Chapter 12 training of thought

But Joachim answered intermittently and vaguely.He took a small thermometer from a red leather case lined with velvet on the table, and put the mercury-filled lower end in his mouth.He holds the watch under the left side of his tongue so that the glass sticks out of his mouth on one side.Then he changed into his room clothes, sandals and a jacket with a lapel like a military uniform, and picked up a typed form and pencil on the table, and a Russian grammar book.He learned Russian because, as he said, he expected it to be of some use to his work.With these in hand, he went to the balcony outside, lay down on the couch, and at the same time threw a camel wool blanket over his feet.

In fact, this is not necessary.For a quarter of an hour, the clouds became thinner and thinner, and the sun shone through the clouds, emitting the hot and dazzling glare of summer.Joachim had to protect his head with a white linen shade attached to the arm of the couch.This hood is small and practical, and can be adjusted to the angle of the sun.Hans Castorp praised this innovation.He wanted to wait to see the result of his cousin's temperature measurement, and at the same time check what was going on around him.He also looked closely at a fur sleeping bag that Joachim used in cold weather, leaning against a corner of the loggia.Then he leaned his elbows on the railing and looked down into the garden.At this time, the public rest room was already full of patients. They stretched their arms and legs and leaned on the back of the chair, some were writing, some were reading, and some were chatting.He only saw part of the room, though, and there were about five chairs in it. "How long will you take your temperature?" asked Hans Castorp, turning around.

Joachim held up seven fingers. "The hour must be up—seven minutes!" Joachim shook his head.After a while, he took out the thermometer from his mouth, looked at it carefully for a while, and said: "Well, time goes very slowly, if you keep your mind on it. I used to measure it four times a day, and I was very happy; because you could see that a minute, or seven minutes, actually meant What are you talking about. Here, the seven days of the week go by with astonishing speed." "You say 'actually,' you can't say 'actually,'" Hans Castorp said against him.He rested his thighs on the railing when he sat, and his eyes were full of red threads. "But when it comes down to it, time isn't 'real'. If it looks long to you, it's long; if it looks short to you, it's short. Whether it's really long or short, no one knows." He is usually not used to talking about philosophy, but now he can't hold back.

Joachim contradicted him. "Not necessarily. We are still counting time. We have clocks and calendars. If a month passes, it will pass for you, for me, and for all of us." "Attention," said Hans Castorp, simply pressing his forefinger to his dull eyes. "So the length of a minute depends entirely on how you feel when you count?" "The length of a minute...it is no more, no less, exactly equal to the time it takes for the second hand of a watch to make one revolution." "However, according to our senses, the length of time required is quite different! Actually... I say, practically..." Hans Castorp repeated, holding his forefinger firmly Nose, make the tip of the nose crooked. "It's a kind of movement, a kind of space movement, isn't it? Wait! It's like saying that we use space to calculate time. But this is the same as we use time to calculate space. Only the unscientific mind That's what people do. From Hamburg to Davos, it takes twenty hours by train. How long does it take on foot? As for thinking in your head, it takes less than a second!"

"Listen," said Joachim, "what do you mean? I take it you want to stay with us?" "Shut up! I'm perfectly clear today. So what's time?" asked Hans Castorp.He twisted his nose aside vigorously, and the tip of his nose suddenly became white and bloodless. "Can you say that? We perceive the existence of space through the senses, that is, sight and touch. Good. But what is our organ of time perception? Can you tell me? Look, you are stumped." Yes. But how can we count something that we don't know enough about to even describe its properties? Let's say time passes. Well, let it pass. But to be able to count it... for a while In order for time to be countable, it must pass evenly, but where is the fact recorded? As far as our consciousness is concerned, it does not, we assume it for convenience. Our unit of measurement is purely a This custom, please allow me..."

"Okay," said Joachim, "my thermometer is now marked four notches higher. Is this also purely a custom? It's because of the five notches that I have to swing here and there, I can't Serve. What a headache! . . . " "Is your body temperature thirty-seven degrees five?" "The temperature has dropped," said Joachim, and entered the temperature on the chart. "It was about thirty-eight degrees last night, and it was caused by your coming to the mountain. All newcomers have a high temperature. But maybe that's a good thing." "I must go now too," said Hans Castorp. "I've got my head full of ideas about time too—a mess, I might almost say. But I don't want to irritate you right now, your temperature is too high. I want to keep it all and we'll talk about it later, maybe After breakfast. When it's breakfast time, you should call me. Now I want to lie down and rest too, thank God, it won't hurt me." So he went through the glass partition to his room, where the little There were also reclining chairs by the table.He picked up the "Ocean Liner" magazine, took out a beautiful, soft, dark red and green plaid poncho from the well-swept room, and lay down.

He also had to put up the sunshade immediately, because the scorching sun was unbearable as soon as he lay down.However, Hans Castorp immediately noticed with pleasure that he was surprisingly comfortable lying down. He had never been in such a comfortable couch as he could remember.The frame was dated in style, but it had a taste, for the chair was obviously new, made of polished terracotta wood.There was matting here, and a soft cotton-like layer over it.In fact, it consists of three thick cushions that extend from the foot end to the backrest.In addition, the round cushions, which are hard yet soft, covered in embroidered linen, are fastened to the chair by a cord, giving an extraordinarily comfortable feeling.Hans Castorp rested with one arm resting on the bare broad armrest, blinking his eyes; he didn't need any more Ocean Liner magazines to entertain him.From the arches of the loggia, the wild, yet sunny landscape was as vivid as a picture.Hans admired the scene carefully, concentrating on it.Suddenly he remembered something, so he broke the silence and asked loudly:

