{"id":"01KG8AMDK9QSZ94RTT3KYP59GG","cid":"bafkreibnms7e6z3kisvcrjujimxfxh4wlzywmbrqvhnr53zoeqyadvffbi","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":12583,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:36.278Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","start_line":12516,"text":"often noticed in hospital attendants. Seldom or never did you see him\r\non deck, and when he _did_ emerge into the light of the sun, it was\r\nwith an abashed look, and an uneasy, winking eye. The sun was not made\r\nfor _him_. His nervous organization was confounded by the sight of the\r\nrobust old sea-dogs on the forecastle and the general tumult of the\r\nspar-deck, and he mostly buried himself below in an atmosphere which\r\nlong habit had made congenial.\r\n\r\nThis young man never indulged in frivolous conversation; he only talked\r\nof the surgeon’s prescriptions; his every word was a bolus. He never\r\nwas known to smile; nor did he even look sober in the ordinary way; but\r\nhis countenance ever wore an aspect of cadaverous resignation to his\r\nfate. Strange! that so many of those who would fain minister to our own\r\nhealth should look so much like invalids themselves.\r\n\r\nConnected with the sick-bay, over which the surgeon’s steward\r\npresided—but removed from it in place, being next door to the\r\ncounting-room of the purser’s steward—was a regular apothecary’s shop,\r\nof which he kept the key. It was fitted up precisely like an\r\napothecary’s on shore, displaying tiers of shelves on all four sides\r\nfilled with green bottles and gallipots; beneath were multitudinous\r\ndrawers bearing incomprehensible gilded inscriptions in abbreviated\r\nLatin.\r\n\r\nHe generally opened his shop for an hour or two every morning and\r\nevening. There was a Venetian blind in the upper part of the door,\r\nwhich he threw up when inside so as to admit a little air. And there\r\nyou would see him, with a green shade over his eyes, seated on a stool,\r\nand pounding his pestle in a great iron mortar that looked like a\r\nhowitzer, mixing some jallapy compound. A smoky lamp shed a flickering,\r\nyellow-fever tinge upon his pallid face and the closely-packed\r\nregiments of gallipots.\r\n\r\nSeveral times when I felt in need of a little medicine, but was not ill\r\nenough to report myself to the surgeon at his levees, I would call of a\r\nmorning upon his steward at the Sign of the Mortar, and beg him to give\r\nme what I wanted; when, without speaking a word, this cadaverous young\r\nman would mix me my potion in a tin cup, and hand it out through the\r\nlittle opening in his door, like the boxed-up treasurer giving you your\r\nchange at the ticket-office of a theatre.\r\n\r\nBut there was a little shelf against the wall of the door, and upon\r\nthis I would set the tin cup for a while, and survey it; for I never\r\nwas a Julius Caesar at taking medicine; and to take it in this way,\r\nwithout a single attempt at disguising it; with no counteracting little\r\nmorsel to hurry down after it; in short to go to the very apothecary’s\r\nin person, and there, at the counter, swallow down your dose, as if it\r\nwere a nice mint-julep taken at the bar of a hotel—_this_ was a bitter\r\nbolus indeed. But, then, this pallid young apothecary charged nothing\r\nfor it, and _that_ was no small satisfaction; for is it not remarkable,\r\nto say the least, that a shore apothecary should actually charge you\r\nmoney—round dollars and cents—for giving you a horrible nausea?\r\n\r\nMy tin cup would wait a long time on that little shelf; yet “Pills,” as\r\nthe sailors called him, never heeded my lingering, but in sober, silent\r\nsadness continued pounding his mortar or folding up his powders; until\r\nat last some other customer would appear, and then in a sudden frenzy\r\nof resolution, I would gulp down my sherry-cobbler, and carry its\r\nunspeakable flavour with me far up into the frigate’s main-top. I do\r\nnot know whether it was the wide roll of the ship, as felt in that\r\ngiddy perch, that occasioned it, but I always got sea-sick after taking\r\nmedicine and going aloft with it. Seldom or never did it do me any\r\nlasting good.\r\n\r\nNow the Surgeon’s steward was only a subordinate of Surgeon Cuticle\r\nhimself, who lived in the ward-room among the Lieutenants,\r\nSailing-master, Chaplain, and Purser.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AKWJQFGKKZ5KFZQKDNTQ3","peer_type":"section","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AMDK60TC64FK8SGJTGRR2","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AMDK6XMGBFVJR6SV0KJS1","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:36.457Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:53.463Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}