SWIMMING.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 27 September 1924, Page 10

SWIMMING.

Citizens of Ealing liava protested against Sunday concerts unless Sunday bathing is also permitted. The pre-war custom of merely sponging the ears after attending a recital “wa® never wholly satisfactory.

MAN OVERBOARD

FASHIONS IN SWIMMING

COSTUMES

1 He was a. big, raw-boned fireman, who hailed from the Clyde, as his accent proclaimed, and ‘he had just enough drink in him to make him fractious. And when he was in that mood he was known to lie dangerous. Had he not, in this very port of Lyttelton, only a few months ago, fought two constables, his own countrymen, too, for nearly half an hour before he was finally put under lock and key. So when he announced that lie would not sail with the ship, there was none to contradict him, at least not among liis own ship-mates. A crowd of watersiders on the wharf watched his antics on the deck, as the Koromiko was singled up, and waited in pleasant expectation. They had ' not long to wait,and their patience was. amply rewarded.

As the steamer moved out from the wharf he put 'his determination into effect. Climbing nimbly over the rail, in the lightest of attire—a shirt- and a pair of shoes comprised liis sole adornment—he took a header into the sea. The dive was not exactly a neat oiie. 1(1 commenced well, but by. the time the diver reached the water it had developed into a flop, and that is exactly how he hit the w’ater. The ship Was by this time moving quickly, and there v r as soon some yards between the swimmer and his vessel. Fortunately the Union Co.’s launch was handy, having been assisting the Koromiko aw'ay. With a vigorous stroke that would have done credit to “Boy” Chariton himself, and now under the sobering influence of cold water, the swimmer quickly made for the boat, where he was hauled aboard. Evidently the captain of the Koromiko’ was of tlie opinion that they could scrape along without the errant one, for the ship did not stop, but put straight to- sea, while the man himself was dumped unceremoniously on the wharf by the launch crew. The sight of the son of Scotia standing shivering on the wharf, .struggling with his scanty shirt in' a vain attempt to protect himself from the vulgar gaze of the now uproarious w r atersiders, wdiat time he called aloud to. the Heavens for vengeance, was ludicrous in the extreme. At length, finding the ship would not w r ait for him, he made a sprint for the Wanaka, in the forecastle of wliich he changed from the improvised kilts to the less picturesque, if more serviceable, ‘breeks” an old pair, discarded by a fellow denizen of the stokehold. Later .he was seen to make his w r ay quietly ashore.