nd arms are her means of expression. I thought of
Barbey d'Aurevilly's phrase, "_Elle avait l'air de monter vers Dieu
les mains toutes pleines de bonnes oeuvres._"

* * * * *

Isadora's teaching has had its results but her influence has been
wider in other directions. Fokine thanks her for the new Russian
Ballet. She did indeed free the Russians from the conventions of the
classic ballet and but for her it is doubtful if we should have seen
_Scheherazade_ and _Cleopatre_. _Daphnis et Chloe_, _Narcisse_, and
_L'Apresmidi d'un Faune_ bear her direct stamp. This then, aside from
her own appearances, has been her great work. Of her celebrated school
of dancing I cannot speak with so much enthusiasm. The defect in her
method of teaching is her insistence (consciously or unconsciously) on
herself as a model. The seven remaining girls of her school dance
delightfully. They are, in addition, young and beautiful, but they are
miniature Isadoras. They add nothing to her style; they make the same
gestures; they take the same steps; they have almost, if not quite,
acquired a semblance of her spirit. They vibrate with intention; they
have force; but constantly they suggest just what they are ...
imitations. When they dance alone they often make a very charming but
scarcely overpowering effect. When they dance with Isadora they are
but a moving row of shadow shapes of Isadora that come and go. Her own
presence suffices to make the effect they all make together.... I have
been told that when Isadora watches her girls dance she often weeps,
for then and then only she can behold herself. One of the griefs of an
actor or a dancer is that he can never see himself. This oversight of
nature Isadora has to some extent overcome.

Those who like to see pretty dancing, pretty girls, pretty things in
general will not find much pleasure in contemplating the art of
Isadora. She is not pretty; her dancing is not pretty. She has been
cast in nobler mould and it is her pleasure to climb higher mountains.
Her gesture is titanic; her mood generally one of imperious grandeur.
She has grown larger with the years--and by this I mean something more
than the physical meaning of the word, for she is indeed heroic in
build. But this is the secret of her power and force. There is no
suggestion of flabbiness about her and so she can impart to us the
soul of the struggling moujik, the spirit of a nation, the figure on
the prow o