The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1890-10-30
AT THE SUMNER DANCE
1T IS A PLACE WHERE MANS I'M
PCRTANcE IS RECOGNIZED.

y Young Woman VINO Apparently 6ai
Been There-HaH Grown Boys and
CaIIow Youths in Great Demand.
This is the age Of woman's triumph. She
has demonstrated her ability to administer
| functions of honor hitherto relegated to
mans dominion with dignity and s2gacity.
1t is safe to predicate from her attitude
that the coming woman viii rule the ma
tions while the coming man rocks the era
die, and to prophesy from her success that
the nations will be governed more wisely
and the cradle swayed less scientifically
| than at present.
But notwithstanding all this there is
one place where the scepter has not depart
ed from Israel, where man rules triumph
| ant in all his pristine superiority, where
the smallest boy out of kits and in trou-
sers is at a higher premium than the fair
| est, wisest lady in the land, who might,
with her beauty, put Venus TO the blush,
and with her knowledge cover senior
wranglers with confusion. And this place
where old traditions are restored and man
is acknowledged master is at the summer
hotel dance
The sweetest kind Of a woman's woman,
who is full Of love aud sympathy for her
sex, to whom girls delight in confessing
their secrets and women confide their sor-
rows, finds little profit or pleasure in dane
ing with a woman.
MEN IN DEMAND.
There is something solemn in the atmos-
phere of the summer dance, something pa
thetic in the air of feigned and hysterical
hilarity among the women who wabble
~ I,H -, EHA nieo1
tops when the spring is broken or the
works need mending.
Thrice blessed the woman who has a
husband whom she can coax out Of tennis
shoes and into pumps, out of the smoking
room into the ballroom. How that man
is smiled upon, victimized, cajoled into
making martyr of himself. and dancing
himself into fit of apoplexy with all that
woman's friends.
Happy is the girl with younger broth
er, even if his mustache is in the pin feath-
cry stage, and his voice as little to be de-
pended upon as worn out accordeon, if
only he can sprawl through a waltz and
maintain an upright position.
Envied indeed is the woman whose little
son, in sash and knickerbOckers, has been
taught to step measure in time and order
due.
Somebody announces a lanciers or quad
rille, and there is confusion among the
ranks of dancers. The one self sacrificing
young man who dances dashes about the
room, out in the Office, down in the billiard
room, mopping MS brow and seeking the
persuadable man to come and fill out the
sets. The girls familiar with the figures
tie handkerchiefs about their arms and in
vite other girls to dance, the mothers hunt
up their small boys, and after while the
procession moves with an average of one
man and one small boy TO a set.
THE UNoUEsTIONING MATRoN.
Little questions the fair dame who at
home deliberates most carefully before es-
tablishing the most formal of friendships
with new acquaintance the history or
present station of the man who is pre-
sented to her as a partner for a waltz.
There is a relief in the steady clasp of the
manly arm, the firm touch of the mascu-
line hand, that renders it immaterial
whether he weighs out butter by the pound
or handles tailor's goose and shears when
vacation is over if only he takes the step
she learned in waltzing. and will give her
one or two good turns about the room be-
fore all the other girls who cannot get
man to waltz with.
Little does it concern her TO investigate
in any way his claim to her regard if he
lead her through the figure of the may
dance when older women are depending
upon partners of their own persuasion
flying white handkerchief signals to avoid
mistakes
How the gracious, gratified lady smiles
if he is stout, helps him if he is awkward,
teaches him if he is forgetful and answers
in all sincerity to his conventional thanks
at the close of the figure, "The gratitude is
on my side, assure you"
Even the girl who can dance independent
ly is looked up to after a little by the girls
who cannot take the masculine part, and
when little cliques form, as they invariably
do in a summer hotel, each clique jealousy
guards the girl man almost as seriously as
they would the genuine article from APP
preparation by the other factions
THE DANCE ANALYZED.
The summer hotel dance is an admirable
vantage ground from which to study the
art as modified and in
fuenced by different climates and local
ities-the wild swOop and rush of the
Colorado girl, with the freshness and free
dom in its movement that suggests the
broad, un broken prairie and billowy, wav-
ing grasses tossed and swayed by the
strong wild breezes There's strength and
speed and life, like the swift dash of wild,
horses with sinewy flanks and
flashing eyes and widespread nostrilsl
In sharp contrast is the slow, stately
glide of the Boston belle. subdued and
steady and joyless. It speaks of long
line of stern faced ancestors, repressive,
taciturn, grave; of spectacled schoolma'am
who were married late in
life. and trained their children with infex-
ibe rods Of iron according to Scriptural
The sensuous, dreamy. willowy grace Of
the southern beauty, with the dusk of the
in her eyes, the warmth of the
summer in her smile Not for nothing
did Spanish knight and veiled lady land
upon her coasts and leave as her inherit
auce all the passion AMI the pride of ma
ton famed for duels of love and war. As
the supple. swaving figure. gently yielding
10 the encirciing arm which supports it, |
floats softly past in a melody of motion, |
half forgotten BvrOnic meters, dim trsdi- \
tons Of impossible romance return and |
are verified
As the kiss of suuheams on the crest Of /
the waves. the poise of the humming bird |
upon the breast of rose. the dart OF the |
swallow through the glow Of the sunset, /
is the dance of the New York girl. merry +
and dainty, airy and free, like the tripping 1
Of elves in the sheen Of the moonlight or /
the revel OF naiads in the spray OF ancient /
sylvan fountains.
There is nothing more picturesque and /
FASCINATING than the New York girl dane 4