- end_line
- 9140
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:26.985Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 9088
- text
- ‘Gold-digging, sir?’
‘Nay, sir,’ answered I, starting, ‘I was merely--ahem! merely--I say I
was merely digging--round my chimney.’
‘Ah, loosening the soil, to make it grow. Your chimney, sir, you regard
as too small, I suppose; needing further development, especially at the
top?’
‘Sir!’ said I, throwing down the spade, ‘do not be personal. I and my
chimney----’
‘Personal?’
‘Sir, I look upon this chimney less as a pile of masonry than as a
personage. It is the king of the house. I am but a suffered and inferior
subject.’
In fact, I would permit no gibes to be cast at either myself or my
chimney; and never again did my visitor refer to it in my hearing,
without coupling some compliment with the mention. It well deserves a
respectful consideration. There it stands, solitary and alone--not a
council-of-ten flues, but, like his sacred majesty of Russia, a unit of
an autocrat.
Even to me, its dimensions, at times, seem incredible. It does not look
so big--no, not even in the cellar. By the mere eye, its magnitude can
be but imperfectly comprehended, because only one side can be received
at one time; and said side can only present twelve feet, linear measure.
But then, each other side also is twelve feet long; and the whole
obviously forms a square; and twelve times twelve is one hundred and
forty-four. And so, an adequate conception of the magnitude of this
chimney is only to be got at by a sort of process in the higher
mathematics, by a method somewhat akin to those whereby the surprising
distances of fixed stars are computed.
It need hardly be said, that the walls of my house are entirely free
from fireplaces. These all congregate in the middle--in the one grand
central chimney, upon all four sides of which are hearths--two tiers of
hearths--so that when, in the various chambers, my family and guests are
warming themselves of a cold winter’s night, just before retiring, then,
though at the time they may not be thinking so, all their faces mutually
look towards each other, yea, all their feet point to one centre; and,
when they go to sleep in their beds, they all sleep round one warm
chimney, like so many Iroquois Indians, in the woods, round their one
heap of embers. And just as the Indians’ fire serves, not only to keep
them comfortable, but also to keep off wolves and other savage monsters,
so my chimney, by its obvious smoke at top, keeps off prowling burglars
from the towns--for what burglar or murderer would dare break into an
abode from whose chimney issues such a continual smoke--betokening that
if the inmates are not stirring, at least fires are, and in case of an
alarm, candles may readily be lighted, to say nothing of muskets.
- title
- Chunk 6