On the floor, in the middle of the room, sat, like a Dalai-Lama, the
insignificant "Self" of the person, quite confounded at his own greatness. He
then imagined he had got into a needle-case full of pointed needles of every
size.

"This is certainly the heart of an old maid," thought he. But he was mistaken.
It was the heart of a young military man; a man, as people said, of talent and
feeling.

In the greatest perplexity, he now came out of the last heart in the row; he
was unable to put his thoughts in order, and fancied that his too lively
imagination had run away with him.

"Good Heavens!" sighed he. "I have surely a disposition to madness--'tis
dreadfully hot here; my blood boils in my veins and my head is burning like a
coal." And he now remembered the important event of the evening before, how
his head had got jammed in between the iron railings of the hospital. "That's
what it is, no doubt," said he. "I must do something in time: under such
circumstances a Russian bath might do me good. I only wish I were already on
the upper bank."*

*In these Russian (vapor) baths the person extends himself on a bank or form,
and as he gets accustomed to the heat, moves to another higher up towards the
ceiling, where, of course, the vapor is warmest. In this manner he ascends
gradually to the highest.


And so there he lay on the uppermost bank in the vapor-bath; but with all his
clothes on, in his boots and galoshes, while the hot drops fell scalding from
the ceiling on his face.