What could I do? I had no book to read. And yet, unless I found
out some method of diverting my mind, I felt certain that I was
in the condition to imagine all sorts of horrors; to rack my
brain with forebodings of every possible and impossible danger;
in short, to pass the night in suffering all conceivable
varieties of nervous terror.
I raised myself on my elbow, and looked about the room--which was
brightened by a lovely moonlight pouring straight through the
window--to see if it contained any pictures or ornaments that I
could at all clearly distinguish. While my eyes wandered from
wall to wall, a remembrance of Le Maistre's delightful little
book, "Voyage autour de ma Chambre," occurred to me. I resolved
to imitate the French author, and find occupation and amusement
enough to relieve the tedium of my wakefulness, by making a
mental inventory of every article of furniture I could see, and
by following up to their sources the multitude of associations
which even a chair, a table, or a wash-hand stand may be made to
call forth.
In the nervous unsettled state of my mind at that moment, I found
it much easier to make my inventory than to make my reflections,
and thereupon soon gave up all hope of thinking in Le Maistre's
fanciful track--or, indeed, of thinking at all. I looked about
the room at the different articles of furniture, and did nothing
more.
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