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.

"Holloa!" cried he, leaping down. The bathing attendant, on his side, uttered
a loud cry of astonishment when he beheld in the bath, a man completely
dressed.

The other, however, retained sufficient presence of mind to whisper to him,
"'Tis a bet, and I have won it!" But the first thing he did as soon as he got
home, was to have a large blister put on his chest and back to draw out his
madness.

The next morning he had a sore chest and a bleeding back; and, excepting the
fright, that was all that he had gained by the Shoes of Fortune.


V. Metamorphosis of the Copying-Clerk

The watchman, whom we have certainly not forgotten, thought meanwhile of the
galoshes he had found and taken with him to the hospital; he now went to fetch
them; and as neither the lieutenant, nor anybody else in the street, claimed
them as his property, they were delivered over to the police-office.*

*As on the continent, in all law and police practices nothing is verbal, but
any circumstance, however trifling, is reduced to writing, the labor, as well
as the number of papers that thus accumulate, is enormous. In a
police-office, consequently, we find copying-clerks among many other scribes
of various denominations, of which, it seems, our hero was one.


"Why, I declare the Shoes look just like my own," said one of the clerks,
eying the newly-found treasure, whose hidden powers, even he, sharp as he was,
was not able to discover. "One must have more than the eye of a shoemaker to
know one pair from the other," said he, soliloquizing; and putting, at the
same time, the galoshes in search of an owner, beside his own in the corner.

"Here, sir!" said one of the men, who panting brought him a tremendous pile of
papers.

The copying-clerk turned round and spoke awhile with the man about the reports
and legal documents in question; but when he had finished, and his eye fell
again on the Shoes, he was unable to say whether those to the left or those to
the right belonged to him. "At all events it must be those which are wet,"
thought he; but this time, in spite of his cleverness, he guessed quite wrong,
for it was just those of Fortune which played as it were into his hands, or
rather on his feet. And why, I should like to know, are the police never to be
wrong? So he put them on quickly, stuck his papers in his pocket, and took
besides a few under his arm, intending to look them through at home to make
the necessary notes. It was noon; and the weather, that had threatened rain,
began to clear up, while gaily dressed holiday folks filled the streets. "A
little trip to Fredericksburg would do me no great harm," thought he; "for I,
poor beast of burden that I am, have so much to annoy me, that I don't know
what a good appetite is. 'Tis a bitter crust, alas! at which I am condemned to
gnaw!"

Nobody could be more steady or quiet than this young man; we therefore wish
him joy of the excursion with all our heart; and it will certainly be
beneficial for a person who leads so sedentary a life. In the park he met a
friend, one of our young poets, who told him that the following day he should
set out on his long-intended tour.

"So you are going away again!" said the clerk. "You are a very free and happy
being; we others are chained by the leg and held fast to our desk."

"Yes; but it is a chain, friend, which ensures you the blessed bread of
existence," answered the poet. "You need feel no care for the coming morrow:
when you are old, you receive a pension."

"True," said the clerk, shrugging his shoulders; "and yet you are the better
off. To sit at one's ease and poetise--that is a pleasure; everybody has
something agreeable to say to you, and you are always your own master. No,
friend, you should but try what it is to sit from one year's end to the other


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