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Among the many reasons for this dance of the minuet having become general, is the possibility of dancing it to so many different airs, though the steps are invariable. If one tune does not please a performer, he may call for another; the minuet still remaining unalterable.There is no occasion however for a learner to be confined to this dance. He should rather be encouraged, or have a curiosity be excited in him, to learn especially those dances, which are of the more tender or serious character, contributing, as they greatly do, to perfect one in the minuet; independently of the pleasure they besides give both in the performance and to the sight. The dances the most in request are, theSaraband, theBretagnetheFurlana, thePassepied, theFolie d’Espagne, theRigaudon, theMinuet du DauphintheLouvre,La Mariée, which is always danced at the Opera of Roland at Paris. Some of these are performed solo, others are duet-dances. TheLouvreis held by many the most pleasing of them all, especially when well executed by both performers, in a just concert of motions; no dance affordingthe arms more occasion for a graceful display of them, or a more delicate regularity of the steps; being composed of the most select ones from theatrical dances, and formed upon the truest principles of the art. This dance is executed in most countries of Europe without any variation. It is generally followed or terminated by a minuet; and these two dances, the Louvre and the minuet, are at present the most universally in fashion, and will, in all probability, continue so, from their being both pleasing beyond all others, to the performers, as well as to the spectators, and from their not being difficult to learn, if the scholar has but common docility.Youth being for learning this art undoubtedly the best season, for reasons as I have before observed, tooobvious to need insisting on, the master cannot pay too much attention to the availing himself of the pliancy of that age, to give his scholars the necessary instructions for preparing and well-disposing their limbs. This holds good, particularly with regard to that propensity innate to most persons of turning in their toes. I have already mentioned the expediency of curing this defect, by the directing them to acquire a habit of turning the knees outward, to which I have to add, that on the proper turn of the knee, chiefly depend the graces of the under part of the figure, that is to say, from the foot to the hip.Frequent practice also of dancing, or of any salutary exercise, is also highly recommendable for obtaining a firmnessof body; for a tottering dancer can never plant his steps so as to afford a pleasing execution. It may sound a little odd, but, the truth is, that in dancing, sprightliness and agility are principally produced by bodily strength; while on the contrary, weakness, or infirmity, must give every step and spring, not only a tottering, but a heavy air. The legs that bear with the most ease the weight of the body, will naturally make it seem the lightest.ASummary AccountOf various kinds ofDANCESIn different Parts of the WORLD.Cantatur et saltatur apud omnes gentes, aliquo saltem modo,Quint.INEUROPE.Asalmost every country has dances particular to it, or, at least, so naturalized by adoption from others,that in length of time they pass for originals; a slight sketch of the most remarkable of them may serve to throw a light upon this subject, entertaining to some, and both entertaining and useful to others.InBritain, you have the hornpipe, a dance which is held an original of this country. Some of the steps of it are used in the country-dances here, which are themselves a kind of dance executed with more variety and agreeableness than in any part of Europe, where they are also imitatively performed, as in Italy, Germany and in several other countries. Nor is it without reason they obtain, here the preference over the like in other places. They are no where so well executed. The music is extremely well adapted, and the steps in generalare very pleasing. Some foreign comic dancers, on their coming here, apply themselves with great attention to the true study of the hornpipe, and by constant practice acquire the ability of performing it with success in foreign countries, where it always meets with the highest applause, when masterly executed. There was an instance of this, sometime ago at Venice, at an opera there, when the theatre was as well provided with good singers and dancers, as any other. But they had not the good fortune to please the public. A dancer luckily for the manager, presented himself, who danced the hornpipe in its due perfection. This novelty took so, and made such full houses, that the manager, who had begun with great loss, soon saw himself repaired, and wasa gainer when he little expected it.It is to theHighlandersin North-Britain, that I am told we are indebted for a dance in the comic vein, called theScotch Reel, executed generally, and I believe always intrio, or by three. When well danced, it has a very