out while ululations rise and the tambourines are struck; and when the bride takes her place at the head of the gathering, the poet sets to as poet, the dancer as dancer, and the weight-lifter hoists the stone mortar aloft with a single hand!

It is a fine thing to enumerate the circumstances and sing their praises; but between saying and doing lie three obstacles:

1 — Finding a committee for the comprehensive program whose aim is neutral, pure research.

2 — Providing time enough to prepare the program's materials and search them out. Not less than two years!

Touma — Say a year, my dear sir! You have terrified the two ladies!

Chehab — I am with you. The movement must

be encouraged. But tracking down the arts (almost) perished among the living, as among lifeless things, demands close scrutiny, which in its turn demands time — for the sake of authenticity and mastery.

Shayboub — You mean the "dabke of Hammana" must be as old as the history of Ramses!

Ghorayeb — Or the "songs of Zahle" as ancient as the legend of Adonis!

Chehab — To a point! And you have missed the third matter, the greatest obstacle of all: money. If the men come to our aid (men who, in that case, will have taken on the guise of women!) — I put the costs at not less than 20,000 Lebanese lira, to be spent between wages, transport, materials, and prizes.

Touma — The moment is favorable, and spurs us to take the first leap. If the time is lost, so is the will.

Shayboub — We could prepare a reduced version of the program as drawn up...

Touma — ...to be the nucleus of the larger program later on.

Chehab — The difficulty is in the first step only. But we must not content ourselves with piecemeal work. A dabke by itself, or a mawwal by itself, or a mere fashion parade — with that we shall not have created the atmosphere sufficient to call forth the popular renaissance. And the proverb: Il ne faut pas voir petit.

Ghorayeb — Can you set apart for us some of your time and your money?

Chehab — Once a week.

Touma — Some of the money.

And upon the promise of the two gracious guests, the two women of letters rested content — making the readers of The Woman's Voice witnesses to this promise.