Outswim

Last July in Berkeley, California, a 38-year-old man under the influence of alcohol drowned after a 50-year-old man offered to give him his car if the younger man could outswim him in San Francisco Bay....That same month a 45-year-old man drowned off Cabo San Lucas, at the southern tip of Baja California, Mexico, while trying to surf the ten-foot waves caused by Hurricane Juliette....

He was not afraid now; tortoises do not fight unless attacked, and the boy could easily outswim any of the clumsy creatures.

Fish! that didst outswim the flood; Tortoise! whereon earth hath stood; Boar! who with thy tush held'st high The world, that mortals might not die; Lion! who hast giants torn; Dwarf! who laugh'dst a king to scorn; Sole Subduer of the Dreaded!

The general belief was that this lad, through some strange mischance, had also fallen into the river, a belief which was quickly dispelled by another boy, no doubt his playmate, calling out,-- "That's my chum, Tom, and you needn't be afraid of him; he can outswim a duck and a goose and a fish all together; he jumped over to save that little girl, seeing as all you big men was afraid--and you can just bet he'll do it too."

* It scarcely breathes with its one lung (the other shriveled and abortive); it is passive to the sun and shade, and is cold or hot like a stone; yet "it can outclimb the monkey, outswim the fish, outleap the zebra, outwrestle the athlete, and crush the tiger."

Master Frank was two or three years my senior, and before he went to sea, not going to the same school as myself, we got together only during the vacations; when, notwithstanding my prowess, he would fag me desperately at cricket, outswim me on the lake and out-cap me at making Latin verses.