{"id":"01KG6G87AZ570VZJBQXH4S02RH","cid":"bafkreichofpqmlfthbup6eemgbqo4f4jhlnjywttnnsxblfg3ymwase2ga","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":3316,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:16.150Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","start_line":3274,"text":"for a moment. For suddenly the drum beat to quarters, which familiar\r\nsound happening at least twice every day, had upon the present occasion\r\na signal peremptoriness in it. True martial discipline long continued\r\nsuperinduces in average man a sort of impulse of docility whose\r\noperation at the official tone of command much resembles in its\r\npromptitude the effect of an instinct.\r\n\r\nThe drum-beat dissolved the multitude, distributing most of them along\r\nthe batteries of the two covered gun-decks. There, as wont, the gun\r\ncrews stood by their respective cannon erect and silent. In due course\r\nthe first officer, sword under arm and standing in his place on the\r\nquarter-deck, formally received the successive reports of the sworded\r\nlieutenants commanding the sections of batteries below; the last of\r\nwhich reports being made, the summed report he delivered with the\r\ncustomary salute to the commander. All this occupied time, which in the\r\npresent case was the object of beating to quarters at an hour prior to\r\nthe customary one. That such variance from usage was authorised by an\r\nofficer like Captain Vere, a martinet as some deemed him, was evidence\r\nof the necessity for unusual action implied in what he deemed to be\r\ntemporarily the mood of his men. ‘With mankind,’ he would say, ‘forms,\r\nmeasured forms, are everything; and that is the import couched in the\r\nstory of Orpheus with his lyre spell-binding the wild denizens of the\r\nwoods.’ And this he once applied to the disruption of forms going on\r\nacross the Channel and the consequences thereof.\r\n\r\nAt this unwonted muster at quarters all proceeded as at the regular\r\nhour. The band on the quarter-deck played a sacred air. After which the\r\nchaplain went through the customary morning service. That done, the drum\r\nbeat the retreat, and toned by music and religious rites subserving the\r\ndiscipline and purpose of war, the men in their wonted orderly manner\r\ndispersed to the places allotted them when not at the guns.\r\n\r\nAnd now it was full day. The fleece of low-hanging vapour had vanished,\r\nlicked up by the sun that late had so glorified it. And the\r\ncircumambient air in the clearness of its serenity was like smooth white\r\nmarble in the polished block not yet removed from the marble-dealer’s\r\nyard.\r\n\r\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6G6PJVGBDR6SENVTHTSP83","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG2T49K0H5GDRB0G4YDTPG8H","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6G87AVQWXA2DKPTCHRBGJF","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:19.423Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:48:25.981Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}