{"id":"01KG8AMGMAZ4ARHWCZJ7DPAVKB","cid":"bafkreieh2lxgqbd367e52t5o65ogao6uh6axbmhqou5vyqfaexv5mv5vki","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":9639,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:36.274Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 3","source_file":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","start_line":9593,"text":"hands, and then standing with his own uplifted.\r\n\r\n“Steward!” cried the Lieutenant, “the castor—quick! I always use plenty\r\nof pepper with this dish, Surgeon; it’s oystery. Ah! this is really\r\ndelicious,” he added, smacking his lips over a mouthful. “Try it now,\r\nSurgeon, and you’ll never keep such a fine dish as this, lying uneaten\r\non your hands, as a mere scientific curiosity.”\r\n\r\nCuticle’s whole countenance changed; and, slowly walking up to the\r\ntable, he put his nose close to the tin case, then touched its contents\r\nwith his finger and tasted it. Enough. Buttoning up his coat, in all\r\nthe tremblings of an old man’s rage he burst from the ward-room, and,\r\ncalling for a boat, was not seen again for twenty-four hours.\r\n\r\nBut though, like all other mortals, Cuticle was subject at times to\r\nthese fits of passion—at least under outrageous provocation—nothing\r\ncould exceed his coolness when actually employed in his imminent\r\nvocation. Surrounded by moans and shrieks, by features distorted with\r\nanguish inflicted by himself, he yet maintained a countenance almost\r\nsupernaturally calm; and unless the intense interest of the operation\r\nflushed his wan face with a momentary tinge of professional enthusiasm,\r\nhe toiled away, untouched by the keenest misery coming under a\r\nfleet-surgeon’s eye. Indeed, long habituation to the dissecting-room\r\nand the amputation-table had made him seemingly impervious to the\r\nordinary emotions of humanity. Yet you could not say that Cuticle was\r\nessentially a cruel-hearted man. His apparent heartlessness must have\r\nbeen of a purely scientific origin. It is not to be imagined even that\r\nCuticle would have harmed a fly, unless he could procure a microscope\r\npowerful enough to assist him in experimenting on the minute vitals of\r\nthe creature.\r\n\r\nBut notwithstanding his marvellous indifference to the sufferings of\r\nhis patients, and spite even of his enthusiasm in his vocation—not\r\ncooled by frosting old age itself—Cuticle, on some occasions, would\r\neffect a certain disrelish of his profession, and declaim against the\r\nnecessity that forced a man of his humanity to perform a surgical\r\noperation. Especially was it apt to be thus with him, when the case was\r\none of more than ordinary interest. In discussing it previous to\r\nsetting about it, he would veil his eagerness under an aspect of great\r\ncircumspection, curiously marred, however, by continual sallies of\r\nunsuppressible impatience. But the knife once in his hand, the\r\ncompassionless surgeon himself, undisguised, stood before you. Such was\r\nCadwallader Cuticle, our Surgeon of the Fleet.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 3"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJTJS4FN5MFKBD96AVPYJ","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AMGMFQRC3KTAVEGE2GNCN","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:39.562Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:50.819Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}