At first glance, you will think that this is a paradox, you have so often heard it said that: "There is nothing so good as sleep"; or: "Sleep is so beneficial"; or: "Sleep is the greatest of restorers"; or: "He who sleeps, dines."—I ask your pardon for this last quotation. I am persuaded that you have never experienced its truth.

To all this I might reply that the best things have their bad side, and that we must never abuse them. But I will content myself with simply giving you some figures; you are aware that there is nothing so convincing as figures.

I take people who go to bed at midnight; many, it is true, go to bed much later; but as there are vast numbers who go to bed earlier, the balance is preserved. You retire at midnight, then, and you get up at eight in the morning; you have slept eight hours, or one-third of your day. Consequently, if you live sixty years, you will have devoted twenty years to sleep. Frankly, doesn't that seem to you too much? Ah! but I can hear you retort:

"But, monsieur, one doesn't sleep all night without waking; I never have eight hours' sleep!"

Very good; I agree. Instead of twenty years, then, I will charge you with only fifteen; is not even that a good deal of time wasted?

"Sleep," says Montaigne, "stifles and suppresses the faculties of our mind."

You will say: "Rest is indispensable to mankind"—and to womankind, too, the ladies are so charming when they are asleep!—That is true; but habit is everything in a man's life; with four hours' sleep a day, or a night, you might be in as robust health as Æsculapius. I love to believe that the god of medicine was in robust health; however, I will not take my oath to it. But, to reach that result, you must get into the habit of not sacrificing more than four hours to oblivion of your surroundings. Now, as you adopt a contrary course, the result is that the more you sleep, the more you feel the need of sleep, which, by deadening your faculties, thickens your blood, deprives you of a part of your normal activity, and sometimes makes your mind indolent—that is to say, if you have one; but I am sure that you have.

Sleep has another great disadvantage; it tends to produce obesity; and you will agree that you do not wish to be obese. That is a burden with no corresponding benefit. In general, nothing ages a man so quickly as a big paunch. Find me a man who desires one; I am inclined to think that you would search in vain. On the other hand, you will find men by the hundred who do their utmost to compress and abolish what stomach they have; to that end, they often employ means which impede their respiration; they wear corsets, like women; there are some who even go so far as to refrain from satisfying their appetites, who do not eat as their stomach demands, always in the fear that that organ will protrude unduly.

Alexander the Great, or the great Alexander—no, I think it better to say Alexander the Great, because he stands by himself, and great Alexanders are very numerous—Alexander the Great often desired, even when he was in bed, to resist the attacks of sleep, for fear that it would make him forget the plans and projects that he had in mind. Perhaps you will ask me why he went to bed, that being the case. He went to bed to rest, but not to sleep. To that end, he caused a large copper basin to be placed on the floor beside his bed; he kept his arm extended over the basin, and held in his hand a big copper ball. If sleep overcame him, his fingers would relax, and naturally the ball would drop and make such a splash when it struck the water that it woke him instantly.

You have the right to do as Alexander the Great did, when you wish to avoid going to sleep; but perhaps you will find it rather tiresome to hold your arm over a basin, with a heavy copper ball in your hand. I admit that one must needs be Alexander the Great, or Alexander Dumas, to do such things.

There are other ways of keeping awake: sleep rarely assails you when you are enjoying yourself; therefore, you need only enjoy yourself, but that is not always so easy as one might think.

A gentleman, whom I will call Dupont, with your permission, and who lived in the pretty little town of Brives-la-Gaillarde, had the unfortunate habit of sleeping too much. He was married, but it seems that that fact did not amuse him enough; there are some men who are capable of hinting that it was more likely to increase his infirmity.

This much is certain: that Madame Dupont herself often said to her husband:

"You sleep a great deal too much, monsieur; it's perfectly ridiculous! You're only forty years old; what in heaven's name will you do when you're fifty? You fall asleep as soon as your head touches the pillow, and don't wake up during the night; in the morning, I can hardly make you open your eyes. You're not a man any longer, you're a marmot. Let me tell you that when I married you I didn't think I was marrying a marmot! But never mind about me; this sleeping all the time will be the death of you; you're getting to be terribly fat, and you'll soon have a stomach like Punchinello."

Monsieur Dupont was impressed by his wife's harangue; perhaps he would not have cared so much about the resemblance to a marmot, but he was not anxious to have a stomach like Punchinello.

He did not hesitate, but went at once to his physician and said to him:

"Doctor, I sleep a great deal too much; my wife complains about it, and I feel myself that it's making me lazy. What must I do to sleep less?"

The doctor, who was very fond of smoking, shook his head and rolled a cigarette, as he asked:

"Do you smoke?"

"Yes, doctor, I smoke all the time; but I fall asleep even when I'm smoking."

"That's a pity! because I was going to advise you to smoke."

"Advise something else."

"Do you take snuff?"

"Yes, doctor; I have a collection of snuffboxes; but I don't take much pleasure in it."

"That's too bad! for I would have advised you to take snuff."

"Try something else."

"Do you play cards?"

"I know all the games, but I don't care for any of them; cards put me to sleep at once."

"So much the worse! I would have advised you to play cards. For, after all, to avoid going to sleep, you must amuse yourself. Have you ever been to Paris?"

"Yes, doctor, twice; but it was a long while ago, when I was in business. It was before my marriage. I have an idea that I rather enjoyed myself in Paris."

"Well, then, go there again; spend a few weeks in Paris; that will wake you up, invigorate you, and amuse you. But be sure to go alone; don't take your wife."

Dupont heartily approved this last injunction; he hastily made the necessary preparations, told his wife of the doctor's prescription, and started; nor did madame seem greatly distressed by his departure. But one does not care much for the society of a marmot, unless one is a marmot also.