pleasing effect: and indeed nothing can be imagined more agreeable, or more lively and brilliant, than the steps in many of the Scotch dances. There is a great variety of very natural and very pleasing ones. And a composer of comic dances, might, with great advantage to himself, upon a judicious assemblage of such steps as he might pick out of their dances, form a dance that, with well adapted dresses, correspondent music, and figures capable of a just performance,could hardly fail of a great success upon the theatre.I do not know whether I shall not stand in need of an apology for mentioning here a dance once popular in England, but to which the idea of low is now currently annexed. It was originally adapted from the Moors, and is still known by the name of Morris-dancing, or Moresc-dance. It is danced with swords, by persons odly disguised, with a great deal of antic rural merriment: it is true that this diversion is now almost exploded, being entirely confined to the lower classes of life, and only kept up in some counties. What the reason may be of its going out of use, I cannot say; but am very sure, there was not only a great deal of natural mirth in it, but that it is susceptible enough ofimprovement, to rescue it from the contempt it may have incurred, through its being chiefly in use among the vulgar; though most probably it may have descended among them from the higher ranks. For certainly of them it was not quite unworthy, for the Pirrhic or military air it carries with it, and which probably was the cause of its introduction among so martial a people. Rude, as it was, it might require refinement, but it did not, perhaps, deserve to become quite obsolete.InSpain, they have a dance, called,Les Folies d’Espagne, which is performed either by one or by two, with castanets. There is a dress peculiarly adapted to it, which has a very pleasing effect, as well as the dance itself.InFrance, theirContre-dances, are drawn from the true principles of the art, and the figures and steps are generally very agreeable. No nation cultivates this art with more taste and delicacy. TheirProvençaledance, is most delightfully sprightly, and well imagined. The steps seem to correspond with the natural vivacity and gaiety of the Provençals. This dance is commonly performed to the pipe and tabor.TheFlemishdances run in the most droll vein of true rural humor. The performers seem to be made for the dances, and the dances for the performers; so well assorted are the figures to the representation. Several eminent painters in the grotesque stile, Teniers especially, have formed many divertingpictures taken from life, upon this subject.AtNaples, they have various grotesque dances, which are originals in their kind, being extremely difficult to execute, not only for the variety of the steps, but for the intricacy and uncommonness, or rather singularity of them.But while I am mentioning Naples, I ought not to omit that effect of dancing, which is attributed to it, upon those who are bitten with theTarantula. The original of this opinion, was probably owing to some sensible physician, prescribing such a violent motion, more likely to be kept up in the patient, by the power of music, than by any thing else, as might enable him to expel the poison, by being thereby thrown into a copious sweat, and by other benefitsfrom such a vehement agitation. This, it is supposed, was afterwards abused and turned into a mere trick, to assemble a croud and get money, either by sham bites, or by making a kind of show of this method of practice in real ones. However, that may be, the various grimaces or contortions, leaps and irregular steps, commonly used on this occasion, to be executed to that sort of music, or airs adapted to it, might afford a good subject for a grotesque dance, to be formed upon the plan of a burlesque or mock-imitation: and I am not quite sure that the idea of such a dance, has not been already carried into execution.The castanets theNeapolitansmost frequently use, are of the largest size. It is also from Naples that we have taken the Punchinello dance.AtFlorence, they have a dance, called,il Treschone. The country-women, in the villages, are very fond of it. They are generally speaking, very robust, and capable of holding out the fatigue of this dance, for a long time. To make themselves more light for it, they often pull off their shoes. The dance is opened by a couple, one of each sex. The woman holds in her hand a handkerchief, which she flings to him whom she chuses for her next partner, who, in his turn has an equal right to dispose of it in the same manner, to any woman of the company he chuses. Thus is the dance carried on without any interruption till the assembly breaks up.The favorite dance of theVenetians, is what they call theFurlana, which is performed by two persons dancinga-round with the greatest rapidity. Those who have a good ear, keep time with the crossing their feet behind; and some add a motion of their hands, as if they were rowing or tugging at an oar. This dance is practiced in several other parts of