ting.
Once by daylight Klimov saw the chaplain of the regiment, Father
Alexandr, who was standing before the bed, wearing a stole and with
a prayer-book in his hand. He was muttering something with a grave
face such as Klimov had never seen in him before. The lieutenant
remembered that Father Alexandr used in a friendly way to call all
the Catholic officers "Poles," and wanting to amuse him, he cried:

"Father, Yaroshevitch the Pole has climbed up a pole!"

But Father Alexandr, a light-hearted man who loved a joke, did not
smile, but became graver than ever, and made the sign of the cross
over Klimov. At night-time by turn two shadows came noiselessly in
and out; they were his aunt and sister. His sister's shadow knelt
down and prayed; she bowed down to the ikon, and her grey shadow
on the wall bowed down too, so that two shadows were praying. The
whole time there was a smell of roast meat and the Finn's pipe, but
once Klimov smelt the strong smell of incense. He felt so sick he
could not lie still, and began shouting:

"The incense! Take away the incense!"

There was no answer. He could only hear the subdued singing of the
priest somewhere and some one running upstairs.

When Klimov came to himself there was not a soul in his bedroom.
The morning sun was streaming in at the window through the lower
blind, and a quivering sunbeam, bright and keen as the sword's edge,
was flashing on the glass bottle. He heard the rattle of wheels--
so there was no snow now in the street. The lieutenant looked at
the ray, at the familiar furniture, at the door, and the first thing
he did was to laugh. His chest and stomach heaved with delicious,
happy, tickling laughter. His whole body from head to foot was
overcome by a sensation of infinite happiness and joy in life, such
as the first man must have felt when he was created and first saw
the world. Klimov felt a passionate desire for movement, people,
talk. His body lay a motionless block; only his hands stirred, but
that he hardly noticed, and his whole attention was concentrated
on trifles. He rejoiced in his breathing, in his laughter, rejoiced
in the existence of the water-bottle, the ceiling, the sunshine,
the tape on the curtains. God's world, even in the narrow space of
his bedroom, seemed beautiful, varied, grand. When the doctor made
his appearance, the lieutenant was thinking what a delicious thing
medicine was, how charming and pleasant the doctor was, and how
nice and