The Russian new ballet has attempted to perform Claude Debussy’s _L’Après-Midi d’un Faun_, and Richard Strauss’ _La Légende de Joseph_. In the latter ballet a new Russian dancer, Leonide Miassine, was introduced in the title rôle. Neither Miassine nor _La Légende de Joseph_ proved great attractions. Magnificent as Strauss and Debussy are in their modern compositions otherwise, in ballet music they remain mediocrities. Their rhythm is so anæmic, their images so hazy and their episodes so disconnected that not even a Nijinsky or a Karsavina could put life into them. In criticising the new Russian ballet of Diaghileff and Fokine, Prince Volkhonsky writes: ‘Their main defect is that they develop [the dance] independently from the music; they are a design by themselves--complicated, interesting, very often pleasing to the eye, yet independent of the music. And we have already seen when we spoke of the old codas that the most unpretentious figure, even when banal, becomes inspiring when it coincides with the musical movement, and, on the contrary, the most interesting “picturesque” figure loses meaning when it develops in discord with music. Look at some dance, definite, exact, that has crystallized itself within well-established limits; you may look at it even without music. But try to watch a pantomime without music. In the first place, it will be a design without color, quite an acceptable form; in the second it will be a body without skeleton--something unacceptable.’ The Russian new ballet is an interesting proof of the far-reaching effect that the naturalistic school of dancing indirectly exercised upon the development of the art of dancing. The efforts of the reform that Fokine is attempting to achieve are admirable and show the great possibilities that the revolutionists face in the immediate future. Their whole drawback has been in their conception of the form and music. Even Stravinsky has not been able to shake himself loose from the old pantomimic form. But sooner or later they will see the new point of view and acknowledge the mistake that every reformer is apt to make in his first step. The Russians have the technique, the music, the innate talent and the traditions for all future choreographic inspiration. The solution lies, to a great extent, in the coöperative work of their composers, writers, critics, painters, designers, teachers and dancers. CHAPTER XVIII THE EURHYTHMICS OF JACQUES-DALCROZE Jacques-Dalcroze and his creed; essentials of the ‘Eurhythmic’ system--Body-rhythm; the plastic expression of musical ideas; merits and shortcomings of the Dalcroze system--Speculation on the value of Eurhythmics to the dance. I