Italy.The Peasants ofTirol, have one of the most pleasant and grotesque dances that can be imagined. They perform it in a sort of holy-day dress, made of skins, and adorned with ribbons. They wear wooden shoes, not uncuriously painted; and the women especially express a kind of rural simplicity and frolic mirth, which has a very agreeable effect.TheGrisonsare in possession of an old dance, which is not without its merit, and which they would not exchangefor the politest in Europe; they being as invariably attached to it, as to their dress.TheHungariansare very noisy in their dances, with their iron heels, but when they are of an equal size, and dressed in their uniforms, the agility of their steps, and the regularity of dress in the performers, render them not a disagreeable sight.TheGermanshave a dance called theAllemande, in which the men and women form a ring. Each man holding his partner round the waist, makes her whirl round with almost inconceivable rapidity: they dance in a grand circle, seeming to pursue one another: in the course of which they execute several leaps, and some particularly pleasing steps, when they turn, but sovery difficult as to appear such even to professed dancers themselves. When this dance is performed by a numerous company, it furnishes one of the most pleasing sights that can be imagined.ThePolishnobility have a dance, to which the magnificence of their dress, and the elegance of the steps, the gracefulness of the attitudes, the fitness of the music, all contribute to produce a great effect. Were it performed here on the theatre, it would hardly fail of a general applause.TheCossacs, have, amidst all their uncouth barbarism, a sort of dancing, which they execute to the sound of an instrument, somewhat resembling a Mandoline, but considerably larger, and which is highly diverting, from the extreme vivacity of the steps, and theoddity of the contortions and grimaces, with which they exhibit it. For a grotesque dance there can hardly be imagined any thing more entertaining.TheRussians, afford nothing remarkable in their dances, which they now chiefly take from other countries. The dance of dwarfs with which the Czar Peter the Great, solemnized the nuptials of his niece to the Duke of Courland, was, probably rather a particular whim of his own, than a national usage.INASIA.InTurky, dances have been, as of old in Greece, and elsewhere instituted in form of a religious ceremony. TheDervisheswho are a kind of devotionists execute a dance, called theSemaatin a circle, to a strange wild-simphony, when holding one another by the hand, they turn round with such rapidity, that, with pure giddiness, they often fall down in heaps upon one another.They have also in Turky, as well as India and Persia, professed dancers, especially of the female sex, under the name of dancing-girls, who are bred up, from their childhood, to the profession; and are always sent for to any great entertainment, public or private, as at feasts, weddings, ceremonies of circumcision, and, in short, on all occasions of festivity and joy. They execute their dances to a simphony of various instruments, extremely resembling the antient ones, thetympanum, thecrotala, thecimbals, and the like, as well as to songs, being a kind of small dramatic compositions, or what may properly be calledballads, which is a true word for a song at once sung and danced:ballaresignifying to dance; andballata, a song, composed to be danced. It is probable that from these eastern kind of dances, which are undoubtedlyvery antient, came the name, among the Romans, ofbalatrones. Nothing can be imagined more graceful, nor more expressive, than the gestures and attitudes of those dancing-girls, which may properly be called the eloquence of the body, in which indeed most of the Asiatics and inhabitants of thesouthrenclimates constitutionally excel, from a sensibility more exquisite than is the attribute of the more northern people; but a sensibility ballanced by too many disadvantages to be envied them. The Siamese, we are told, have three dances, called theCone, theLacone, and theRaban. TheConeis a figure-dance, in which they use particularly a string-instrument in the nature of a violin, with some others of the Asiatic make. Those who dance are armed and masked, and seem to be a fighting ratherthan dancing. It is a kind of Indian Pirrhic. Their masks represent the most frightful hideous countenances of wild-beasts, or demons, that fancy can invent. In theLaconethe performers sing commutually stanzes of verses containing the history of their country. The Raban is a mixed dance, of men and women, not martial, nor historical, but purely gallant; in which the dancers have all long false nails of copper. They sing in this dance, which is only a slow march without any high motions, but with a great many contortions of body and arms. Those who dance in the Raban and Cone have high gilt caps like sugar-loaves. The dance of theLaconeis appropriated to the dedication of their temples, when a new statue of theirSommona-codomis set up.In many parts of the East, at