Page:Firecrackers a realistic novel.pdf/153

 Sunday Times. Maida Sonsconsett, aged nine, attends the Institute where Dalcroze Eurythmics are expounded, and Helen Blair has gone in for Gurdjieff. . ..

That is an entirely different matter, and you know it, George, Laura expostulated. Everybody has gone in for Gurdjieff, but acrobats are vulgar.

Laura dear, you're not up on acrobats. Why, I recently read somewhere or other that all circus performers are good to their wives, never get divorces, and attend church services regularly. They never drink and they never swear. Laura, if the younger generation is insisting on physical training, I don't think we could put Consuelo in more moral hands.

George, you're not serious. You are praising middle-class virtues. Do you want your daughter brought up that way?

I am serious. I don't think it would do Consuelo any harm at all to imbibe a few middle-class ideas. Of course, we'll ask Miss Pinchon to accompany her to the studio or whatever they call it and chaperon Consuelo while she takes her lesson. In a short time, doubtless, she will be able to turn cartwheels and handsprings all over the drawing-room floor. The Masons and the Sonsconsetts and the Barbers and the Blairs will die of envy. I predict that you'll live to see an epidemic of fashionable acrobats. Think of it: they can all perform together like a troupe of Arabs. You'll always have enter-