Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1894-08-11

she cares for It as al accomplished artist
no longer as an amateur. Still her heart
beats wildly at the mere thought OF a
dance. but now it is at the thought of a
perfect dance, in fact, an imperfect one no
longer enters her head, she has ceased to
consider the possibility thereof.
Ana then, In phase SIX she does not al
low upon her program the names of men
VINO do not please her as converse tionalists.
She says quite openly that she would rather
sit dance out. The waves of the music
DO not make her feet ache now, but her
heaTt, IN vague, hal-acknOwle1ged way.
The fast wild strain moves her to bright.
cynical, careless talk, as it swells to power,
her thoughts are expressed in passionate
struggling words or she is silent from i'm
potency TO say what she means; as the
chords vail low and soft, her voice sinks
ana with half-closed, weary eyes, yet a
smile of apparent pleasure, she says those
Things which are tenderest, or waits with
assurance for them to be said to her. They
are always said. If she allows it. for she
mas reached the stage where men find her
cIeNer woman, woman of the world,
good to talk TO, and, better yet good lis
tener She will sit it OUT and look in al
most wonder, certainly pity. at the gay
young people in the first ages. She is sorry
Tor them, for she knows that they too must
come TO the sixth stage even as she has,
ana she knows what lot they must find
out before they do, how the bloom will be
rubbed off LIES peach and how it will be
bruised and bitter in parts to the taste.
she sees the debutante in her fieecy white
the girl little older in butterfly glory of
colors, and she knows that the light bright
coIors cover light. bright hearts; then she
looks at her own perfect gown, as she sits
IN the dim conservatory or under electric
nshts, and realizes that it's brilliant color
hlss are absurdly unSuited to the tempera-
ment of the woman they clothe She gives
a little smiling sigh, none the less real for
the smile however, and as Dick bends over
and asks If that sigh is a token of surren-
NJ for cha ha, nF,A
determined herself, and she likes to keep
him on pins and needles. 1t is about the
only kind of pleasure she has now, and she
knows that it is all she is fit for: her
energies have all been directed to this from
the cradle, and she is to be pitied, not
blamed.
Then the Last stage.
The last and seventh age is reached when
she is profoundly bored at being asked to
go to dance; when she would rather stay
tJiiIioft&U.y III lone or linger over Il good
dinner; when dancing music is bitter from
the useless, happy past 1t brings up; when
the look of a polished floor reminds her
how her best hours have glided away; when
70 see Jack is to remember how he has
forgotten her, to see Tom is to remember
a life she has wrecked, to be near Dick Is
to remember that in him lies soul COM
pletely in her power, with which she may
do as she villa responsibility she is afraid
to assume.
When, at last. the woman who was once
mad, gay dancer down life's hall puts on
with hatred and WEAKNESS a ball gown or
pens on scented paper regret" for a
ball. she is at the end of eXperienceS-that
Is, of actual experiences; negative ones may
follow, yet which will refine give shape
to the crude first ones, but the miles of the
road have be IN covered. She can look back
ana remember now the designs on the mile
stones AMI in the light OF constantly COM
ing events can understand and them
better. But the pathway has been Travelled.