{"id":"01KG8AM9VE89PEJK43242ZF5SP","cid":"bafkreicb3advvyu6oba4xsphtfnfv72kyx5ml7vxy7zhqedctkh7otwf4u","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":4658,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:26.981Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 23","source_file":"01KG89J1FFTGRE9J93Z3K29NGY","start_line":4599,"text":"I had supposed he would. This Shanghai crowed till midday, at least.\r\nWould he keep a-crowing all day? I resolved to learn. Again I ascended\r\nthe hill. The whole country was now bathed in a rejoicing sunlight. The\r\nwarm verdure was bursting all round me. Teams were afield. Birds, newly\r\narrived from the south, were blithely singing in the air. Even the crows\r\ncawed with a certain unction, and seemed a shade or two less black than\r\nusual.\r\n\r\nHark! there goes the cock! How shall I describe the crow of the Shanghai\r\nat noontide? His sunrise crow was a whisper to it. It was the loudest,\r\nlongest, and most strangely musical crow that ever amazed mortal man. I\r\nhad heard plenty of cock-crows before, and many fine ones; but this one!\r\nso smooth and flute-like in its very clamour; so self-possessed in its\r\nvery rapture of exultation; so vast, mounting, swelling, soaring, as if\r\nspurted out from a golden throat, thrown far back. Nor did it sound like\r\nthe foolish, vain-glorious crow of some young sophomorean cock, who knew\r\nnot the world, and was beginning life in audacious gay spirits, because\r\nin wretched ignorance of what might be to come. It was the crow of a\r\ncock who crowed not without advice; the crow of a cock who knew a thing\r\nor two; the crow of a cock who had fought the world and got the better\r\nof it, and was now resolved to crow, though the earth should heave and\r\nthe heavens should fall. It was a wise crow; an invincible crow; a\r\nphilosophic crow; a crow of all crows.\r\n\r\nI returned home once more full of reinvigorated spirits, with a\r\ndauntless sort of feeling. I thought over my debts and other troubles,\r\nand over the unlucky risings of the poor oppressed _peoples_ abroad, and\r\nover the railroad and steamboat accidents, and over even the loss of my\r\ndear friend, with a calm, good-natured rapture of defiance, which\r\nastounded myself. I felt as though I could meet Death, and invite him to\r\ndinner, and toast the Catacombs with him, in pure overflow of\r\nself-reliance and a sense of universal security.\r\n\r\nToward evening I went up to the hill once more to find whether, indeed,\r\nthe glorious cock would prove game even from the rising of the sun unto\r\nthe going down thereof. Talk of Vespers or Curfew!--the evening crow of\r\nthe cock went out of his mighty throat all over the land and inhabited\r\nit, like Xerxes from the East with his double-winged host. It was\r\nmiraculous. Bless me, what a crow! The cock went game to roost that\r\nnight, depend upon it, victorious over the entire day, and bequeathing\r\nthe echoes of his thousand crows to night.\r\n\r\nAfter an unwontedly sound, refreshing sleep I rose early, feeling like a\r\ncarriage-spring--light, elliptical, airy, buoyant as sturgeon-nose--and,\r\nlike a football, bounded up the hill. Hark! Shanghai was up before me.\r\nThe early bird that caught the worm--crowing like a bugle worked by an\r\nengine--lusty, loud, all jubilation. From the scattered farm-houses a\r\nmultitude of other cocks were crowing, and replying to each other’s\r\ncrows. But they were as flageolets to a trombone. Shanghai would\r\nsuddenly break in, and overwhelm all their crows with his one\r\ndomineering blast. He seemed to have nothing to do with any other\r\nconcern. He replied to no other crow, but crowed solely by himself, on\r\nhis own account, in solitary scorn and independence.\r\n\r\nOh, brave cock!--oh, noble Shanghai!--oh, bird rightly offered up by the\r\ninvincible Socrates, in testimony of his final victory over life.\r\n\r\nAs I live, thought I, this blessed day will I go and seek out the\r\nShanghai, and buy him, if I have to clap another mortgage on my land.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 23"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJVQAZF49HK19VVYQ1DXW","peer_type":"segment","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1FFTGRE9J93Z3K29NGY","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AM9VPND71RQEYZ8389G8R","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AM9VDK6T8VXDJ72W0XGYY","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:32.622Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:39.478Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}