* I have stated several times, and I now do so for the lasttime, that by "dancers" I mean waltzers. I hope that mymeaning will not be wilfully misconstrued.
Innocent and healthful recreation forsooth! The grotesque abominations of the old Phallic worship had a basis of clean and wholesome truth, but as the obscene rites of that worship desecrated the principle that inspired them, so do the pranks of the "divine waltz" libel the impulse that stirs its wriggling devotees. The fire that riots in their veins and the motive that actuates their haunches is an honest flame and a decent energy when honestly and decently invoked, but if blood and muscle would be pleased to indulge their impotent raptures in private, the warmer virtues would not be subjected to open caricature, nor the colder to downright outrage.
What do I mean by such insinuations? Nay, then, gentle reader, I will not insinuate, but will boldly state that with the class with which I am now dealing—the dancers par excellence, the modern waltz is not merely "suggestive," as its opponents have hitherto charitably styled it, but an open and shameless gratification of sexual desire and a cooler of burning lust. To lookers-on it is "suggestive" enough, Heaven knows, but to the dancers—that is to say, to the "perfect dancers"—it is an actual realization of a certain physical ecstacy which should at least be indulged in private, and, as some would go so far as to say, under matrimonial restrictions. And this is the secret to which I have alluded. It cannot even beclaimedas private property any longer.
"For shame!" cries the horrified (and non-waltzing) reader; "how can you make such dreadfully false assertions! And who are these 'perfect dancers' you talk so much about? And how cameyouto know their 'secret' as you term it? Surely no woman of even nominal decency would make such a horrible confession, and yet the most immaculate women waltz, and waltz divinely!"
By your leave, I will answer these questions one at a time. Who are these "perfect waltzers?" Of the male sex there are several types, of which I need only mention two.
The first is your lively and handsome young man—a Hercules in brawn and muscle—who exults in his strength and glories in his manhood. Dancing comes naturally to him, as does everything else that requires grace and skill. He is a ruthless hunter to whom all game is fair. The gods have made him beautiful and strong, and the other sex recognize and appreciate the fact. Is it to be expected of Alcibiades that he scorn the Athenian lasses, or of Phaon the Fair that he avoid the damsels of Mytelene? No indeed! it is for the husband and father to take care of the women—hecan take care of himself. Yet even this gay social pirate and his like might take a hint from the poet:
"But ye—who never felt a single thought
For what our morals are to be, or ought;
Who wisely wish the charms you view to reap,
Say—would you make those beauties quite so cheap?"
But this fine animal is by no means the most common or degraded type of ball-room humanity. It would be perhaps better if he were. In his mighty embrace a woman would at least have the satisfaction of knowing that she was dancing with a wholesome creature, however destitute he might be of the finer feelings that go to make up what is called a man.
No, the most common type of the male "perfect dancer" is of a different stamp. This is the blockhead who covers his brains with his boots—to whom dancing is the one serious practical employment of life, and who, it must be confessed, is most diligent and painstaking in his profession. He is chastity's paramour—strong and lusty in the presence of the unattainable, feeble-kneed and trembling in the glance of invitation; in pursuit a god, in possession an incapable—satyr of dalliance, eunuch of opportunity. This creature dances divinely. He has given his mind to dancing, has never got it back, and is the richer for that. He haunts "hops" and balls because his ailing virility finds a feast in the paps and gruels of love there dispensed. It is he to whose contaminating embrace your wi—I mean your neighbor's wife or daughter, dear reader, is oftenest surrendered, to whet his dulled appetite for strong meats of the bagnio—nay to coach him for offences thatmustbe nameless here. She performs her function thoroughly, conscientiously, wholly—merges her identity in his, and lo! the Beast with two Backs!
A pretty picture is it not?—-the Grand Passion Preservative dragged into the blaze of gas to suffer pious indignities at the hand of worshippers who worship not wisely, but too well! The true Phallos set up at a cross-roads to receive the homage of strolling dogs—male and female created he them! Bah! these orgies are the spawn of unmannerly morals. They profane our civilization, and are an indecent assault upon common sense. It is nearly as common as the dance itself, to hear the male participants give free expression, loose tongued, to the lewd emotions, the sensual pleasure, in which they indulge when locked in the embrace of your wives and daughters; if this be true, if by any possibility it can be true, that a lady however innocent in thought is exposed to lecherous comments of this description, then is it not also true thateverywoman possessing a remnant of delicacy, will flee from the dancing-hall as from a pestilence.
