was difficult to establish a practice in medicine without some capital,
else I had remained in London; and, being in need of instant means, I
gladly accepted the offer. But six months were to intervene before the
beginning of my duties--how to fill that time profitably was the
question. I longed to travel, having scarcely been out of England during
my life. Some one suggested the position of surgeon on one of the great
steamers running between England and Australia. The idea of a long sea-
voyage was seductive, for I had been suffering from over-study, though
the position itself was not very distinguished. But in those days I
cared more for pleasing myself than for what might become a newly-made
professor, and I was prepared to say with a renowned Irish dean: "Dignity
and I might be married, for all the relations we are."

I secured the position with humiliating ease and humiliating smallness
of pay. The steamer's name was the 'Fulvia'. It was one of the largest
belonging to the Occidental Company. It carried no emigrants and had a
passenger list of fashionable folk. On the voyage out to Australia the
weather was pleasant, save in the Bay of Biscay; there was no sickness
on board, and there were many opportunities for social gaiety, the
cultivation of pleasant acquaintances, and the encouragement of that
brisk idleness which aids to health. This was really the first holiday
in my life, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. Nothing of unusual interest
occurred on the outward voyage; for one thing, because there were no
unusual people among the passengers; for another, because the vessel
behaved admirably. The same cannot be said of the return voyage: and
with it my story really begins. Misfortune followed us out of Sydney
harbour. We broke a crank-shaft between there and Port Phillip,
Melbourne; a fire in the hold occurred at Adelaide; and at Albany we
buried a passenger who had died of consumption one day out from King
George's Sound. At Colombo, also, we had a misfortune, but it was of a