their weddings, in conducting the bride from her house to the bridegroom’s, as in Persia especially, they make use of processional music and dancing. But, in the religious ceremonies of the Gentoos, when, at stated times, they draw the triumphal car, in which the image of the deity of the festival is carried, the procession is intermixed with troops of dancers of both sexes, who, proceed, in chorus, leaping, dancing, and falling into strange antics, as the procession moves along, of which they compose a part; these adapt their gestures and steps to the sounds of various instruments of music.Considering withal that the Romans, in their most solemn processions, as in that called thePompa, which I have before mentioned, in which not only thePirrhic dance was processionally executed, but other dances, in masquerade, by men who, in their habits, by leaping and by feats of agility, represented satirs, theSileni, andFauni, and were attended by minstrels playing on the flute and guitar; besides which, there wereSalianpriests, andSalianvirgins, who followed, in their order, and executed their respective religious dances; it may bear a question whether not an unpleasing use might not be made, on the theatres, of processional dances properly introduced, and connected, especially in the burlesque way. In every country, and particularly in this, processions are esteemed an agreeable amusement to the eye; and certainly they must receive more life and animation from a proper intermixture of dances, than what a mere solemn march can represent, where there is nothing to amuse but a long train ofpersonages in various habits, walking in parade. I only mention this however as a hint not impossible to be improved, and reduced into practice.But even, where it might be improper or ridiculous to think of mixing dances with a procession, though it were but in burlesque, which must, if at all, be the preferable way of mixing them, the pleasure of those who delight in seeing processions and pageantry exhibited on the theatre, might be gratified, without any violence to propriety, by making them introductory to the dances of the grandest kind. For example; where a dance in Chinese characters is intended, a procession might be previously brought in, of personages, of whom the habits, charactures, and manners might be faithfully copied from nature, and from the truth ofthings, and convey to the spectator a juster notion, of the people from which the representation was taken, of their dress and public processions, than any verbal description, or even prints or pictures. After which, the dance might naturally take place, in celebration of the festival, of which, the procession might be supposed the occasion.In order to give a more distinct idea of this hint, I have hereto annexed theprint of a Chinese processiontaken from the description of a traveller into that country; by which a good composer would well know how to make a proper choice of what might be exhibited, and what was fit to be left out; especially according as the dance should be, serious or burlesque. In the last case;even the horses might be represented by a theatrical imitation. And certainly, bringing the personages on in such a regular procession at first, would give a better opportunity of observing their dresses, than in the huddled, confused manner of grouping them, that has been sometimes practised: to say nothing of the pleasure afforded to the eye by the procession itself.The print annexed represents the procession of a Chinese Mandarin of the first order. First appear two men who strike each upon a copper instrument called a gongh, resembling a hollow dish without a border, which has pretty much the effect of a kettle-drum.Follow the ensign-bearers, on whose flags are written in large charactersthe Mandarin’s titles of honour. Next fourteen standards, upon which appear the proper simbols of his office, such as the dragon, tiger, phœnix, flying tortoise, and other winged creatures of fancy, emblematically exhibited.Six officers, bearing a staff headed by an oblong square board, raised high, whereon are written in large golden characters the particular qualities of this Mandarin.Two others bear, the one a large umbrella of yellow silk (the imperial color) of three folds, one above the other; the other officer carries the case in which the umbrella is kept.Two archers on horseback, at the head of the chief guard: then theguards, armed with large hooks, adorned with silk fringe, in four rows one above another; two other files of men in armor, some bearing maces with long handles; others, maces in the form of a hand, or of a serpent: others, equipped with large hammers and long hatchets like a crescent. Other guards bearing sharp axes: some, weapons like scythes, only strait. Soldiers carrying three-edged halberds.Two porters, carrying a splendid coffer, containing the seal of his office.Two other men, beating each agongh, which gives notice of the Mandarin’s approach.Two officers, armed with staves, to keep off the croud.Two mace-bearers with gilt maces in the shape of