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"What! the girl that I love by another embraced!
Another man's arm round my chosen one's waist!
What! touched in the twirl by another man's knee;
And panting recline on another than me!
Sir, she's yours; you have brushed from the grape its soft blue,
From the rose you have shaken the delicate dew;
What you've touched you may take—pretty Waltzer, adieu!"
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et us now consider the female element in this immodesty. Is the woman equally to blame with the man? Is she the unconscious instrument of his lust, or the conscious sharer in it? We shall see.
In the first place, it is absolutely necessary that she shall be able and willing to reciprocate the feelings of her partner before she can graduate as a "divine dancer." Until she can and will do this she is regarded as a "scrub" by the male experts, and no matter what her own opinion of her proficiency may be she will surely not be sought as a companion in thatpiece de résistanceof the ball-room the "after—supper glide."
Horrible as this statement seems, it is the truth and nothing but the truth, and though I could affirm it upon oath from what I have myself heard and seen, I fortunately am able to confirm it by the words of a highly respected minister of the gospel—Mr. W. C. Wilkinson, who some years ago published in book form an article on "The Dance of Modern Society," which originally appeared in one of our American Quarterly Reviews.
This gentleman gives a remark overheard on a railway car, in a conversation that was passing between two young men about their lady acquaintances.
"The horrible concreteness of the fellow's expression," says Mr. Wilkinson, "may give a wholesome recoil from danger to some minds that would be little affected by a speculative statement of the same idea. Said one: I would not give a straw to dance with Miss ————; you can't excite any more passion in her than you can in a stick of wood." Can anything be plainer than this.
"Pure young women of a warmer temperament," the same reverend author subsequently adds, "who innocently abandon themselves to enthusiastic proclamations of their delight in the dance in the presence of gentlemen, should but barely once have a male intuition of themeaningof the involuntary glance that will often shoot across from eye to eye among their auditors. Or should overhear the comments exchanged among them afterwards. For when young men meet after an evening of the dance to talk it over together, it is not points of dress they discuss. Their only demand (in this particular) and it is generally conceded, is that the ladies' dress and shall not needlessly embarrass suggestion."
But here is one of my own experiences in this connection. At a fashionable sociable, I was approached by a friend who had been excelling himself in Terpsichorean feats during the whole evening. This friend was a very handsome man, a magnificent dancer, and of course a great favorite with the ladies. I had been watching him while he waltzed with a young and beautiful lady, also of my acquaintance, and had been filled with wonder at the way he had folded her in his arms—literally fondling her upon his breast, and blending her delicate melting form into his ample embrace in a manner that was marvellous to behold. They had whirled and writhed in a corner for fully ten minutes—the fury of lust in his eyes, the languor of lust in hers—until gradually she seemed to lose her senses entirely, and must have slipped down upon the floor when he finally released her from his embrace had it not been for the support of his arm and shoulder. Now as he came up to me all flushed and triumphant I remarked to him that he evidently enjoyed this thing very much.
"Of course I do," he answered. "Why not?"
"But I should think," said I, not wishing to let him see that I knew anything about the matter from experience, "that your passions would become unduly excited by such extremely close contact with the other sex."
"Excited!" he replied, "of course they do; but not unduly—what else do you suppose I come here for? And don't you know, old fellow," he added in a burst of confidence, "that this waltzing is the grandest thing in the world. While you are whirling one of those charmers—if you do it properly, mind you—you can whisper in her ear things which she would not listen to at any other time. Ah! but she likes it then, and comes closer still, and in response to the pressure of her hand, your arm tightens about her waist, and then"—but here he grew very eloquent at the bare remembrance, and the morals of the printer must be respected.
"But," said I, "I should be afraid to take such liberties with a respectable woman."
"O," he answered, "that's nothing—they like it; but, as I said before, you must know how to do it; there must be no blundering; they wont stand that. The best place to learn to do the thing correctly is in one of those dance-cellars; there you can take right hold of them. The girls there are "posted," you know; and they'll soon "post" you. Let everything go loose. You will soon fall into the step. All else comes natural. I go round amongst them all. Come with me a few nights, I'll soon make a waltzer of you—you will see what there is in it." He still rests under the promise to "show me round" in the interests of the diffusion of useful knowledge; and if he does not trace the authorship of this book to me, and take offence thereat, I will go at some future time. It must indeed be "jolly," as he called it, to possess such consumate skill in an art which makes the wives and daughters of our "best people" the willing instruments of his lechery. Oh yes—Imust learn. This is a supreme accomplishment I cannot afford to be without. It has been said that out of evil comes good, and assuredly "this is an evil born with all its teeth."
