Images, memories, and ideas of the strangest description followed one another with extraordinary rapidity and vividness.

First it was the medicine he had poured out for the patient and spilt over the spoon, then the midwife's white hands, then the queer posture of Alexey Alexandrovitch on the floor beside the bed.

"To sleep! To forget!" he said to himself with the serene confidence of a healthy man that if he is tired and sleepy, he will go to sleep at once.

And the same instant his head did begin to feel drowsy and he began to drop off into forgetfulness.

The waves of the sea of unconsciousness had begun to meet over his head, when all at once--it was as though a violent shock of electricity had passed over him.