rather simply and frugally and, I might say, sketchily on
rations consisting of one loaf of soldiers' bread, one bottle of mineral
water and a one-pound pot of sour and rancid honey which must have
emanated in the first place from a lot of very morbid, low-minded bees.

However, in those exciting days there were many little moving distractions
about to keep one from brooding o'ermuch on thoughts of lacking provender.
I boast not, but merely utter a verity, when I state that every time I
shook myself I shifted the center of population. Where we had been the
lesser wild life of midcontinental Europe abounded. In the matter of a
distinction which had come to me utterly without solicitation or effort on
my part I have no desire to brag, but in justice to myself--and my
boarders--I must add that at that moment, of all the human beings in
Central Europe, I was the most densely inhabited. My companions scratched
along, doing fairly well, too; but I led the field--I was so much roomier
than any one of them was.

But here aboard this Pullman on this, the dedicatory day of my
self-imposed martyrdom, I could not lose myself as I had on that former
historic occasion in the ardor of chasing the small game of the country.
By four o'clock in the afternoon I could appreciate the sensations of a
conch shell on a parlor whatnot. I had a feeling that if anyone were to
press his ear up against me he would hear a murmuring sound as of distant
sea waves. Yet, mark you, I held bravely out, fighting still the good
fight. This, then, was my dinner, if such it might in truth be called:
Clear soup, a smallish slice of rare roast beef cut shaving thin, gluten
bread sparsely buttered, a cloud of watercress no larger than a man's
hand, another raw apple and a bit of domestic cheese--nothing rich,
nothing exotic, no melting French _fromages_, no creamy Danish pastries.

Only when I reached my demi-tasse, which I took straight, did I permit
myself a touch of luxury. I lit my cigar with a genuine imported Swedish
parlor match.

Followed then the first comforting manifestation, the first gratefully
registered taste of recompense for my privations. I had to speak that
night and in a large hall, too, and I found my voice to be clearer and
stronger than usual, and found, also, that I spoke with much less effort
than usual. I was sure partial fasting during the day was bearing fruits
in the evening, and I was right, as subsequent evening experiences prov