{"id":"01KG8AMFD0QJAY5KZ7VTEEEYP5","cid":"bafkreiegmgvpbafx6tq4onyewepr7cfzb6v6wp43nfb3hwl44b4ebhgaua","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":14388,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:36.278Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","start_line":14337,"text":"uttermost point on their main-mast.\r\n\r\nThus they reason: Secure of this antagonism between the marine and the\r\nsailor, we can always rely upon it, that if the sailor mutinies, it\r\nneeds no great incitement for the marine to thrust his bayonet through\r\nhis heart; if the marine revolts, the pike of the sailor is impatient\r\nto charge. Checks and balances, blood against blood, _that_ is the cry\r\nand the argument.\r\n\r\nWhat applies to the relation in which the marine and sailor stand\r\ntoward each other—the mutual repulsion implied by a system of\r\nchecks—will, in degree, apply to nearly the entire interior of a\r\nman-of-war’s discipline. The whole body of this discipline is\r\nemphatically a system of cruel cogs and wheels, systematically grinding\r\nup in one common hopper all that might minister to the moral well-being\r\nof the crew.\r\n\r\nIt is the same with both officers and men. If a Captain have a grudge\r\nagainst a Lieutenant, or a Lieutenant against a midshipman, how easy to\r\ntorture him by official treatment, which shall not lay open the\r\nsuperior officer to legal rebuke. And if a midshipman bears a grudge\r\nagainst a sailor, how easy for him, by cunning practices, born of a\r\nboyish spite, to have him degraded at the gangway. Through all the\r\nendless ramifications of rank and station, in most men-of-war there\r\nruns a sinister vein of bitterness, not exceeded by the fireside\r\nhatreds in a family of stepsons ashore. It were sickening to detail all\r\nthe paltry irritabilities, jealousies, and cabals, the spiteful\r\ndetractions and animosities, that lurk far down, and cling to the very\r\nkelson of the ship. It is unmanning to think of. The immutable\r\nceremonies and iron etiquette of a man-of-war; the spiked barriers\r\nseparating the various grades of rank; the delegated absolutism of\r\nauthority on all hands; the impossibility, on the part of the common\r\nseaman, of appeal from incidental abuses, and many more things that\r\nmight be enumerated, all tend to beget in most armed ships a general\r\nsocial condition which is the precise reverse of what any Christian\r\ncould desire. And though there are vessels, that in some measure\r\nfurnish exceptions to this; and though, in other ships, the thing may\r\nbe glazed over by a guarded, punctilious exterior, almost completely\r\nhiding the truth from casual visitors, while the worst facts touching\r\nthe common sailor are systematically kept in the background, yet it is\r\ncertain that what has here been said of the domestic interior of a\r\nman-of-war will, in a greater or less degree, apply to most vessels in\r\nthe Navy. It is not that the officers are so malevolent, nor,\r\naltogether, that the man-of-war’s-man is so vicious. Some of these\r\nevils are unavoidably generated through the operation of the Naval\r\ncode; others are absolutely organic to a Navy establishment, and, like\r\nother organic evils, are incurable, except when they dissolve with the\r\nbody they live in.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJVX0SKHXXG3JA3D02FNW","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AMFD0B1NS7YBHNSXK9NF1","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:38.304Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:55.811Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}