But to see a lady wearing a long gown trailing on the ground does not impress me as being elegant, though I understand the ladies in Europe and America think otherwise.

It would almost seem as if their conceptions of beauty depended on the length of their skirts.
In a ballroom one sometimes finds it very difficult not to tread on the ladies' skirts, and on ceremonial occasions each lady has two page boys to hold up the train of her dress.

It is impossible to teach an Oriental to appreciate this sort of thing.

Certainly skirts which are not made either for utility or comfort, and which fashion changes, add nothing to the wearer's beauty; especially does this remark apply to the "hobble skirt", with its impediment to free movement of the legs.
The ungainly "hobble skirt" compels the wearer to walk carefully and with short steps, and when she dances she has to lift up her dress.
Now the latest fashion seems to be the "slashed skirt" which, however, has the advantage of keeping the lower hem of the skirt clean.
Doubtless this, in turn, will give place to other novelties.

A Chinese lady, Doctor Ya Mei-kin, who has been educated in America, adopted while there the American attire, but as soon as she returned to China she resumed her own native dress.