in the morning for fear of being scalded by the fluid that flowed
from the cold-water faucet--our reservoir is entirely unprotected by
shade-trees, and in summer a favorite spot for young Waltons who
like to catch bass already boiled--my neighbors and myself lived on
cracked ice, ice-cream, and destructive cold drinks. I do not myself
mind hot weather in the daytime, but hot nights are killing. I can't
sleep. I toss about for hours, and then, for the sake of variety, I
flop, but sleep cometh not. My debts double, and my income seems to
sizzle away under the influence of a hot, sleepless night; and it
was just here that a certain awful thing saved me from the insanity
which is a certain result of parboiled insomnia.

It was about the 16th of July, which, as I remember reading in an
extra edition of the _Evening Bun_, got out to mention the fact, was
the hottest 16th of July known in thirty-eight years. I had retired
at half-past seven, after dining lightly upon a cold salmon and a
gallon of iced tea--not because I was tired, but because I wanted to
get down to first principles at once, and remove my clothing, and
sort of spread myself over all the territory I could, which is a
thing you can't do in a library, or even in a white-and-gold parlor.
If man were constructed like a machine, as he really ought to be, to
be strictly comfortable--a machine that could be taken apart like an
eight-day clock--I should have taken myself apart, putting one
section of myself on the roof, another part in the spare room,
hanging a third on the clothes-line in the yard, and so on, leaving
my head in the ice-box; but unfortunately we have to keep ourselves
together in this life, hence I did the only thing one can do, and
retired, and incidentally spread myself over some freshly baked
bedclothing. There was some relief from the heat, but not much. I
had been roasting, and while my sensations were somewhat like those