{"id":"01KG6GMNZSKZFNWKF5NAWSPW8T","cid":"bafkreih2apeggz6usgefhuncn56izqgy3ng3gtacfunl4gjwzcxq7qgbhe","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":3698,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:55:03.879Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","start_line":3653,"text":"and though it were adamant they would wear it. In his retirement the\r\nsuperannuated giant begins to mellow down into a sort of animal decay.\r\nIn hard, rude natures, especially such as have passed their lives among\r\nthe elements, farmers or sailors, this animal decay mostly affects the\r\nmemory by casting a haze over it; not seldom, it softens the heart as\r\nwell, besides more or less, perhaps, drowsing the conscience, innocent\r\nor otherwise.\r\n\r\nBut let us come to the close of a sketch necessarily imperfect. One fine\r\nEaster Day, following a spell of rheumatic weather, Orme was discovered\r\nalone and dead on a height overlooking the seaward sweep of the great\r\nhaven to whose shore, in his retirement from sea, he had moored. It was\r\nan evened terrace, destined for use in war, but in peace neglected and\r\noffering a sanctuary for anybody. Mounted on it was an obsolete battery\r\nof rusty guns. Against one of these he was found leaning, his legs\r\nstretched out before him; his clay pipe broken in twain, the vacant bowl\r\nand no spillings from it, attesting that his pipe had been smoked out to\r\nthe last of its contents. He faced the outlet to the ocean. The eyes\r\nwere open, still continuing in death the vital glance fixed on the hazy\r\nwaters and the dim-seen sails coming and going or at anchor near by.\r\nWhat had been his last thoughts? If aught of reality lurked in the\r\nrumours concerning him, had remorse, had penitence any place in those\r\nthoughts? Or was there just nothing of either? After all, were his\r\nmoodiness and mutterings, his strange freaks, starts, eccentric shrugs\r\nand grimaces, were these but the grotesque additions like the wens and\r\nknobs and distortions of the trunk of an old chance apple-tree in an\r\ninclement upland, not only beaten by many storms, but also obstructed in\r\nits natural development by the chance of its having first sprouted among\r\nhard-packed rock? In short, that fatality, no more encrusting him, made\r\nhim what he came to be? Even admitting that there was something dark\r\nthat he chose to keep to himself, what then? Such reticence may\r\nsometimes be more for the sake of others than one’s self. No, let us\r\nbelieve that that animal decay before mentioned still befriended him to\r\nthe close, and that he fell asleep recalling through the haze of memory\r\nmany a far-off scene of the wide world’s beauty dreamily suggested by\r\nthe hazy waters before him.\r\n\r\nHe lies buried among other sailors, for whom also strangers performed\r\none last rite in a lonely plot overgrown with wild eglantine uncared for\r\nby man.\r\n\r\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6GKXWEWYVEB39CKDVT9V08","peer_type":"section","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG2T49K0H5GDRB0G4YDTPG8H","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6GMNZQHGHA01XCNMB8J4PS","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:55:07.641Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:55:15.804Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}