is now some seventeen years since we felt it our duty to call the attention of the public to the lamentable disuse into which ; the Art of Swimming had fallen. Since that period great advances have been made in teaching this important accomplishment, which belongs alike to all classes of the community. ' There is hardly a county throughout the 'British isles which has not either rivers or brooks large enough to enable the Art of Swimming to be efficiently and rapidly taught. During the summer months, most distressing accidents are of constant occurrence, and particularly so on large rivers, like the Thames and the Mersey, which on warm days are often crowded with amateur boatmen. Swimming, which is by no means difficult of acquisition, when once mastered, is never afterwards forgotten. Every one must | have observed that a large number of animals transmit themselves from place , to place by swimming; and when taking ; a view of the variety of forms presented i by the locomotive organs of these animals, we perceive that they perform their movements in various ways.

All those animals which constantly, breathe the air—especially man and the i higher orders, must float on the surface j while swimming. They die of suffocation j when water chokes up the air-tubes of the lungs. This is called drowning; and j when persons are found in that condition, the rules of the NATIONAL LIFE-BOAT INSTITUTION for the Restoration of the Apparently Drowned are found in- valuable.

Accordingly, when persons who cannot swim find themselves in deep water, they are usually drowned; and this lamentable result naturally follows the improper use they make of their limbs.

The cause of this misapplication of the limbs by man, when immersed in deep water, is owing to the totally different mode in which the limbs are made use of in walking and running on land, to that in which they should be exercised in water.

Again, sea-water being heavier than that of rivers, is best calculated to support man in swimming; and those persons who are specifically heavier than river- water, may be sustained in a floating position in sea-water.

It may be observed that man, being so nearly of the same specific gravity as water, and air being 1,000 times lighter, a few cubic inches of air in a bag are sufficient to keep up one who cannot swim permanently on its surface. As air retained in a bag cannot in all cases be permanently depended on, the NATIONAL LIFE- BOAT INSTITUTION sanctions only cork- jackets—which each man of the crews of its Life-boats is required to wear before he goes afloat in the boat. These cork- jackets have an average buoyant or sustaining power of 25 Ibs.; in other words they possess sufficient buoyancy to support a man, with his clothes on, under the most , perilous circumstances. i It is somewhat astonishing, not with- t standing the large number of persons I who are annually drowned in our rivers arising from inability to swim, that measures are not enforced by the local authorities to compel watermen and others who let out boats, to keep constantly in f them some such simple method as cork floats for sustaining the body in the. water , if only for a few minutes. i Swimming should form part of the : physical education of our youth of both sexes; not only with a view to cleanliness, but also to the increase of health and strength, as well as to provide a sufficient guard against subsequent accidents.

It is, therefore, with considerable satisfaction that the NATIONAL LIFE-BOAT INSTITUTION observes that, at some places in connection with our large rivers, Public Meetings have recently been held to consider the project of placing thereat large Public Floating Baths for Swimmers.

We are far behind many other countries, as has been well observed by The Daily News, in the matter of public baths; partly, we are inclined to hope, from the fact that the English people use a good deal of cold water at home. But there are millions amongst us who are unacquainted with the morning ' tub' or the shower- bath; and on a summer's day the numbers of men and boys who manage to obtain surreptitious baths by diving into half- hidden pools and creeks in our rivers offer ample testimony to the use that these streams might be turned to, if only the proper facilities were placed on their banks. Then there are thousands amongst us who find in the splashing of a house- bath no tolerable equivalent for the brisk exercise of a good swim, and who look at a river, particularly on a warm July day, with a longing which sometimes is developed into a hatred of those innocent parties of loungers whose presence along the banks renders a plunge impossible.

It is really an odd thing that the opportunities for bathing offered by our large streams have never been turned to their proper use. The smaller of our rivers are used in a happy-go-lucky fashion by swimmers who fancy they have found out a corner where they can exercise their art unperceived, or by crowds of boys whose manifold voices, heard at a long distance, give warning to all wayfarers. But our larger rivers are frequently guarded by a series of boards announcing that the direst penalties of the law will visit the in- cautious lad who strips himself and dashes into the water; so that the English lover of swimming is driven to choose between the police-court and deep water. It is true that, in many quarters, the natural wish on the part of the bather to escape observation has been considered sufficient to keep our rivers secure.

