[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] • Sin,---•-The letter from
Mr. Somers Cocks is timely. A week or so ago the Observer quoted a writer as saying, " I remembei the time when the sight of a girl's calves would have given a - youn" g man. palPitations." It may be admitted that young men of to=day are more -quiescent ; the bus-cOnchictor in piitich- of the 1890'§'said, " Ankles is no treat to me, Miss ; I sees 'em eveiyday,•" and the youth of to-day are similarly blaie about but- the once-ycning men of the passing generation are -licit all -dead yet, and it is monstrous that they should be emotionally disturbed hy.the Unexpected :sight of female flesh dial:Acted on the screen.- It is not necessary perhaps to go to the length of. prohibiting these films -altogether,-but it should be cOmpulsory for the showman- to place a notice outside the house that the film is " for young people only." Then, if elderly sensitive is entrapped into seeing more than is good- for hini it will be due to his OiVn negligence.•--I am, "Puritan" writes " I am discovering every day, after gaining a rather extensive and peculiar knowledge of theatres and music-halls, that the amusements of France are quite as clean, generally speaking, as those of our own country. I don't see why the French should be libelled because of a comparatiVely small Salacious section. Probably France has no more degenerates than we. The more I see of the average Frenchman the more I appreCiate the fact that though he enjoys life more than the Englishman he has his own love of propriety. His family life is clean and wholesome. He is not a prude. He allows some things we should detest, but there is no evil where evil never enters his mind. I am sorry to say that during three weeks or more in Nice, and visits to Monte Carlo, Mentone and other places, I have been tempted to feel the change of atmosphere did me good morally. For one thing, I have thanked God that for a space at least I have not been worried by the filthy language I hear in every main street at home. I have walked about quite alone at. all hours, unmolested."
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