dragons, and a number of officers of justice, some equiped with bamboes, a kind of flat cudgels, to give the bastinado: others with chains, whips, cutlasses, and hangers.Two standard-bearers, and the captain of the guard.All this equipage precedes the Mandarin or Viceroy, who is carried in his chair, surrounded with pages and footmen, having near his person an officer who carries a large fan in the shape of a hand-fire-screen.He is followed by guards, some armed with maces, and others with long-handled sabres; after whom come several ensigns and cornets, with agreat number of domestics on horseback, every one bearing some necessary belonging to the Mandarin: as for example, a particular Tartarian cap, if the weather should oblige him to change the one he has on.From the above, it may appear, what scope or range a composer may have for the exhibition of processions and pageantry of other nations, as well as of the Chinese; in all which, nothing is more recommendable than adhering, in the representation, as much as the limitations of the theatre will admit, to the truth of things, as they actually pass in the countries where the scene is laid: which is but, in saying other words, in this, as in every other imitative branch, strike to nature as close as possible.INAFRICA.Thespirit of dancing prevails, almost beyond imagination, among both men and women, in most parts of Africa. It is even more than instinct, it is a rage, in some countries of that part of the globe.Upon the Gold-coast especially, the inhabitants are so passionately fond of it, that in the midst of their hardest labor, if they hear a personsing, or any musical instrument plaid, they cannot refrain from dancing.There are even well attested stories of some Negroes flinging themselves at the feet of an European playing on a fiddle, entreating him to desist, unless he had a mind to tire them to death; it being impossible for them to cease dancing, while he continued playing. Such is the irresistible passion for dancing among them.With such an innate fondness for this art, one would imagine that children taken from this country, so strong-made and so well-limbed as they generally are, and so finely disposed by nature, might, if duly instructed, go great lengths towards perfection in the art. But I do not remember to have heard that the experimentwas ever made upon any of them, by some master capable of giving them such an improvement, as one would suppose them susceptible of.Upon the Gold-coast, there long existed and probably still exists a custom, for the greater part of the inhabitants of a town or village to assemble together, most evenings of the year, at the market-place to dance, sing, and make merry for an hour or two, before bed-time. On this occasion, they appear in their best attire. The women, who come before the men, have a number of little bells tinkling at their feet. The men carry little fans or rather whisks in their hand made of the tails of elephants and horses, much like the brushes used to brush pictures; only that theirs are gilt at bothends. They meet usually about sunset. Their music consists of horn-blowers or trumpeters, drummers, players on the flute, and the like; being placed a-part by themselves. The men and women, who compose the dance, divide into couples, facing each other, as in our country-dances, and forming a general dance, fall into many wild ridiculous postures, advancing and retreating, leaping, stamping on the ground, bowing their heads, as they pass, to each other, and muttering certain words; then snapping their fingers, sometimes speaking loud, at other times whispering, moving now slow, now quick, and shaking their fans.Artus and Villault add, that they strike each another’s shoulders alternately with those fans; also that the women, laying straw-ropes in circles onthe ground, jump into or dance round them; and clicking them up with their toes, cast them in the air, catching them as they fall with their hands.They are strangely delighted with these gambols; but do not care to be seen at them by strangers, who can scarce refrain laughing, and consequently putting them out of countenance.After an hour or two spent in this kind of exercise, they retire to their respective homes.Their dances vary according to times, occurrences, and places. Those which are in honor of their religious festivals, are more grave and serious. There have been sometimes public dances instituted by order of their Kings, as at Abrambo,a large town in Widaw, where annually, for eight days together, there resorted a multitude of both sexes from all parts of the country. This was called the dancing-season. To this solemnity all came dressed in the best manner, according to their respective ability. The dance was ridiculous enough; but it served to keep up their agility of body. And amidst all the uncouth barbarism of their gestures and attitudes, nature breaks out into some expressions of joy, or of the passions, that would not be unworthy of an European’s observation.They have also their kind of Pirrhic dances, which they execute by