ON THE ART OF SWIMMIiS-O. 325 



I have occasionally conversed with many intelligent reasoners 

 on the subject, and must confess that none of the observations 

 I have heard are such as give me satisfaction. By some, it Questions? 

 has been remarked, that the superior degree of sensibility of , ,^, ^'^Jd^ 

 mind in man, compared with brutes, disqualifies him from from terror, or 

 making the proper exertions in a situation of such novelty and habits not bein* 

 alarm ; and others have adverted to the very great difference adapted to 

 between the ordinary habits of quadrupeds and men ; the former *^^"'^'^'"° ' 

 requiring only to perform their usual process of walking when 

 in the water ; whereas a man must adopt an unusual position 

 and actions in order to swim. Neither of these remarks? ap- 

 pear to me to be well founded. A man of the utmost courage 

 •and determination on board a ship, finds those powers of little 

 effect when he is left alone to struggle without skill in the 

 ocean. And though in our artificial method of swimming, (taken Probably Ttoji^ 

 from the frog, and very unlike the methods practised by the "^'^^^'^' 

 Asiatics), a man does act very difierently from his manner of 

 walking when on the land ; yet it will not be pretended that he 

 •would sink, it he were to rely on his ordinary walk, as brutes do 

 upon theirs. Upon various former occasions, I have experienced 

 your readiness to discuss such subjects as your correspondents 

 have pointed out. This subject is not, I am sure, unworthy of Importance of 

 jiotice, since the most valuable lives might perhaps be saved, '^'^ inquiry, 

 merely by knowledge and information respecting an art which, 

 I strongly suspect, has been thought to require much more 

 practice in its acquirement than it really does, or which, per- 

 haps, may be as natural to us as to other animals. 

 I remain, Sir, 

 ^ Your constant reader, 



R. B. 



Qbse>"oations on Stvimming, in Reply to the preceeding Letter. 



W. N. 

 That the practice of swimming is pleasant, healthy, and Great advan- 

 liighly useful, will be admitted by every one. They who can- p^i|c*tice of 

 not swim, are ever ready to deplore their incapacity with all its swimming, 

 serious consequences ; and those who know their own powers, 

 in that element which so often serves to convey us from place 

 to place, must be highly sensible of the ease and comfort such 

 1^ consciousness bestows. I^; is not generally apprehended, that 



the 