"Ah, yes," continued my enthusiastic friend, "it isn't the whirling that makes the waltz, and those who think it is are the poorest dancers. A little judicious handling will make a sylph out of the veriest gawk of a girl that ever attempted the "light' fantastic;" and once manage to initiate one of those stay-at-home young ladies, and I'll warrant you she'll be on hand at every ball she is invited to for the rest of that season. I'll wager, sir, that there isn't a "scrub" in this room who just knows the step but what I can make a dancer of her in fifteen minutes—the dear creatures take to it naturally when they are properly taught. But don't forget to come with me to the 'dives' one of these evenings and I'll show you what there is in it." And this was the estimation in which this man held the ladies of his acquaintance: this is the kind of satyr to the quenching of whose filthy lusts we are to furnish our wives and daughters; this is the manner of Minotaur who must be fed upon comely virgins—may he recognize a Theseus in these pages!
And yet, dear reader, do not imagine that this man was a social ogre of unusual monstrosity. No, indeed, he was, and is, a "very nice young man;" he is, in fact, commonly regarded as a model young man. Nor must you imagine that his partner had a single stain upon her reputation. She is a young lady of the highest respectability; she takes a great interest in Sunday schools, is regular at the communion-table, makes flannel waistcoats for the heathen, and is on all sides allowed to be the greatest catch of the season in the matrimonial market. If she and the young man in question meet in the street, a modest bow on her part, and a respectful lifting of the hat on his, are the only greetings interchanged—he may enjoy her body in the ball-room, but, you see, he is not well enough acquainted with her to take her hand on the street.
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"Where lives the man that hath not tried
How mirth can into folly glide,
And folly into sin!"—Scott.
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he conversation I have given in the last chapter is faithfully reported—it is exact in spirit very nearly so in letter; we may surely believe that the clergyman from whom I have quoted some pages back, was honest in his statements, and I think that there can be no man who has mixed among his sex in the ballroom and not heard similar remarks made. All this is, it seems to me, ample proof of the fact which I set out to demonstrate, namely, that the lechery of the waltz is not confined to the males, but is consciously participated in by the females, and if further evidence be needed, then, I say, take the best of all—watch the dancers at their sport—mark well the faces, the contortions of body and limb, and be convinced against your will. But even over and beyond this, I shall now lay before you a kind of testimony which you will be surprised to find brought to bear on the case.
Shortly after I had determined to publish a protest against the abominations of the waltz, it became plainly apparent to me that I must if possible obtain the views on the subject of some intelligent and well known lady, whose opinion would be received with respect by all the world. With this end in view, I addressed one of the most eminent and renowned women of America. I could not fortell the result of such a step, I certainly did not expect it to be what it is, I hardly dared to hope that she would accede to my request in any shape. But I knew that if she did speak, it would be according to her honest convictions, and I resolved in that event to publish her statement whatever it might be. This lady freely and generously offered me the use of her name, and as this would be of great value to my undertaking, I had originally intended to print it; but upon consideration I have concluded that it would be a poor return for her kindness and self-devotion, to subject her to the fiery ordeal of criticism she would in that case have to endure, and for this reason, and this only, I withhold her name for the present. But I do earnestly assure the reader that if ever the words of a great and good woman deserved respectful attention, it is these:—"You ask me to say what I think about 'round dances.' I am glad of the opportunity to lay my opinion on that subject before the world; though, indeed I scarcely know what I can write which you have not probably already written. I will, however, venture to lay bare a young girl's heart and mind by giving you my own experience in the days when I waltzed.
"In those times I cared little for Polka or Varsovienne, and still less for the old-fashioned 'Money Musk' or 'Virginia Reel,' and wondered what people could find to admire in those 'slow dances.' But in the soft floating of the waltz I found a strange pleasure, rather difficult to intelligibly describe. The mere anticipation fluttered my pulse, and when my partner approached to claim my promised hand for the dance I felt my cheeks glow a little sometimes, and I could not look him in the eyes with the same frank gaiety as heretofore.
