{"id":"01KG8AKWJDNZD8V4V11F61XEDY","cid":"bafkreifnflqruylyftimqy7z6hgwimea5yhctjjs6xwt2kt3briswqapq4","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":3506,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:14.838Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 3","source_file":"01KG89J1GP71YDJ60P8SRH97MF","start_line":3445,"text":"And now I am talking of books, I must tell of Jack Blunt the sailor,\r\nand his Dream Book.\r\n\r\nJackson, who seemed to know every thing about all parts of the world,\r\nused to tell Jack in reproach, that he was an _Irish Cockney._ By which\r\nI understood, that he was an Irishman born, but had graduated in\r\nLondon, somewhere about Radcliffe Highway; but he had no sort of brogue\r\nthat I could hear.\r\n\r\nHe was a curious looking fellow, about twenty-five years old, as I\r\nshould judge; but to look at his back, you would have taken him for a\r\nlittle old man. His arms and legs were very large, round, short, and\r\nstumpy; so that when he had on his great monkey-jacket, and sou’west\r\ncap flapping in his face, and his sea boots drawn up to his knees, he\r\nlooked like a fat porpoise, standing on end. He had a round face, too,\r\nlike a walrus; and with about the same expression, half human and half\r\nindescribable. He was, upon the whole, a good-natured fellow, and a\r\nlittle given to looking at sea-life romantically; singing songs about\r\nsusceptible mermaids who fell in love with handsome young oyster boys\r\nand gallant fishermen. And he had a sad story about a man-of-war’s-man\r\nwho broke his heart at Portsmouth during the late war, and threw away\r\nhis life recklessly at one of the quarter-deck cannonades, in the\r\nbattle between the Guerriere and Constitution; and another\r\nincomprehensible story about a sort of fairy sea-queen, who used to be\r\ndunning a sea-captain all the time for his autograph to boil in some\r\neel soup, for a spell against the scurvy.\r\n\r\nHe believed in all kinds of witch-work and magic; and had some wild\r\nIrish words he used to mutter over during a calm for a fair wind.\r\n\r\nAnd he frequently related his interviews in Liverpool with a\r\nfortune-teller, an old negro woman by the name of De Squak, whose house\r\nwas much frequented by sailors; and how she had two black cats, with\r\nremarkably green eyes, and nightcaps on their heads, solemnly seated on\r\na claw-footed table near the old goblin; when she felt his pulse, to\r\ntell what was going to befall him.\r\n\r\nThis Blunt had a large head of hair, very thick and bushy; but from\r\nsome cause or other, it was rapidly turning gray; and in its transition\r\nstate made him look as if he wore a shako of badger skin.\r\n\r\nThe phenomenon of gray hairs on a young head, had perplexed and\r\nconfounded this Blunt to such a degree that he at last came to the\r\nconclusion it must be the result of the black art, wrought upon him by\r\nan enemy; and that enemy, he opined, was an old sailor landlord in\r\nMarseilles, whom he had once seriously offended, by knocking him down\r\nin a fray.\r\n\r\nSo while in New York, finding his hair growing grayer and grayer, and\r\nall his friends, the ladies and others, laughing at him, and calling\r\nhim an old man with one foot in the grave, he slipt out one night to an\r\napothecary’s, stated his case, and wanted to know what could be done\r\nfor him.\r\n\r\nThe apothecary immediately gave him a pint bottle of something he\r\ncalled _“Trafalgar Oil_ for restoring the hair,” _price one dollar;_\r\nand told him that after he had used that bottle, and it did not have\r\nthe desired effect, he must try bottle No. 2, called _“Balm of\r\nParadise, or the Elixir of the Battle of Copenhagen.”_ These\r\nhigh-sounding naval names delighted Blunt, and he had no doubt there\r\nmust be virtue in them.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 3"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJQ1DADRPA06G38V29X3T","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1GP71YDJ60P8SRH97MF","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AKWJDY0QKVFV5D7B8E8RC","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AKWJA8KJPFW6NT9XP7PFB","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:19.021Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:27.103Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}