DANCING SOLDIERS

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 210, 24 May 1918, Page 7

DANCING SOLDIERS

They danced the tango between tho plum trees. And tlie land girls looked on in delighted amazement, and begged tliem to go through the steps just ones mure; nnd tho sun shone on two khakiclad moil in their heavy hoots humming a time to -which thoy waltzed and glided down the pathway through the intricate stops of the tango. "Tnkos you back to tho old- Convalescent Camp, doesn't it?" said ono to tho other as they , laughingly finished and •returned to their plough. It took mo back ton. Back to the largest Convalescent Camp in France, nestling among a countryside as fair and as fruitful as this plum and applo patch of England. ■ Dancing is.ono of tho greatest pleasures of tho men who nro convalescing after wounds and sickness and getting fit for the line again. Twice and thrice a week ono may read the announcement in tho Y.M.C.A. lint that the M.C.'s for the next dance night will bo Private Brown and Sergeant Smith—"Light shoes requested wherever possible." Willing hands and feet help to coax tho floor into dancing trim before tho groat event; and how the women at homo would smilp if they could see lliese sons, brothers, husbands—yes, and I'athers—"sprucing . themselves up" for the danco! Thero is no suggestion of roughness or rowdyism, for tho men take their dancing very seriously. One man will go up to. another, smilingly ask for the dance, offer his arm, and the next moment lie will be whirling his "lady" among the dancers. Now and again an onlooker when asked for a dance will half-shyly protest that ho does not know tho step. "Can you waltz?" asked his prospective partner. "Then you'll soon pick up the rost. Two to tho left, two to the right; glide left, drop; glide right, drop; waltz." A six-foot New Zealander instructing a wiry little Welshman is a sight to remember, especially when the head of the latter only reaches tho big man's heart.

AVar seems so very distant when watch ing such a scene. ' The men forget, and so does tho onlooker as tho laughing faces go by. One is only aware that these men of ours mending from tho hurts of war, and soon returning to the scene of war, are for ono blessed evening forgetting it all in tho happy, healthy jollity of tho dance. Not only in the Convalescent Camp, but also throughout tho reinforcement bases a dance night is one of tho entertainments most eagerly looked forward to by tho soldior. In one camp, where a military band performs, men come from all over the baso to join in the Y.M.C.A. Saturday night dances, and hero ono may see the very "latest" dances—all mnnner'of trots and glides, and hugs—as well as the very oldest, as pleasingly performed by soldiers as over by ma,n and maid,

At the Soldiers' Leave Club in Paris, oromoted by the "Daily Mail's" Paris Edition, the fine ballroom of the Hotel Moderno never held happier gatherings than the khaki men who dance together in tho ovening. Many a soldier returns with jolly memories of that bright sptjt. Tho big stack of light shoes aud rubber overshoes in one corner.of the room would make tho casual observer curious. I was curious until I saw a number of Canadians, passing through Paris on their way to a war area, hurriedly milting on these shoes and hastening into the dance.

The French often wonder if all they havfl hoard of British stolidity is truo when they see our boys dancing together from sheor lovo of rhythmical movement, so simply and happily expressing the joy of life that is wit^fi/i-them. And when the boys cpniu home we womenfolk are going to wonder also. For thousands whom wo never believed capable of a hop, skip, or jump wjjl coolly ask us if wo can do the taneo.—By Hilda M. Love, in the "Daily Mail."