“I’ll remember you to everybody,” Hans Castorp responded, “and say you are coming back in five months at the outside. Done me good? If it has done me good to be up here? I should like to think so; some improvement must surely have taken place, even in this short time. I have received a great many new impressions, new in every sense of the word; very stimulating, but a good deal of strain too, physically and mentally. I have not at all the feeling of having really got acclimatized⁠—which would certainly be the first necessary step toward improvement. Maria, thank goodness, is her old self; for several days now, I have been able to get the aroma. But my handkerchief still becomes red from time to time when I use it⁠—and this damned heat in my face, and these idiotic palpitations, I shall apparently have them up to the last minute. No, it seems I can’t talk about being acclimatized⁠—how could I, either, in so short a time? It would take longer than this to overcome the change of atmosphere and adjust oneself perfectly to the unusual conditions, so that a real recovery could begin and I should commence to put on flesh. It is too bad. It was certainly a mistake not to have given myself more time⁠—for of course I could have had it.