In commencing to learn, all boys should first learn to swim well on their chests. Since the introduction of the side stroke it will be often found that lads who have barely learned to swim properly at all try to imitate the first-class professionals, and in so doing succeed simply in making themselves ridiculous.
“The great secret of a good stroke,” says Webb, “is to kick out the legs wide; and here let me observe that it is a popular fallacy to imagine that the speed of the swimmer in any way depends upon the resistance of the water against the soles of the feet. I have often heard it observed—‘Oh! that man would make a fine swimmer; he has got such large feet.’ Now, in the movement of the legs the flat of the foot never directly meets the water, except in the case known as ‘treading water.’ The propelling power in swimming is caused by the legs being suddenly brought from a position in which they are placed wide apart into one in which they are close together, like the blades of a pair of scissors. In fact, the mechanical power here brought into play is that of the wedge. For instance, suppose a wedge of ice were suddenly pinched hard between the thumb and finger, it is evident that it would shoot off [pg 260]in the direction opposite to that in which the sharp edge points. Now a wedge of water is forced backwards, and the resistance caused propels the body forward in an opposite direction.” When this point is well considered, the importance of drawing the legs well up will at once become manifest.
Again, too, in dwelling on the stroke (and by “dwelling on the stroke” is meant resting for a few seconds in the water while the body moves forward), care should be taken that the toes are pointed in a direction contrary to that in which the swimmer is going. The movement of the arms is never one in which great difficulty will be found. The two hands should be kept perfectly flat, the palms resting on the water; and at the same time as the swimmer strikes out his legs each hand should be brought slowly round, one to the right and the other to the left, care being taken that the palm of the hand is horizontal. Were the hands to be placed sideways, it is at once evident that the water would offer but little resistance. By keeping the hands in the position named the resistance offered by the water in case of sinking would be very considerable. Should the beginner doubt this, let him enter the water and stoop down, and keeping his hand flat, bring it suddenly downwards in the water; the resistance the water will offer prevents him from doing this with any speed at all. On the other hand, should he strike downwards with his hands sideways, he will find that he can do it as fast almost as he could in the air. Now, in reaching forward with the hands the swimmer should always endeavour to reach as far forward as possible. Let him imagine some small object is placed in the water just out of reach, and let him struggle to reach it; the more he reaches forward the faster he will swim. This is a very important point.
Every boy should in learning to swim be very particular as to the kind of stroke he acquires with his legs. Bear in mind that if once you get into a bad style you will experience ten times the difficulty in altering it into a correct one than you would by commencing to learn to swim afresh; for this reason every one learning to swim should go and watch carefully some first-class swimmer, and note how he moves his legs, and then imitate him as closely as possible.
Diving from a height requires, as Artemus Ward observed when he took the census, experience, like any other business; and just as that worthy gentleman got into difficulties with the two first old maids he met, and whose mouths he attempted to examine, not believing their answers to be correct with regard to age, so many a boy who has witnessed the apparently easy feat of taking a header has come to terrible grief by finding himself come down flat on the water, which he has shortly afterwards left with the appearance of having had a particularly strong mustard poultice on his chest. Now, in diving from a height of, say, six feet, the heels must be thrown well up, the legs should be kept straight and well together, and the two hands brought forward in front of the head, exactly similar to the position that a man takes in making his first attempt at swimming on his chest. The hands act simply as a breakwater, and they should be turned up the moment the water is reached, thus preventing the diver going deep, and also enabling him to dart forward along the surface the moment he reaches the water. A good diver can dive from a height of forty to fifty feet, and yet never go a yard below the surface.
On one occasion, when only fourteen years of age, a boy dived from the top deck of Her Majesty’s ship President, stationed at the West India Docks. The height above water was [pg 261]forty-five feet, and those who witnessed him state that they did not think he went more than two feet below the surface. Neither man nor boy should attempt to dive from such a height. Were they to slip or to fall flat, the probability is that they would be killed on the spot. But should it at any time be necessary to take a dive from a high place, bear in mind that you must not give the same movement to your body as if you were going off from the height of a few feet, otherwise you will turn completely over in the air and come down on your back, which, should the distance be very great, would probably kill you; and if the distance be moderate, you would certainly have the appearance of having had a severe whipping. In diving, and in everything else, it is practice only that will make perfect. Webb dived off the yard-arm of a ship quite thirty feet above the water; but if by chance any one from such a height comes in the least degree flat, he will hurt himself considerably.
DIVING.
Many stories have been told in this work of native divers, but referring merely to their power of remaining under water, and not their diving from a height; and, so far as swimming goes, no black people approach a first-class English swimmer. Three feet of water are sufficient to dive in, but no man in his senses would ever make a dive from any height unless the water was at least five or six feet deep, as if by chance he should come down a little straighter than he intended, he would inevitably dash his brains out, in addition to breaking both his arms against the bottom of the bath or river. Great care, too, should be taken in diving into any open piece of water. Webb mentions a case in which a man was seen to receive a fearful laceration of his skull from diving on to a broken green glass bottle which had been thrown in.
Innumerable are the inventions for assisting the learner of swimming, or for aiding those who cannot swim to float. Foremost in the latter category must be placed what is known as the Boyton dress, an American invention. It is a complete india-rubber suit, and can be inflated at any point desired, the result being that the wearer can lie down, remain in a perpendicular or slanting direction in the water, his body being kept as warm, and if in exertion warmer, than it would be under ordinary circumstances. Captain Paul Boyton crossed the Channel in it without difficulty, floating, paddling, and even sailing (for a sail is part of the gear), meanwhile feeding from the knapsack or receptacle which is a component part of the dress, smoking, and drinking cherry brandy amid the boiling waves. [pg 262]This dress would no doubt enable a shipwrecked person to live for days, and even weeks, in the water. Its expense is not great, but too much for general adoption. It was while wearing this dress, in crossing the Straits of Messina on the 10th of March, 1877, that Captain Boyton met with the adventure illustrated in our plate. We translate from an Italian journal the following account of it:—