The three living members of this male quartet were all Muscovites, which is to say, products of the Imperial School of Moscow and dancers of the Bolshoi Theatre, rather than products of the Maryinsky. In Russian ballet this was a sharp distinction and a fine one, with the Maryinskians inclined to glance down the nose a bit at their Moscow colleagues. And possibly with reason. Laurent Novikoff was born five years later than Theodore Kosloff; he graduated from the Moscow School an equal number of years later. He remained at the Bolshoi Theatre for only a year before joining the Diaghileff Ballet in Paris for an equal length of time. On his return to Moscow at the close of the Diaghileff season, he became a first dancer at the Bolshoi, only to leave to become Anna Pavlova’s partner the next year. As a matter of fact, the three remaining members of the quartet were all, at one time or another, partners of Pavlova. With Pavlova, Novikoff toured the United States in 1913 and in 1914. Returning once again to Moscow, he staged ballets for opera, and remained there until the revolution, when he went to London and rejoined the Diaghileff Company, only to leave and join forces once again with Pavlova, remaining with her this time for seven years, and eventually opening a ballet school in London. In 1929, Novikoff accepted an invitation from the Chicago Civic Opera Company to become its ballet-master; and later, for a period of five years, he was ballet-master of the Metropolitan Opera Company. As a dancer, Novikoff had a number of distinguished qualities, including a fine virility, a genuinely romantic manner, imagination and authority. As a choreographer, he can hardly be classified as a progressive. While he staged a number of works for Pavlova, including, among others, _Russian Folk Lore_ and _Don Quixote_, most of his choreographic work was with one opera company or another. In nearly all cases, ballet was, as it still is, merely a poor step-sister in the opera houses and with the opera companies, often regarded by opera directors merely as a necessary nuisance, and only on rare occasions is an opera choreographer ever given his head. A charming, cultured, and quite delightful gentleman, Laurent Novikoff now lives quietly with his wife Elizabeth in the American middle west. _ALEXANDRE VOLININE_ Alexandre Volinine was Anna Pavlova’s partner for a longer time than any of the others. Born in 1883, he was a member of the same Moscow Imperial class as Theodore Kosloff, attained the rank of first dancer at the Bolshoi Theatre, and remained there for nine years.