Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1883-10-07
DANCING AT WEST POINT.
The Very Lively Balls Which the
Cadets Enjoy Three Times a Week.

NEW L OTk DUH.
The cadet balls which occur here three
times week during the summer encamp-
ment have delicious flavor of old-fashioned
children's parties about them. They begin at
and end at 10 sharp. Uncle Sam provides
good ball room and ten musicians, and the
cadets provide the guests. The officers mag
unanimously stay away except the superin-
tendent and his wife, who punctiliously &C
cept the invitations rendered them The
only preparation the cadets can make is to
put on their freshest laundried white duck
trousers and scrub their already shining
faces. Their trousers are objects of much
solicitude with them. They rigidly avoid sit
ting down at the balls, for fear that their
knees should acquire q baggy and civilian
look, and it may be said that the military
tailor who makes their trousers is perfect
master of the mystery of fitting.
About o'clock in the evening innumerable
white-legged and bobtail- coated young men
assemble in front of the academic building
containing the ball room, where the omnibuses
deposit the blooming young ladies, who make
the cadets hearts beat beneath their nicely
padded jackets Having only two hours of
revealing to count on, they have got the
question of time down fine. Every dance is
engaged for, and the intervals between the
dances are infinitesirnal These boys show
in their fresh faces and 1.-the forms the bene-
fit OF the regular hours, wholesome fare, and
healthy discipline The continual attention
of the riding master, the fencing master, and
the dancing master is shown in their deport-
ment. The bad manners of many society
men would need no better foil than the polite
attention to their guests to these cadets.
Punctually at the band strikes up, and
the whirling begins Everything dances;
the bob-tailed coats scintillate, the white
trousered legs twinkle, and the ecstatic young
ladies are in the Elysian fields. Chaperones
at these wkite balls are of small account.
There is no danger of couples straying off;
the cadet is engaged for every dance, and
there is very little time for sentiment. The
band playsa kind OF hoppity-saippity-ju jump
music that is highly appropriate to the occa-
sion. The fact that the assemblage is rather
youthful must, however, be. studiousIy
avoided in conversation. The cadets speak
OF each other always as men. The cadet Of
fcers, with sashes tied around their slim
waists, are considered terrible fellows among
the girls by the rest of the corps. At the
balls, the girl who gets an adolescent officer
with q sash is looked upon as O mortal
blessed by the gods.
The two toars slip By like lightning. At a
quarter to 10a cadet with drum appears at
the door OF the bah room. The band twists
''Houle, Sweet Home" into a queer sort OF
waltz, the cadets, meanwhile, dancing for all
they arc worth now in these last few pre-
cious minutes. Then the band slides into
Take Back the Heart done as another
waltz, a highly appropriate and suggestive
air, selected on purpose IS a final warning to
the young ladies, and suddenly the drummer,
who has been cycling the clock, seizes his
drum sticks, and loud rattle, rattle, bang
whir-r-r resounds. It is like the crack OF
doom. Every blessed little cadet tucks his
partner under his arm and makes dash for
the doorway. The young ladies who want
to be escorted TO their onnnibuses are quick
in getting On their wraps, and in half an
hour from the rolling Of the drum the girls
are trundled off and the cadets are snug in
rod