{"id":"01KG6YH01NV1D3WKG320P3JP8K","cid":"bafkreigtasecpv5mszelmzuftrnt4jdqpddkaown7ax4rjices3wu7uz2y","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":2078,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T07:57:45.581Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 19","source_file":"01KG6YDD8GKW0DRD5H2MY1NRZ7","start_line":2013,"text":"cadaverously fierce with misery and misanthropy--amazement! the old\r\nPersian roses bloomed in his cheeks. And yet poor as any rat; poor\r\nin the last dregs of poverty; a pauper beyond almshouse pauperism; a\r\npromenading pauper in a thin, threadbare, careful coat; a pauper with\r\nwealth of polished words; a courteous, smiling, shivering gentleman.\r\n\r\nAh, poor, poor Jimmy--God guard us all--poor Jimmy Rose!\r\n\r\nThough at the first onset of his calamity, when creditors, once fast\r\nfriends, pursued him as carrion for jails; though then, to avoid their\r\nhunt, as well as the human eye, he had gone and denned in the old\r\nabandoned house; and there, in his loneliness, had been driven half\r\nmad, yet time and tide had soothed him down to sanity. Perhaps at\r\nbottom Jimmy was too thoroughly good and kind to be made from any cause\r\na man-hater. And doubtless it at last seemed irreligious to Jimmy even\r\nto shun mankind.\r\n\r\nSometimes sweet sense of duty will entice one to bitter doom. For what\r\ncould be more bitter now, in abject need, to be seen of those--nay,\r\ncrawl and visit them in an humble sort, and be tolerated as an old\r\neccentric, wandering in their parlors--who once had known him richest\r\nof the rich, and gayest of the gay? Yet this Jimmy did. Without rudely\r\nbreaking him right down to it, fate slowly bent him more and more to\r\nthe lowest deep. From an unknown quarter he received an income of some\r\nseventy dollars, more or less. The principal he would never touch, but,\r\nby various modes of eking it out, managed to live on the interest. He\r\nlived in an attic, where he supplied himself with food. He took but one\r\nregular repast a day--meal and milk--and nothing more, unless procured\r\nat others' tables. Often about the tea-hour he would drop in upon some\r\nold acquaintance, clad in his neat, forlorn frock coat, with worn\r\nvelvet sewed upon the edges of the cuffs, and a similar device upon the\r\nhems of his pantaloons, to hide that dire look of having been grated\r\noff by rats. On Sunday he made a point of always dining at some fine\r\nhouse or other.\r\n\r\nIt is evident that no man could with impunity be allowed to lead this\r\nlife unless regarded as one who, free from vice, was by fortune brought\r\nso low that the plummet of pity alone could reach him. Not much merit\r\nredounded to his entertainers because they did not thrust the starving\r\ngentleman forth when he came for his alms of tea and toast. Some\r\nmerit had been theirs had they clubbed together and provided him, at\r\nsmall cost enough, with a sufficient income to make him, in point of\r\nnecessaries, independent of the daily dole of charity; charity not sent\r\nto him either, but charity for which he had to trudge round to their\r\ndoors.\r\n\r\nBut the most touching thing of all were those roses in his cheeks;\r\nthose ruddy roses in his nipping winter. How they bloomed; whether\r\nmeal or milk, and tea and toast could keep them flourishing; whether\r\nnow he painted them; by what strange magic they were made to blossom\r\nso; no son of man might tell. But there they bloomed. And besides the\r\nroses, Jimmy was rich in smiles. He smiled ever. The lordly door which\r\nreceived him to his eleemosynary teas, know no such smiling guest as\r\nJimmy. In his prosperous days the smile of Jimmy was famous far and\r\nwide. It should have been trebly famous now.\r\n\r\nWherever he went to tea, he had all of the news of the town to tell. By\r\nfrequenting the reading-rooms, as one privileged through harmlessness,\r\nhe kept himself informed of European affairs and the last literature,\r\nforeign and domestic. And of this, when encouragement was given, he\r\nwould largely talk. But encouragement was not always given. At certain\r\nhouses, and not a few, Jimmy would drop in about ten minutes before the\r\ntea-hour, and drop out again about ten minutes after it; well knowing\r\nthat his further presence was not indispensable to the contentment or\r\nfelicity of his host.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 19"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6YGBGJFFWM00TFQS297SSV","peer_type":"segment","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6YDD8GKW0DRD5H2MY1NRZ7","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG6YCG626JN4FCG8QK17CQCF","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6YH01VFSHAB2FPME1TNYD4","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6YH0PGC4Z3PKS3856HTN0P","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T07:57:46.933Z","ts":"2026-01-30T07:57:53.288Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}