{"id":"01KG6G8ADR8RFAS6KGT2VRAAGM","cid":"bafkreihspm2xbae2ndnz4oqq65idesnnp5ftkortfloikezm7fsm7kley4","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":11692,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:16.153Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","start_line":11642,"text":"clock, spruced up in thy goodly person and decked at lapel with the\r\ngolden eagle suspended by the white-bordered blue ribbon, an order which\r\nWashington and Lafayette and thy grandfather and father wore before\r\nthee, thou takest thy customary place at the club’s bay-window. There\r\nthou comfortably settlest thyself till lunch-time, discoursing at whiles\r\nwith whomsoever may, fortunately for himself, happen to be at hand.\r\n\r\nNow thy Fourth-of-July outgivings, though indeed yearly varying in\r\nexpression, yet in spirit are much the same. Dost thou remember all that\r\nthou saidest on the last Fourth, Major? Hardly. But I do; and will try\r\nto refresh thy memory by reproducing it, with some accompanying\r\ncircumstances, and as if all were of to-day.\r\n\r\nAfter gazing out of the open window for a time, noting the strange\r\nSabbatarian quiet of the Avenue, on other week-days so abounding with\r\ndiversified life, thou mutterest to thyself a strange litany of\r\nlamentations touching the general falling-off in the old-time\r\ncelebration. ‘Well, well,’ thou mutterest, ‘it is getting along now in\r\nits second century, this anniversary, and nearly everything falls off\r\nwith years. In Victoria’s reign is Guy Fawkes’ Day what it was in\r\nElizabeth’s? I trow not. _Sic transit, Sic transit!_’\r\n\r\nHere some swift return of thought to its everyday channel causes thee\r\nsuddenly to wheel in thy revolving chair and face inward. Thou remarkest\r\nthe vacant lounges and sofas, thou absorbest the drear silence. Is it\r\nthe tabernacle on a week-day? Evidently, thou bethinkest thee of the\r\nmany absentees. Anon, with thy ample white handkerchief mopping the\r\nbeads from thy brow, thou exclaimest, ‘Shame upon them! Why, even the\r\nthermometer, though a creature metallic, is more sensitive than these\r\nrenegades to the momentous occasion. Sure, the mercury rises to it! But\r\nthey--they run from it. Now degenerate, not only from their sires, but\r\ntheir own boyhood. Ah, my good sir,’ giving another impulsive turn to\r\nthe revolving chair so as directly to face the one person present, a\r\nsomewhat reserved gentleman of mature years engaged in methodically\r\nrefolding a letter just perused, ‘Ah, my good sir, it is your boy who is\r\nyour true patriot. _He_ made on the _Third_ for Long Branch or\r\nelsewhere? Nay, sir, on the Third, if not before, he lays in his\r\nammunition, his powder-crackers; at early dawn on the blessed Fourth he\r\ncrams his breeches-pockets with them, and though in his heedless\r\nenthusiasm, mixing them up there with his matches, they get ignited and\r\nsuddenly begin going off like minute-guns hurried up, making him a\r\nspluttering blunderbuss to himself and the crowd, what recks he if but\r\nluckily he come out of it unharmed? Another boy, a yet more devoted\r\nyoung acolyte of the Salii, should repeated discharges at last burst his\r\ntoy-cannon, and he go to Hades for it, what then? _Ducit amor patriae!_\r\nThat’s the inscription, sir, on General Worth’s monument you and I pass\r\nevery day. Ten to one you never noticed it--the inscription, I mean. Ah,\r\nbut he was a paladin, a homespun paladin, General Worth. And happy in\r\nhis surname, though indeed his _worth_ was of another sort than that of\r\nthe purse.’\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6G6RG13WHMX37KHEWTF2ZK","peer_type":"frontmatter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG2T49K0H5GDRB0G4YDTPG8H","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6G8ADRSQPAXFNHGV6QFWRK","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6G849ZW0F9127NNXVKSKY1","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:22.584Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:48:32.634Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}