At eleven o’clock I went to the Brause-bad.  This is too delightful:  it requires a day or two of practice to enable the patient to enjoy it thoroughly.  The water at Marienberg is all very cold, and one must never stand still for above a few seconds at a time, and must be ever employed in rubbing the parts of the body which are exposed to the silvery element.  The bath is a square room, eight feet by six.  The shower above consists of a treble row of holes, drilled in a metal vessel, about one foot long, and at an elevation of eight feet from the floor.  There is, besides, a lateral gush of water, in bulk about equal to three ordinary pumps, which bathes the middle man.  When I entered the bath, I held my hands over my head, to break the force of the water; and having thus seasoned my knowledge-box, I allowed the water to fall on my back and breast alternately, rubbing most vigorously with both hands:  the allotted time for this aquatic sport is four minutes, but I frequently begged the bademeister to allow me a minute or two more.  At my sortie, the bademeister threw over me the dry sheet, and he and his assistants rubbed me dry to the bone, and left me in full scarlet uniform.  After this bath I took at least three glasses of water, and a most vigorous walk.

One of the least agreeable processes in the water system is being sweated.  Mr. Lane describes his sensations as follows:—­

At five o’clock in walked the executioner who was to initiate me into the sweating process.  There was nothing awful in the commencement.  Two dry blankets were spread upon the mattress, and I was enveloped in them as in the wet sheet, being well and closely tucked in round the neck, and the head raised on two pillows.  Then came my old friend the down bed, and a counterpane.

At first I felt very comfortable, but in ten minutes the irritation of the blanket was disagreeable, and endurance was nly only resource; thought upon other subjects out of the question.  In half-an-hour I wondered when it would begin to act.  At six, in came Bardon to give me water to drink.  Another hour, and I was getting into a state.  I had for ten minutes followed Bardon’s directions by slightly moving my hands and legs, and the profuse perspiration was a relief; besides, I knew that I should be soon fit to be bathed, and what a tenfold treat!  He gave me more water; and in a quarter of an hour he returned, when.  I stepped, in a precious condition, into the cold bath, Bardon using more water on my head and shoulders than usual, more rubbing and spunging, and afterwards more vigorous dry rubbing.  I was more than pink, and hastened to get out and compare notes with Sterling.

By the sweating process, the twenty-eight miles of tubing which exist in the pores of the skin are effectually relieved; and—­in Dr. Wilson’s words—­’you lose a little water, and put yourself in a state to make flesh.’  The sweating process is known at water establishments as the ‘blanket-pack.’