[Illustration] “Very convincing!” I cried. “The intoed tendency is beautifully extenuated in a most logical way. Plainly it would be as foolish for a woman to walk with her toes out as it would be for a cavalryman to ride with his knees out.” “Unless she were going up stairs.” “Up stairs? Oh, I see. You are to explain the waddling. That will be an immense comfort to every man—I mean the explanation. So many of us have turned our faces away from the spectacle of a lovely creature who walked with a Delsartean lilt and seated herself with the inexpressible grace of a bird who has reached the chosen branch, mounting a flight of steps with the roll of a breathless duck.” “Let us now take this hoople for Figure Two,” said the Gym Girl, with a serious effect. “The two feet, still represented by the dumb-bells, now seek not the point of least resistance but the point of most resistance. They do not wish to tread on the gown, which is likely to happen, even when it is slightly lifted, unless the knees assist in lifting the forward edge. This chalk mark extending to A and B will indicate by its variation from the circular line the direction in which the feet alternately move in the effort to keep the skirt free in front. Of course a woman who tries to go up stairs with her hands full, without holding her skirt, must waddle more than a woman who is able to let her hands help her feet.” “I have no doubt that what you have intimated with regard to the dexterities imposed by the skirt is quite true. There must be a certain important amount of muscular power not otherwise demanded in the current method of holding up the skirt with one hand at the back, or even in twisting the loose of it into a tuft on one hip. The habit doesn’t seem to be intrinsically pretty, yet it has that fascination which makes us wonder whether conventional ideas of beauty are of any importance whatever. I fancy that Greek and Roman women had some such untransmittable method of managing redundant drapery during those intervals when the use of beauty gave place to its twin, the beauty of use.” [Illustration] “Yes, I think you will find that from the beginning of time woman has sought to combine garments in which she may be becomingly draped and in which she may move abroad. The Professor tells us that a trailing gown is an anachronism out of doors, save to those women who are carried—you know what I mean, in a carriage or something. We have heard that a great many times; but all the same, I suppose women will go on trying to make the gown they prefer to be seen in do service during the transits as well as during the pauses.” “There is much transit about the modern woman.” “I hope you find something to be glad of in that.” “I do; but no man can help feeling that draperies are a great burden which no gallantry can lighten.” “O yes, gallantry can! See that her packages are sent home—or carry them for her.” [Illustration]