"But the climax of my confusion was reached when, folded in his warm embrace, and giddy with the whirl, a strange, sweet thrill would shake me from head to foot, leaving me weak and almost powerless and really almost obliged to depend for support upon the arm which encircled me. If my partner failed from ignorance, lack of skill, or innocence, to arouse these, to me, most pleasurable sensations, I did not dance with him the second time.
"I am speaking openly and frankly, and when I say that I did not understand what I felt, or what were the real and greatest pleasures I derived from this so-called dancing, I expect to be believed. But if my cheeks grew red with uncomprehended pleasure then, they grow pale with shame to-day when I think of it all. It was the physical emotions engendered by the magnetic contact of strong men that I was enamoured of—not of the dance, nor even of the men themselves.
"Thus I became abnormally developed in my lowest nature. I grew bolder, and from being able to return shy glances at first, was soon able to meet more daring ones, until the waltz became to me and whomsoever danced with me, one lingering, sweet, and purely sensual pleasure, where heart beat against heart, hand was held in hand, and eyes looked burning words which lips dared not speak.
"All this while no one said to me: you do wrong; so I dreamed of sweet words whispered during the dance, and often felt while alone a thrill of joy indescribable yet overpowering when my mind would turn from my studies to remember a piece of temerity of unusual grandeur on the part of one or another of my cavaliers.
"Girls talk to each other. I was still a school girl although mixing so much with the world. We talked together. We read romances that fed our romantic passions on seasoned food, and none but ourselves knew what subjects we discussed. Had our parents heard us they would have considered us on the high road to ruin.
"Yet we had been taught that it was right to dance; our parents did it, our friends did, and we were permitted. I will say also that all the girls with whom I associated, with the exception of one, had much the same experience in dancing; felt the same strangely sweet emotions, and felt that almost imperative necessity for a closer communion than that which even the freedom of a waltz permits, without knowing exactly why, or even comprehending what.
"Married now, with home and children around me, I can at least thank God for the experience which will assuredly be the means of preventing my little daughters from indulging in any such dangerous pleasure. But, if a young girl, pure and innocent in the beginning, can be brought to feel what I have confessed to have felt, what must be the experience of a married woman?Sheknows what every glance of the eye, every bend of the head, every close clasp means, and knowing that reciprocates it and is led by swifter steps and a surer path down the dangerous, dishonorable road.
"I doubt if my experience will be of much service, but it is the candid truth, from a woman who, in the cause of all the young girls who may be contaminated, desires to show just to what extent a young mind may be defiled by the injurious effects of round dances. I have not hesitated to lay bare what are a young girl's most secret thoughts, in the hope that people will stop and consider, at least before handing their lillies of purity over to the arms of any one who may choose to blow the frosty breath of dishonor on their petals."
And this is the experience of a woman of unusual strength of character—one whose intellect has gained her a worldwide celebrity and earned for her the respect and attention of multitudes wherever the English language is spoken. What hope is there then for ordinary women to escape from this mental and physical contamination? which
"Turns—if nothing else—at least our heads."
None whatever.
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"Il fault bien dire que la danse est quasi le comble de tous vices * * * * c'est le commencement d'une ordure, laquelle je ne veux declarer. Pour en parler rondement, il m'est advis que c'est une maniéré de tout villaine et barbare * * * A quoy servent tant de saults que font ces filles, soustenues des compagnons par soubs les bras; à fin de regimber plus hault? Quel plaisir prennent ces sauterelles à se tormenter ainsi et demener la pluspart des nuicts sans se soûler ou lasser de la danse?"L. Vives.
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any will say—have said—Byron wrote against the waltz because a physical infirmity prevented him from waltzing—that he is not a proper person to quote as an example for others to follow. It must be conceded that whatever his motive was, hewell knewwhat he was writing about, and whatever his practices may have been in other respects, it is to his credit that his sense of the proprieties of life were not so blunted as to render him blind to this cause of gross public licentiousness.
But, unlike Byron, I have, as has been stated before,practical experience, and positive knowledgein the matter whereof I speak, and am possessed of the most convincing assurances that my utterances will be received with joy by thousands of husbands and fathers whose views have been down-trodden—their sentiments disregarded, and their notions of morality held up to scorn because they disapprove of this "innocent amusement."
It has also been before said that this vice was "seemingly tolerated by all," but I am proud to say that the placard posted about the streets announcing a
"Sunday School Festival—dancing
TO COMMENCE AT NINE O'CLOCK"
does not reflect the sentiments of the entire community; that in all the marts of business, in every avenue of trade, in counting-house and in work-shop, men are to be found who would shrink with horror from exposing their wives and daughters to the allurements of the dance-hall—men who form a striking contrast to those simpering simpletons who sympathize with their feelings, but have not the courage to maintain the family honor by enforcing their views in the domestic circle.
