my breath gave out with a gasp, my breast felt
like bursting, and my heart beat heavily on my ribs. So I lay supine
upon the water, closed my eyes, and derived a surfeit of joy from
this rest after fatigue.

And, while I was doing that, I suffered a queer thing. Through my
closed lids I saw a yellow atmosphere that was fast whitening. It
seemed to smell very sweet; and the sensation of seeing it and
smelling it was intoxicatingly delightful. It was like an opiate.
What Freedham was doing in the atmosphere I know not, but I saw him,
as one would in a dream. An exquisite sleepiness was entrancing me,
when the cold water rushed in at my ears and mouth, and with an
"Oh!" and a choking, I struggled to the rope. Dizzily, and feeling a
pain in my head and neck, I scrambled out and lay upon the cold
sides of the baths.

"Heavens!" thought I. "That was a close shave. I must have strained
myself and nearly fainted. Why have I got that ass, Freedham, on the
brain?"

At that moment the sound of Jerry Brisket's return caused me to
jump up and dress. I was quite recovered, but tired and depressed.
And, as a result of the curious conditions of the evening, there
seemed to be gathering about me a presentiment of disaster.

When I passed Jerry's door on my way out of the building, I thought
I would like to hear a friendly voice, so I called:

"Good-night, Jerry."

He came to the door in his white sweater and white trousers.

"Good-night, Mr. Ray. Where are you off to now?"

"Well, to tell the truth, I'm off to be walloped."

Jerry was too courteous to seek particulars.

"Oh, bad luck," he said. "Come to the baths this time to-morrow, and
it'll be all over."

"Oh, I don't mind, it, Jerry," I replied. "Good-night"; and, letting
the door swing behind me, I passed out of the baths.

"Good old Jerry," I murmured sentimentally. "By Jove, if I could
only swim like him! Dear--old--Jerry."

An unaccountable melancholy overcame me, as I rambled in this
strain. I sighed: "I think I'm getting too old to be whacked."

And, as I phrased the thought, walking dreamily outside the baths,
the strangest thing of this evening happened. There seemed to be
thrown over me, far more heavily than on that evening up the Fal,
the shadow of my oncoming manhood. And with it came ineffable
longings--longings to live, and to feel; to do, and to be. The vague
wish to avoid the indignity of corporal punishment threw off its
cloak and showed itself to