The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-09-18

II
nNHE story from London that the au-
thorities In British India will for
i bid the appearance of Maud Allan
upon the Anglo-1ndian stage upon the
ground that her manner of dancing might
injuriously affect the prestige of English
women in India is probably not merely a
press agents tale.
The British throughout their Asian pos
sessions are energetic in their efforts to
keep the natives under the impression
that they are a superior race, and there
fore diyinely appointed to rulershp. De-
spite the differences between social con-
ventions IN various parts of the world, all
men in all countries and in all states OF
social development value and respect
modesty and chastity in women. The
British, therefore. would have their for
eign subjects bekeve that all English
women are ABOVE reproach. In further
ance ofstheir efforts In this direction the
British authorities take elaborate precau-
tions to prevent any English woman of
bad character from entering British
crown colony or dependency They very
freely admit disreputable women who reg
lister as being Of other nationalities than
British.
: In India danciug girls are ranked with
vocationally immoral women. Out of the
east, and especially from India, come the
suggestive dances which have become
popular upon the western stage and,
with certain notifications, in western
bathrooms. 1t is not improbable that the
appearance of Maud Allan, whose fame
has been won in London, would be dis
turbing to the British in Bombay and
Calcutta. The natives would perhaps see
no distinction between dances called
artistic interpretations and the familiar
muscle dances of the Nautch girls, and
it has been impressed upon the Hindu
mind that Nautch girls are an unclean
outcropping of an unclean religion against
which every English missionary strives.
1t might also be difficult to drill into
Oriental minds tho western Idea that
there may be a great difference between
zones professional and personal morals, if
one is dancer of artistic interpretativa
dances, just as there is popularity admitted
to be difference between the personal
and political honesty of a practical" pol
itician. The Hindu mind might see in
London's favorite dancer, not the artist
with private personality detached from
her art, and perhaps puritanical. but
merely the woman dancing dances not
wholly unlike those danced by the
Nautchee attached to the Hindu temples,
or by the humber, but equally skillful
street dancing girls Of the Indian cities.
But If 1t is true that Bombay and Cal
cutta, Delhi AMI Ogra and the other In
dian cities boastirg Anglo-Indian ahea-
tres will warn off Maud Allan, what will
the British do If the turkey trot is
brought east Of Sues by British society? ?
Although some of the magazine writer's
in New York AMI London persist In re-
garding the motif and movements OF
the present-day dances as having come
from Africa, and persist in using the
term "nigger Dances" it is probable that
all that the African natives know about
dances that Interpret animal instincts:
was learned from the east as result of
migrations, from Asia into Egypt and
other North African countries. At any
rate, the unmodif5ed ''wiggle' dances that
were a feature of the social life of the
Negro tenderloin in America wears ago
are somewhat akin to Nautch dancing.
Polite society adopted them in a form SO
modified that the ballroom turkey tret
is merely more or less suggestive to the
onloolxer, and perhaps not at all SO IL
the average participant. But the to-
delo" was as brazenly descriptive as an
Indian dancing girls gyrations.
The Sudanese hoochee-coochee girls
of the Midway Plaisance at the Column
bian exposition are popularity credited
with having introduced into America the
''pas seule" from which was evolved the
pas sexuelle' for two. called the to-
delo'. by the negroes and given various
names by whites. But the Sudanese and
the Arabs in Egypt and Alsiers are mere
imitatois vi the Nautch girls. 1t may
be said In passing that persons who fire.
quented the Midway Plaisance will recall
that Streets Of Cairo had no monop-
/ t. s.