It is only a few years since theFrankfort Journalannounced that the authorities had decided, in the interest of good morals, that in future dancing-masters should not teach their art to children who had not yet been confirmed. The teaching of dancing in boarding-houses and hotels was also forbidden. It is not desirable that the law should interfere with purely domestic affairs, but really it seems as if those unfortunate parents and husbands who shudder at the evil but are awed into silence by ridicule or open rebellion, stand in as urgent need of the law's assistance as the Magdeburg godfathers and godmothers.
I well know that many young ladies profess entire innocence of any impure emotions during all this "palming work."
To them let me say: If you are so sluggish in your sensibilities as this would imply, then you are not fit subjects for the endearments of married life, and can give but poor promise of securing your husband's affection. But if on the other hand (as in most cases is true) you experience the true bliss of this intoxication, then indeed will the ground of your emotions be pretty well worked over before you reach the hymeneal altar, and the nuptial couch will have but little to offer for your consideration with which you are not already familiar.
A friend at my elbow remarks. "I agree with you perfectly, but my wife likes these dances,—sees no harm in them, and her concluding and unanswerable argument is, that if I danced them, I should like them just as well as she does." The truth of this latter statement depends upon your moral perceptions. There is but one answer to the former, given by "Othello,"
"This is the curse of Marriage:
We call these delicate creatures ours—
But not their appetites."
If you are so lax in your attention—so deficient in those qualities which go to make a woman happy—that she seeks the embrace of other men to supply the more than half acknowledged need—if this be true, my friend, I leave the matter with you—it belongs to another class of subjects, treated of by Doctor Acton of London—-I refer you to his able works.
Another says: Both my wife and I enjoy these dances. We see no particular harm in them—"to the pure all things are pure." The very same thing may be said by thehabituésof other haunts of infamy—
''Vice is a monster of so frightful mien,
As, to be hated, needs but to be seen;
Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,
We first endure, then pity, then embrace."
There is, again, a very large class of dancers who frankly allow that there is immorality in the modern waltz, but insist that this immorality need not be, and by them is not, practised. They dance—but very properly, you know. These are the Pharisees who beat their breasts in public places, crying fie! upon their neighbors, and bravo! upon themselves.
Of course, they will tell you, there are persons who are excited impurely by the waltz, but these are persons who would be immoral under any circumstances. "To the pure all things are pure." It is astonishing how apt they are with these tongue-worn aphorisms. To the pure all things are pure,—yes, but purity is only a relative virtue whose value is fixed by the moral standard of the individual. What would be pure to some would be grossly impure to others, and when you place your wife or daughter in the arms of such salacious gentry as have been described in the foregoing pages are you not pretty much in the position of the gentleman who when gravely informed by a guest who was taking an unaccountably hasty leave that his (the host's) wife had lewdly entreated him, replied: "But, my friend, that is nothing; your wife did as much for me when I visited you last year." This gentleman, remember, was also ready to add: "to the pure all things are pure." The Waltz should assuredly have figured among the "pure impurities" of Petronius.
But even if itbeallowed that a lady can waltz virtuously, I have already shown that in that case she must not dancewell. And what a pitiful spectacle, surely, is that of a lady trying "how not to do it"—converting her natural grace into clumsiness in order that she may do an indecent thing decently, and remain
"Warm but not wanton; dazzled, but not blind."
But perhaps shecannotwaltz. In that case how long will it take her to learn? Will not one single dance lower her standard of purity if her partner happens to be one of the adepts I have described?
"But," cries the fair dancer "you must remember that no lady will permit herself to be introduced to, or accept as a partner, any but a gentleman, who she is sure will treat her with becoming respect."
I will not stop to inquire what her definition of a "gentleman" is—-whether the most courteous and urbane of men may not be a most desperate roué at heart. The attitude and contact are the same in any case, and if it needs must be that a husband is to see his wife folded in the close embrace of another man, is it any consolation for him to know that her partner is eligible as a rival in other respects than his nimble feet—that he who is brushing the bloom from his peach is at least his equal? Can you stop to consider the intellectual accomplishments and social status of the man who has invaded the sacred domain of your wife's chamber? No—equally unimportant is it to you, who or what he may be—that has thus exercised a privilege reserved by all pure-minded women for their husbands alone.
