The whole treatment of the exquisite story of the youth who fell in love with his own beauty, and was drowned seeking to come near its reflection, was heavy-handed, even a little barbarous and ugly. And all the grave movements imprisoned in stone and marble by the sculptors of ancient Greece, all the joyous silhouettes on Greek vases, seemed to remain remote, and secure from the conquest of the devouring Russian, restlessly seeking material for his ballets in all nations and all times. I had a sudden seizure of distrust; it was as though the disdain of the Greek had sapped the foundations of my belief in the justness of the praises lavished on the new dance; but then memories of gestures, colors, bounding movements, freedom of expression given by perfection of technique, came crowding pell-mell into my mind. The frown on a cold marble forehead could not extinguish my joy in the flame of life which burns so ardently in the work of the Russian ballet.
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Russian Ballet, by Ellen Terry