observe the laws of
temperance; the consequence was that I returned to Vienna with such a
severe indigestion that in twenty-four hours I was at the point of death.

I made use of the last particle of intelligence left in me by the disease
to save my own life. Campioni, Roquendorf and Sarotin were by my bedside.
M. Sarotin, who felt great friendship for me, had brought a physician,
although I had almost positively declared that I would not see one. That
disciple of Sangrado, thinking that he could allow full sway to the
despotism of science, had sent for a surgeon, and they were going to
bleed me against my will. I was half-dead; I do not know by what strange
inspiration I opened my eyes, and I saw a man, standing lancet in hand
and preparing to open the vein.

"No, no!" I said.

And I languidly withdrew my arm; but the tormentor wishing, as the
physician expressed it, to restore me to life in spite of myself, got
hold of my arm again. I suddenly felt my strength returning. I put my
hand forward, seized one of my pistols, fired, and the ball cut off one
of the locks of his hair. That was enough; everybody ran away, with the
exception of my servant, who did not abandon me, and gave me as much
water as I wanted to drink. On the fourth day I had recovered my usual
good health.

That adventure amused all the idlers of Vienna for several days, and Abbe
Grosse-Tete assured me that if I had killed the poor surgeon, it would
not have gone any further, because all the witnesses present in my room
at the time would have declared that he wanted to use violence to bleed
me, which made it a case of legitimate self-defence. I was likewise told
by several persons that all the physicians in Vienna were of opinion that
if I had been bled I should have been a dead man; but if drinking water
had not saved me, those gentlemen would certainly not have expressed the
same opinion. I felt, however, that I had to be careful, and not to fall
ill in the capital of Austria, for it was likely that I should not have
found a physician without difficulty. At the opera, a great many persons
wished after that to make my acquaintance, and I was looked upon as a man
who had fought, pistol in hand, against death. A miniature-painter named
Morol, who was subject to indigestions and who was at last killed by one,
had taught me his system which was that, to cure those attacks, all that
was necessary was to drink plenty of water and to be patient. He died
b