The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1905-01-04

The cross pieces are placed at the small
of the back and the sportswoman leans
against the wind luxuriously as if in a
reclining chair, while her skates skim
over the ice at any speed from ten to
forty miles an hour. Cautious skaters
hold the cross pieces in front of. them
selves, so all they have to do is to let
go in case of accident.
New York society is renewing its
old-time interest in snow and ice The
special evenings in the ST. Nicholas
rink are attended largely, and the park
commissioners believe the lakes in
Central and Van Cortlandt parks will
be crowded more than ever this year.
Woman, of course, is responsible for
the barking back to wintry joys. Miss
Manhattan has also to express weari-
ness of indoor amuSements when,
presto! as II she commanded the Frost
King and ruled the winds, zero wealth
er nips along, snow falls for sleighing
and Father Knickerbocker rubs his
eyes as it he saw vision of the
days when Forty-second street was
way up town and all New York was on
runners. Pretty Bessie Moulton is an
other devotee of the gliding art. She
can skate backward at a pace. that
would distance many a college athlete
going in forward direction, and the
figure s. the grapevine, the Dutch roll,
the outer edge and other intricacies are
no mysteries to her. Furthermore
Miss Moulton is only one of hundreds
OF society girls who prefer to get their
roses in natures shop.
Lovely Louise CULVER, with whom
no less prince of cotillons than Mr..
r o. n F1sa1 etc
Pennington dance in Sherry's, is an
admlrer of the minuet and thinks the
stately measure of century long gone
should be revived. She talks of max
ing the lnnovation-ro renovation-in
dancing class the latter half of the
month, and is convinced she will make
it popular. Miss CULVER is an opti-
mist. Metropolitan fashion never will
return to anything SO dignified as the
dance of it's forefathers Attempts
without number have been made to re-
store the smooth grace of the bows
and curtsies, and all have failed. The
most nearly successful took the form
of the Oxford minuet twelve or fifteen
years ago. That dance held it's own
through three or four seasons, but it
was an apology at best, for half the
Berlin, the ripple and the military
schottische were too graceful for mod
ern society. The two-step represents
its idea of high-water mark in the
poetry of motion.
The trouble is that the average So
ciety girl is too indolent to learn real
dances. Anybody can dance the two
step and almost any naturally graceful
woman can waltz after a fashion. It
takes study and practice, however, to
master the mazurka, the schottische.
the varsovienne, the polonaise and
the half dozen other beautiful figures
of a generation or two ago. The same
is true of the auadrille and the waltz
quadrille, beside either of which the
lanciers must remain a crude string of
more or less nlonotonous steps. AS
for the country or contra dance. the
Virginia reel, the Roger de Coverley and
older dances, they are far beyond the
capability Of the modern young wom-
an. It's all very well for hostesses to
complain of the scarcity of dancing
men. Those much missed males might
be more plentiful if society would pro-
vide few dancing girls. Only in the
cotillon does any grace survive.