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{
IN the year 1878 I took my degree of Doctor of Medicine of the University of
London, and proceeded to Netley to go through the course prescribed for
surgeons in the army. Having completed my studies there, I was duly attached
to the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers as Assistant Surgeon. The regiment was
stationed in India at the time, and before I could join it, the second Afghan
war had broken out. On landing at Bombay, I learned that my corps had advanced
through the passes, and was already deep in the enemy's country. I followed,
however, with many other officers who were in the same situation as myself,
and succeeded in reaching Candahar in safety, where I found my regiment, and
at once entered upon my new duties. The campaign brought honours and promotion
to many, but for me it had nothing but misfortune and disaster. I was removed
from my brigade and attached to the Berkshires, with whom I served at the
fatal battle of Maiwand. There I was struck on the shoulder by a Jezail
bullet, which shattered the bone and grazed the subclavian artery. I should
have fallen into the hands of the murderous Ghazis had it not been for the
devotion and courage shown by Murray, my orderly, who threw me across a
pack-horse, and succeeded in bringing me safely to the British lines.

Worn with pain, and weak from the prolonged hardships which I had undergone, I
was removed, with a great train of wounded sufferers, to the base hospital at
Peshawar. Here I rallied, and had already improved so far as to be able to
walk about the wards, and even to bask a little upon the verandah, when I was
struck down by enteric fever, that curse of our Indian possessions. For months
my life was despaired of, and when at last I came to myself and became
convalescent, I was so weak and emaciated that a medical board determined that
not a day should be lost in sending me back to England. I was dispatched,
accordingly, in the troopship “Orontes,” and landed a month later on
Portsmouth jetty, with my health irretrievably ruined, but with permission
from a paternal government to spend the next nine months in attempting to
improve it.

I had neither kith nor kin in England, and was therefore as free as air—or as
free as an income of eleven shillings and sixpence a day will permit a man to
be. Under such circumstances, I naturally gravitated to London, that great
cesspool into which all the loungers and idlers of the Empire are irresistibly
drained. There I stayed for some time at a private hotel in the Strand,
leading a comfortless, meaningless existence, and spending such money as I
had, considerably more freely than I ought.  }
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