And he disputed the point with himself; it might well have been Sabine's hair, only the neck did not seem sufficiently slim.

At that hour of the night he had lost the power of recognition and of action.

In this terrible agony of uncertainty his inside caused him such acute suffering that he pressed against the door in order to calm himself, shivering like a man in rags, as he did so.

Then seeing that despite everything he could not turn his eyes away from the window, his anger changed into a fit of moralizing.

He fancied himself a deputy; he was haranguing an assembly, loudly denouncing debauchery, prophesying national ruin.