of heh 
As soon as you draw up your knees you will 
go under, and as soon as your legs have 
delivered their stroke your head will again 
come up. Don’t mind that. Hold your 
breath after each leg-stroke and you won’t 
ship any water. After practicing the stroke 
a while your head will stay on top. Here’s 
the stroke: Draw the knees up to your 
chest, only be sure they are as wide apart as 
possible or the stroke won’t carry. When 
the knees are well back, give a kick or, rather, 
a shove, not with the tips of your toes but 
with the palms of your feet. If you will only 
remember to “kick with your heels’’ your 
foot-stroke will assume correct form of itself. 
To get the right leg-action always spread the 
knees wide when drawing them back for a 
stroke. Practice the complete leg-stroke for 
RECREATION 
with better results. The “swimming in- 
structors” generally teach the breast-stroke 
first, which is most discouraging to the 
pupil and most profitable to the teacher. 
To swim on the back, using both arms 
and legs, simply sweep the arms through the 
water simultaneously with delivering the 
leg-kick, remembering all that has been said 
about arm and leg position. Even if you did 
not know any other but the back-stroke, 
which any one properly taught can learn in 
a lesson or two, you would have more 
benefit from it than from any other stroke. 
Floating will keep you above water for 
hours, and the back-stroke itself is swifter 
than the breast-stroke. You have fair speed 
and can swim against the heaviest sea 
with minimum effort. You can save another 

THE FLOATING POSITION 
Back well straightened, head back and chin up, arms out at sides with palms down. - 
This is the first thing to learn, that the water will float you. 
a while with your arms crossed behind your 
head, folded on your chest, or at the sides, 
and you will notice that the legs propel much 
better than the arms. Most beginners rely 
too much on their arms, though they are 
little good except for steermg and as an 
auxiliary to the leg-stroke, which is the real 
motive power of the body. The finishing 
touch to the leg-stroke consists in bringing 
both legs together forcefully after the stroke. 
In delivering the stroke, the knees, being wide 
apart, force the feet still wider apart as the 
stroke is made, and after the kick the legs 
are like a half-opened pair of scissors. Close 
the “scissors”? and you have the finishing 
touch of the leg-stroke. This little trick, by 
displacing quite a body of water between the 
legs, adds greatly to the momentum of the 
leg-kick and, properly performed, itincreases 
the speed of swimming considerably. 
_ [have taught you to float first to give you 
confidence, to show you that the water will 
and can support you if you only give it a 
chance to. do so. I have taught you.to swim 
first with your arms, then with your legs, 
while floating, since this is the least tiresome 
and most all-around useful stroke, and 
from which you can learn the other strokes 
from drowning by seizing him behind the 
back at the armpits and throwing yourself 
back into the floating position, with his 
back against your stomach and chest. To 
gain the shore, simply employ the leg-stroke. 
Husband your strength and take long, 
smooth strokes. See that your man is 
straightened out full length and that his 
head, like yours, is submerged to the ears. 
THE SIDE STROKE 
From the position of floating fling your- 
self over so that your left side faces the bot- 
tom. Dig in with your right hand as far as 
you can reach in a straight line w.th your 
body. Move up this “oar” hand into 
position, with the palm toward your body 
and close enough to almost touch it. From 
your elbow to your finger-tips the right arm 
is submerged during this stroke, which 
covers generally two-thirds the length of the 
body, starting right below the nose and 
finishing almost over the- knee. While the 
right hand goes forward to make the stroke, 
the left hand is just reaching forward, with 
the palm pointing to the bottom. This 
‘‘reaching”’ of the left arm must be cor- 
rectly done, as all the “floating in motion” 