But in this matter of the selection of the fittest the ladies have set up a man of straw, which I must proceed to demolish. In order that the lawless contact may be impartially distributed, and that no lady may be free to choose whose sexual magnetism she shall absorb, we have imported from across the water a foreign variety of the abomination, by which ingenious contrivance the color of the ribbon a lady chances to hold determines who shall have the use of her body in the waltz, and places her in the pitiable predicament of the "poore bryde" at ancient French weddings, who, as we read in Christen, "State of Matrimony," must "kepe foote with all dancers, and refuse none, how scabbed, foule, droncken, rude, and shameless soever he be."
Nor are even the square dances any longer left as a refuge for the more modest, for to such a pitch has the passion for this public sexual intimacy come, that the waltz is now inseparably wedded to the quadrille. Even the old fogies are sometimes trapped by this device. A quadrille is called and they take their places feeling quite safe. "First couple forward!" "Cross over!" "Change partners!" "Waltz up and down the centre!" "Change over!" "All hands waltz round the outside!" and before they know it their sedate notions are lost in the "waltz quadrille." It may be said that every arrangement of the dance looks to an "equitable" distribution of each lady's favors. It is a recognized fact that a lady dancing repeatedly with the same gentleman shows a marked preference thereby—and he is deemed rude and selfish who attempts to monoplize his affianced, or shows reluctance in resigning her to the arms of another.
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"Transformed all wives to Dalilahs,
Whose husbands were not for the cause;
And turned the men to ten-horn'd cattle,
Because they went not out to battle."
Samuel Butler.
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one time ago a lady friend said to me: "How is it that while so many of you gentlemen are fond of dancing until you are married, yet from that moment few of you can be induced to dance any more. In fact it is a fraud perpetrated upon young ladies; you fall in love with them in the ball room, you court them there, you marry them there, and they naturally think you will continue to take them there. But no—thenceforth they must stay at home, or if you induced to go occasionally, you are as cross and ill-natured about it as possible; as though it was something dreadful. If the dancing-hall is good enough to get a wife in, is it not good enough to take a wife to?"
My dear lady, said I, you have stated the case with a fairness not often met with in an opponent. There can be no stronger evidence (none other is required) to establish the sexualism of the popular dance than that which you have just cited. The privileges of matrimony relieve the necessity for the dance. Theloveris compelled to share that which thehusbandconsiders all his own. Those who, while single, were most deeply versed in the mysteries and pleasures of the waltz are, when married, the first to proclaim their abhorrence of it, too often, it is true, in a mild and impotent protest, but not always.
Is the reader acquainted with Boyesen's novel called "Gunnar?" If so he will remember that Ragnhild was to wed Lars under the pressure of parental authority. She preferred, however, the valiant, dancing Gunnar. "Ha! ha! ha!" cried he, "strike up a tune and that a right lusty one!" The music struck up, he swung upon his heel, caught the girl who stood nearest him round the waist; and whirled away with her. Suddenly he stopped and gazed right into her face, and who should it be but Ragnhild. She begged and tried to release herself from his arm, but he lifted her from the floor, made another leap, and danced away, so that the floor shook under them."
"Gunnar, Gunnar," whispered she, "please, Gunnar, let me go"—he heard nothing. "Gunnar," begged she again, now already half surrendering, "only think what mother would say if she were here." But now she began to feel the spell of the dance. The walls, the roof, and the people began to whirl round her in a strange, bewildering circle; at one moment the music seemed to be winging its way to her from an unfathomable depth in an inconceivable, measureless distance, and in the next it was roaring and booming in her ears with the rush and din of an infinite cataract of tone. Unconsciously her feet moved to its measure, her heart beat to it,and she forgot her scruples, her fear, and everything buthimin the bliss of the dance.
Gunnar knew how to tread the springing dance, and no one would deny him the rank of the first dancer in the valley, so, it was a dance worth seeing, and of the girls, there was scarcely one who did not wish herself in the happy Ragnhild's place"—(of course they did.) After the music had ceased, it was some time before Ragnhild fully recovered her senses—(quite likely); she still clung fast to Gunnar's arm, the floor seemed to be heaving and sinking under her—(quite common in such cases), and the space was filled with a vague, distant hum." (Why not?)
