{"id":"01KG8AKX4S495YF0XSYZGAJEW3","cid":"bafkreihnc5d3kwt3fbd5trw5yz5n4hinlzuvnzizznbudlx5n46qboal7y","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":9654,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:14.842Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 4","source_file":"01KG89J1GP71YDJ60P8SRH97MF","start_line":9589,"text":"hearts of the emigrants fell. Nearly all of them had now hied below, to\r\nescape the uncomfortable and perilous decks: and from the two\r\n_“booby-hatches”_ came the steady hum of a subterranean wailing and\r\nweeping. That irresistible wrestler, sea-sickness, had overthrown the\r\nstoutest of their number, and the women and children were embracing and\r\nsobbing in all the agonies of the poor emigrant’s first storm at sea.\r\n\r\nBad enough is it at such times with ladies and gentlemen in the cabin,\r\nwho have nice little state-rooms; and plenty of privacy; and stewards\r\nto run for them at a word, and put pillows under their heads, and\r\ntenderly inquire how they are getting along, and mix them a posset: and\r\neven then, in the abandonment of this soul and body subduing malady,\r\nsuch ladies and gentlemen will often give up life itself as\r\nunendurable, and put up the most pressing petitions for a speedy\r\nannihilation; all of which, however, only arises from their intense\r\nanxiety to preserve their valuable lives.\r\n\r\nHow, then, with the friendless emigrants, stowed away like bales of\r\ncotton, and packed like slaves in a slave-ship; confined in a place\r\nthat, during storm time, must be closed against both light and air; who\r\ncan do no cooking, nor warm so much as a cup of water; for the\r\ndrenching seas would instantly flood their fire in their exposed galley\r\non deck? How, then, with these men, and women, and children, to whom a\r\nfirst voyage, under the most advantageous circumstances, must come just\r\nas hard as to the Honorable De Lancey Fitz Clarence, lady, daughter,\r\nand seventeen servants.\r\n\r\nNor is this all: for in some of these ships, as in the case of the\r\nHighlander, the emigrant passengers are cut off from the most\r\nindispensable conveniences of a civilized dwelling. This forces them in\r\nstorm time to such extremities, that no wonder fevers and plagues are\r\nthe result. We had not been at sea one week, when to hold your head\r\ndown the fore hatchway was like holding it down a suddenly opened\r\ncesspool.\r\n\r\nBut still more than this. Such is the aristocracy maintained on board\r\nsome of these ships, that the most arbitrary measures are enforced, to\r\nprevent the emigrants from intruding upon the most holy precincts of\r\nthe quarter-deck, the only completely open space on ship-board.\r\nConsequently—even in fine weather—when they come up from below, they\r\nare crowded in the waist of the ship, and jammed among the boats,\r\ncasks, and spars; abused by the seamen, and sometimes cuffed by the\r\nofficers, for unavoidably standing in the way of working the vessel.\r\n\r\nThe cabin-passengers of the Highlander numbered some fifteen in all;\r\nand to protect this detachment of gentility from the barbarian\r\nincursions of the _“wild Irish”_ emigrants, ropes were passed\r\nathwart-ships, by the main-mast, from side to side: which defined the\r\nboundary line between those who had paid three pounds passage-money,\r\nfrom those who had paid twenty guineas. And the cabin-passengers\r\nthemselves were the most urgent in having this regulation maintained.\r\n\r\nLucky would it be for the pretensions of some parvenus, whose souls are\r\ndeposited at their banker’s, and whose bodies but serve to carry about\r\npurses, knit of poor men’s heartstrings, if thus easily they could\r\nprecisely define, ashore, the difference between them and the rest of\r\nhumanity.\r\n\r\nBut, I, Redburn, am a poor fellow, who have hardly ever known what it\r\nis to have five silver dollars in my pocket at one time; so, no doubt,\r\nthis circumstance has something to do with my slight and harmless\r\nindignation at these things.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 4"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJSA770PKV5198BNW3617","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1GP71YDJ60P8SRH97MF","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AKX5259Q2M1C4HNNT71VY","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:19.609Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:33.033Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}