{"id":"01KG8AKRPJDVJEZ9B5N5RWGQYN","cid":"bafkreibjxnnxqo6o3uit2o6v7qbsxiaakovctb66cptt2s3kaoedj4nesi","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":5953,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:14.842Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 1","source_file":"01KG89J1GP71YDJ60P8SRH97MF","start_line":5882,"text":"CHAPTER XXXI.\r\nWITH HIS PROSY OLD GUIDE-BOOK, HE TAKES A PROSY STROLL THROUGH THE TOWN\r\n\r\n\r\nWhen I left home, I took the green morocco guide-book along, supposing\r\nthat from the great number of ships going to Liverpool, I would most\r\nprobably ship on board of one of them, as the event itself proved.\r\n\r\nGreat was my boyish delight at the prospect of visiting a place, the\r\ninfallible clew to all whose intricacies I held in my hand.\r\n\r\nOn the passage out I studied its pages a good deal. In the first place,\r\nI grounded myself thoroughly in the history and antiquities of the\r\ntown, as set forth in the chapter I intended to quote. Then I mastered\r\nthe columns of statistics, touching the advance of population; and\r\npored over them, as I used to do over my multiplication-table. For I\r\nwas determined to make the whole subject my own; and not be content\r\nwith a mere smattering of the thing, as is too much the custom with\r\nmost students of guide-books. Then I perused one by one the elaborate\r\ndescriptions of public edifices, and scrupulously compared the text\r\nwith the corresponding engraving, to see whether they corroborated each\r\nother. For be it known that, including the map, there were no less than\r\nseventeen plates in the work. And by often examining them, I had so\r\nimpressed every column and cornice in my mind, that I had no doubt of\r\nrecognizing the originals in a moment.\r\n\r\nIn short, when I considered that my own father had used this very\r\nguide-book, and that thereby it had been thoroughly tested, and its\r\nfidelity proved beyond a peradventure; I could not but think that I was\r\nbuilding myself up in an unerring knowledge of Liverpool; especially as\r\nI had familiarized myself with the map, and could turn sharp corners on\r\nit, with marvelous confidence and celerity.\r\n\r\nIn imagination, as I lay in my berth on ship-board, I used to take\r\npleasant afternoon rambles through the town; down St. James-street and\r\nup Great George’s, stopping at various places of interest and\r\nattraction. I began to think I had been born in Liverpool, so familiar\r\nseemed all the features of the map. And though some of the streets\r\nthere depicted were thickly involved, endlessly angular and crooked,\r\nlike the map of Boston, in Massachusetts, yet, I made no doubt, that I\r\ncould march through them in the darkest night, and even run for the\r\nmost distant dock upon a pressing emergency.\r\n\r\nDear delusion!\r\n\r\nIt never occurred to my boyish thoughts, that though a guide-book,\r\nfifty years old, might have done good service in its day, yet it would\r\nprove but a miserable cicerone to a modern. I little imagined that the\r\nLiverpool my father saw, was another Liverpool from that to which I,\r\nhis son Wellingborough was sailing. No; these things never obtruded; so\r\naccustomed had I been to associate my old morocco guide-book with the\r\ntown it described, that the bare thought of there being any\r\ndiscrepancy, never entered my mind.\r\n\r\nWhile we lay in the Mersey, before entering the dock, I got out my\r\nguide-book to see how the map would compare with the identical place\r\nitself. But they bore not the slightest resemblance. However, thinks I,\r\nthis is owing to my taking a horizontal view, instead of a bird’s-eye\r\nsurvey. So, never mind old guide-book, _you,_ at least, are all right.\r\n\r\nBut my faith received a severe shock that same evening, when the crew\r\nwent ashore to supper, as I have previously related.\r\n\r\nThe men stopped at a curious old tavern, near the Prince’s Dock’s\r\nwalls; and having my guide-book in my pocket, I drew it forth to\r\ncompare notes, when I found, that precisely upon the spot where I and\r\nmy shipmates were standing, and a cherry-cheeked bar-maid was filling\r\ntheir glasses, my infallible old Morocco, in that very place, located a\r\nfort; adding, that it was well worth the intelligent stranger’s while\r\nto visit it for the purpose of beholding the guard relieved in the\r\nevening.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 1"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJRKE76XA8GX60MNS3NKC","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1GP71YDJ60P8SRH97MF","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AKRPJ4NRM2WDQRTK0MH8F","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:15.058Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:29.914Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}