mock-skirmishing in cadence, and striking on their targets with their cutlasses.I have already mentioned that it is from Africa, the Moresc-dances originally came. But what is somewhat surprising, the Portugueze themselves, among whom I will not however include the higher ranks of life in that nation, but, at least, the number of the people who adopted, from the Caffrees, or Negroes of their African possessions, a dance called by themLasCheganças, (Approaches) was so great that the late King of Portugal was obliged to prohibit it by a formal edict. The reason of which was, that some of the motions and gestures had so lascivious an air, and were so contrary to modesty, that the celebratedFrey Gaspar, a natural son, if I mistake not, of the late King of Portugal, represented so efficaciously to his Portugueze Majesty, the shame and scandal of this dance being any longer suffered,that it was put down by royal authority. Nor was this done without occasioning heavy complaints againstFrey Gaspar, against whom there were lampoons and ballads publickly sung, upon his having used his influence to procure that prohibition.INAMERICA.Inthis part of the world, so lately discovered, nothing is a stronger proof of the universality of dancing, of its being, in short, rather an human instinct, than an art, than the fondness for dancing every where diffused over this vast continent.InBrazil, the dancers, whether men or women, make a point of dancing bare-headed. The reason of this is not mentioned: it cannot however be thought a very serious one, since nothing can be more comical than their gestures, their contortions of body, and the signs they make with the head to each other.InMexico, they have also their dances and music, but in the most uncouth and barbarian stile. For their simphony they have wooden drums, something in form of a kettle-drum, with a kind of pipe or flageolet, made of a hollow cane or reed, but very grating to an European ear. It is observed they love every thing that makes a noise how disagreeable soever the sound is. They will also hum over something like a tune, when they dancethirty or forty in a circle, stretching out their hands, and laying them on each others shoulders. They stamp and jump, and use the most antic gestures for several hours, till they are heartily weary. And one or two of the company sometimes step out of the ring, to make sport for the rest, by showing feats of activity, throwing up their lances into the air, catching them again, bending backwards, and springing forwards with great agility. Then when they are in a violent sweat, from this exercise, they will frequently jump into the water, without the least bad consequences to their health. Their women have their dancing and music too by themselves; but never mingle in those of the men.InVirginia, according to the author of the history of that country,they have two different kinds of dancing; the first, either single, or at the most in small companies; or, secondly, in great numbers together, but without having any regard either to time or figure.In the first kind one person only dances, or two, or three at most. While during their performance, the rest, who are seated round them in a ring, sing as loud as they can scream, and ring their little bells. Sometimes the dancers themselves sing, dart terribly threatening looks, stamp their feet upon the ground, and exhibit a thousand antic postures and grimaces.In the other dance, consisting of a more numerous company of performers, the dance is executed round stakes set in the form of a circle, adornedwith some sculpture, or round about a fire, which they light in a convenient place. Every one has his little bell, his bow and arrow in his hand. They also cover themselves with leaves, and thus equipped, begin their dance. Sometimes they set three young women in the midst of the circle.InPeru, the manner of dancing has something very particular. Instead of laying any stress on the motion of the arms, in most of their dances, their arms hang down, or are wrapped up in a kind of mantle, so that nothing is seen but the bending of the body, and the activity of the feet; they have however many figure-dances, in which they lay aside their cloaks or mantles, but the graces they add, are rather actions than gestures.ThePeruvianCreolians dance after the same manner, without laying aside their long swords, the point of which they contrive to keep up before them so that it may not hinder them from rising, or in coupeeing, which is sometimes to such a degree that it looks like kneeling.They have a dance there, adopted from the natives, which they callZapatas, (shoes) because in dancing they alternately strike with the heels and toes, taking some steps, and coupeeing, as they traverse their ground.Among the savages of North-America, we are told there are various dances practised, such as that of the calumet, the leaders dance, the war-dance, the marriage-dance, the sacrifice-dance, all which, respectively differ in the movements,and some, amidst all the wildness of their performance, are not without their