NATURE AND ART.
To Betty, who can afford to defy the laws of symmetry.
[Being reflections on the old theory, recently developed before the Hellenic Society by Mr. Jay Hambridge, that certain formulæ of proportions found in nature—notably in the normal ratio between a man's height and the span of his outstretched arms (2 : √5)—constituted the basis of symmetry in the art of the Greeks and, earlier, of the Egyptians.]
Betty, I fear you don't conform
Precisely to the female norm
From dainty foot to charming noddle,
But, closely measured, span by span,
Seem built upon a private plan
Not found in Annie Kellerman
Or in the well-known Melos model.
If you compare your width and height—
Arms horizontal, left and right—
With ancient types of pure perfection,
The ratio may not, it's true,
Be as the root of 5 to 2,
But what, my dear, has that to do
With laws of natural selection?
Let Mr. Hambridge to your shape
Apply his T-square and his tape,
And wish that you were more archaic;
Why should I care? I love you best
For what no compasses can test,
For graces not to be expressed
In terms however algebraic.
I love you for the lips and eyes
That none may hope to standardize
On any system known to Hellas;
And what I like about your smile
Has no relation to the style
Of any pyramid of Nile
Figured by mathematic fellahs.
Though your proportions mayn't agree
With Fechner's pedant formulæ,
I don't complain of such disparity;
Too flawless that perfection shows;
For me a larger comfort flows
From human failings (take your nose—
I like its quaint irregularity).
Indeed I love you best of all
For those defects by which you fall
Short of the pattern you should follow;
As I would fain be loved for mine,
Speaking as one whose own design
Lacks something of the perfect line
Affected by the young Apollo.
O. S.