THE GREATEST OF SWIMMERS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXIX, Issue 8237, 15 September 1906, Page 6

THE GREATEST OF SWIMMERS.

No'fewer than twenty two cartoons of "Famous Athletes"are reproduced in thejAugnsc Windsor {Magazine in the original ooioursfrom Vanity Fair many of them full-page size, and as a portrait gallery of f the great men of sport, the series is unique. In the aocompanymg letterpress, rich in anecdote, the chronicler [says:—"lf George was the greatest of runners, Captain Webb was undoubtedly the greatest of our swimmers. He was of an adventurous and restless disposition, and, after leaving the training frigate Conway, went sailoring in many parts of the world. When in a mail steamer coming from America, he jumped overboard in a half-gale after a man who had fallen into the sea, took off his clothes under water, and was not picked up for half an hour. For this he received two medals; and upon this he determined to address himself specially to the art of swimming. Full-blooded, with a free and ready, circulation and a tremendous chest, he was fitted for any task in the water. It was on August 25th, 1874, the year before be was oar toonedin Vanity Fair, that he swam the Channel, after having been twenty-one hours and three-quarters in the water, and having gone over in distance. He was a simple-minded man, indisposed to over-advertise hitrself, and very shy. When he spoke, it was bluntly and honestly." The August Windsor Magazine, which is to hand from Messrs MoLeod and Young, is a splendid holiday nuaiher, containing stories by Anthony Hope, S. R. Crockett, Jack London, P, G. Wodehouse, Fiances Rivers and other favourite novelists, besides many valuable and entertaining articles. An appreciation of "The Art of Mr Marcus Stone, R.A." is aooompafied by seventeen plates fiom his most successful pictures.