{"id":"01KG8AMFY6KEXMWQ9K08QPECR1","cid":"bafkreigaotbmozv76wg3o47qi6nypf74lm3xlf7b35iy3czfujokzqcvs4","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":3093,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:36.270Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","start_line":3013,"text":"a man-of-war, which, with its martial formalities and thousand vices,\r\nstabs to the heart the soul of all free-and-easy honourable rovers.\r\n\r\nI have said that I was wont to mount up aloft and muse; and thus was it\r\nwith me the night following the loss of the cooper. Ere my watch in the\r\ntop had expired, high up on the main-royal-yard I reclined, the white\r\njacket folded around me like Sir John Moore in his frosted cloak.\r\n\r\nEight bells had struck, and my watchmates had hied to their hammocks,\r\nand the other watch had gone to their stations, and the _top_ below me\r\nwas full of strangers, and still one hundred feet above even _them_ I\r\nlay entranced; now dozing, now dreaming; now thinking of things past,\r\nand anon of the life to come. Well-timed was the latter thought, for\r\nthe life to come was much nearer overtaking me than I then could\r\nimagine. Perhaps I was half conscious at last of a tremulous voice\r\nhailing the main-royal-yard from the _top_. But if so, the\r\nconsciousness glided away from me, and left me in Lethe. But when, like\r\nlightning, the yard dropped under me, and instinctively I clung with\r\nboth hands to the “_tie_,” then I came to myself with a rush, and felt\r\nsomething like a choking hand at my throat. For an instant I thought\r\nthe Gulf Stream in my head was whirling me away to eternity; but the\r\nnext moment I found myself standing; the yard had descended to the\r\n_cup_; and shaking myself in my jacket, I felt that I was unharmed and\r\nalive.\r\n\r\nWho had done this? who had made this attempt on my life? thought I, as\r\nI ran down the rigging.\r\n\r\n“Here it comes!—Lord! Lord! here it comes! See, see! it is white as a\r\nhammock.”\r\n\r\n“Who’s coming?” I shouted, springing down into the top; “who’s white as\r\na hammock?”\r\n\r\n“Bless my soul, Bill it’s only White-Jacket—that infernal White-Jacket\r\nagain!”\r\n\r\nIt seems they had spied a moving white spot there aloft, and,\r\nsailor-like, had taken me for the ghost of the cooper; and after\r\nhailing me, and bidding me descend, to test my corporeality, and\r\ngetting no answer, they had lowered the halyards in affright.\r\n\r\nIn a rage I tore off the jacket, and threw it on the deck.\r\n\r\n“Jacket,” cried I, “you must change your complexion! you must hie to\r\nthe dyers and be dyed, that I may live. I have but one poor life,\r\nWhite-Jacket, and that life I cannot spare. I cannot consent to die for\r\n_you_, but be dyed you must for me. You can dye many times without\r\ninjury; but I cannot die without irreparable loss, and running the\r\neternal risk.”\r\n\r\nSo in the morning, jacket in hand, I repaired to the First Lieutenant,\r\nand related the narrow escape I had had during the night. I enlarged\r\nupon the general perils I ran in being taken for a ghost, and earnestly\r\nbesought him to relax his commands for once, and give me an order on\r\nBrush, the captain of the paint-room, for some black paint, that my\r\njacket might be painted of that colour.\r\n\r\n“Just look at it, sir,” I added, holding it lip; “did you ever see\r\nanything whiter? Consider how it shines of a night, like a bit of the\r\nMilky Way. A little paint, sir, you cannot refuse.”\r\n\r\n“The ship has no paint to spare,” he said; “you must get along without\r\nit.”\r\n\r\n“Sir, every rain gives me a soaking; Cape Horn is at hand—six\r\nbrushes-full would make it waterproof; and no longer would I be in\r\nperil of my life!”\r\n\r\n“Can’t help it, sir; depart!”\r\n\r\nI fear it will not be well with me in the end; for if my own sins are\r\nto be forgiven only as I forgive that hard-hearted and unimpressible\r\nFirst Lieutenant, then pardon there is none for me.\r\n\r\nWhat! when but one dab of paint would make a man of a ghost, and it\r\nMackintosh of a herring-net—to refuse it I am full. I can say no more.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJQ3RYCG05CMSKM7C58NJ","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AMFY66X4C30FY0SNZ3ZR5","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:38.854Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:44.704Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}