Page:Modern Dancing (1914) Castle.djvu/27

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MODERN DANCING

most attractive kind of folk-dancing. Both Mr. and Mrs. Castle have made a specialty of the Maxixe as an exquisite expression of joyousness and of youthful spontaneity.

The Half and Half is an original drawing-room dance invented by Mr. Castle. It combines the best steps of the Hesitation and the Maxixe, but the tempo is entirely new.

In this book Mr. Castle has explained in detail and with the aid of some excellent photographs, exactly how to dance these modern dances, and so clearly and simply that any one reading the text can follow their explanations, and by attention and practice learn to dance with ease and grace.

We have here, then, the authoritative book on dancing, written by the foremost exponents in America, the inventors of the famous and popular Castle Walk.

Perhaps in view of the wide-spread criticism of some of the modern dances I may be permitted to add a word concerning dancing itself.

If we bar dancing from the world we bar one of the supreme human expressions of happiness and exultation. The tiny child skips for joy and prances to the music of the hand-organ long before it knows the difference between happiness and sorrow. In time of festival in many countries dancing is the keynote of the gathering.

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