However, this is all incidental—­a mere passing note of gratitude for blessings received—­it has nothing to do with my subject.  My subject is health resorts.  All unhealthy people ought to domicile themselves in Vienna, and use that as a base, making flights from time to time to the outlying resorts, according to need.  A flight to Marienbad to get rid of fat; a flight to Carlsbad to get rid of rheumatism; a flight to Kalteneutgeben to take the water cure and get rid of the rest of the diseases.  It is all so handy.  You can stand in Vienna and toss a biscuit into Kaltenleutgeben, with a twelve-inch gun.  You can run out thither at any time of the day; you go by phenomenally slow trains, and yet inside of an hour you have exchanged the glare and swelter of the city for wooded hills, and shady forest paths, and soft cool airs, and the music of birds, and the repose and the peace of paradise.

And there are plenty of other health resorts at your service and convenient to get at from Vienna; charming places, all of them; Vienna sits in the centre of a beautiful world of mountains with now and then a lake and forests; in fact, no other city is so fortunately situated.

There is an abundance of health resorts, as I have said.  Among them this place—­Hochberghaus.  It stands solitary on the top of a densely wooded mountain, and is a building of great size.  It is called the Appetite Anstallt, and people who have lost their appetites come here to get them restored.  When I arrived I was taken by Professor Haimberger to his consulting-room and questioned: 

‘It is six o’clock.  When did you eat last?’

‘At noon.’

‘What did you eat?’

‘Next to nothing.’

‘What was on the table?’

‘The usual things.’

‘Chops, chickens, vegetables, and so on?’

‘Yes; but don’t mention them—­I can’t bear it.’

‘Are you tired of them?’

‘Oh, utterly.  I wish I might never hear of them again.’

‘The mere sight of food offends you, does it?’

‘More, it revolts me.’

The doctor considered awhile, then got out a long menu and ran his eye slowly down it.

‘I think,’ said he, ’that what you need to eat is—­but here, choose for yourself.’

I glanced at the list, and my stomach threw a hand-spring.  Of all the barbarous lay-outs that were ever contrived, this was the most atrocious.  At the top stood ’tough, underdone, overdue tripe, garnished with garlic;’ half-way down the bill stood ’young cat; old cat; scrambled cat;’ at the bottom stood ’sailor-boots, softened with tallow—­served raw.’  The wide intervals of the bill were packed with dishes calculated to gag a cannibal.  I said: 

’Doctor, it is not fair to joke over so serious a case as mine.  I came here to get an appetite, not to throw away the remnant that’s left.’

He said gravely:  ‘I am not joking; why should I joke?’