St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1886-03-08

ever the ice Is weak and liable to let them
down. In dancing. as popularity INDUCED
In to-day, see several places where dan
ger signals should be erected. Let me
draw your attention to them.
DANGER SIGNAL NO. 1.
Be careful when you dance. You have
no right to turn night into day and day into
night, breaking well-known sanitary laws,
and tempting Providence by your
recklessness. The Bible says, there
is time TO dance" That does not mean
from 10 o'clock p. m. till 2. Upon your
list OF engagements for the evening let the
last be with the hack driver to carry you
home promptly at 1880. That is late
enough for any respectable citizen to be
up. Quiet slumber is more valuable than
feverish excitement. You do not feel as
cross as a bear next day, and nightly smiles
do not give way 10 morning frOwns. Another
sanitary hint. To many young women the
merry dance has been the dance of death,
because they gave not physiological heed
to dress and draughts. Going to party
in flowing attire when the thermometer
stands at zero means quick pneumonia or
lingering consumption. Sudden cooling off
in draught means suicide. One of the
best arguments in favor of dancing is the
necessity of perspiratiOn. 1t takes a wise
man to learn the value of sweat, but it
takes a wiser one to learn how to cool off
without catching cold. Before you learn
to dance learn few lessons in physiology.
DANGER SIGNAL NO. 2.
Be careful how you dance. Now we
come up out of physics into morals, and
now 1 shall talk more plainly than before.
A time-hOnOred distinction exists between
square dancing and round dancing, and the
reason for this is obvious enough. 1t has a
basis of common sense. In one form of
dancing a man is not allowed, as a rule, to
put his arm around the woman's waist; in
the other he is. Now, then, knowing what
do about the tinder-like quality of human
nature, / affirm that when a young woman
allows the familiarities which convention
ality sanctions in round dancing, she stands
on much more dangerous ground than
when gliding through the figures of the
square dance. l know how fathers, who
have once been young men and seen the
world. feel upon this subject. There is
line where safety ends and danger begins
In dancing it can be very definitely drawn
and the place to draw it is about the
wOman's waist. Ninety-nine one-hundredthS
of all the evils which flow from dancing
take their origin in this wholly uncalled-for
and unnecessary liberty accorded to young
] people in the round dances. The present
manner of dancing the waltz and kindred
dances in public gatherings is indecent
and injurious to public and private morals.
| 1t is nothing less than shameless and I'M
principled hugging 1t is the embrace that
| gives such witchery to the dance and has
caused the waltz to be called ''vOluptuOuS."
Herein certainly there is need of reform,
and without it there should be rigid pro-
hibition in every household. Prof. James
u Watah tha aalabrataI Hannipcr or Of
Philadelphia, attributes a large share of the
vice and immortality of our times to the inn
modest license permitted by custom in
! round dancing. No young man has any
right to put his arm about young woman
in dance or anywhere else unless he is EN-
gagged to her, and any young woman who
allows it ought to blush for shame and hide
her head. She ought to have higher re-
gard for her own womanly dignity. Round
| dancing has often been the spark which
started passionate cOnfagration in which
modesty, happiness and heaven have been
consumed. Beware then of the initial
spark. The chief of police in New York
city stated that three-fOurths of the aban-
doned women in that city attributed their
fall to dancing. L believe parents are not
strict enough in the matter of allowing their
children to dance, and mothers do not tell
their daughters what every young woman
| ought to know, and which if they did know
! they would not be so easily led astray.
False mOdesty between parent and child
and gross immodesty in the dance as often
practiced to-day are drawing many down to
ruin every year.
| DANGER SIGNAL NO. 3.
EBe careful where and with whom you
dance. Dancing in an improper manner
with men of pure and gentlemanly instincts
is bad enough, but trusting oneself to the
arms of total stranger is dementia itself
Contact is often only another word for con-
tagiOn. Many well-dressed, highly-per-
fumed individual is moral leper; behind
the diamond-studded shirt bosom resides a
beast. have known young men at college
who were said to belong to the elite. but
from their conversation about innocent
ladies who served as their partner in dance
1 should say they belonged to the hellites.
l would as soon see my sister in the arms of
the devil himself as in the clutches of these
sO-called respectable members of society.
This is strong language, but mean every
VOID of it. l have an anathema against
this pernicious custom of promiscous dane
ing. Public balls in which young women