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upon this business in so serious a light, as to give up all hope of
accomplishing my ultimate design, and finally make up my mind to the
necessity of a descent. But this hesitation was only momentary. I
reflected that man is the veriest slave of custom, and that many points
in the routine of his existence are deemed essentially important, which
are only so at all by his having rendered them habitual. It was very
certain that I could not do without sleep; but I might easily bring
myself to feel no inconvenience from being awakened at intervals of an
hour during the whole period of my repose. It would require but five
minutes at most to regenerate the atmosphere in the fullest manner, and
the only real difficulty was to contrive a method of arousing myself
at the proper moment for so doing. But this was a question which, I am
willing to confess, occasioned me no little trouble in its solution. To
be sure, I had heard of the student who, to prevent his falling asleep
over his books, held in one hand a ball of copper, the din of whose
descent into a basin of the same metal on the floor beside his chair,
served effectually to startle him up, if, at any moment, he should
be overcome with drowsiness. My own case, however, was very different
indeed, and left me no room for any similar idea; for I did not wish to
keep awake, but to be aroused from slumber at regular intervals of time.
I at length hit upon the following expedient, which, simple as it may
seem, was hailed by me, at the moment of discovery, as an invention
fully equal to that of the telescope, the steam-engine, or the art of
printing itself.
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