{"id":"01KG6G84X0CYKMGP14VBNXWRTY","cid":"bafkreibii7xtgwtqono7jwlv6ammrdeuss7coxnmw5dxy52q6jbrpn56f4","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":6897,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:16.153Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 4","source_file":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","start_line":6801,"text":"\r\nHe bowed over his venerable head, and--as I live--something like a\r\nshower-drop somehow fell from my face into the shallows.\r\n\r\n‘Tip!’\r\n\r\nWe tipped.\r\n\r\n‘A little more!’\r\n\r\nWe tipped a little more.\r\n\r\n‘A _leetle_ more!’\r\n\r\nWe tipped a _leetle_ more.\r\n\r\n‘Just a _leetle_, very _leetle_ bit more.’\r\n\r\nWith great difficulty we tipped just a _leetle_, very _leetle_ more.\r\n\r\nAll this time my uncle was diligently stooping over, and striving to\r\npeep in, up, and under the box where the coiled anacondas and adders\r\nlay; but the machine being now fairly immersed, the attempt was wholly\r\nvain.\r\n\r\nHe rose erect, and waded slowly all round the box; his countenance firm\r\nand reliant, but not a little troubled and vexed.\r\n\r\nIt was plain something or other was going wrong. But as I was left in\r\nutter ignorance as to the mystery of the contrivance, I could not tell\r\nwhere the difficulty lay, or what was the proper remedy.\r\n\r\nOnce more, still more slowly, still more vexedly, my uncle waded round\r\nthe box, the dissatisfaction gradually deepening, but still controlled,\r\nand still with hope at the bottom of it.\r\n\r\nNothing could be more sure than that some anticipated effect had, as\r\nyet, failed to develop itself. Certain I was, too, that the water-line\r\ndid not lower about my legs.\r\n\r\n‘Tip it a _leetle_ bit--very _leetle_ now.’\r\n\r\n‘Dear uncle, it is tipped already as far as it can be. Don’t you see it\r\nrests now square on its bottom?’\r\n\r\n‘You, Yorpy, take your black hoof from under the box!’\r\n\r\nThis gust of passion on the part of my uncle made the matter seem still\r\nmore dubious and dark. It was a bad symptom, I thought.\r\n\r\n‘Surely you _can_ tip it just a _leetle_ more!’\r\n\r\n‘Not a hair, uncle.’\r\n\r\n‘Blast and blister the cursed box, then!’ roared my uncle, in a terrific\r\nvoice, sudden as a squall. Running at the box he dashed his bare foot\r\ninto it, and with astonishing power all but crushed in the side. Then\r\nseizing the whole box, he disembowelled it of all its anacondas and\r\nadders, and, tearing and wrenching them, flung them right and left over\r\nthe water.\r\n\r\n‘Hold, hold, my dear, dear uncle!--do for Heaven’s sake desist. Don’t\r\ndestroy so, in one frantic moment, all your long, calm years of devotion\r\nto one darling scheme. Hold, I conjure!’\r\n\r\nMoved by my vehement voice and uncontrollable tears, he paused in his\r\nwork of destruction, and stood steadfastly eyeing me, or rather blankly\r\nstaring at me, like one demented.\r\n\r\n‘It is not yet wholly ruined, dear uncle; come put it together now. You\r\nhave hammer and wrench; put it together again, and try it once more.\r\nWhile there is life there is hope.’\r\n\r\n‘While there is life hereafter there is _despair_,’ he howled.\r\n\r\n‘Do, do now, dear uncle--here, here, put these pieces together; or, if\r\nthat can’t be done without more tools, try a _section_ of it--that will\r\ndo just as well. Try it once; try, uncle.’\r\n\r\nMy persistent persuasiveness told upon him. The stubborn stump of hope,\r\nploughed at and uprooted in vain, put forth one last miraculous green\r\nsprout.\r\n\r\nSteadily and carefully culling out of the wreck some of the more\r\ncurious-looking fragments, he mysteriously involved them together, and\r\nthen, clearing out the box, slowly inserted them there, and ranging\r\nYorpy and me as before, bade us tip the box once again.\r\n\r\nWe did so; and as no perceptible effect yet followed, I was each moment\r\nlooking for the previous command to tip the box over yet more, when,\r\nglancing into my uncle’s face, I started aghast. It seemed pinched,\r\nshrivelled into mouldy whiteness, like a mildewed grape. I dropped the\r\nbox, and sprang toward him just in time to prevent his fall.\r\n\r\nLeaving the woeful box where we had dropped it, Yorpy and I helped the\r\nold man into the skiff, and silently pulled from Quash Isle.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 4"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6G6Q62R4C7A5SAZF9TP92K","peer_type":"article","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG2T49K0H5GDRB0G4YDTPG8H","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6G84WXAA9GNFHV4K5FFWVP","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6G84X0A9RB2Z80YTZQ7F07","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:16.928Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:48:28.439Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}