{"id":"01KG2TSH38WJQPF0MNKBK75JMB","cid":"bafkreigbzge3jv3zucp67wegz6m5q57jpehed45g7n4nkgvid6y3ridcyq","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":5613,"extracted_at":"2026-01-28T17:35:34.215Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG2T4RHC4E1XKJ12BJRXE8E8","start_line":5550,"text":"gestures which a machine might have used—supposing the machine to be a\r\ntrifle out of order. But he got through safely, though cruelly scared,\r\nand got a fine round of applause when he made his manufactured bow and\r\nretired.\r\n\r\nA little shamefaced girl lisped, “Mary had a little lamb,” etc.,\r\nperformed a compassion-inspiring curtsy, got her meed of applause, and\r\nsat down flushed and happy.\r\n\r\nTom Sawyer stepped forward with conceited confidence and soared into\r\nthe unquenchable and indestructible “Give me liberty or give me death”\r\n speech, with fine fury and frantic gesticulation, and broke down in the\r\nmiddle of it. A ghastly stage-fright seized him, his legs quaked under\r\nhim and he was like to choke. True, he had the manifest sympathy of the\r\nhouse but he had the house’s silence, too, which was even worse than\r\nits sympathy. The master frowned, and this completed the disaster. Tom\r\nstruggled awhile and then retired, utterly defeated. There was a weak\r\nattempt at applause, but it died early.\r\n\r\n“The Boy Stood on the Burning Deck” followed; also “The Assyrian Came\r\nDown,” and other declamatory gems. Then there were reading exercises,\r\nand a spelling fight. The meagre Latin class recited with honor. The\r\nprime feature of the evening was in order, now—original “compositions”\r\nby the young ladies. Each in her turn stepped forward to the edge of the\r\nplatform, cleared her throat, held up her manuscript (tied with dainty\r\nribbon), and proceeded to read, with labored attention to “expression”\r\nand punctuation. The themes were the same that had been illuminated upon\r\nsimilar occasions by their mothers before them, their grandmothers, and\r\ndoubtless all their ancestors in the female line clear back to the\r\nCrusades. “Friendship” was one; “Memories of Other Days”; “Religion in\r\nHistory”; “Dream Land”; “The Advantages of Culture”; “Forms of Political\r\nGovernment Compared and Contrasted”; “Melancholy”; “Filial Love”; “Heart\r\nLongings,” etc., etc.\r\n\r\nA prevalent feature in these compositions was a nursed and petted\r\nmelancholy; another was a wasteful and opulent gush of “fine language”;\r\nanother was a tendency to lug in by the ears particularly prized words\r\nand phrases until they were worn entirely out; and a peculiarity that\r\nconspicuously marked and marred them was the inveterate and intolerable\r\nsermon that wagged its crippled tail at the end of each and every one of\r\nthem. No matter what the subject might be, a brainracking effort was\r\nmade to squirm it into some aspect or other that the moral and religious\r\nmind could contemplate with edification. The glaring insincerity of\r\nthese sermons was not sufficient to compass the banishment of the\r\nfashion from the schools, and it is not sufficient today; it never will\r\nbe sufficient while the world stands, perhaps. There is no school in all\r\nour land where the young ladies do not feel obliged to close their\r\ncompositions with a sermon; and you will find that the sermon of the\r\nmost frivolous and the least religious girl in the school is always the\r\nlongest and the most relentlessly pious. But enough of this. Homely\r\ntruth is unpalatable.\r\n\r\nLet us return to the “Examination.” The first composition that was read\r\nwas one entitled “Is this, then, Life?” Perhaps the reader can endure an\r\nextract from it:\r\n\r\n“In the common walks of life, with what delightful emotions does the\r\nyouthful mind look forward to some anticipated scene of festivity!\r\nImagination is busy sketching rose-tinted pictures of joy. In fancy, the\r\nvoluptuous votary of fashion sees herself amid the festive throng, ‘the\r\nobserved of all observers.’ Her graceful form, arrayed in snowy robes,\r\nis whirling through the mazes of the joyous dance; her eye is brightest,\r\nher step is lightest in the gay assembly.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG2TRBHWJHR8JAS9YZ8PHRN2","peer_label":"CHAPTER XXI","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG2T4RHC4E1XKJ12BJRXE8E8","peer_label":"tom_sawyer.txt","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG2T49K0H5GDRB0G4YDTPG8H","peer_label":"Test Collection","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG2TSH24H4WSZQNEFPGRS90P","peer_label":"Chunk 1","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG2TSH280PMWRY6TJ6V3PBB7","peer_label":"Chunk 3","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-28T17:35:34.686Z","ts":"2026-01-28T17:35:35.575Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}