OCR Text |
Show 66 THE CODE OF TERPSICHORE. Your head, shoulders, and bust, ought to be supported and adorned by your arms, and so precisely follow their motions, that they may present altogether a graceful ensemble; and, as we have already remarked, the legs must, of course, participate in the harmony of their movements. In the performance of your steps let your body be quiet, firm, and unshaken, yet easy and pliant, according to the play of the legs and arms. But in this beware of stiffness. H e who, whilst dancing, moves his body by jerks-raises his shoulders at each movement of his legs-bends or relaxes his loins to facilitate the execution of his terns, and who shows, by the distortion of his features, how much pain his performance occasions him, is, unquestionably, an object of ridicule, and the name of a grotesque would suit him much better than that of a dancer. I have repeatedly seen examples of this defective mode of dancing; and cannot but attribute it principally to the negligence of masters, who, over-anxious to see their pupils exhibit on a public stage, leave them to themselves before they have completed their studies. The public, also, by their too indulgent applause, or their want of taste, considerably increase the number of this class of dancers, or, more properly speaking, leapers, who, finding themselves so much encouraged, immediately imagine that they h ave attained the summit of perfection in their art. " le vulgaire s'extasie Aux tours de force aux entrechats.'' L'HOSPITAL. Such miserable dancers ought to be banished from the boards of every threatre, as actors devoid of merit, and tending only to the preservation of bad taste. |