{"id":"01KG6G85HDB492E00DFC43GFSN","cid":"bafkreidy23e2e6liqxugrfd2j4rzrw5vhqqzc3ylhopsft6z4tignztmdm","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":1579,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:16.150Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 6","source_file":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","start_line":1542,"text":"reports, more especially as to the epithets, for he well knew how\r\nsecretly unpopular may become a master-at-arms--at least, a\r\nmaster-at-arms in those days, zealous in his function--and how the\r\nblue-jackets shoot at him in private their raillery and wit; the\r\nnickname by which he goes among them (_Jemmy Legs_) implying under the\r\nform of merriment their cherished disrespect and dislike.\r\n\r\nIn view of the greediness of hate for provocation, it hardly needed a\r\npurveyor to feed Claggart’s passion. An uncommon prudence is habitual\r\nwith the subtler depravity, for it has everything to hide. And in case\r\nof any merely suspected injury, its secretiveness voluntarily cuts it\r\noff from enlightenment or disillusion; and not unreluctantly, action is\r\ntaken upon surmise as upon certainty. And the retaliation is apt to be\r\nin monstrous disproportion to the supposed offence; for when in anybody\r\nwas revenge in its exactions aught else but an inordinate usurer. But\r\nhow with Claggart’s conscience? For though consciences are unlike as\r\nforeheads, every intelligence, not excluding the Scriptural devils who\r\n‘believe and tremble,’ has one. But Claggart’s conscience being but the\r\nlawyer to his will, made ogres of trifles, probably arguing that the\r\nmotive imputed to Billy in spilling the soup just when he did, together\r\nwith the epithets alleged, these, if nothing more, made a strong case\r\nagainst him; nay, justified animosity into a sort of retributive\r\nrighteousness. The Pharisee is the Guy Fawkes prowling in the hid\r\nchambers underlying some natures like Claggart’s. And they can really\r\nform no conception of an unreciprocated malice. Probably, the\r\nmaster-at-arms’ clandestine persecution of Billy was started to try the\r\ntemper of the man; but it had not developed any quality in him that\r\nenmity could make official use of, or ever pervert into even plausible\r\nself-justification; so that the occurrence at the mess, petty if it\r\nwere, was a welcome one to that peculiar conscience assigned to be the\r\nprivate mentor of Claggart; and for the rest, not improbably, it put him\r\nupon new experiments.\r\n\r\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 6"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6G6NZQDT19J9MSHXZPHRXV","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG2T49K0H5GDRB0G4YDTPG8H","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6G85HB4SDF0AWH03DVG867","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:17.581Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:48:24.517Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}