where. The wonderfully clear water is
cool and exhilarating, but to swim in it is impossible, it is so heavy
from its large percentage of salt. So every one floats, but not at all
as one floats in other waters. We lie upon our backs, of course--at
least we think we do--but our feet are always out of the water, and our
heads straight up, with large straw hats upon them.

They have a way of forming human chains on the water that often startles
one at first. They are made by hooking one's arms close to the shoulder
over the ankles of another person, still another body hooking on to you,
and so on. Then each one will stretch his or her arms out and paddle
backward, and in this way we can go about without much effort, and can
see all the funny things going on around us. As I am rather tall,
second position in a chain is almost always given to me, and my first
acquaintance with masculine toes close to my face came very near being
disastrous. The feet stood straight up, and the toes looked so very
funny, with now and then a twitch back or front, that soon I wanted
to laugh, and the more I tried not to the more hysterical I became. My
shoulders were shaking, and the owner of the toes--a pompous man--began
to suspect that I was laughing and probably at the toes. Still he
continued to twist them around--one under the other--in an astonishing
way, that made them fascinating. The head of the chain--the pompous
man--became ominously silent. At last I said, almost sobbing, "Can't
you see for yourself how funny all those things are in front of us? They
look like wings in their pin-feather stage--only they are on the wrong
side--and I am wondering if the black stockings would make real black
wings--and what some of us would do with them, after all!" After that
there was less pompous dignity and less hysteria, although the toes
continued to wigwag.

It is a sight that repays one to watch, when dozens of these
chains--some long, some short--are paddling about on the blue water that
is often without a ripple. It is impossible to drown, for sink in it you
cannot, but to get the brine in one's nose and throat is dangerous, as
it easily causes strangulation, particularly if the person is at all
nervous. We wear little bits of cotton in our ears to prevent the
water from getting in, for the crust of salt it would leave might cause
intense pain.

Bathing in water so salt makes one both hungry and sleepy, therefore it
is considered quite the