Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. Shows that Scrooge was a mean and unkind man. The list of verbs shows that people had many reasons to dislike him and the use of tight-fisted hand at the grindstone implies that he grinds down his employees and customers while making money for himself.