'When I was about fifteen years of age a steam packet came to Hessle, bringing a number of swimmers from Hull. Soon alter their arrival a lad came running to me and said, "Jack, there's some of those Hull chaps bathing, and they say they can beat thee." I didn't like that; and when I got to them, a young gentleman said, pointing to me, "Here is a lad that shall swim you for what you like." One of them said, "Is he that Ellerthorpe of Hessle?" "No matter who he is," replied the young man, "I'll back him for a sovereign," when one of the young gentlemen called out, "It is Jack Ellerthorpe, I won't have aught to do with him, for he can go as fast feet foremost as I can with my hands foremost, he's a first-rate swimmer." By this time I was stripped, and at once plunged into the river. I crept on my hands and knees on the water, and then swam backwards and forwards with my feet foremost, and not one among them could swim with me. I showed them the "porpoise race," which consisted in disappearing under the water, and then coming "bobbing" up suddenly, at very unlikely spots. I then took a knife and cut my toe-nails in the water. The young gents were greatly delighted, and afterwards they would have matched me to swim anybody, to any distance. And I believe that at that time I could have swam almost any length; for after I had swam two or three miles my spirits seemed to rise, and my strength increased. When other lads seemed thoroughly beaten out, I was coming to my best, and the longer I remained in the water the easier and faster I could swim. [Sidenote: SWIMS TO BARROW.]