Fa. Your companion, Johnson, I think, can swim very well?
Rob. Yes.
Fa. Reflect, then, on the difference betwixt him and you. A boat oversets with you both in a deep stream. You plump at once to the bottom, and infallibly lose your life. He rises like a cork, darts away with the greatest ease, and reaches the side in perfect safety. Both of you, pursued by a bull, come to the side of a river. He jumps in and crosses it. You are drowned if you attempt it, and tossed by the bull if you do not. What an advantage he has over you! Yet you are furnished with exactly the same bodily powers that he is. How is this?
Bob. Because he has been taught, and I have not.
Fa. True, but it is an easy thing to learn, and requires no other instruction than boys can give one another when they bathe together: so that I wonder anybody should neglect to acquire an art at once agreeable and useful. The Romans used to say, by way of proverb, of a blockhead, “He can neither read nor swim.” You may remember how Cesar was saved at Alexandria by throwing himself into the sea, and swimming with one hand, while he held up his commentaries with the other.
Rob. I should like very well to swim, and I have often tried, but I always pop under water, and that daunts me.
Fa. And it is that fear which prevents you from succeeding.
Rob. But is it as natural for man to swim as for other creatures? I have heard that the young of all other animals swim the first time they are thrown into the water.
Fa. They do—they are without fear. In our climate the water is generally cold, and is early made an object of terror. But in the hot countries, where bathing is one of the greatest pleasures, young children swim so early and well, that I should suppose they take to it almost naturally.
Rob. I am resolved to learn, and will ask Johnson to take me with him to the river.