Louis XIV.) CRATCHIT (_Bob_ or _Robert_), clerk of Ebenezer Scrooge,
stock-broker. Though Bob Cratchit has to maintain nine persons on 15s.
a week, he has a happier home and spends a merrier Christmas than his
master with all his wealth and selfishness.

_Tiny Tim Cratchit_, the little lame son of Bob Cratchit, the Benjamin
of the family, the most helpless and most beloved of all. Tim does not
die, but Ebenezer Scrooge, after his change of character, makes him
his special care.--C. Dickens, _A Christmas Carol_ (in five staves,
1843).

CRAW'FORD (_Lindsay, earl of_), the young earl-marshal of
Scotland.--Sir W. Scott, _Fair Maid of Perth_ (time, Henry IV.).

_Craw'ford (Lord)_, captain of the Scottish guard at Plessis les
Tours, in the pay of Louis XI.--Sir W. Scott, _Quentin Durward_ (time,
Edward IV.).

CRAWLEY (_Sir Pitt_), of Great Gaunt Street, and of Queen's Crawley,
Hants. A sharp, miserly, litigious, vulgar, ignorant baronet, very
rich, desperately mean, "a philosopher with a taste for low life," and
intoxicated every night. Becky Sharp was engaged by him to teach his
two daughters. On the death of his second wife, Sir Pitt asked her to
become lady Crawley, but Becky had already married his son, Captain
Rawdon Crawley. This "aristocrat" spoke of "brass fardens," and was
unable to spell the simplest words, as the following specimen will
show:--"Sir Pitt Crawley begs Miss Sharp and baggidge may be hear on
Tuseday, as I leaf ... to-morrow erly." The whole baronetage, peerage,
and commonage of England did not contain a more cunning, mean,
foolish, disreputable old rogue than Sir Pitt Crawley. He died at the
age of fourscore, "lamented and beloved, regretted and honored," if we
can believe his monumental tablet.

_Lady Crawley_. Sir Pitt's first wife was "a confounded quarrelsome,
high-bred jade." So he chose for his second wife the daughter of Mr.
Dawson, iron-monger, of Mudbury, who gave up her sweetheart, Peter
Butt, for the gilded vanity of Crawleyism. This ironmonger's daughter
had "pink cheeks and a white skin, but no distinctive character, no
opinions, no occupation, no amusements, no vigor of mind, no temper;
she was a mere female machine." Being a "blonde, she wore draggled
sea-green or slatternly sky-blue dresses," went about slip-shod and in
curl-papers all day till dinner-time. She died and left Sir Pitt for
the second time a widower, "to-morrow to fresh woods and pastures
new."

_Mr. Pitt Crawley