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SWIMMING.

(_To the Editor._)

The practice of swimming is so pleasurable, and so conducive to health,
and a knowledge of the art of such evident utility, that it is strange
that in sea-girt England we should possess no treatise on the subject
at all commensurate with its importance. There is a large work on the
subject by Bernardi, a Neapolitan, too voluminous and discursive for
general use; and by being in the Italian language, a sealed book to the
English reader. A translation of this work into German was reviewed
in the 67th number of the _Quarterly Review_; and after the
observations made by the reviewer, it was really to be hoped that
_we_ should before now have possessed some valuable translation
of Bernardi.

Great numbers are deterred from attempting to acquire the art of
swimming by the time which they know must be consumed, under the present
system of learning, before the exercise can be so far learned as to make
it a pleasant recreation.

The substance of Bernardi's practical theory appears to be, the
"adapting the habitual movements of the body on land to its progress in
water;" and it is attested by a commission, appointed by the Neapolitan
Government to investigate Bernardi's system, that "the new method is
sooner learnt than the old, to the extent of advancing a pupil in one
day as far as a month's instruction according to the old plan."

My reason for addressing you is, that the appearance of this
communication, or a remark of your own in your widely diffused
periodical, may possibly meet the eye of some individual willing
and able to clothe Bernardi in an English garb.

M.L.T.

* * * * *

THE SKETCH-BOOK.

* * * * *

THE HON. MRS. NAPIER.

"Let me embrace thee, good old chronicle,
That hast so long walked hand in hand with time."

You ask me for a single reminiscence of the olden time, which may
challenge your sympathy for female suffering, and is as yet unhacknied.
You shall have one.

The recent perusal of a file of old Newspapers has brought it freshly to
memory, and if your sympathy can be excited by the recital of an event
of a private nature, which gave occasion in its time to deep and
heartfelt regret, and occurred towards the close of the revolutionary
war; I will detain you for a few moments by reverting to the year 1780,
and by taking you with me wit