house and home.  In the afternoon the water-drinking goes on as merrily as before, and you may now talk to the ladies if you like; but in the morning you may not approach them, for they are not then dressed for society.  Before dinner some of them are to be seen running about with wet stockings, as if they had been walking through a field of clover, others have wet bandages tied round their heads, and all of them let their hair hang down over their shoulders, and wear a Venus’ girdle round their waists, which last, however, is not visible.  But in the afternoon, as I said, you may talk to them as much as you like, but will most likely get short answers unless you speak to them about their health, and ask them how often they have been packed, and what effect it had on them, for that is the sort of conversation that is most approved of at a water-cure establishment.  After amusing yourself in this way for a little you must have a touche (douche), that is a great rush of ice-cold water—­and that’s a good thing too.  Above all, Charles, you must know that what every one most dislikes, and whatever is most intensely disagreeable is found to be wholesome and good for the constitution.”  “Then you ought to be quite cured of your gout,” said Hawermann, “for of all things in the world cold water was what you always disliked the most.”  “It’s easy to see from that speech that you’ve never been at the water-cure, Charles.  Listen—­this is how the doctor explained the whole thing to me.  That confounded gout is the chief of all diseases—­in other words, it is the source of them all, and it proceeds from the gouty humor which is in the bones, and which simply tears one to pieces with the pain, and this gouty substance comes from the poisonous matter one has swallowed as food—­for example, kuemmel or tobacco—­or as medicine at the apothecary’s.  Now you must understand that any one who has gout must, if he wishes to be cured, be packed in damp sheets, till the water has drawn all the tobacco he has ever smoked, and all the kueimmel he has ever drunk out of his constitution.  First the poisonous matter goes, then the gouty matter, and last of all the gout itself.”  “And has it been so with you?” “No.”  “Why didn’t you remain longer then?  I should have stayed on, and have got rid of it once for all if I had been you.”  “You don’t know what you are talking about, Charles.  No one could stand it, and no one has ever done it all at once. * * * But now let me go on with my description of our daily life.  After the touche you are expected to walk again, and by the time that is finished it has begun to grow dusk.  You may remain out later if you like, and many people do so, both gentlemen and ladies, or you may go into the house and amuse yourself by reading.  I always spent the evening in studying the water-books written by an author named Franck, who is, I understand, at the head of his profession.  These books explain the plan on which the water-doctors proceed, and give reasons for all they do; but it’s