{"id":"01KG6YGZGHTMDVVQ06VAP2SFJ6","cid":"bafkreihb5kyx6jqkinmni7qtcvqdfppmljyybf6btxfiu445i37r6cnswe","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":1200,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T07:57:45.581Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG6YDD8GKW0DRD5H2MY1NRZ7","start_line":1139,"text":"great author has ever come up to the idea of his reader. But that dust\r\nof which our bodies are composed, how can it fitly express the nobler\r\nintelligences among us? With reverence be it spoken, that not even in\r\nthe case of one deemed more than man, not even in our Saviour, did his\r\nvisible frame betoken anything of the augustness of the nature within.\r\nElse, how could those Jewish eyewitnesses fail to see heaven in his\r\nglance!\r\n\r\nIt is curious how a man may travel along a country road, and yet miss\r\nthe grandest or sweetest of prospects by reason of an intervening\r\nhedge, so like all other hedges, as in no way to hint of the wide\r\nlandscape beyond. So has it been with me concerning the enchanting\r\nlandscape in the soul of this Hawthorne, this most excellent Man of\r\nMosses. His Old Manse has been written now four years, but I never read\r\nit till a day or two since. I had seen it in the book-stores--heard\r\nof it often--even had it recommended to me by a tasteful friend,\r\nas a rare, quiet book, perhaps too deserving of popularity to be\r\npopular. But there are so many books called \"excellent,\" and so much\r\nunpopular merit, that amid the thick stir of other things, the hint\r\nof my tasteful friend was disregarded and for four years the Mosses\r\non the Old Manse never refreshed me with their perennial green. It\r\nmay be, however, that all this while the book, likewise, was only\r\nimproving in flavor and body. At any rate, it so chanced that this long\r\nprocrastination eventuated in a happy result. At breakfast the other\r\nday, a mountain girl, a cousin of mine, who for the last two weeks has\r\nevery morning helped me to strawberries and raspberries, which, like\r\nthe roses and pearls in the fairy tale, seemed to fall into the saucer\r\nfrom those strawberry-beds, her cheeks--this delightful creature,\r\nthis charming Cherry says to me--\"I see you spend your mornings in the\r\nhaymow; and yesterday I found there Dwight's _Travels in New England_.\r\nNow I have something far better than that, something more congenial to\r\nour summer on these hills. Take these raspberries, and then I will give\r\nyou some moss.\" \"Moss!\" said I. \"Yes, and you must take it to the barn\r\nwith you, and good-by to Dwight.\"\r\n\r\nWith that she left me, and soon returned with a volume, verdantly\r\nbound, and garnished with a curious frontispiece in green; nothing\r\nless than a fragment of real moss, cunningly pressed to a fly-leaf.\r\n\"Why, this,\" said I, spilling my raspberries, \"this is the _Mosses from\r\nan Old Manse_.\" \"Yes,\" said cousin Cherry, \"yes, it is that flowery\r\nHawthorne.\" \"Hawthorne and Mosses,\" said I, \"no more it is morning: it\r\nis July in the country: and I am off for the barn.\"\r\n\r\nStretched on that new mown clover, the hillside breeze blowing over\r\nme through the wide barn door, and soothed by the hum of the bees in\r\nthe meadows around, how magically stole over me this Mossy Man! and\r\nhow amply, how bountifully, did he redeem that delicious promise to\r\nhis guests in the Old Manse, of whom it is written: \"Others could give\r\nthem pleasure, or amusement, or instruction--these could be picked\r\nup anywhere; but it was for me to give them rest--rest, in a life of\r\ntrouble! What better could be done for those weary and world-worn\r\nspirits? ... what better could be done for anybody who came within our\r\nmagic circle than to throw the spell of a tranquil spirit over him?\" So\r\nall that day, half-buried in the new clover, I watched this Hawthorne's\r\n\"Assyrian dawn, and Paphian sunset and moonrise from the summit of our\r\neastern hill.\"\r\n\r\nThe soft ravishments of the man spun me round about in a web of dreams,\r\nand when the book was closed, when the spell was over, this wizard\r\n\"dismissed me with but misty reminiscences, as if I had been dreaming\r\nof him.\"\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6YGBGJFFWM00TFQS297SSV","peer_type":"segment","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6YDD8GKW0DRD5H2MY1NRZ7","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG6YCG626JN4FCG8QK17CQCF","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6YGZGHDXPTY5JENV5A3RX3","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6YGZGDKNSKE3NXKPNYBW33","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T07:57:46.385Z","ts":"2026-01-30T07:57:52.466Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}