Later, the gleaming knife in the hands of Lars, showed that he but too plainly understood the nature of the performance in which his future wife had been engaged. And the sequel well attests, that his happiness did not increase with his knowledge. Even the vigor of a Norwegian climate was not sufficient to cool his fury. What a promising field for future operations must sunnier climes present for such enterprising young gentlemen.
Follow the subject a little further and it will be seen that Ragnhild lost more than her head in the bewildering whirl. Now let me ask any father or mother (or husband if you will),—any man possessing a grain of common sense, if Ragnhild was in a safe condition to be shown by Gunnar, to one of our commodious carriages and driven to her home (perhaps miles away) at three o'clock in the morning?
"Lead us not into temptation."
Yet this is done—is permitted by very many of our so-called "prudent parents" and while they are crying out about "social evils," are doing all in their power to furnish recruits for the great army of the infamous.
Deliver us from evil."
There are two types of married ladies who practise, and of course enjoy, the waltz, and lest either might discover the portrait of the other and take offence that her own lovely face was not used to adorn these pages, each shall have a separate notice. They will probably have already recognized portraits of themselves in this volume, but the object here is more particularly to distinguish between the two.
The first of these we may safely call semi-respectable—she is so partly from necessity, partly from choice—from choice because she regards it as the "proper thing" that her husband should dance attendance while she dances something else, during the performance of which, the poet tells us,
"The fair one's breast
Gives all it can and bids us take the rest."
She has not yet quite reached that stage of shamelessness when she can carouse the entire night without some lingering regard for what Mrs. Grundy will say; besides this, she is not quite sure of her position, and does not know exactly how much her husband will bear. She is afflicted with a bare suspicion that his docile nature might be over taxed—that in the pigeon holes of his dull cranium might be found a desire to make it rather lively if too openly slighted. "Oh, no," she reasons, "take him along—his presence makes it all right—his smile gives sanction to all that may happen. When he is with me who dare complain?"
But the woman whom it would be my joy to describe, whose perfections surpass description, is moved by no such paltry considerations. She glories in an independence which scorns all such petty restraints. She it is whose insight into domestic politics descries the true position, "to go with her husband is a bore"—his very presence is a hindrance to a full and free exercise of all the privileges of the "Boston Dip." She can find it in her heartnowto laugh at the ridiculous vow she made when playing that old-fashioned farce before the altar—the vow to "leave all others and cleave to him alone." How much pleasanter, surely, to cleave and cling to all others, and leavehimalone. She may be "too ill" to attend with her husband; but let "Mr. Nimblefoot"—sprightly of heel and addled of brain—come along, with an invitation to attend a ball, and in a trice she so far recovers her declining health as to make such an elaborate toilet that
"Not Cleopatra on her galley's deck,
Displays so much of leg, or more of neck."
Then it is, when with a disregard for neighborly comments which would do credit to a better cause, we see her in all her naked loveliness. No vulgar restraint upon her movements, no "greeneyed monster" to inquire into her absence or take note of her doings. None to say
"Methinks the glare of yonder chandelier
Shines much too far—or I am much too near."
But a more detailed account of this lady and of "how it all came about," is it not written in the chronicles of the Courts having "original jurisdiction" in cases of divorce?
Who, then, after reviewing this ghastly procession of moral lepers, shall find words wherewith to express his reverence and admiration for those pure-minded girls and women who refuse to dance—on principle!No renowned hero of ancient or modern times has a better right to claim the bays than the woman who, seeing the degradation of the modern dance, has the independence and moral courage to avoid it. Her heroism is greater than you might suppose, for she is sorely tempted to do wrong on the one hand, and severely punished for doing right on the other. Tempted—because she is as fair and graceful as her less modest sisters, and naturally as fond of man's admiration, and as sensible of physical pleasure as they; punished—by the sneers of women who call her "prude" and "wall-flower," and by the slights put upon her by men who avoid her because she "doesn't dance." In spite of the example set by those whom she has perhaps been taught to regard as wiser and better than herself, she yet resists the fascination of the Social Basilisk from pure pride of womanhood, and sacrifices her inclinations upon the altar of modesty.
These are the wives and daughters who do honor to their families. Their reward is the respect and admiration of all honorable men.
"My child," said a friend of mine to his daughter who had declined to attend a "sociable" on the ground that dancing was improper, "my child, I honor your judgment, and let me give you a father's advice: never allow a man's arm to encircle your waist till you are married,and then only your husband's." And this advice I re-echo to all young ladies.