His First Turkish Bath.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXI, Issue XVII, 24 October 1903, Page 7

His First Turkish Bath.

I was now ushered into the “hot room.” where a number of gentlemen were lolling about and perspiring affably and fluently; Being of a timid, shrin <- inw nature, I was somewhat embarrass •>! on entering a room thus rilled with strangers, and the more so as I realised that my costume was too bizarre and striking for one of my willowy proportions (remarks the man who is describing the sensations of his first Turkish bath). So I flung myself with an affectation of easy grace upon a marble divan, but immediately arose therefrom with a vivid blush and a large blister. 1 then sat upon a seething chair until f came to a boil, when I rose up and endeavoured to alleviate my sufferings by restlessly pacing the room. A few towels were scattered about, and as the nimble chamois leaps from crag to crag, so leaped I from towel to towel in my efforts to keep my feet off Ihe red-hot floor.

Having- basked in this room until 1 was quite aglow, I summoned the attendant and told him he could take m ■ out at once or wait yet a little longer and remove me through a hose. I then passed into the ’‘manipulating room,” where I was laid out on an unelastic marble slab like a “found drowned” at the morgue, and was taken in hand by a muscular attendant, who proceeded to manipulate me with great violence. He began upon my chest, upon which lie pressed until he lifted his feet off the lloor and my shoulder-blades made dents in the marble. I mildly asked if it was absolutely necessary that my respiratory organs should thus be flattened, to which he replied with a rich Turkish accent: “Come off, young feller, I know any biz,” and swooped down upon my digestive organs. Manipulation consists of disjointing, dismembering, bruising and rending limb from limb, and may be healthful, but it is not popular with me. This man said he was a pianist also, and that he could manipulate and at the same time strengthen his fingers an! improve his technique, and to illustrate he struck a few resounding chords in the small of my back and then proceeded to interpret Wagner up and down my vertebrae, running scales, twiddling up in the treble and thundering down in the bass, just as if 1 were the keyboard <>f a Steinway grand, an illusion doubtless heightened by the ivory whiteness of my skin. He wound up by playing that grand show-off piece, the “Battle of Prague,” while I joined in with the “Cries of the Wounded.’ It was a fine rendering, no doubt, but next time I am to be played upon I shall ask for a soft andante movement—a Chopin nocturne, say.