The Bathing Season 



was health in the waistcoat pocket, a medicine-chest 

 between finger and thumb; the secret had been 

 extracted at last, and nature had given up the ghost 

 as it were of her hidden physic. His eloquence con- 

 jured up in my mind a vision of the rocks beside the 

 Hudson river papered over with acres of advertising 

 posters. But no; by his further conversation I 

 found that I had mentally slandered him; he was 

 not a proprietor of patent medicine; he was a man 

 of education and private means; he belonged to a 

 much higher profession, in fact he was a " jogger " 

 travelling about from place to place " globe- 

 trotting " from capital city to watering-place all 

 over the world in the exercise of his function. I had 

 wondered if his accent was American (petroleum- 

 American), or German, or Italian, or Russian, or 

 what. Now I wondered no longer, for the jogger is 

 cosmopolitan. When he had exhausted his lozenge 

 he told me how many times the screw of the steamer 

 revolved while carrying him across the Pacific from 

 Yokohama to San Francisco. I nearly suggested that 

 it was about equal to the number of times his tongue 

 had vibrated in the last ten minutes. The bathers 

 went over twice more. I was anxious to take note of 

 their bravery, and turned aside, leaning over the iron 

 back of the seat. He went on just the same; a hint 

 was no more to him than a feather bed to an 

 ironclad. 



My rigid silence was of no avail ; so long as my ears 

 were open he did not care. He was a very energetic 

 jogger. However, it occurred to me to try another 

 plan: I turned towards him (he would much rather 

 have had my back) and began to talk in the most 

 strident tones I could command. I pointed out to 

 him that the pier was decked like a vessel, that the 



