{"id":"01KG8AKCKR1JAT9PTDCG79K19Q","cid":"bafkreidfkevcoauqf33wmbfktpcjv4b5xyso2oy554czgy5j7ybvkfgbki","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":4966,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:47:57.722Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG89J1JMR8XVKPA0G8ADAPC4","start_line":4879,"text":"\"Having met with few or none of either, I hardly think I am competent to\r\nanswer.\"\r\n\r\n\"I will answer for you. Fools are most.\"\r\n\r\n\"Why do you think so?\"\r\n\r\n\"For the same reason that I think oats are numerically more than horses.\r\nDon't knaves munch up fools just as horses do oats?\"\r\n\r\n\"A droll, sir; you are a droll. I can appreciate drollery--ha, ha, ha!\"\r\n\r\n\"But I'm in earnest.\"\r\n\r\n\"That's the drollery, to deliver droll extravagance with an earnest\r\nair--knaves munching up fools as horses oats.--Faith, very droll,\r\nindeed, ha, ha, ha! Yes, I think I understand you now, sir. How silly I\r\nwas to have taken you seriously, in your droll conceits, too, about\r\nhaving no confidence in nature. In reality you have just as much as I\r\nhave.\"\r\n\r\n\"_I_ have confidence in nature? _I?_ I say again there is nothing I am\r\nmore suspicious of. I once lost ten thousand dollars by nature. Nature\r\nembezzled that amount from me; absconded with ten thousand dollars'\r\nworth of my property; a plantation on this stream, swept clean away by\r\none of those sudden shiftings of the banks in a freshet; ten thousand\r\ndollars' worth of alluvion thrown broad off upon the waters.\"\r\n\r\n\"But have you no confidence that by a reverse shifting that soil will\r\ncome back after many days?--ah, here is my venerable friend,\" observing\r\nthe old miser, \"not in your berth yet? Pray, if you _will_ keep afoot,\r\ndon't lean against that baluster; take my arm.\"\r\n\r\nIt was taken; and the two stood together; the old miser leaning against\r\nthe herb-doctor with something of that air of trustful fraternity with\r\nwhich, when standing, the less strong of the Siamese twins habitually\r\nleans against the other.\r\n\r\nThe Missourian eyed them in silence, which was broken by the\r\nherb-doctor.\r\n\r\n\"You look surprised, sir. Is it because I publicly take under my\r\nprotection a figure like this? But I am never ashamed of honesty,\r\nwhatever his coat.\"\r\n\r\n\"Look you,\" said the Missourian, after a scrutinizing pause, \"you are a\r\nqueer sort of chap. Don't know exactly what to make of you. Upon the\r\nwhole though, you somewhat remind me of the last boy I had on my place.\"\r\n\r\n\"Good, trustworthy boy, I hope?\"\r\n\r\n\"Oh, very! I am now started to get me made some kind of machine to do\r\nthe sort of work which boys are supposed to be fitted for.\"\r\n\r\n\"Then you have passed a veto upon boys?\"\r\n\r\n\"And men, too.\"\r\n\r\n\"But, my dear sir, does not that again imply more or less lack of\r\nconfidence?--(Stand up a little, just a very little, my venerable\r\nfriend; you lean rather hard.)--No confidence in boys, no confidence in\r\nmen, no confidence in nature. Pray, sir, who or what may you have\r\nconfidence in?\"\r\n\r\n\"I have confidence in distrust; more particularly as applied to you and\r\nyour herbs.\"\r\n\r\n\"Well,\" with a forbearing smile, \"that is frank. But pray, don't forget\r\nthat when you suspect my herbs you suspect nature.\"\r\n\r\n\"Didn't I say that before?\"\r\n\r\n\"Very good. For the argument's sake I will suppose you are in earnest.\r\nNow, can you, who suspect nature, deny, that this same nature not only\r\nkindly brought you into being, but has faithfully nursed you to your\r\npresent vigorous and independent condition? Is it not to nature that you\r\nare indebted for that robustness of mind which you so unhandsomely use\r\nto her scandal? Pray, is it not to nature that you owe the very eyes by\r\nwhich you criticise her?\"\r\n\r\n\"No! for the privilege of vision I am indebted to an oculist, who in my\r\ntenth year operated upon me in Philadelphia. Nature made me blind and\r\nwould have kept me so. My oculist counterplotted her.\"\r\n\r\n\"And yet, sir, by your complexion, I judge you live an out-of-door life;\r\nwithout knowing it, you are partial to nature; you fly to nature, the\r\nuniversal mother.\"\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJM4MS3PS24HNRJ04GFSB","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1JMR8XVKPA0G8ADAPC4","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AKCKR23FJPWDT4XA81R3C","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AKCKRKZZQ5FAF2V9QSZ7X","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:02.680Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:09.797Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}