The Waterbury Democrat., 1931-02-27

dancers of this section.
 Yes, you'll encounter dancing girls a Ia Earl Carroll and you'n see them in such Oriental finery as Zieg- field and George White together have never attempted.
 You'll see some of them taking American cigarettes from familiar looking packages with fingertips fairly glistening with dazzling henna; you'll meet them wearing gold teeth for beauty's sake; you'll find them with hands blackened wit h strange stains and tatooed with I beauty marks; you'll find some who fiirt openly from Under long. waxed eye-lashes and you'll encoun- ter those who are part and parcel of an underworld tour. You'll find girls who will dance only at the invitation of the towns wealthiest merchants find groups that toss their torsos for a collection of coins.
 My own introduction to the danc- ing girls of this section of the world was something like this:
 It was Marrakech and the hour was near midnight. We went through slimy, cobbled alleys, un- lighted lanes and twisting trails. Tn |the doorways the beggars were Igathering for the night. When the streets grew wider they slept il, their dirty-white burnooses in the street.
 Here and there mendicant sat on stone bringing screeching notes from one-stringed fiddle and chanting his fawning prayer for aims as strangers passed.
 Soon the streets seemed clut- tered with crouching bundles, each of which was sleeper with no place to go. Then we were shunted suddenly down worn stairs, through 8 passageway and into the theater, the price of which was that of a balcony seat purchased at Joe Le- blang's.
 Like all such places. a pleasant garden was just outside the door way. with gardens, palms and a fountain. Inside the lighting was achieved through anemic lamps placed in niches in the wall. The theater was clammy with the cold, damp sweat of underground caverns. We kept on our coats and squatted on cushions along the wall. For a moment. I thought we had made mistake, for we appeared to have stumbled into a grammar school class. No dancing girl in the array that greeted us was more than 13 years old. Several seemed to be all | of II or 12. Later I was told that when the age of IA has been reach ed they are discarded as venerable grandmothers and fresh children are brought in.
 My first instinct was to tell them lan to run upstairs and go to bed. while we put them to sleep by tell ling bedtime stories. The guide bade me say nothing.
 A moment later an epileptic vir- tuoso of a native fiddle had begun to play those nasal tunes that final- 1y haunt your waking and sleeping hours. A stout and older girl, nc longer fit for dancing. began tc beat an eerie dirge upon @ crock cry jar covered with some sort oi lpelt.
 Then the dancers took up theil bored routine. Light golden they were in the half-light, like young South Sea Islanders-and some Ivery beautiful; One there was with the saddest eyes I have ever seer in this lifetime. A child of a pooi l family, sold out to this life with but six months of experience. | Yet each one of them as hard as a New York night club hostess. In- nocent of face, these tiny devil, would try to take your watch, your wallet or your fountain pen. Their dance was of the variety which, in old sideshow days. we called the kottch. or muscle school of motion. Their dexterity wal often amazing, their motions were barbaric. with . certain restraint and the instinct of a nautch. So the evening went on-until one's eardrums rocked with rhyt11- mic monotone and a screeching of lhi9h falsettos. And so we went out