On an Atlantic liner, when there is a large list of passengers, especially of English passengers, it is difficult to get a convenient hour in the morning at which to take a bath. This being the case, the purser usually takes down the names of applicants and assigns each a particular hour. Your hour may be, say seven o’clock in the morning. The next man comes on at half-past seven, and the third man at eight, and so on. The bedroom steward raps at your door when the proper time arrives, and informs you that the bath is ready. You wrap a dressing-gown or a cloak around you, and go along the silent corridors to the bath-room, coming back, generally before your half hour is up, like a giant refreshed. Plodkins’ bath hour was seven o’clock in the morning. Mine was half-past seven. On the particular morning in question the steward did not call me, and I thought he had forgotten, so I passed along the dark corridor and tried the bath-room door. I found it unbolted, and as everything was quiet inside, I entered. I thought nobody was there, so I shoved the bolt in the door, and went over to see if the water had been turned on. The light was a little dim even at that time of the morning, and I must say I was horror-stricken to see, lying in the bottom of the bath-tub, with his eyes fixed on the ceiling, Plodkins. I am quite willing to admit that I was never so startled in my life. I thought at first Plodkins was dead, notwithstanding his open eyes staring at the ceiling; but he murmured, in a sort of husky far-away whisper, “Thank God,” and then closed his eyes. “What’s the matter, Plodkins?” I said. “Are you ill? What’s the matter with you? Shall I call for help?” There was a feeble negative motion of the head. Then he said, in a whisper, “Is the door bolted?” “Yes,” I answered. After another moment’s pause, I said— “Shall I ring, and get you some whiskey or brandy?” Again he shook his head. “Help me to get up,” he said feebly. He was very much shaken, and I had some trouble in getting him on his feet, and seating him on the one chair in the room. “You had better come to my state-room,” I said; “it is nearer than yours. What has happened to you?” He replied, “I will go in a moment. Wait a minute.” And I waited. “Now,” he continued, when he had apparently pulled himself together a bit, “just turn on the electric light, will you?” I reached up to the peg of the electric light and turned it on. A shudder passed over Plodkins’ frame, but he said nothing. He seemed puzzled, and once more I asked him to let me take him to my stateroom, but he shook his head. “Turn on the water.” I did so. “Turn out the electric light.” I did that also. “Now,” he added, “put your hand in the water and turn on the electric light.”