BATHING. 



137 



cise of the people that has been more neglected than that 

 of public bathing. 



Everybody knows with what alacrity the cockney '^^takes to 

 the water''"' in summer^ although indeed he can, as a rule, only 

 do so under great difficulties. The pluck that must be re- 

 quired to venture to bathe amid such an assemblage as that in 

 Hyde Park must be of itself considerable, and yet the enor- 

 mous crowds that practise it here show us to what an extent 

 decent cleanly bathing would be taken advantage of by the 

 working population of London. If it were provided it would 

 prove one of the greatest boons that could be conferred on 

 them ; and surely no great good could be so cheaply effected 

 as that of providing proper bathing-places in all our parks 

 and open spaces. The benefit to be got by the regular 

 practice of bathing by our working me a during the summer 

 months could not be equalled by any other exercise or 

 recreation. It is a good of which the advantages have not 

 to be pointed out to the people ; and every one of our parks 

 offers capital positions, in which inexpensive bathing-places 

 might be made. Bathing-places should always be intro- 

 duced in a quiet and somewhat retired part of a park or 

 public garden. They should be surrounded by plantations 

 sufficient to thoroughly conceal the bathing from all but the 

 bathers. They should be made of a convenient depth for swim- 

 ming purposes, and, above all things, should have a clean level 

 bottom ; for a sticky, muddy bottom, such as is likely to occur 

 in some places about London, is very objectionable ; and in 

 making a swimming pond it would not be difficult to provide 

 against this. They should be surrounded by a diversified 

 plantation of trees and shrubs, with the taller growing sub- 

 jects kept somewhat back, and with an inner edge of dense 

 dwarf shrubs. The free-growing and smoke- enduring ever- 

 greens, such as Box and Aucuba, should be extensively 

 used around these bathing-places, which should also have a 

 very wide marginal walk of clean gravel, and long seats in 

 recesses of the shrubbery borders. 



It would be an excellent plan if roomy sheds were also 

 erected near the water''s edge, but slightly thrown back and 

 concealed by vegetation. These might be well utilized in 



