ut turning a hair, but he was brought
up by a narrow side street on which he had not counted, not having
anticipated, like cats, a battle on the tiles. It was only some twelve
or fifteen feet across the gap, and the landing on the other side was
a flat roof. Taking it all at a rush he cleared the street
successfully, but the flat roof, black with ages of soot, proved to be
a glass skylight, and he entered a house in a way new even to him. His
falling on a stone floor many feet below accounted for his
"unfortunate accident"! After many months in bed, the man took an
unexpected turn, his back mended, and with only a slight leg paralysis
he was able to return to the outside world. His long suffering and
incarceration in hospital were accepted by the law as his punishment,
and he assured me by all that he held sacred that he intended to
retire into private life. Oddly enough, however, while on another
case, I saw him again in the prisoner's dock and at once went over and
spoke to him.

"Drink this time, Doctor," he said. "I was down on my luck and the
barkeeper went out and left his till open. I climbed over and got the
cash, but there was so little space between the bar and the wall that
with my stiff back I couldn't for the life of me get back. I was
jammed like a stopper in a bottle."

Among many interesting experiences, one especially I shall never
forget. Like the others, it occurred during my service for Sir
Frederick Treves as house-surgeon, and I believe he told the story. A
very badly burned woman had been brought into hospital. Her dress had
somehow got soaked in paraffin and had then taken fire. Her terribly
extensive burns left no hope whatever of her recovery, and only the
conventions of society kept us from giving the poor creature the
relief of euthanasia, or some cup of laudanum negus. But the law was
interested. A magistrate was brought to the bedside and the husband
sent for. The nature of the evidence, the meaning of an oath, the
importance of the poor creature acknowledging that her words were
spoken "in hopeless fear of immediate death," were all duly impressed
upon what remained of her mind. The police then brought in the savage,
degraded-looking husband, and made him stand between two policemen at
the foot of the bed, facing his mangled wife. The magistrate, after
preliminary questions, asked her to make her dying statement as to how
she came by her death. There was a terrible moment of silence. It