The Hattiesburg news. (Hattiesburg, Miss.) 1908-1917, 1909-10-14
M GREcIAH Urn RI7ZIAL
Five Of these girls are Americans.

Five of these girls are Americans.
The Paris garden where they exer-
else belongs to one Of our older Amer
lean fortunes. made by an honest
westerner years ago, while uplifting
the tastes of his fellow citizens. The
granddaughter of the man who owned
opera houses has gone beyond the
Italian operas that pleased his genera
ton, but something of the beautiful
old gestures remain fixed in her ideal.
The girls names may not be given
1t is promised-but their search for
grace and cultured ease, apart from
beauty, reveals tendency of the hour
among the rich and fashionable that
must deeply interest all women.
These fair Americans In Paris seek
something more attractive than beau
ty; at least, something without which
mere beauty fails to hold. With 1t the
average girl may triumph And the
average girl may acquire 1t.
Grace! 1t is becoming more and
more recognized as essential, not only
to know how to walk and sit, but to
possess that personal grace of attitude
and movement which the nineteenth
century neglected. In renaissance
paintings and in old Greek and Indian
reliefs we recognize that we are ex-
tremely ugly in our movements.
Why should not the poses of artists
models be natural to us? 1t is part
of curious nineteenth century shame
to be found affected" or putting on
airs;" yet the same considerations
ought to forbid women changing their
gowns with the fashion or men cult
waiting formal politeness. To the
country Jay the city man is affected. "
But the nineteenth century ia past
and one courageous American girl has
shown how the world Graves return
to grace. Isadora Duncan's success is
not Of the stage alone. Paris society
goes to her for private lessons.
ut is not to develop bust and biceps
by ten minutes rational exercise each
morning." explained one girl. cit is
not breathing exercises. Physical
training makes the instrument; we
are learning how to play on it."
The instrument is the perfected
body. To acquire grace is to give it a
chance to express itself; and l had a
pathetic object lesson of the matter in
that garden.
l noticed that one of the girls went
through her exercises with somber
and ferocious enthusiasm; a beautiful
girl, but never smiling. never speak
ing; and the priestess took tender
interest in her. She does not appear
in the present photograph.
"Rich and beautiful, that girl is 60
ing through a great unhappiness," I
was told later. "The man that she
cares for has called her stick. She
was stick. Being rich and beauti-
full, it never occurred to her to take
pains. Dancing, she sprawls over her
partner. In ordinary movements she
is awkward and negligent And her
dreaded rival is, exactly, a skinny
heroine with plain face, whose one
redeeming quality is grace. 1t is suffi-
cient. The poor relation Of third
class European ambassador, she has
diplomatic society of Paris at her
feet"
Charm of manner" said.
"She is not even intelligent" was
the answer. at is mere physical
beauty of movement, charm Of pose
and gesture"
"And she is beating that rich and
beautiful American girl to it?"
unused. 1t explained the American
girls somber ardor. She is desperate
ly trying to make up for lost time.
l understood the ritual of the old
Paris garden. There is nothing far
fetched about costumes or exercises.
The girls seek earnestly to enter into
the spirit of the ancient Greeks and
the renaissance of the time of Botti-
celli.
Their priestess is an American girl
of wide culture and strong nature,
writing successful French poetry I'M
der mans name. Another of the
coterie travelled to the orient and sat
under the sage who continues the rev.
elation of the Bah. The ritual is &C.
lectic, from the Roman pageant of the
spring to the Provencal courts of the
muses. by way of Keats lode to a
Grecian Urn"
No pains are too great to throw
them back into the old graceful spirit.
1t is no laughing adventure. Through
summer afternoons their songs are
accompanied by slow, rhythmic dances.
The responses to the priestess are
chanted amid studied figures. Drap.