Any one familiar with our larger rivers knows that out of their beds are formed a series of islets, on which tall sedges, | willows, and wild flowers grow abundantly.

i The small channels between these islets and : the mainland are for the most part sheltered by this vegetation; and accordingly, on fine summer days, the swimmers pull up to these creeks, anchor their boats, throw ; their clothes on to the bank, and jump : into the water. This would be all very well but for the fact that a swimmer is sometimes a creature of impulse, and when he is going through some favourite performance—say that of lying on his back, i with one leg in the air and one arm round his head, while he propels himself with | the other arm and leg—he may suddenly i find himself shooting out from the en- trance of the creek into the main stream.

There are generally boats on the stream.

The boats sometimes contain young ladies; and then the alarmed swimmer, discovering his whereabouts, wishes that he had the ; dexterity of a dolphin, and could suddenly i dive and hide his troubled visage in the abyss.

When the Swimming Baths come into ! use, many modifications will be needed in order to suit various requirements; but it will be found that, in the neighbour enclosures, such as those on the Seine and | the Moldau, which are exclusively devoted to the use of the confident swimmer, we ' ought to have a series of private baths, | such as those familiar to the pine— wooden boxes, as it were, let down into [ i! the river, which rushes through them. A '! rope attached to the side gives the victim ' of a first plunge an ample sense of safety, while he enjoys, at the same time that he knows he is in the river, the privacy of a bath-room. It would also be a great boon to timid swimmers, or persons learning to swim, if one of the swimming-baths were ' constructed with a board some five feet below the surface of the river, an arrangement which has been found serviceable in ! the excellently-appointed public baths of Prague. When we come down the Thames from Richmond, however, and get to the neighbourhood of London, the condition , of the water itself becomes an important matter for consideration. The proposal to filter the water of the swimming-bath through sand can only be applied, of ] course, to an enclosed tank; but perhaps the joyous sense of abandonment experienced by the swimmer who plunges into the clear waters of the Seine just under- neath the houses of Paris, may be judiciously bartered, when we come to London, for a half-assured conviction that the water is fairly clean. Fortunately the Thames is becoming purer every year; and when once our towns and villages have been finally coaxed or threatened into carrying their drainage elsewhere, the bathers may then not be much worse off than the swimmer who dips into the Seine under the bridges of Paris. With public baths placed along the banks of a stream, all the unpleasant circumstances connected with furtive and uncomfortable river-bathing disappear; and a series of such buildings would at once contribute to public decency, considerably affect the cleanliness and health of the population, and provide a pleasant and inexpensive means of recreation and amusement.

In each of these baths, too, we hope to find a teacher of swimming established, with a strong clientele of pupils. It ought to be a matter of personal pride with our youths and young men to be able to swim; and if the mere ability to keep afloat for five minutes, or to strike across twenty yards of stream, were more common, we should have far fewer of those fatal accidents which every year mark our boating annals. It is not necessary that a young man should be an expert swimmer; but the simple fact of supporting oneself in the water for a few minutes—an accomplishment which any person in ordinary health can learn by a few hours' practice—often means the rescue from a premature death.

Feats of swimming seldom save lives.

When a man is shipwrecked in mid-ocean, the ability to keep himself afloat for a considerable time certainly multiplies the chance of his being picked up, but the chance is small all through. On the other hand, the NATIONAL LIFE-BOAT INSTITUTION has every year to lament a number of deaths on our coasts which need never have occurred, if the victims of such catastrophes had been able to swim even a dozen or twenty yards.

HINTS TO BATHERS.—The Royal Humane Society has issued the following notice:—Avoid bathing within two hours after a meal, or when exhausted by fatigue or from any other cause; or when the body is cooling after perspiration; or altogether in the open air if, after having been a short time in the water, there is a sense of chilliness with numbness of the hands and feet; but bathe when the body is warm, provided no time is lost in getting into the water. Avoid chilling the body lay sitting or standing undressed on the banks or in boats after having been in the water. Avoid remaining too long in the water; leave the water immediately there is the slightest feeling of chilliness. The vigorous and strong may bathe early in ; the morning on an empty stomach. The young, j and those who are weak, had better bathe two or three hours after a meal; the best time for such is from two to three hours after breakfast. Those who are subject to attacks of giddiness or faintness,- and those who suffer from palpitation and other sense of discomfort at the heart, should not bathe without first consulting their medical adviser.