DANCING.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 18239, 25 November 1924, Page 10

DANCING.

TO THE EDITOR OF "THE PRESS." Sir, —I cannot refrain from deploring the singular inadequacy, and even childish irrelevancy of; some of the comments which, as a faithful recorder of public opinion, you report on the above subject. Surely it should, be possible to speak about dancing, as about any other matter of social interest, reasonably and dispassionately. A man is not necessarily a puritan or a prude who objects to excessive promiscuous dancing: he is not necessarily a puritan or a prude although he objects to promiscuous dancing altogether: Some of the gayest nations on earth have taken the latter position—the Japanese for example. Once in Tokyo at a Government reception which had resolved, itself into a ball on the part of the foreigners and a few of the Japanese present, Japanese who had been abroad and had taken to foreign ways, I went up to a Japanese nobleman whom I saw quietly watching the dancers, and remarked: "I suppose, sir, you do not care for this sort of thing?" u Oh, no," he replied, gravely but mildly, "it is quite contrary to our ideas of propriety." . And I confess that I'" felt no inclination to resent or denounce, still less to ridicule, his point of view. It was quite a legitimate point of view for one who, while sharing his countrymen's partiality for pleasure, was scrupulous about propriety.—Yours, etc., W. GRAY DIXON. November 22nd, 1924.