Drag

“ DOWSER. Vulgar pronunciation of DOUCEUR.
DOXIES. She beggars, wenches, whores.
DRAB. A nasty, sluttish whore.
DRAG. To go on the drag; to follow a cart or waggon, in order to rob it. CANT.
DRAG LAY. Waiting in the streets to rob carts or waggons.
DRAGGLETAIL or DAGGLETAIL. One whose garments are bespattered with dag or dew: generally applied to the female sex, to signify a slattern.
DRAGOONING IT. A man who occupies two branches of one profession, is said to dragoon it; because, like the soldier of that denomination, he serves in a double capacity. ”

“ The light of their faces they show him—his case is Prejudged and his verdict already secured. "But none can outlast her, and few travel faster, She strides in her work clean away from The Drag; You hold her and sit her, she couldn't be fitter, Whenever you hit her she'll spring like a stag. ”

“ If they personally prefer a blood-sport to a bloodless pastime, let them say so—it is a matter on which we will take their word—but when they assert that a drag-hunt is not suitable for pedestrians, or for schoolboys, they only convict themselves of knowing as little about the practical as about the moral side of the controversy. The following statement was made by the late Lady Florence Dixie, who spoke with unquestionable authority:—
“Drags can be fast run or slow run, according to the way they are laid. ”

“ “But you’re a naughty girl. Last holidays you licked the paint off my lozenge-box, and the holidays before that you let the boat drag my fish-line down when I’d set you to watch it, and you pushed your head through my kite, all for nothing.” ”

“ The Prince of the Dragon Cave hastily bade the dance cease, and had the dancers of the nightingale round step forth. These were all lovely young girls of sixteen. They made a delicate music with flutes, so that the breeze blew and the roaring of the waves was stilled in a moment. The water gradually became as quiet as a crystal world, transparent to its lowest depths. When the nightingale dancers had finished, they withdrew and posted themselves in the western courtyard. ”

“ Poor brave small servant girls, earning your living while you are yet but children! I see your faces at the doors, rosy from the country or yellowish-white from anæmia and strong tea; see how your young breasts hardly fill out your clinging bodices, all askew, and how your hips are not yet grown to support your skirts properly—draggle-tails! ”

“ Long, flowing, and even trailing skirts are beautiful and appropriate in the parlor, but in the muddy streets, draggling in the filth, and embarrassing every movement of the wearer, or in the country among the bushes and briers, they lose all their beauty and grace, because no longer fitting. The prettiest costume we have ever seen for a shopping excursion or a walk in the city, and especially for a ramble in the country, is a short dress or frock reaching to the knee, and trowsers of the common pantaloon form, but somewhat wider. ”

“ At times the crowd opens to let some procession pass through. Now it is the dragon-dancers, the dragon's head being a huge and terrifying affair made of coloured pasteboard, and carried on a pole draped with a long garment which hides the dancer. ”

“ DRAGON-FLY. Evening dress of green tulle, spangled with green tinsel, trimmed with bulrushes and dragon-fly; a dragon-fly on the head and on each shoulder.
DRESDEN CHINA. Under this name almost any poudré character may be worn, with or without a sacque. It is generally thus rendered: Quilted short skirt; high-heeled shoes and clocked stockings; chintz or brocaded bunched-up tunic; muslin apron; low bodice; short sleeves with ruffles; coloured stomacher laced across; bow of ribbon or black velvet round neck; straw hat or muslin cap; powdered hair. ”

“ Touch me not.’ This ingenious dance is, you know, contrived to show how great a degree of assurance and airs de dragon can be united to pretty music and measured steps. Its gaiety and boldness will always recommend it to the majority; but there cannot be worse taste than making young ladies the performers. ”

“ But when first the two black dragons sprang out of the fog upon the small clerk, they had merely the effect of all miracles—they changed the universe. He discovered the fact that all romantics know—that adventures happen on dull days, and not on sunny ones. When the chord of monotony is stretched most tight, then it breaks with a sound like song. ”

