Page:Complete Works of Count Tolstoy - 18.djvu/428

 recalled it, but experienced the same necessity of beating and destroying which I experienced then. I remember how I wanted to act and how all other considerations than those which were necessary for action had taken flight from my mind. I entered into that condition of the beast or of a man under the influence of physical excitement in time of danger, when a man acts precisely, leisurely, but, at the same time, without losing a minute and with one definite purpose in view.

"The first thing I did was to take off my boots and, remaining in my socks, to walk over to the wall above the divan, where guns and daggers were hanging, and to take down a sharp Damascus dagger which had never been used and which was very sharp. I took it out of the scabbard. The scabbard, I remember, I threw behind the divan, and I remember saying to myself, 'I must find it later, or else it will be lost.' Then I took off my overcoat, which I had kept on all the time, and, stepping softly in my socks, I went there.