The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-11-04

! who are attached to Queen Mary's court, her gowns are of the simplest de- scription, very long in the skirt and made without any excessive devotion to ad- vanced fashion Her grace Is enthu- 1 sastically fond of dancing. and as heard racing man express his opinion l of her powers in this amusement, "she 1 Is good mover" In fact, she dances | with much more grace than she walks, which Is often the case with English women. It seems to me that something l is wrong about the system of education l that teaches girls very carefully how 1 to dance, but will give them no sort Of instruction about how to walk. In these days, since women have taken to drtlhng
 and field labor and activities of an un- usually strenuous kind their failure to
 use their feet well under ordinary cir cumstances is particularly conspicuous. English women either stride or toddle or move their feet in a care4ess awkward fashion. You very seldom see 8 woman who really walks with any real grace or correct balance Of the pody.
 l., T. think one of the reasons why ths
 beauty and elegance of some women Of
 the older generator, such as the Mar chioness of Ripon and Queen Alexandria, are still so apparent Is because they know how to move their feet and balance
 their bodies. Queen Alexandria is an old woman and l believe has one stiff
 knee, for she always carries n long stick or an umbrella. To see her walk across room should be an education to many younger women. Queen Mary, who IS fine woman with a good carriage, on the contrary, walks w.inout any grace and is seen at her best when seated In a carriage or al a box al the opera or theatre. l think that III that happy tine after the war English parents will Without doubt see to It that their daugh-
 terS learn to walk. as well as to dance With grace and elegance. 1 heard a eiI- 1 known woman commenting the other day on the system ol Anerlcan eoucalaon of glris, which, in her opmlon, was mucn III advance of the English style. She is great adnirer of Amencan women
 who, she says, have beautiful figures which they know now to carry"
 All sosts of surprising and curious happenings occur to most of us these times in London. A friend of mlne, the daughter of 8 Well-knoWn medical man. who IS doing government work near one ot inc great arsenals on the outskirts of London. had strange experience recently. She lives in town and, natur- ally. when there are air raids about she feels rather anxious about her parents { who are living in what may be aptly described as danger zone" After one of our particularly fierce encounters with the aerial enemy my friend. who was staying in the country, rang up her lather's house on the long distance tele- phone in order to inquire if they were all snte and if any bombs had been dropped in their vicinity.
 She received satisfactory answers and thought nothing more of the incident until . few days afterwards when she was visited in her flat in town by a polite gentleman from Scotland yard who put her through a most severe course of questioning as to why she had tele- phoned to such and such a district and mentioned enemy aircraft, and why she should take such special interest in that particular part of the country, anyhow. [ She was also catechised as to her place | of birth, her parents, nationality and | various other matters: also as she is | employed on the staff of an important 1 weekly newspaper, she was asked about | her work and what reason she had for 1 taking home with her German papers and i, literature which she read and translated | late at night
 The amazing knowledge displayed by the Scotland yard official of the doings of my perfectly innocent young friend [ nearly reduced her to a state of col lapse. It happens that a portion of her duties on the paper are concerned with the reading and translation of much | German literature. She was educated at Baden and speaks the language perfectly, therefore her suitability for such a posi- 1 ton is beyond question. But the ex- traordinary Knowledge displayed of her modest and quiet inconspicuous private i, life frightened her iderably, although as she told me, she has also a contrary feeling of extreme satisfaction for 1t 1 shows the precise and elaborate care and attention that is being given now to every detail that might be susn'cious
 LADY MARY