The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1871-09-02
Letter from, the Seo-Shore.

BY THE SEA, August %, 1871.
DEAR UNION: DO you know anything of the art and
mystery ofseaside bathingS We not Newport Cape
May Long Branch, and do it in less demonstrative
more democratic way not for observation but enjoy
ment We do it not in crowds but in pairs rplets, or
sngly. We do it at early dawn sultry noon, dewy
We do it at ebb ow at high tide at low tide.
And we do it in safety, except occasionally we have no
unmanageable surf undertow no history past &C
cdent dread of future peril. Children may go in
alone. Women almost invariably do, and they may
wade out specially at half tide hundred feet and not
be beyond depth.
Not doing things to be seen we have need to take
thought for raiment don't mean that we initiate
Sandwich Islanders, "and such which it would not be
proper for us to do But we don't have to be got up
gOrgeously. Now and then young girl-fresh from
the rhetoricaly insane descriptions of summer
pondents-who thinks that bathing is mainly the bath
ing dress, astonshes these sands with costume such
as Solomon might have arrayed Mrs Sheba in and GER
tainly has affinity with that the lilies She
puts it on-and rather think it has been in drier
and more secluded atmosphere and where the glass is
generous. She steps upon the beach, conscious, min
ces then prances decaely, and with various pace not
to say grace, approaches the wave that rushes
greet her, shreks and runs back from its overeager
ness and then stands and looks and looks and stands
and shivers, and would you and wouldn't you, and by
and bye gets in ankle Deep and then-but this won't
do. Suffice it to say that if you meet going up the
beach little later, very limp and damp and dripping
and uncanny looking damse all the gores of that
clean gone forever If she isn't fool she learns some
thing; if she is she doesn't battle again.
We who used to it do it out and out. Such buds
such hats They are weather beaten, water soaked,
have seen service, work 1t isn't the figure we
cut upon the beach we care but the fun in the water
and so we have that we do not care if do look like
guys. have seen men well disguised by other liquids
but the disguise emphatic may be had with pure salt
water only. The first requisite for bathing is your
dress Let it be fit not too well fitting. And the next
requisite is BREATH If you man, you want it for
plunge, swim. If you are woman still more you
want it, but you want it for a Shrek. With women
shrieking is nine parts of bathing. Tie up womans
tn and she would never battle The shrek is the
first thing, the second thing, the third thing It's
cr1o arrfht
the sweet well the bitter dressing up themselves
and dressing down Others Though there is something
individual in each, and they run all the way from the
delicate little Shrek of sentiment the squeamish shrek
of make believe modesty to the hearty laugh
ing or the honest Shrek of honest fear. Yet this
shrieking gets to be painfully monotonous shrill
piping of male and female youngsters swels the whole
into chorus more lively than musical. But then its
the way people have and you must take people as they
The next thing about bathing is dressing again The
bathing itself is all right, jolly but the coming out the
towel part, the getting into your things again, the
keeping out of the wet and the making yourself dry
raw closet called bathing house-why that ism just
the fun of it, But then when it is all done and you
emerge into the sun again, you have not only new
elasticity in every nook of lung and brain and body,
but that pquant eXharancy which comes of having
done it, that good boy feeling which possesses and alb
serbs one SO evenly and as sort of moral cosmetic
to add subter beauty to the fresh glow which mantes
your reuvenated face and your unbending FORM
Great is Ocean, and great who get surface
sins washed away in its briny furrows
This little fishing village, stretching along three
beaches, has now over two thousand summer nhab-
tants In front is the sea- behind, fields and woods
and hills and drives of great beauty Eighteen steam
trains day. and horse every half hour connect
with Boston twelve miles away. When will any place
within twelve miles of Baltimore have the like Our
nearest neghbor is Lynn, city of Shoes where two
more thousand pairs are made daily in more than one
establishment, and yet you can't find pair for your
feet Lynn people to think of the soleS far
away Christians do of the souls far off neglect
ing those near at home Its good deal here about
fish, Our fishermen send their fish to Boston, and then
we have to send to Boston for fish, But fish here is
fish, specially ifyou waylay boat just in and order
your chowder out of it. Our bay has been full Of
herring for few days that they had not to SWIM
and the seive boats have been very busy. They are
used for bait for the bigger fish, Before that the macke
rel were here. The way it is is somewhat this The
herring chase in shore the little nameless fish, the
mackere chase in the herring the buesh chase in the
mackerel, and the sharks drive in the blue fish, So
know about how it is and make calculations, and
when it turns up shark there's fuss among the nets
you may be sure. l have seen some fellows on the
beach would not care to meet in the sea.
That we have some driving here you may know,
since three hundred and twenty-five vehicles one un
favorable afternoon passed given point in hour and
half. We get up the greatest sunsets, ranbows
meteorS and auroras here-gratis. j. F. W. W.