"Isn't there a short lady who served us breakfast just now?" "Hush—" Joachim stopped him. "Keep your voice down. Yes, the little girl has one. How's it going?" "Nothing. We haven't talked about her at all yet." So he was in a daze again.It was ten o'clock when he lay down.An hour has passed.It was an unremarkable hour, neither short nor long.As soon as an hour passed, the house and garden began to sound gongs, coming nearer from afar, and then receding away. "Breakfast," said Joachim.He can be heard getting up. This time Hans Castorp had finished his bed therapy and went into his room to groom himself a little.The cousins ​​met in the hallway and went downstairs together.Hans Castorp says:

"Well, it's delicious to lie on. How on earth are these chairs made? If I could buy them here, I'd like to take one to Hamburg. It's like heaven to lie on. See, are they based on Behrens' design?" Joachim didn't know.Putting the subject aside, they entered the dining room for the second time.There, people were eating again. The dining room glowed white with milk.At each seat was a large glass filled with half a liter of milk. "I don't want to eat," said Hans Castorp, as he sat down again between the seamstress and the Englishwoman, and spread out his napkin, though he was already full from the first breakfast of. "I don't want it," he said, "I can't drink milk at all, God help me, and I don't want any now. Maybe it's stout over there?" he turned to the little girl politely and gently.It's a pity that the stout is not available.But she agreed to get the German place name of Kurmubach, famous for its beer production.Beer, it turned out, was served.It was thick and dark, with a brown foam, and there was no better substitute for stout.Hans Castorp drank greedily from a tall half-liter glass.He ate slices of sausage on toast.The waiter brought oatmeal again, with lots of butter and fruit.He just watched, unable to eat.He also looked at the diners.Everyone began to pay attention to him, especially some people.

His table was already full, except for the chief seat opposite him which remained vacant; he was told that this was the doctor's seat, since the doctor also dined with the sick, as time allowed, and sat at each table in turn, while The chief seat on the table is reserved for doctors.At this time, neither of the two doctors came, and it was said that they were performing an operation.The young man with the moustache came into the dining room again, his head drooped as before, his chin close to his chest, with a sad face, and he said nothing.The thin fair-haired woman sat down again, spooning yogurt as if it was her only food.This time she was seated next to a little, brisk old lady who struck up conversation with the taciturn young man in Russian.The other party just looked at her preoccupied, and nodded frequently instead of answering.Judging from the expression on his face, it seemed that there was something bitter in his mouth.On the other side of the old lady opposite him, sat a young girl, very beautiful, with a radiant face, high breasts, wavy chestnut hair, round brown childlike eyes, and delicate hands. Wear a ruby ​​ring.She laughed a lot and spoke Russian, too, and only Russian.Hans Castorp heard her name: Marussa.He had also inadvertently noticed that Joachim's eyes were downcast and his face was tense when she was talking and laughing.

At this time, Setambrini came in through the side door, raised his mustache and strode towards his seat.His seat was at the bottom of the table, exactly diagonal to where Hans Castorp was sitting.When he sat down, the people at the same table laughed, maybe he said something sharp.Hans Castorp also recognized the members of the Half-Lung Club.Hermine Kleefeldt slipped from the balcony door to the table with dull eyes.She greeted the thick-lipped youth who had previously drawn attention by wearing an inappropriate coat.Lefe, with a face as white as ivory, was sitting next to the fat woman Iltis at a table that was slanted to Hans Castorp's right, and he didn't know anyone at the table. "Your neighbor is over there," Joachim whispered to his cousin, bending over.The couple just passed Hans Castorp to the last table on the right, the "lower Russian table", where a family was already sitting, one of which was an ugly child. Gobble up porridge.The Russian was small and thin, with sunken gray cheeks.He wore a brown leather jacket and heavy felt boots with buckles.His wife was also very petite, she wore little Russian high-heeled leather shoes, and when she walked, she hopped and hopped, and even the feathers on her hat wobbled.Around her neck was a dirty feather boa.Hans Castorp looked at the couple with a stern look which he had never used to look at, and which even he found too cruel; pleasure.His eyes were dull and aggressive at the same time.Just at this moment, the glass door on the left slammed shut as it had earlier the first time, and the glass rattled.Now he wasn't startled as he had been this morning, but just put on a lazy grimace; when he wanted to look back, he felt heavy and it wasn't worth the effort.Therefore, this time, he couldn't figure out who it was that closed the door recklessly. Originally, Hans would never be dazed when he drank beer in the early morning, but today the young man was completely drunk and groggy, as if someone had punched him on the forehead.His eyelids were heavy as lead, and when he tried to chat with the Englishwoman out of politeness, his tongue didn't work, and he even had trouble looking left and right.Besides, the hot and irritating feeling of yesterday came back to his face, his cheeks were swollen with heat, and his breath was short of breath, and his heart was pounding like a hammer wrapped in a cloth.If all this didn't bother him particularly, it was because he had inhaled chloroform several times, it seemed, in his head.This time at breakfast, Dr. Krokowski sat facing him at his table, and he was only vaguely and dreamily aware of his presence, although the doctor had repeatedly stared at him intently.At this moment the young girls—that is, Marusa the young girl and the thin man drinking yogurt—bowed their heads before him humbly and shyly.Needless to say, Hans Castorp was well behaved.He was silent, because his tongue didn't obey, he just waved the knife and fork in a regular manner.When his cousin nodded to him to leave the table, he stood up, bowed impertinently to his tablemate, and followed Joachim out step by step. "When shall we lie down and rest again?" he asked as he left the house. "As far as I'm concerned, that's the best thing going on here. I'd love to lie on that goddam couch again. Shall we go for some more walks?"