- end_line
- 4864
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T03:55:03.879Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 4824
- text
- I found the civil-process enveloping the cigar. When I unrolled the
cigar, I unrolled the civil-process, and the constable standing by
rolled out, with a thick tongue, ‘Take notice!’ and added, in a whisper,
‘Put that in your pipe and smoke it!’
I turned short round upon the gentlemen then and there present in that
bar-room. Said I, ‘Gentlemen, is this an honourable--nay, is this a
lawful way of serving a civil-process? Behold!’
One and all they were of opinion that it was a highly inelegant act in
the constable to take advantage of a gentleman’s lunching on cheese and
porter, to be so uncivil as to slip a civil-process into his hat. It was
ungenerous; it was cruel; for the sudden shock of the thing coming
instanter upon the lunch would impair the proper digestion of the
cheese, which is proverbially not so easy of digestion as blanc-mange.
Arrived home, I read the process, and felt a twinge of melancholy.
Hard world! hard world! Here I am, as good a fellow as ever
lived--hospitable--open-hearted--generous to a fault: and the Fates
forbid that I should possess the fortune to bless the country
with my bounteousness. Nay, while many a stingy curmudgeon rolls in
idle gold, I, heart of nobleness as I am, I have civil-processes
served on me! I bowed my head, and felt forlorn--unjustly
used--abused--unappreciated--in short, miserable.
Hark! like a clarion! yea, like a jolly bolt of thunder with bells to
it--came the all-glorious and defiant crow! Ye gods, how it set me up
again! Right on my pins! Yea, verily on stilts!
Oh, noble cock!
Plain as cock could speak, it said: ‘Let the world and all aboard of it
go to pot. Do you be jolly, and never say die. What’s the world compared
to you? What is it anyhow but a lump of loam? Do you be jolly!’
Oh, noble cock!
‘But my dear and glorious cock,’ mused I, upon second thought, ‘one
can’t so easily send this world to pot; one can’t so easily be jolly
with civil-processes in his hat or hand.’
- title
- Chunk 10