{"id":"01KG8AKAMTEK5HHQPD331VEBQ9","cid":"bafkreid45ppdmndxejewr4j3nwouiatqtlfluvdoa2qnppt4sslilyhhau","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":9467,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:47:57.726Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 8","source_file":"01KG89J1JMR8XVKPA0G8ADAPC4","start_line":9413,"text":"arrival than he hurried to call upon him. He found him curiously rusty\r\nin dress, sallow in cheek, and decidedly less gay and cordial in manner,\r\nwhich the more surprised China Aster, because, in former days, he had\r\nmore than once heard Orchis, in his light rattling way, declare that all\r\nhe (Orchis) wanted to make him a perfectly happy, hilarious, and\r\nbenignant man, was a voyage to Europe and a wife, with a free\r\ndevelopment of his inmost nature.\r\n\r\n\"Upon China Aster's stating his case, his trusted friend was silent for\r\na time; then, in an odd way, said that he would not crowd China Aster,\r\nbut still his (Orchis') necessities were urgent. Could not China Aster\r\nmortgage the candlery? He was honest, and must have moneyed friends; and\r\ncould he not press his sales of candles? Could not the market be forced\r\na little in that particular? The profits on candles must be very great.\r\nSeeing, now, that Orchis had the notion that the candle-making business\r\nwas a very profitable one, and knowing sorely enough what an error was\r\nhere, China Aster tried to undeceive him. But he could not drive the\r\ntruth into Orchis--Orchis being very obtuse here, and, at the same time,\r\nstrange to say, very melancholy. Finally, Orchis glanced off from so\r\nunpleasing a subject into the most unexpected reflections, taken from a\r\nreligious point of view, upon the unstableness and deceitfulness of the\r\nhuman heart. But having, as he thought, experienced something of that\r\nsort of thing, China Aster did not take exception to his friend's\r\nobservations, but still refrained from so doing, almost as much for the\r\nsake of sympathetic sociality as anything else. Presently, Orchis,\r\nwithout much ceremony, rose, and saying he must write a letter to his\r\nwife, bade his friend good-bye, but without warmly shaking him by the\r\nhand as of old.\r\n\r\n\"In much concern at the change, China Aster made earnest inquiries in\r\nsuitable quarters, as to what things, as yet unheard of, had befallen\r\nOrchis, to bring about such a revolution; and learned at last that,\r\nbesides traveling, and getting married, and joining the sect of\r\nCome-Outers, Orchis had somehow got a bad dyspepsia, and lost\r\nconsiderable property through a breach of trust on the part of a factor\r\nin New York. Telling these things to Old Plain Talk, that man of some\r\nknowledge of the world shook his old head, and told China Aster that,\r\nthough he hoped it might prove otherwise, yet it seemed to him that all\r\nhe had communicated about Orchis worked together for bad omens as to his\r\nfuture forbearance--especially, he added with a grim sort of smile, in\r\nview of his joining the sect of Come-Outers; for, if some men knew what\r\nwas their inmost natures, instead of coming out with it, they would try\r\ntheir best to keep it in, which, indeed, was the way with the prudent\r\nsort. In all which sour notions Old Prudence, as usual, chimed in.\r\n\r\n\"When interest-day came again, China Aster, by the utmost exertions,\r\ncould only pay Orchis' agent a small part of what was due, and a part of\r\nthat was made up by his children's gift money (bright tenpenny pieces\r\nand new quarters, kept in their little money-boxes), and pawning his\r\nbest clothes, with those of his wife and children, so that all were\r\nsubjected to the hardship of staying away from church. And the old\r\nusurer, too, now beginning to be obstreperous, China Aster paid him his\r\ninterest and some other pressing debts with money got by, at last,\r\nmortgaging the candlery.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 8"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJNPWB4PV4EMCJY73T33E","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1JMR8XVKPA0G8ADAPC4","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AKAMPHM3TWPBSVRA6WKHD","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AKANVXK3YJD0TZK04TFB9","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:00.666Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:14.827Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}