TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Press, Volume XLIX, Issue 14831, 24 November 1913, Page 6

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

After the visit of the Genee Making Company there is much in-

the terest in an article in "McDancer. Clure'e" on training for the

ballet," the true ballet of beautiful art. It gives one some idea of the immense amount of work and patience that goes to make up the delightful art of such dancers as Genee and Volinin. At the Milan Ballet School the course lasts nine years, and at the Imperial Ballet School at St. Petersburg it is even longer, but there more attention is paid to general education. It is not merely that a good dancer must be able to do difficult things, but she must bo able to do them ■with consummate ease, which can bo acquired only through years of hard work. "Students during their training can do many of tho things, after a fashion, that tho most finished dancers do on the stage. The difference is that the students do thorn waveringly, uncertainly; the ballerina with tho sureness and authority with which an accomplished pianist plays his scales." The spring into the air, and the bringing of the feet together several times, while the body ia off the ground, is part of what the writer calls "the very bones of technique." A girl training to bo a premiere must learn to bring her feet together four times while in the air, but a boy who aspires to be a leading dancer must be able to do this six or eight times. Genee has done it six or seven times, and Nijinsky, the , famous Russian, can easily do -it ten times. This technique must be learnt before the age of twenty. After that, a dancer may grow in grace and poetry, but she will not become more agile. And the wonderful poise and balance and quick movements sho has mastered are retained in her service only by constant practice. Gene"c and Pavlova practice elementary ballet exercises in the theatre for some time beforo going on the stago; tho exorcises that the ballet-dancer learns as a little girl must be kept up all through her career. Genee says that if sho goes without practico for a week, during a vacation or while she is at sea, it takes her three weeks to get back, and that, when she begins work again, her muscles are so soro that sho dreads a vacation." It can easily bo understood that a dancer, once she has retired cannot "como back."

Th© retirement from tho Spanish arena of Bombita, the "Sport." famous Spanish matadcr-

millionaire and elayor of three thousand bullet has aroused much comment owing to the fact that he is still a young man. A New Yorker who saw Bombita twice gives his impressions of him in the New York "livening Post." The second occasion was.at the Plaza do Toros, Madrid, and the typical bullring episode which took place there is well described by the eye-witness. The bull was ono of tho formidable Miuras, "an agile, snappy, vicious little jabonera." He galloped out, tossing his horns, and lashing his tail, and his first act was the tossing of Gaona, a visiting Mexican matador, who was not, however, seriously hurt. Then came tho tragedy of the afternoon, the goring of Lajartillo, one of Bombita's bandiileros (men who insert the gaily decked spindles in the bull's shoulders). "Hβ placed the banderillos beautifully, stepping aside with ever so slight aud graceful a movement as the bull charged, and the crowd yelled at his cleverness." Turning to bow his recognition. Lajartillo was undone. The bull charged him from behind, and one horn penerated tho base of his skull. •'This didn't stop the show —it never does —and when Bombita ran out into the ring and 'dedicated' the bull to some unknown in the crowd, there was an anxious hush over the entire arena. But Bombita was as nonchalant as you please. The bull had been teased into a fury. The matador advanced on him with the bright scarlet rag held out across his sword-blade, and talked to him in a quiet conversational drawl, but, I was told, in most abusive language. There was a little preliminary play with the red rag, and then Bombita delivered the death stroke, beautifully, exactly between the shoulderblades." At this, the audience were carried away with enthusiasm. Bombita -was lifted shoulder-high, the carcase was kicked and execrated, and some rushed to the spot where Lajartillo had fallen to gather up handfuls of the blood-eoaked sand as mementoes." And the Spanish, it should not be forgotten, are tho people who look upon the English sport of football as brnfcal and degrading 1