for the most part, be avoided, by choosing places, where grown persons should attend, and protect them from danger, while they taught them the practice. I am satisfied, that a knowledge of the art of swimming would be far more useful to the rising generation, than many accomplishments which are at present taught at a very great expense. But until something of this kind is established, I may be permitted to remark, how necessary it is both for health, and safeguard against accident, that every lad, intended either for the sea or land service, should be taught to swim. I would recommend the following rules, to all, who may wish to become expert swimmers.

Throw yourself on on your back, so as to lie quite straight and stiff, suffering yourself to sink until the surface of the water becomes level with your ears. Your body will thus acquire an equilibrium, and so long as you keep yourself lying at your length in this way, you will be enabled to float like a log in the watery element. Some have been saved from shipwreck by these means.

A most extraordinary instance of escape from drowning in this manner, we have an account of in the narrative of Captain Campbell, who sailed from Goa in the year 1782, and was wrecked on the Malabar coast. Captain Campbell relates, that seeing a log of timber floating by the vessel, he left the wreck in the hope of seizing it, to float on the water by its means, but after repeated attempts to take it, a heavy sea snatched it irrecoverably from him, leaving him much bruised by the blows he received from it. The following extract from his narrative is highly interesting, whilst it furnishes a case in point respecting the advantage of floating in the water to save life :

"Death seemed inevitable; and all that occurred to me now to do, was to accelerate it, and get out of its pangs as speedily as possible; for, though I knew how to swim, the tremendous surf rendered swimming useless, and all

B

hope from it would have been ridiculous. I therefore be gan to swallow as much water as possible; yet, still rising by the buoyant principle of the waves to the surface, my former thoughts began to recur; and whether it was that, or natural instinct, which survived the temporary impressions of despair, I know not; but I endeavoured to swim, which I had not done long, when I again discovered the log of wood I had lost, floating near me, and with some difficulty caught it: hardly had it been an instant in my hands, when I lost it again. I had often heard it said in Scotland, that if a man will throw himself flat on his back in the water, lie quite straight and stiff, and suffer himself to sink till the water gets into his ears, he will continue to float. This occurred to me now, and I determined to try the experiment; so I threw myself on my back in the manner I have described, and left myself to the disposal of Providence; nor was it long before I found the truth of the saying-for I floated with hardly an effort, and began for the first time to conceive something like hopes of preservation.

"After lying in this manner, committed to the discretion of the tides, I soon saw the vessel was at a considerable distance behind me. Liveliest hopes began to play about my heart, and joy fluttered with a thousand gay fancies in my mind: I began to form the favourable conclusion, that the tide was carrying me rapidly to land, from the vessel, and that I should soon once more touch terra firma.

"This expectation was a cordial that revived my exhausted spirits: I took courage, and left myself still to the same all-directing Power that had hitherto preserved me, scarcely doubting that I should reach the land. Nor was I mistaken; for, in a short time more, without effort or exertion, and without once turning from off my back, I found myself strike against the sandy beach. Overjoyed to the highest pitch of transport at my provi

dential deliverance, I made a convulsive spring, and ran up a little distance on the shore; but was so weak and worn down by fatigue, and so unable to clear my stomach of the salt water with which it was loaded, that I suddenly grew deadly sick, and apprehended that I had only exchanged one death for another; and in a minute or two fainted away."

In my own experience, I frequently found that I could float for several hours on the water, when tranquil, and I have been so much in the habit of swimming, that I used to indulge myself by floating until I became desirous of sleeping on the water. It is therefore certain, that in cases where life is often endangered great benefit might arise from learning to float, if individuals drowning could preserve that presence of mind which is so necessary in such desperate efforts, Every mean, however, which tends to improve the art of swimming is exceedingly useful, and the improvement of the art has occupied the attention of some very great men, Foremost among the number was the celebrated Dr. Franklin. Many of his remarks are so very singular, that, although, from experience, I am inclined to differ from him with regard to some particulars, yet it may be proper on this subject, to let him speak for himself. The Doctor observes, "When I was a boy, I made two oval pallets, each about ten inches long, and six broad, with a hole for the thumb, in order to retain it fast in the palm of my hand. They much resembled a painter's pallets. In swimming I pushed the edges of these forward, and I struck the water with their flat surfaces as I drew them back. I remember I swam faster by means of these pallets, but they fatigued my wrists. I also fitted to the soles of my feet a kind of sandals; but I was not satisfied with them, because I observed that the stroke is partly given by the inside of the feet and the ancles, and not entirely with the soles of the feet."

"We have here* waistcoats for swimming, which are made of double sail-cloth, with small pieces of cork quilted": in between them."

“I know by experience, that it is a great comfort to a swimmer, who has a considerable distance to go, to turn himself sometimes on his back, and to vary in other respects the means of procuring a progressive motion.

"When he is seized with the cramp in the leg the method of driving it away is to give the parts affected a sudden, vigorous, and violent shock; which he may dỡ in the air as he swims on his back."

"During the great heats of summer there is no danger · in bathing, however warm we may be, in rivers which have been thoroughly warmed by the sun. But to throw one self into cold spring water, when the body has been heated in the sun, is an imprudence which may prove fatal. I once knew an instance of four young men, who having worked at harvest in the heat of the day, with a view of refreshing themselves, plunged into a spring of cold water: two died upon the spot, a third the next morning, and the fourth recovered with great difficulty. A copious draft of cold water, in similar circumstances, is frequently attended with the same effect in North America."+

"The exercise of swimming is one of the most healthy and agreeable in the world. After having swam for an hour or two in the evening, one sleeps coolly the whole night, even during the most ardent heat of summer. Perhaps the pores being cleansed, the insensible perspiration increases and occasions this coolness."

But the Doctor was not aware of the danger that might arise to persons who wear their own hair, particu-. larly if it should be long or bushy. I know not a surer

* In America.

We may add Great Britain and Ireland.

way of catching cold, perhaps a deadly fever, than going to sleep with wet or damp hair. Bathing caps, although they keep the hair from becoming wet, not only prevent one chief purpose of bathing, the ablution of the head; but may in some instances occasion serious disorders by the action of the water operating on all the other parts of the frame, while it is prevented by them from approaching the head. To render evening bathing, which the Doctor so strongly recommends, at all safe, it appears indispensably necessary that the bather should walk a mile or two after he gets out of the water, and take special care that his hair is thoroughly dry before he retires to rest.

"It is certain that much swimming is the means of stopping a diarrhoea, and even of producing a constipation. With respect to those who do not know how to swim, or who are affected with a diarrhoea, at a season which does not permit them to use that exercise, a warm bath, by cleansing and purifying the skin, is found very salutary, and often effects a radical cure. I speak from my own experience, frequently repeated, and that of others to whom I have recommended this."

"As the ordinary method of swimming is reduced to the act of rowing with the arms and legs, and is consequently a laborious and fatiguing operation, when the space of water to be crossed is considerable; there is a method in which a swimmer may pass to great distances with much facility, by means of a sail. This discovery I fortunately made by accident, and in the following

manner:

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"When I was a boy, I amused myself one day with flying a paper kite; and approaching the bank of a pond, which was near a mile broad, I tied the string to a stake, and the kite ascended to a very considerable height above the pond, while I was swimming. In a little time, being desirous of amusing myself with my kite, and enjoying at