iryland
at once, and Hiawatha's _cheemaun_ becomes a possible possession. Rowing
is peculiarly graceful and appropriate as a feminine exercise, and any
able-bodied girl can learn to handle one light oar at the first lesson,
and two at the second; this, at least, we demand of our own pupils.

Swimming has also a birdlike charm of motion. The novel element, the
free action, the abated drapery, give a sense of personal contact
with Nature which nothing else so fully bestows. No later triumph of
existence is so fascinating, perhaps, as that in which the boy first
wins his panting way across the deep gulf that severs one green bank
from another, (ten yards, perhaps,) and feels himself thenceforward lord
of the watery world. The Athenian phrase for a man who knew nothing was,
that he could "neither read nor swim." Yet there is a vast amount of
this ignorance; the majority of sailors, it is said, cannot swim a
stroke; and in a late lake disaster, many able-bodied men perished
by drowning, in calm water, only half a mile from shore. At our
watering-places it is rare to see a swimmer venture out more than a rod
or two, though this proceeds partly from the fear of sharks,--as if
sharks of the dangerous order were not far more afraid of the rocks
than the swimmers of being eaten. But the fact of the timidity is
unquestionable; and we were told by a certain clerical frequenter of a
watering-place, himself a robust swimmer, that he had never met but two
companions who would venture boldly out with him, both being ministers,
and one a distinguished Ex-President of Brown University. We place this
fact to the credit of the bodies of our saints.

But space forbids us thus to descant on the details of all active
exercises. Riding may be left to the eulogies of Mr. N.P. Willis, and
cricket to Mr. Lillywhite's "Guide." We will only say, in passing, that
it is pleasant to see the rapid spread of clubs for the latter game,
which a few years since was practised only by a few transplanted
Englishmen and Scotchmen; and it is pleasant also to observe the twin
growth of our indigenous American game of base-ball, whose briskness
and unceasing activity are perhaps more congenial, after all, to our
national character, than the comparative deliberation of cricket.
Football, bating its roughness, is the most glorious of all games to
those whose animal life is sufficiently vigorous to enjoy it. Skating is
just at present the fashion for ladies as well