The daily commonwealth. (Greenwood, Leflore Co., Miss.) 1916-1919, 1917-06-30

4 BILLY WALLOPS THE DANCE.
Everybody seems to be dancing. Where ono
only a comparatively few trippcI the light fan
tistic, nowadays dancing seems to be the moi
diversion in the city restaurants and the chic
Iamusements of fashionable hotel crowds. Nobod
who keeps up with the times deems it safe t
neglect an education in the trots, glides and Jump
of the modern dance.
Clubs and societies and lodges and what no
like the dance also. And in the home it has pro
crossed enormously, due principally to the de
velopment of the talking machine, a large proper
ton of the records turned out being especially
designed for dance purposes. These are adver
ised extensively, and naturally help to spread thu
dance fever.
Of course, there are come folks who do moi
dance-it is against their ethics, their principals
possibly their religious sc-'lple. Among these is
Billy Sunday. Billy delivered a broadside against
the modern dance recently chat is a classic. It is
for this reason, more than any other, that we
publish it. Here is what lilly said:
I'm with Ii Hung Chang, the great China.
man, who said, after looking at an American
dance, why don't they sit down to hug"
II want to see the bucks hair who can wrap
his arms around my wife! I'm going to mono
police all that hugging business myself, take it
from me!
"Take it from me again, I'd consider it a
nuisance to gallop three-quarters of a mile to get
a hugging!
IF l had the power to make a law for America,
I'd have a law that no boy or girl over twelve years
of age should dance until he or she was married
and then they should dance with each other. =
"Some people may say: mi. Sunday, you
are too severe; we like dancing for exercise, the
pleasure it gives. All right. Then you men
dance with each other and you women dance with
each other. You'll get all the exercise and all
the innocent amusement Of the dance that way.
But if that system was put into effect, l bet the old
dance would shut up shop between New York and
San Francisco before the end of the week!
1T will take your daughter when she is a
rose-geranium Of purity and make her into a
of lust. The Cubanola Glide and the
Mobile Buck were not bad enough, so they had to
invent he Bunny Hug and the Puppy Snuggle and
the Kitchen Sink and hell only knows what!
"How do you like it when you see your wife
in the embrace Of a man who was once her lover?
"Most men don't care a rap for the dance, it's
the hug they are after. Thatll give your old
rheumatic and govt masters a chance. A fellow
has got to get powerfully old and decrepit when
he doesn't enjoy a hug, I'll tell you that.
II want to tell you l don't believe that there
ere many people who can 60 on the ballroom
floor and dance with a pretty girl Rugged to his
brest and look upon charms under the influence
of fascinating music, and then go out with prayer
meeting feelings. l will bet you, sir, that if
ninety men who dance would tell the truth, ninety
of one hundred will say:
20 "You are right, Bill; you are the first one who
ever had the grit to tell it"
II have more respect for a sloonkeeper than
for a dancing teacher. "
II don't believe the saloons will do as much to
damn the morals of young people as the dancing
school,"