welcome to somebody out of doors: 
to somebody at that moment coming on, towards 
the snug small home and the crisp fi re: there is no 
doubt whatever. Mrs. Peerybingle knew it, perfectly, 

as she sat musing before the hearth. It’s a dark night, 
sang the kettle, and the rotten leaves are lying by 
the way; and, above, all is mist and darkness, and, 
below, all is mire and clay; and there’s only one relief 
in all the sad and murky air; and I don’t know that 
it is one, for it’s nothing but a glare; of deep and 
angry crimson, where the sun and wind together; 
set a brand upon the clouds for being guilty of such 
weather; and the widest open country is a long dull 
streak of black; and there’s hoar-frost on the fi ngerpost, and thaw upon the track; and the ice it isn’t 
water, and the water isn’t free; and you couldn’t say 
that anything is what it ought to be; but he’s coming, 
coming, coming! — 
And here, if you like, the Cricket did chime in1! 
with a Chirrup, Chirrup, Chirrup of such magnitude, 
by way of chorus; with a voice so astoundingly 
disproportionate to its size, as compared with the 
kettle; (size! you couldn’t see it!) that if it had then 
and there burst itself like an overcharged gun, if it 
had fallen a victim on the spot, and chirruped its 
little body into fi ft y pieces, it would have seemed 
a natural and inevitable consequence, for which it 
had expressly laboured.
Th e kettle had had the last of its solo performance. 
It persevered with undiminished ardour; but the 

1 did chime in — (разг.) подал голос; вступил в разговор

Cricket took fi rst fi ddle and kept it. Good Heaven, 
how it chirped! Its shrill, sharp, piercing voice 
resounded through the house, and seemed to 
twinkle in the outer darkness like a star. Th ere was 
an indescribable little trill and tremble in it, at its 
loudest, which suggested its being carried off  its 
legs, and made to leap again, by its own intense 
enthusiasm. Yet they went very well together, the 
Cricket and the kettle. Th e burden of the song was 
still the same; and louder, louder, louder still, they 
sang it in their emulation.
Th e fair little listener — for fair she was, and young: 
though something of what is called the dumpling 
shape; but I don’t myself object to that — lighted a 
candle, glanced at the Haymaker on the top of the 
clock, who was getting in a pretty average crop of 
minutes; and looked out of the window, where she 
saw nothing, owing to the darkness, but her own 
face imaged in the glass. And my opinion is (and so 
would yours have been), that she might have looked 
a long way, and seen nothing half so agreeable. When 
she came back, and sat down in her former seat, the 
Cricket and the kettle were still keeping it up1, with 
a perfect fury of competition. Th e kettle’s weak side 
clearly being, that he didn’t know when he was beat.

1 were still keeping it up — (разг.) не останавливались; 
продолжали

Th ere was all the excitement of a race about it. 
Chirp, chirp, chirp! Cricket a mile ahead. Hum, 
hum, hum-m-m! Kettle making play in the distance, 
like a great top. Chirp, chirp, chirp! Cricket round 
the corner. Hum, hum, hum-m-m! Kettle sticking 
to him in his own way; no idea of giving in. Chirp, 
chirp, chirp! Cricket fresher than ever. Hum, 
hum, hum-m-m! Kettle slow and steady. Chirp, 
chirp, chirp! Cricket going in to fi nish him. Hum, 
hum, hum-m-m! Kettle not to be fi nished. Until 
at last they got so jumbled together, in the hurryskurry, helter-skelter, of the match, that whether 
the kettle chirped and the Cricket hummed, or the 
Cricket chirped and the kettle hummed, or they 
both chirped and both hummed, it would have 
taken a clearer head than yours or mine to have 
decided with anything like certainty. But, of this, 
there is no doubt: that, the kettle and the Cricket, 
at one and the same moment1, and by some power 
of amalgamation best known to themselves, sent, 
each, his fi reside song of comfort streaming into 
a ray of the candle that shone out through the 
window, and a long way down the lane. And this 
light, bursting on a certain person who, on the 
instant, approached towards it through the gloom, 

1 at one and the same moment — (уст.) одновременно