well
ourselves and fit us to bring into the world such children as will amaze
us with their health of body and purity of mind. No alteration of the
facts of life is necessary, but only a change of attitude. Why, when
Trilby brought the bare foot into prominence, it was gravely debated
whether or not such an indecency should be permitted. It was assumed
that a naked foot was indecent. Why a foot more than a hand? Why any one
part of the body more than another? Comstockery! Comstockery!

[Illustration]

DON QUIXOTE AND HAMLET

In Peter Kropotkin's Book: "Russian Literature" (published by McClure,
Phillips & Company), there is a quotation from Turgenieff's works, which
shows the Russian poet's genius and psychological insight in all its
wonderful depth. Here it is:

"Don Quixote is imbued with devotion towards his ideal, for which he is
ready to suffer all possible privations, to sacrifice his life; life
itself he values only so far as it can serve for the incarnation of the
ideal, for the promotion of truth, of justice on earth.... He lives for
his brothers, for opposing the forces hostile to mankind: the witches,
the giants--that is, the oppressors.... Therefore he is fearless,
patient; he is satisfied with the most modest food, the poorest cloth:
he has other things to think of. Humble in his heart, he is great and
daring in his mind.... And who is Hamlet? Analysis, first of all, and
egotism, and therefore no faith. He lives entirely for himself, he is
an egotist; but to believe in one' self--even an egotist cannot do that:
we can believe only in something which is outside us and above us.... As
he has doubts of everything, Hamlet evidently does not spare himself;
his intellect is too developed to remain satisfied with what he finds in
himself; he feels his weakness, but each self-consciousness is a force
where-from results his irony, the opposite of the enthusiasm of Don
Quixote.... Don Quixote, a poor man, almost a beggar, without means and
relations, old, isolated--undertakes to redress all the evils and to
protect oppressed strangers over the whole world. What does it matter to
him that his first attempt at freeing the innocent from his oppressor
falls twice as heavy upon the head of the innocent himself?... What does
it matter that, thinking that he has to deal with noxious giants, Don
Quixote attacks useful windmills?... Nothing of the sort can ever happen
with Hamlet: how could he, with his perspicaci