de.

It was remarkable, and at the same time amusing, to observe the
difference in the demeanor of the two sexes. The lions and the fawns
seemed to have changed hearts,--perhaps they had. It was the boys that
were nervous. The girls were unquailing. The boys were, however, heroic.
They tried bravely to hide the fox and his gnawings; but traces were
visible. They made desperate feint of being at the height of enjoyment
and unconscious of spectators; but they had much modesty, for all that.
The girls threw themselves into it _pugnis et calcibus_,--unshrinking,
indefatigable.

There is another thing which girls and their mothers do not seem to
consider. The present mode of dress renders waltzing almost as
objectionable in a large room as the boldest feats of a French
ballet-dancer. Not to put too fine a point on it, I mean that these
girls' gyrations in the centre of their gyrating and centrifugal hoops
make a most operatic drapery-display. I saw scores and scores of public
waltzing-girls last summer, and among them all I saw but one who
understood the art, or, at any rate, who practised the art, of avoiding
an indecent exposure. In the glare and glamour of gas-light it is only
flash and clouds and indistinctness. In the broad and honest daylight,
it is not. Do I shock ears polite? I trust so. If the saying of shocking
things might prevent the doing of shocking things, I should be well
content. And is it an unpardonable sin for me to sit alone in my own
room and write about what you go into a great hall, before hundreds of
strange men and women, and do?

I do not speak thus about waltzing because I like to say it; but ye have
compelled me. If one member suffers, all the members suffer with it. I
respect and revere woman, and I cannot see her destroying or debasing
the impalpable fragrance and delicacy of her nature without feeling the
shame and shudder in my own heart. Great is my boldness of speech
towards you, because great is my glorying of you. Though I speak as a
fool, yet as a fool receive me. My opinions may be rustic. They are at
least honest; and may it not be that the first fresh impressions of an
unprejudiced and uninfluenced observer are as likely to be natural and
correct views as those which are the result of many afterthoughts, long
use, and an experience of multifold fascinations, combined with the
original producing cause? My opinions may be wrong, but they will do no
harm; the penalty will rest alone o