First & Last

To one of London's charity clinics last week went a strong-smelling, matted old man who told the entry clerk that he was 80 years old. In the examining room, an interne ordered the octogenarian to be forthwith soaked and scrubbed. Cried the oldster: "Don't put me in the bath! I've never had a bath! It will kill me!"

Strong nurses stripped him of his clothes, lifted him writhing and shrilling, plumped him into a tub of warm water. He gave a gasp, ceased struggling. His eyelids fell halfway down over his popped eyes. He was dead.

Coroner Edwin Smith was not surprised at the result of the old man's first and last bath. Commented Doctor Smith: "There are some persons who are entire strangers to baths." Cause of death: "reflex syncope" (shock).

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.