When one considers the inexpressible Advantage there is in arriving at some Excellence in this Art, it is monstrous to behold it so much neglected.  The following Letter has in it something very natural on this Subject.

  Mr.  SPECTATOR,

I am a Widower with but one Daughter; she was by Nature much inclined to be a Romp, and I had no way of educating her, but commanding a young Woman, whom I entertained to take Care of her, to be very watchful in her Care and Attendance about her.  I am a Man of Business, and obliged to be much abroad.  The Neighbours have told me, that in my Absence our Maid has let in the Spruce Servants in the Neighbourhood to Junketings, while my Girl play’d and romped even in the Street.  To tell you the plain Truth, I catched her once, at eleven Years old, at Chuck-Farthing among the Boys.  This put me upon new Thoughts about my Child, and I determined to place her at a Boarding-School, and at the same Time gave a very discreet young Gentlewoman her Maintenance at the same Place and Rate, to be her Companion.  I took little Notice of my Girl from Time to Time, but saw her now and then in good Health, out of Harm’s way, and was satisfied.  But by much Importunity I was lately prevailed with to go to one of their Balls.  I cannot express to you the anxiety my silly Heart was in, when I saw my Romp, now fifteen, taken out:  I never felt the pangs of a Father upon me so strongly in my whole Life before; and I could not have suffered more, had my whole Fortune been at Stake.  My Girl came on with the most becoming Modesty I had ever seen, and casting a respectful Eye, as if she feared me more than all the Audience, I gave a Nod, which, I think, gave her all the Spirit she assumed upon it, but she rose properly to that Dignity of Aspect.  My Romp, now the most graceful Person of her Sex, assumed a Majesty which commanded the highest Respect; and when she turned to me, and saw my Face in Rapture, she fell into the prettiest Smile, and I saw in all her Motion that she exulted in her Father’s Satisfaction.  You, Mr. SPECTATOR, will, better than I can tell you, imagine to yourself all the different Beauties and Changes of Aspect in an accomplished young Woman, setting forth all her Beauties with a Design to please no one so much as her Father.  My Girl’s Lover can never know half the Satisfaction that I did in her that Day.  I could not possibly have imagined, that so great Improvement could have been wrought by an Art that I always held in it self ridiculous and contemptible.  There is, I am convinced, no Method like this, to give young Women a Sense of their own Value and Dignity; and I am sure there can be none so expeditious to communicate that Value to others.  As for the flippant insipidly Gay and wantonly Forward, whom you behold among Dancers, that Carriage is more to be attributed to the perverse Genius of the Performers, than imputed to the Art it self.  For my Part, my Child has danced her