{"id":"01KG8AP4J9HWB22DYF8Y6BWT2C","cid":"bafkreiff6tkk63ipy5jsjrk3hee3zmnswxu3i6qyrd3f4cddbumvsjkbcy","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":2048,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:49:30.764Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 20","source_file":"01KG89J198KE6FY8WPVJQQRCZ6","start_line":1979,"text":"reputation, and joins the great whale-fishery, you should see the\r\ncomical things he does upon reaching the seaport. In bespeaking his\r\nsea-outfit, he orders bell-buttons to his waistcoats; straps to his\r\ncanvas trowsers. Ah, poor Hay-Seed! how bitterly will burst those\r\nstraps in the first howling gale, when thou art driven, straps,\r\nbuttons, and all, down the throat of the tempest.\r\n\r\nBut think not that this famous town has only harpooneers, cannibals,\r\nand bumpkins to show her visitors. Not at all. Still New Bedford is a\r\nqueer place. Had it not been for us whalemen, that tract of land would\r\nthis day perhaps have been in as howling condition as the coast of\r\nLabrador. As it is, parts of her back country are enough to frighten\r\none, they look so bony. The town itself is perhaps the dearest place to\r\nlive in, in all New England. It is a land of oil, true enough: but not\r\nlike Canaan; a land, also, of corn and wine. The streets do not run\r\nwith milk; nor in the spring-time do they pave them with fresh eggs.\r\nYet, in spite of this, nowhere in all America will you find more\r\npatrician-like houses; parks and gardens more opulent, than in New\r\nBedford. Whence came they? how planted upon this once scraggy scoria of\r\na country?\r\n\r\nGo and gaze upon the iron emblematical harpoons round yonder lofty\r\nmansion, and your question will be answered. Yes; all these brave\r\nhouses and flowery gardens came from the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian\r\noceans. One and all, they were harpooned and dragged up hither from the\r\nbottom of the sea. Can Herr Alexander perform a feat like that?\r\n\r\nIn New Bedford, fathers, they say, give whales for dowers to their\r\ndaughters, and portion off their nieces with a few porpoises a-piece.\r\nYou must go to New Bedford to see a brilliant wedding; for, they say,\r\nthey have reservoirs of oil in every house, and every night recklessly\r\nburn their lengths in spermaceti candles.\r\n\r\nIn summer time, the town is sweet to see; full of fine maples—long\r\navenues of green and gold. And in August, high in air, the beautiful\r\nand bountiful horse-chestnuts, candelabra-wise, proffer the passer-by\r\ntheir tapering upright cones of congregated blossoms. So omnipotent is\r\nart; which in many a district of New Bedford has superinduced bright\r\nterraces of flowers upon the barren refuse rocks thrown aside at\r\ncreation’s final day.\r\n\r\nAnd the women of New Bedford, they bloom like their own red roses. But\r\nroses only bloom in summer; whereas the fine carnation of their cheeks\r\nis perennial as sunlight in the seventh heavens. Elsewhere match that\r\nbloom of theirs, ye cannot, save in Salem, where they tell me the young\r\ngirls breathe such musk, their sailor sweethearts smell them miles off\r\nshore, as though they were drawing nigh the odorous Moluccas instead of\r\nthe Puritanic sands.\r\n\r\n\r\nCHAPTER 7. The Chapel.\r\n\r\nIn this same New Bedford there stands a Whaleman’s Chapel, and few are\r\nthe moody fishermen, shortly bound for the Indian Ocean or Pacific, who\r\nfail to make a Sunday visit to the spot. I am sure that I did not.\r\n\r\nReturning from my first morning stroll, I again sallied out upon this\r\nspecial errand. The sky had changed from clear, sunny cold, to driving\r\nsleet and mist. Wrapping myself in my shaggy jacket of the cloth called\r\nbearskin, I fought my way against the stubborn storm. Entering, I found\r\na small scattered congregation of sailors, and sailors’ wives and\r\nwidows. A muffled silence reigned, only broken at times by the shrieks\r\nof the storm. Each silent worshipper seemed purposely sitting apart\r\nfrom the other, as if each silent grief were insular and\r\nincommunicable. The chaplain had not yet arrived; and there these\r\nsilent islands of men and women sat steadfastly eyeing several marble\r\ntablets, with black borders, masoned into the wall on either side the\r\npulpit. Three of them ran something like the following, but I do not\r\npretend to quote:—\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 20"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AK7FP6P1V67V3ATJHHZ83","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J198KE6FY8WPVJQQRCZ6","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AP4J14RKSM7MJGTB5M418","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AP4J9596891BG1FHV91BY","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:49:32.745Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:49:39.892Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}