{"id":"01KG8AN3V9ZYHVBEV7P1YDJP47","cid":"bafkreibq33ppxmqvkiq74lsv2o4xsexqzgvzuk7zwgnjhjur7lfyiw2m34","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":11131,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:52.921Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 1","source_file":"01KG89J1JSYKSGCE149MH9HF6A","start_line":11081,"text":"II.\r\n\r\nThese were stirring letters. The Library Form! an Illustrated Edition!\r\nHis whole heart swelled.\r\n\r\nBut unfortunately it occurred to Pierre, that as all his writings were\r\nnot only fugitive, but if put together could not possibly fill more than\r\na very small duodecimo; therefore the Library Edition seemed a little\r\npremature, perhaps; possibly, in a slight degree, preposterous. Then, as\r\nthey were chiefly made up of little sonnets, brief meditative poems, and\r\nmoral essays, the matter for the designer ran some small risk of being\r\nbut meager. In his inexperience, he did not know that such was the great\r\nheight of invention to which the designer's art had been carried, that\r\ncertain gentlemen of that profession had gone to an eminent\r\npublishing-house with overtures for an illustrated edition of \"Coke upon\r\nLyttleton.\" Even the City Directory was beautifully illustrated with\r\nexquisite engravings of bricks, tongs, and flat-irons.\r\n\r\nConcerning the draught for the title-page, it must be confessed, that on\r\nseeing the imposing enumeration of his titles--long and magnificent as\r\nthose preceding the proclamations of some German Prince (\"_Hereditary\r\nLord of the back-yard of Crantz Jacobi; Undoubted Proprietor by Seizure\r\nof the bedstead of the late Widow Van Lorn; Heir Apparent to the\r\nBankrupt Bakery of Fletz and Flitz; Residuary Legatee of the Confiscated\r\nPin-Money of the Late Dowager Dunker; &c. &c. &c._\") Pierre could not\r\nentirely repress a momentary feeling of elation. Yet did he also bow low\r\nunder the weight of his own ponderosity, as the author of such a vast\r\nload of literature. It occasioned him some slight misgivings, however,\r\nwhen he considered, that already in his eighteenth year, his title-page\r\nshould so immensely surpass in voluminous statisticals the simple page,\r\nwhich in his father's edition prefixed the vast speculations of Plato.\r\nStill, he comforted himself with the thought, that as he could not\r\npresume to interfere with the bill-stickers of the Gazelle Magazine, who\r\nevery month covered the walls of the city with gigantic announcements of\r\nhis name among the other contributors; so neither could he now--in the\r\nhighly improbable event of closing with the offer of Messrs. Wonder and\r\nWen--presume to interfere with the bill-sticking department of their\r\nbusiness concern; for it was plain that they esteemed one's title-page\r\nbut another unwindowed wall, infinitely more available than most walls,\r\nsince here was at least one spot in the city where no rival\r\nbill-stickers dared to encroach. Nevertheless, resolved as he was to let\r\nall such bill-sticking matters take care of themselves, he was sensible\r\nof some coy inclination toward that modest method of certain kid-gloved\r\nand dainty authors, who scorning the vulgarity of a sounding parade,\r\ncontented themselves with simply subscribing their name to the\r\ntitle-page; as confident, that that was sufficient guarantee to the\r\nnotice of all true gentlemen of taste. It was for petty German princes\r\nto sound their prolonged titular flourishes. The Czar of Russia\r\ncontented himself with putting the simple word \"NICHOLAS\" to his\r\nloftiest decrees.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 1"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AKTMJC7WS31CG5E4CDD06","peer_type":"subsection","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1JSYKSGCE149MH9HF6A","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AN3V3RVCX6NDSD9P6PH3M","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:59.241Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:49:27.717Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}