“ Also for the Thrusters and they are not few
Who send in a “ten” when the season is through
It pays for the timber they broke in one run.
U is for Us when united we fight
That the skirt called “divided” be worn by the Fair ”

“ As the dragon charged it released huge clouds of hissing steam through its nostrils. It was almost as if a gigantic teapot had gone mad. ”

“ In repose one was startled to discover that the nose was long and thin, the mouth tired and a little childish, the eyes unsatisfied—a rather pinched peasant girl, dragged from the cafés-chantants and quite incapable of establishing any harmony between the claims of her art, of her appetites, of her dreams, and of her crowded daily routine. ”

“ So they set off up the hill arm-in-arm, the Saint, the Dragon, and the Boy. The lights in the little village began to go out; but there were stars, and a late moon, as they climbed to the Downs together. And, as they turned the last corner and disappeared from view, snatches of an old song were borne back on the night-breeze. I can't be certain which of them was singing, but I think it was the Dragon! ”

“ The dramatic possibilities of the thing had tickled the dragon immensely, and he had been up from an early hour, preparing for his first public appearance with as much heartiness as if the years had run backwards, and he had been again a little dragonlet, playing with his sisters on the floor of their mother's cave, at the game of saints-and-dragons, in which the dragon was bound to win.
A low muttering, mingled with snorts, now made itself heard; rising to a bellowing roar that seemed to fill the plain. ”

“ For night’s swift dragons cut the clouds full fast;
And yonder shines Aurora’s harbinger,
At whose approach, ghosts wandering here and there
Troop home to churchyards. ”

“ The most modest and retiring dragon in the world, if he's as big as four cart-horses and covered with blue scales, cannot keep altogether out of the public view. And so in the village tavern of nights the fact that a real live dragon sat brooding in the cave on the Downs was naturally a subject for talk. ”

“ For Queen Diana did my body change
Into a fork-tongued dragon flesh and fell,
And through the island nightly do I range,
Or in the green sea mate with monsters strange,
When in the middle of the moonlit night
The sleepy mariner I do affright. ”

“ The Boy made his way back to the village in a state of great despondency. First of all, there wasn't going to be any fight; next, his dear and honoured friend the dragon hadn't shown up in quite such a heroic light as he would have liked; and lastly, whether the dragon was a hero at heart or not, it made no difference, for St. George would most undoubtedly cut his head off. ”

“ "Look here, father, you know we've each of us got our line. You know about sheep, and weather, and things; I know about dragons. I always said, you know, that that cave up there was a dragon-cave. I always said it must have belonged to a dragon some time, and ought to belong to a dragon now, if rules count for anything. Well, now you tell me it has got a dragon, and so that's all right. I'm not half as much surprised as when you told me it hadn't got a dragon. Rules always come right if you wait quietly. ”

“ Of course, for some dances you may wear an ordinary skirt and blouse or a narrow afternoon frock. The Tango may be danced in the narrowest of skirts, because the feet are always close together; the Maxixe needs but a little more room, while the One Step and the Hesitation Waltz, with their longer glides and more intricate steps, require the regular plaited effect of which I have spoken.
Clothes are really a great aid to the woman in dancing, for the sweep of her soft skirts, the charm of her frock, lends her a grace that a man must inevitably lack. ”

“ The flickering candles in tin sconces against the walls, or depending in rude chandeliers of barrel-hoops from the ceiling, lit up the most astounding diversity of female costume the master had ever seen. Gowns of bygone fashions, creased and stained with packing and disuse, toilets of forgotten festivity revised with modern additions; garments in and out of season—a fur-trimmed jacket and a tulle skirt, a velvet robe under a pique sacque; fresh young faces beneath faded head-dresses, and mature and buxom charms in virgin' white. ”

“ It is dancing, too, that has made the vogue for the new garters, with their deep lace ruffles, and the little lace pantalets—all to hide those slender ankles that show in the dip. It is dancing that has made the vogue for the Tango slippers, with their ribbons and jeweled slides; and it is dancing that has made the small hat of tulle or lace fashionable for afternoons in place of wide picture-hats. "Big hats are unpleasant to dance in." ”

