Daily Ohio statesman. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1855-1870, 1867-06-28
The Ru.sian vapor Bsth-NIarl<
szI,Waim,s Experience Thereto.

u
only got over calamitous cold in the
head yesterday, and to-day / felt like the
breaking up of hard winter. had the
blues, and ceaseless drumming and ring
ing in the ears, and deadening oppression
on the brain, and horrible sense OF suffo-
cation. The weather was cold, and the
gases from the villaiuons coal fire were
Sitting. Beside all these little inconven-
fences, my thoughts persi>tently ran on
funerals and suicide. / was in fit frame
OF mint for any desperate enterprise, and
with a reeklessness that even stirred a sort
Of dull admiration within me, resolved to
go5and take bath. In five minutes was
breasting the frosty wind and plonghing
through the soft new snow, and IN fifteen /
stumbled upon the place where they keep
the monster they call the Russian bath.
This was rather more than L bargaiued for.
but I hesitated only moment and went ins
went up stairs in the sly leshs building,
and along carpeted hall. and entered q
large and eupptuepsly furnished and de-
corated drawing room, with pictures hung
round the walls, and general air of conn
fort and luxury visible all about the place
that could not he otherwise than exasper-
atingsto q man in my frame of mind: A
very polite man entered my name in
book, taxed me dollar and q quarter, took
charge of1my watch and portmonaie, gave
me ticket. and turned me over to an att
tendant who conducted me into another
part of the house and gave me neat state-
room whPreins to undress. 5.e5l r.i.s $. i.7u
when came out of there, a fine healthy
young descendant of Adam Il think he
was a descendant of Adam. because he
hadn't anything onsbut fig leaf made of
arag) took me into large apartment that
was as hot as sin, and gave me basin of
cold water to wash my face in, and a cup
of ice water to drink, and then left me.
The place had a latticed floor, and great
plunye- bath in the middle of it, and two
long rows of high, broad marble benches,
running down the eidps-a sort of stair
ways that reached halfway up'to the cell
ing. The room began to fill with steam,
and began to sweat. / oozed drops of
water from every pore as large as marbles
+-.5narbles of the small kind. climbed up
on one bench, and then on the next, and
finally to the third-and the higher went
the hotter it got The fog grew thicker
and thicker, till the gaslights were only
faint blurs In the mist. / could not breathe
throngh0 my nose any more because the
steam was so thick had to inhale it
through my mouth-and If / hadn't had
mouth like ships hatchway must have
suffocated anyhow i was little scared,
thinking about steamboat explosions and
such things, because knew / was carry
ing about sixty pounds of steam to the
square inch, and IF / ever shut down my
throttlevalve for single moment was
d
comfort to me to know that / had such
head OH by this time that If did let go l
would be likely to blow the most of that
bath house over into Jersey somewhere.
At this critical period Adam appeared,
and was uncommon glad to see hlm, not
withstahdingf doomed SO vaguely through
the shrouding mist that I could not swear
that saw him at all. He put me under
cold shower bath and turned deluge loose
Rr,k fclf vf O la mn
e0ii "a marble bench and soaped me and
scrubbed me all over with an implement
that was rough for a brush but soft for a
curry-cemb.r l. got another shower-bath
after this and then the outcast stood me up
and shot me in the back with spray of
hot water that made me face around-well,
quick as you mightsay-and instantly shot
me with spray of Ice water-and when
whirled again | caught a blast of hot air
aboveya spray of hot water below, and a
jet of ice water like thousand needles in
the middle. The operation makes man
getaround as spry as ANYTHING know OF.
But it is exquisite torture. Then this in
shutnan Russian posted me iu a corner and
discharged avolley OF boiling hot and ice
cold streams of water against every part of
my body. To say that this makes a
man frisky is to use language of unspeak-
able tameness. Then was told to jump in
TO the plunge bath. said, with some irony,
that i'll was to go into q furnace next, and
afterwards into an ice chest, and then suf-
fer an earthquake and be struck by light
ming, would prefer to tackle those out
RACES first and get them off my mind, il it
would be al the same to the Russian Bath
Company. But the foreigner said No, and
look. perplexed-d,l licate sarcasm always
perplexes q rfOreigner-and plunged in.
After this, / had to climb up on the marble
benches and sweat and cook again for
fifteen minutes and then Adam came back
and put me through the same old system
gof tortures. again, winding up with Nj
agara of shower bath that must have
washed all my sins away-unless they had
got caktd on me-because felt like re-
generated man moment afterward. Adam
took me into room OF gentler tempera-
rnre ext. and rubbed me with his hands
and kneaded me all over with his knuckles
As II were cough; and sprung all my
joints and tried to pull my limbs out by the
sroots.. Then he brushed me gently all over
with soft brush, and finally sat me up
and scratched and scratched and scratched
my=hPad for ten minutes with his finger
tnails. but / had him there-he never caught
anything.
room and got my valuables, and as the
epolite eeuperinte tendent insisted and insisted
sand dnsisted on my taking drink with
him-be asked me once, any way-I did
take Just a small taste to make him happy,
and went my Nway. u appreciated that
young man, because politeness to stran-
rer Is rare in New York. The sharp win
trv,vind never felt SO bracing or smelled
30 delicious as it did when l went strid1ng