{"id":"01KG6YH1XF1D3SVA2PBJZKWFCM","cid":"bafkreiciwjgbfavtiuy55ys5lfuuqmjmsci3gkcerc7gctxgojh4xyakn4","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":3490,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T07:57:45.581Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG6YDD8GKW0DRD5H2MY1NRZ7","start_line":3430,"text":"Anacreon, do these degenerate Templars now think it sweeter far to fall\r\nin banquet hall than in war? Or, indeed, how can there be any survival\r\nof that famous order? Templars in modern London! Templars in their\r\nred-cross mantles smoking cigars at the Divan! Templars crowded in a\r\nrailway train, till, stacked with steel helmet, spear, and shield, the\r\nwhole train looks like one elongated locomotive!\r\n\r\nNo. The genuine Templar is long since departed. Go view the\r\nwondrous tombs in the Temple Church; see there the rigidly-haughty\r\nforms stretched out, with crossed arms upon their stilly hearts, in\r\neverlasting undreaming rest. Like the years before the flood, the bold\r\nKnights-Templars are no more. Nevertheless, the name remains, and the\r\nnominal society, and the ancient grounds, and some of the ancient\r\nedifices. But the iron heel is changed to a boot of patent-leather;\r\nthe long two-handed sword to a one-handed quill; the monk-giver of\r\ngratuitous ghostly counsel now counsels for a fee; the defender of the\r\nsarcophagus (if in good practice with his weapon) now has more than one\r\ncase to defend; the vowed opener and clearer of all highways leading\r\nto the Holy Sepulchre, now has it in particular charge to check, to\r\nclog, to hinder, and embarrass all the courts and avenues of Law; the\r\nKnight-combatant of the Saracen, breasting spear-point at Acre, now\r\nfights law-points in Westminster Hall. The helmet is a wig. Struck by\r\nTime's enchanter's wand, the Templar is to-day a Lawyer.\r\n\r\nBut, like many others tumbled from proud glory's height, like the\r\napple, hard on the bough but mellow on the ground, the Templar's fall\r\nhas but made him all the finer fellow.\r\n\r\nI dare say those old warrior-priests were but gruff and grouty at the\r\nbest; cased in Birmingham hardware, how could their crimped arms give\r\nyours or mine a hearty shake? Their proud, ambitious, monkish souls\r\nclasped shut, like horn-book missals; their very faces clapped in\r\nbomb-shells; what sort of genial men were these? But best of comrades,\r\nmost affable of hosts, capital diner is the modern Templar. His wit and\r\nwine are both of sparkling brands.\r\n\r\nThe church and cloisters, courts and vaults, lanes and passages,\r\nbanquet-halls, refectories, libraries, terraces, gardens, broad walks,\r\ndomicils, and dessert-rooms, covering a very large space of ground,\r\nand all grouped in central neighborhood and quite sequestered from the\r\nold city's surrounding din; and everything about the place being kept\r\nin most bachelor-like particularity, no part of London offers a quiet\r\nwight so agreeable a refuge.\r\n\r\nThe Temple is, indeed, a city by itself. A city with all the best\r\nappurtenances, as the above enumeration shows. A city with a park to\r\nit, and flower-beds, and a riverside--the Thames flowing by as openly,\r\nin one part, as by Eden's primal garden flowed the mild Euphrates.\r\nIn what is now the Temple Garden the old Crusaders used to exercise\r\ntheir steeds and lances; the modern Templars now lounge on the benches\r\nbeneath the trees, and switching their patent-leather boots, in gay\r\ndiscourse exercise at repartee.\r\n\r\nLong lines of stately portraits in the banquet-halls, show what great\r\nmen of mark--famous nobles, judges, and Lord Chancellors--have in their\r\ntime been Templars. But all Templars are not known to universal fame;\r\nthough, if the having warm hearts and warmer welcomes, full minds and\r\nfuller cellars, and giving good advice and glorious dinners, spiced\r\nwith rare divertisements of fun and fancy, merit immortal mention, set\r\ndown, ye muses, the names of R.F.C. and his imperial brother.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6YGBGKAZPPX2G91V9P9TY1","peer_type":"segment","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6YDD8GKW0DRD5H2MY1NRZ7","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG6YCG626JN4FCG8QK17CQCF","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6YH1X8E9JA9YRKAFTNCARZ","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6YH1XCR87NSYZBN6FT2R4R","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T07:57:48.847Z","ts":"2026-01-30T07:57:54.419Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}