{"id":"01KG6GMQ4TMGGDCKBT6J4215WD","cid":"bafkreicbfmaza5gvxefgbuun4bnd75j4t7flegcblr7sjh33hrrwf5uyni","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":9185,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:55:03.883Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 7","source_file":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","start_line":9134,"text":"them comfortable, but also to keep off wolves and other savage monsters,\r\nso my chimney, by its obvious smoke at top, keeps off prowling burglars\r\nfrom the towns--for what burglar or murderer would dare break into an\r\nabode from whose chimney issues such a continual smoke--betokening that\r\nif the inmates are not stirring, at least fires are, and in case of an\r\nalarm, candles may readily be lighted, to say nothing of muskets.\r\n\r\nBut stately as is the chimney--yea, grand high altar as it is, right\r\nworthy for the celebration of High Mass before the Pope of Rome and all\r\nhis cardinals--yet what is there perfect in this world? Caius Julius\r\nCæsar, had he not been so inordinately great, they say that Brutus,\r\nCassius, Antony, and the rest, had been greater. My chimney, were it not\r\nso mighty in its magnitude, my chambers had been larger. How often has\r\nmy wife ruefully told me that my chimney, like the English aristocracy,\r\ncasts a contracting shade all round it. She avers that endless domestic\r\ninconveniences arise--more particularly from the chimney’s stubborn\r\ncentral locality. The grand objection with her is, that it stands midway\r\nin the place where a fine entrance-hall ought to be. In truth, there is\r\nno hall whatever to the house--nothing but a sort of square\r\nlanding-place, as you enter from the wide front door. A roomy enough\r\nlanding-place, I admit, but not attaining to the dignity of a hall. Now,\r\nas the front door is precisely in the middle of the front of the house,\r\ninwards it faces the chimney. In fact, the opposite wall of the\r\nlanding-place is formed solely by the chimney; and hence--owing to the\r\ngradual tapering of the chimney--is a little less than twelve feet in\r\nwidth. Climbing the chimney in this part, is the principal\r\nstaircase--which, by three abrupt turns, and three minor landing-places,\r\nmounts to the second floor, where, over the front door, runs a sort of\r\nnarrow gallery, something less than twelve feet long, leading to\r\nchambers on either hand. This gallery, of course, is railed; and so,\r\nlooking down upon the stairs, and all those landing-places together,\r\nwith the main one at bottom, resembles not a little a balcony for\r\nmusicians, in some jolly old abode, in times Elizabethan. Shall I tell a\r\nweakness? I cherish the cobwebs there, and many a time arrest Biddy in\r\nthe act of brushing them with her broom, and have many a quarrel with my\r\nwife and daughters about it.\r\n\r\nNow the ceiling, so to speak, of the place where you enter the house,\r\nthat ceiling is, in fact, the ceiling of the second floor, not the\r\nfirst. The two floors are made one here; so that ascending this turning\r\nstairs, you seem going up into a kind of soaring tower, or lighthouse.\r\nAt the second landing, midway up the chimney, is a mysterious door,\r\nentering to a mysterious closet; and here I keep mysterious cordials, of\r\na choice, mysterious flavour, made so by the constant nurturing and\r\nsubtle ripening of the chimney’s gentle heat, distilled through that\r\nwarm mass of masonry. Better for wines is it than voyages to the Indies;\r\nmy chimney itself a tropic. A chair by my chimney in a November day is\r\nas good for an invalid as a long season spent in Cuba. Often I think how\r\ngrapes might ripen against my chimney. How my wife’s geraniums bud\r\nthere! Bud in December. Her eggs, too--can’t keep them near the chimney,\r\non account of hatching. Ah, a warm heart has my chimney.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 7"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6GKZ3MPDDZB30GXGTJ7ATV","peer_type":"section","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG2T49K0H5GDRB0G4YDTPG8H","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6GMQ4WD8Q0HMB1ARHCNAZN","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6GMQ4W9SJDRCFWJ5RZ1J17","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:55:08.826Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:55:20.011Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}