{"id":"01KG6GMQ4W5T4WER6GVDM8GNF7","cid":"bafkreiatkgkrhbpi76ulcbnogoutgtlup2bitepd4p52xbjw5jfyyfyac4","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":9036,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:55:03.883Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 4","source_file":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","start_line":8973,"text":"chiefly for its three great lions--the Great Oak, Ogg Mountain, and my\r\nchimney.\r\n\r\nMost houses here are but one and a half stories high; few exceed two.\r\nThat in which I and my chimney dwell, is in width nearly twice its\r\nheight, from sill to eaves--which accounts for the magnitude of its main\r\ncontent--besides showing that in this house, as in this country at\r\nlarge, there is abundance of space, and to spare, for both of us.\r\n\r\nThe frame of the old house is of wood--which but the more sets forth the\r\nsolidity of the chimney, which is of brick. And as the great wrought\r\nnails, binding the clap-boards, are unknown in these degenerate days, so\r\nare the huge bricks in the chimney walls. The architect of the chimney\r\nmust have had the pyramid of Cheops before him; for after that famous\r\nstructure it seems modelled, only its rate of decrease toward the summit\r\nis considerably less, and it is truncated. From the exact middle of the\r\nmansion it soars from the cellar, right up through each successive\r\nfloor, till, four feet square, it breaks water from the ridge-pole of\r\nthe roof, like an anvil-headed whale through the crest of a billow. Most\r\npeople, though, liken it, in that part, to a razeed observatory, masoned\r\nup.\r\n\r\nThe reason for its peculiar appearance above the roof touches upon\r\nrather delicate ground. How shall I reveal that, forasmuch as many years\r\nago the original gable roof of the old house had become very leaky, a\r\ntemporary proprietor hired a band of woodmen, with their huge, cross-cut\r\nsaws, and went to sawing the old gable roof clean off. Off it went, with\r\nall its birds’ nests and dormer windows. It was replaced with a modern\r\nroof, more fit for a railway wood-house than an old country gentleman’s\r\nabode. This operation--razeeing the structure some fifteen feet--was, in\r\neffect upon the chimney, something like the falling of the great spring\r\ntides. It left uncommon low water all about the chimney--to abate which\r\nappearance, the same person now proceeds to slice fifteen feet off the\r\nchimney itself, actually beheading my royal old chimney--a regicidal\r\nact, which, were it not for the palliating fact that he was a poulterer\r\nby trade, and, therefore, hardened to such neck-wringings, should send\r\nthat former proprietor down to posterity in the same cart with Cromwell.\r\n\r\nOwing to its pyramidal shape, the reduction of the chimney inordinately\r\nwidened its razeed summit. Inordinately, I say, but only in the\r\nestimation of such as have no eye to the picturesque. What care I, if,\r\nunaware that my chimney, as a free citizen of this free land, stands\r\nupon an independent basis of its own, people passing it, wonder how such\r\na brick-kiln, as they call it, is supported upon mere joists and\r\nrafters? What care I? I will give a traveller a cup of switchel, if he\r\nwant it; but am I bound to supply him with a sweet taste? Men of\r\ncultivated minds see, in my old house and chimney, a goodly old\r\nelephant-and-castle.\r\n\r\nAll feeling hearts will sympathise with me in what I am now about to\r\nadd. The surgical operation above referred to, necessarily brought into\r\nthe open air a part of the chimney previously under cover, and intended\r\nto remain so, and, therefore, not built of what are called\r\nweather-bricks. In consequence, the chimney, though of a vigorous\r\nconstitution, suffered not a little, from so naked an exposure; and,\r\nunable to acclimate itself, ere long began to fail--showing blotchy\r\nsymptoms akin to those in measles. Whereupon travellers, passing my way,\r\nwould wag their heads, laughing: ‘See that wax nose--how it melts off!’\r\nBut what cared I? The same travellers would travel across the sea to\r\nview Kenilworth peeling away, and for a very good reason: that of all\r\nartists of the picturesque, decay wears the palm--I would say, the ivy.\r\nIn fact, I’ve often thought that the proper place for my old chimney is\r\nivied old England.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 4"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6GKZ3MPDDZB30GXGTJ7ATV","peer_type":"section","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG2T49K0H5GDRB0G4YDTPG8H","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6GMPF3W9NV7HZQXJ8H8T1W","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6GMQ4WSBFM4T5HZZFFVDF7","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:55:08.828Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:55:19.821Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}