But swimming is an entirely different matter. The moment you begin to "paddle your own canoe," lively and--to the lookers-on--mirth-provoking exercises ensue. When you stick your hand under to make a stroke your feet decline to stay anywhere but on top; and when, after an exciting tussle with your refractory pedal extremities, you again get them beneath the surface, your hands fly out with the splash and splutter of a half-dozen flutter wheels. If, on account of your brains being heavier than your heels, you chance to turn a somersault, and your head goes under, your heels will pop up like a pair of frisky, dapper ducks. You cannot keep more than one end of yourself under water at once, but you soon learn how to wrestle with its novelties, and then it becomes a thing of beauty and a joy for any summer day. The water is delightful to the skin, every sensation is exhilarating, and one cannot help feeling in it like a gilded cork adrift in a jewel-rimmed bowl of champagne punch. In the sense of luxurious ease with which it envelops the bather, it is unrivaled on earth. The only approximation to it is in the phosphorescent waters of the Mosquito Indian coast. The water does not freeze until the thermometric mercury tumbles down to eighteen degrees above zero, or fourteen below the ordinary freezing point. It is clear as crystal, with a bottom of snow-white sand, and small objects can be distinctly seen at a depth of twenty feet. There is not a fish or any other living thing in all the 2,500 to 3,000 square miles of beautiful and mysterious waters, except the yearly increasing swarms of summer bathers. Not a shark, or a stingaree, to scare the timid swimmer or floater; not a minnow, or a frog, a tadpole, or a pollywog--nothing that lives, moves, swims, crawls or wiggles. It is the ideal sea-bathing place of the world. CHAPTER VI. THE INVASION OF OKLAHOMA. A History of the Indian Nation--Early Struggles of Oklahoma Boomer--Fight between Home-Seekers and Soldiers--Scenes at the Opening of Oklahoma Proper--A Miserable Night on the Prairie--A Race for Homes--Lawlessness in the Old Indian Territory. Oklahoma, the youngest of our Territories, is in many respects also the most interesting. Many people confound Oklahoma Territory with the Indian Territory, but the two are separate and distinct, the former enjoying Territorial Government, while the latter, unfortunately, is in a very anomalous condition, so far as the making and enforcing of laws is concerned.