SUBJECT TO FITS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 224, 22 September 1938, Page 24

SUBJECT TO FITS.

BUT WENT FOR SWIM. WIFE'S. FULL APPROVAL. ft. -GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT" (special.—By Air Mall.) LONDON, September 3. A "gentleman's agreement" between a man who was subject to epileptic fits and his wife that he should take the risk of bathing in the sea was mentioned at a Portsmouth inquest.

The man, Mr. Ralph James Goslin, 46, a retired auctioneer, of Elphinstone Road, Southsea, had been an epileptic since the war, when he was thrown from a horse during an air raid near Boulogne. So keen was he on swimming that he told his medical adviser he would rather meet death in the sea than be knocked down m the street. On August 9he went for a dip at Southsea, and his body was recovered five days later. "Worth It." Mr. A. H. Hadley, a brother-in-law, said Goslin told him he could not do many things, but as he had been a swimmer for 20 years he thought he might go on for another 20 years. The Coroner: He thought the risk was worth itt Mr. Hadley: Yes; and it was done with the full approval and consent of his wife. It was a "gentleman's agreement." They agreed he should take the chance.

Dr. X. J. Roche said that he had advised Goslin only to bathe among other people so that someone could be near if he had a fit in the water.

Ex-Sergeant Lefevre, manager of the Portsmouth Swimming Club, stated that ho had taken Goslin from the water several times and told him of the danger and inconvenience he caused as they always had to watch him. A verdict of "death from misadventure" wu returned.