“ There are fancy dances in plenty which call for no distinctive style of dress, but the fashion fits the footstep as a rule, and no doubt influenced its birth. The stately movements of the minuet and the grace of the gavotte ask for the dignity of powder and brocade; the country dance seems the merrier for the gaily-coloured fluttering ribbons and short bright petticoats ”

“ As the dance goes on they grow hysterical, and it becomes a frenzied whirl of twisting, contorting women, who swing around the circle and thrust into the men’s faces the heads they carry, upbraiding them for their laziness and inability to bring in meat for their women. ”

“ From the soft bricks of the floor the red ochre rose in a thin cloud of dust, making hazy the shadowy dancers; the three musicians, in their black hats and their cloaks, sat obscurely in the corner, making a music that came quicker and quicker, making a dance that grew swifter and more intense, more subtle, the men seeming to fly and to implicate other strange inter-rhythmic dance into the women, the women drifting and palpitating as if their souls shook and resounded to a breeze that was subtly rushing upon them, through them ”

“ Either our houses must be all built over and made larger, or female crinolines must be made smaller, or dancing must continue as it now is, the most absurd and ungraceful of all attempts at amusement. The effort to execute round dances in the limits of modern houses, in the prevailing style of dress, can only lead to developments more startling than agreeable. Dancing in the open air, on the shaven green of lawns, is a pretty and graceful exercise, and there only can full sweep be allowed for the present feminine toilet. ”

“ All this proves that the modern dances are reformers of fashion. There are still, however, a few lessons to be learned about dressing for the dance. One should not wear in the afternoon a frock so light and décolleté that it looks like an evening gown. Soft silk gowns of dark shades, with black slippers and stockings, are far smarter and in better taste than either the light frock or a tailored suit, though one does see a number of blouses and skirts at thés dansants. ”

“ The peasants who went dancing by in picturesque costumes, and the finely formed women walking erect with vases of water on their heads, or drawing an even thread from their distaffs, as they went singing along, furnished her memory with subjects for many a picture. Sometimes her exclamations would attract the attention of a group of dancers, who, pleased with an exuberance of spirits akin to their own, and not unmindful of forthcoming coin, would beckon to the driver to stop, while they repeated their dances for the amusement of the Signorina. ”

“ The Twelve Princesses heard him, and laughed. The eldest said: ‘He, too, must forfeit his life.’
Then they got up, opened cupboards, chests, and cases, and brought out their beautiful dresses. They decked themselves before the glass, skipping about and revelling in the prospect of the dance. ”

“ They wear upon state occasions voluminous, silk-gauze skirts of variegated hues; a diaphanous silken jacket, with long loose sleeves, extending beyond the hands, protects the shoulders; jewelled girdles, pressing their naked breasts, sustain their draperies. An elaborate, heavy and artificial head-dress of black hair, twisted in plaits and decorated with many silver ornaments, is worn. The music of the dance is plaintive and the song of the dancer somewhat melancholy. Many movements are executed in stockinged feet; the dances are quite free from indelicacy and suggestiveness. ”

“ When I say that the present mode of dress renders waltzing almost as objectionable in a large room as the boldest feats of a French ballet-dancer, I mean that, from what I have heard and read of ballet-dancers, I judge that these girls gyrating in the centre of their gyrating and unmanageable hoops, cannot avoid, or do not know how to avoid, at any rate do not avoid, the exposure which the short skirts of the ballet-dancer are intended to make, and which, taking to myself all the shame of both the prudery and the coarseness if I am wrong, I call an indecent exposure. ”

“ There are filmy stockings with anklets embroidered in colored gems, lace-incrusted hose with silver embroideries, and, of course, all kinds of clocks and butterflies to draw attention to a slender foot and ankle. Any of these may be worn without violating good taste, and are the one part of a woman's wardrobe against which dancing has not started its reform campaign—principally because it was not needed. ”