The Sun.
London, England, 1865-01-25 00:00:00

THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

Theretent to judge had announced that the Thera
surface was firm, solid, and safe?
would be no tyranny, no interference With the
orlot'
berty of the subject, in that. The law which f ;
railway passengers to alight from a train while
motion, the law which prevents a publican Jolla,
lowing children of tender age to drink at tr:'e, "aro
and the law which regulates the sale of poisonhl een
all interventions in their several degrees beto.
why,
personal right and the public interest.
we repeat, is the protection of the parks, at tnrr
dangerous period of the year, left almost altogeffthe
to the good and excellent efforts of the Royal 1111,,g
mane Society ? 'That society placarded the bae4t
of the Serpentine on Monday with warnings,,.t.%,
the ice was no more that: an inch and a half twend
Yet five hundred people Weye allowed to skate 11,,
slide, wantonly, foolishly, and wickedly, as if in c° -o
tempt of the mercies of Providenese. Can this
way be prevented? The waters ill Keni,Sin,it of
Gardens were similarly thronged, and the ii-is„o,-ing
ten persons were for a considerable time lam" at
upon the doctor's fiat. In the Regent's ril", ts,
Battersea, and at Hampstead, there were azei°,loce
which in all cases, ho matter whether the pools
only knee deep or, as at Hampstead, floating °' ,e
strangulating depths of slime and mud, might. 'le
been fatal. It would be absurd to make hs
Li,
text of a homily against skating. The sport is 30
mirable and healthy. If the performers adopt `'io
necessary precautions it may be of benefit W theecies
many ways. Btit; so many of our amateurs, hesl on
risking the thin ice, ialeur injuries by venturing tile
the very rough and the very smooth alternately be
most perilous error possible. They thin tolaat do
Vwn
fearless they must be violent. They ok re,
either at the ice or at their own feet, and thas
cipitate formidable collisions. They fancy that '1
(1'o';
can imitate the Dutch travelling roll in a
park, and hence a large proportion of the casuapt
which take place. It seems a truism, and /We
seems necessary, to remind young people,
strati e
and intrepid qualities, that, in order to enjoy
they must have the ice to skate over—not a -;t
frost upon the water. In the north of Europe "ers,
common to travel in skates on the gulfs and ri;g
and, with a favourable wind, the men thus J° jor
neying go faster than ordinary ships. Theilrs the
iiiv
moreover, a kind of flight, for they only totte-L,,
ground in the slightest possible of delicate I,at
The Frieslander, as a rule, can run across the 'cep
half the common velocity of a steam-enele' two
1801 two young women, making 30 miles
in
,ace
hours, won a handsome prize at a skating 'sed
instituted by the good burghers of Gottingen ;
as a creditable historian relates, 20 years afterw3"o,
a Lincolnshire man, for a wager of 100 glull s.
skated a mile within two seconds of three
so that we are by no means anxious to disPrB;,it
this favourite English recreation. But even its most
facile practitioners should not be indifferent Tot
dangers they confront. Who needs to be telui,sgs
men with an irritable state of the blood or .--ten(l
should never skate against the wind, or that, stead
of skimming, in the way of bravado, along by')
ice, he should get away from it by the lauln.„'"
m of
ethod of locomotion practicable • but, in sir tilo
all this, tens of thousands need to' be told, and a'
over and over again, and that without much 111;`er
rent effect, that they should never, however ti
suaded, hazard themselves upon ice less than
inches thick. We fancy we hear the bola °„s.
crying "Bogey !" Let us ask them a simple 4.1$
tion—ls all the skating sport of the season vilog,
single human life ? That poor boy who, at StPfro
endeavoured to save his brother, and came 13-Pf
an abyss of ooze and weed, with a mouthful. °l,'t
nnnute4l
10
wretched child's hair between his teeth, min e.J.'
expected to warn, in one way or another, the fog
less fools who fling fruit and money on the crac the
ice, and cruelly and abominably lure them of the
risk of their lives. Is it conceivable that any
fellows who behaved thus on Monday last weIL,OA
parents of families ? They utterly misaPPre#
let us tell them, the uses of the metropolitall ,'it%tioo
The parks are no more designed for the satislt'iljng
of their inane tastes than they are for the lig+iinel
ruffians who 101 l upon their lawns in summer hick
unnoticed by constables, or for the waterfowlt,„'' the
enjoy better protection than is vouchsafed
public. Evelyn and Pepys both record how
before Christmas in St. James's made thew, tiog,
pleasantly of a Dutch winter with its P-5.414
" which is a very pretty art," but neither efrode
" the sliding rabble" which " pretended to I°,l ndills
up of gay flatterers, and incited the boys an'', ',yell
to risk the. breaking of their necks on the 1-1.
pool." Whenever we have a frost, however,
pestered with this nuisance, the abatement of
would be a public benefit.