Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Fuess and Stearns, comps. The Little Book of Society Verse. 1922.

By. Mary Mapes Dodge

The Minuet

GRANDMA told me all about it,

Told me so I could n’t doubt it,

How she danced—my Grandma danced!—

Long ago.

How she held her pretty head,

How her dainty skirt she spread,

Turning out her pretty toes;

How she slowly leaned and rose—

Long ago.

Grandma’s hair was bright and sunny;

Dimpled cheeks, too—ah, how funny!

Really quite a pretty girl,

Long ago.

Bless her! why, she wears a cap,

Grandma does, and takes a nap

Every single day; and yet

Grandma danced the minuet

Long ago.

Now she sits there rocking, rocking,

Always knitting Grandpa’s stocking—

(Every girl was taught to knit

Long ago.)

Yet her figure is so neat,

And her ways so staid and sweet,

I can almost see her now

Bending to her partner’s bow,

Long ago.

Grandma says our modern jumping,

Hopping, rushing, whirling, bumping,

Would have shocked the gentle folk

Long ago.

No—they moved with stately grace,

Everything in proper place,

Gliding slowly forward, then

Slowly curtseying back again,

Long ago.

Modern ways are quite alarming,

Grandma says; but boys were charming—

Girls and boys I mean, of course,—

Long ago.

Bravely modest, grandly shy,—

She would like to have us try

Just to feel like those who met

In the graceful minuet

Long ago.

With the minuet in fashion,

Who could fly into a passion?

All would wear the calm they wore

Long ago.

In time to come, if I, perchance,

Should tell my grandchild of our dance,

I should really like to say,

“We did it, dear, in some such way,

Long ago.”