graces. But the dance of the calumet is esteemed the finest; this is used at the reception of strangers whom they mean to honor, or of ambassadors to them on public occasions. This dance is commonly executed in an oval figure.TheAmericans, in some parts, prescribe this exercise by way of phisic, in their distempers: a method of treatment, not, it seems unknown to the antients: but, in general, their motive for dancing, is the same as with the rest of the world, to give demonstrations of joy and welcome to their guests, or to divert themselves. On some occasions indeed, they make them part of the ceremony at their assemblies upon affairs, when eventheir public debates are preceded by dancing, as if they expected that that exercise would rouse their mental faculties, and clear their heads. The war-dance is also used by them, by way of proclamation of war against their enemies.The foregoing summary sketch of some of the various dances, which are practised in different parts of the globe, and which, to describe universally and minutely, would fill whole volumes, may serve to show that nature has, in all parts of the inhabited world, given to man the instinct of dancing, as well as of speaking, or of singing. But it certainly depends on the nations who encourage the polite arts, once more to carry it up to that pitch of excellence, of which the history of theGreeks and Romans shows it to have been susceptible, among the antients, however the moderns may have long fallen short of it. There has indeed lately appeared a dawning hope of its recovery; which, that it may not be frustrated, is the interest of all who wish well to an innocent and even useful pleasure.OFPANTOMIMES.Asthis branch of the art of dancing is often mentioned, especially in this country, without a just idea being affixed to it, or any other idea than what is vulgarly taken from a species of compositions which are sometimes exhibited after the play, on the theatre here, (not to mention Sadler’swells) and go by the name of pantomime entertainments; it may not be unacceptable to the reader, my layingdown before him the true grounds and nature of this diversion, which once made so great a figure in the theatrical sphere of action.And as, on this point, Monsieur Cahusac, an ingenious French writer, has treated the historical part of it with so much accuracy, that it was hardly possible to offer any thing new upon it, beyond what he has furnished; and that not to make use of his researches would only betray me into a fruitless affectation of originality, I am very ready to confess, that for the best and greatest part of what I am now going to offer upon this subject I am indebted to his production.That prodigious perfection to which the antients carried the pantomime art, appeared so extraordinary to the celebratedabbot Du Bos, that, notbeingable to contradict the authorities which establish the truth of it, he was tempted to consider the art of dancing in those times as something wholly different from what is at present understood by dancing.The chevalier Ramsay places it also among the lost arts. Both, no doubt, grounding their opinion on that deficiency of execution on the modern theatres, compared to what is incontestably transmitted to us, by history, of the excellence of the antient pantomimes.But none have more contributed to establish the opinion of the pantomime art being an art totally different from that of dancing, and not merely an improvement of it, as was certainly the case, than some of the professors ofthe art themselves, who even exclaimed against M. Cahusac, for his attempts to give juster notions, and to recommend the revival of it.We are too apt to pronounce upon possibilities from our own measure of knowledge, or of capacity. Nothing is more common than to hear men of a profession declare loudly against any practice attempted to be established for the improvement of their art, and peremptorily to aver such a practice being impossible, for no other reason than that their own study and efforts had not been able to procure them the attainment of it. In this too they are seconded by that croud of superficial people who frequent the theatres, and who can believe nothing beyond what themselves have seen: any thing above the reach of what they are accustomedor habituated to admire, always seems to them a chimera.The reproach of incredulity is commonly made to men of the greatest knowledge, because they are not over-apt to admit any proposition without proof: but this reproach may, with more justice, be oftenest made to the ignorant, who generally reject, without discussion, every thing beyond their own narrow conception.To these it may sound more than strange; it may appear incredible, that on the theatre of Athens, the dance of the Eumenides, or Furies, had so expressive a character, as to strike the spectators with irresistible terror. The Areopagus itself shuddered with horror and affright; men grown old in the profession of arms, trembled; themultitude ran out; women with child miscarried; people imagined they saw in earnest those barbarous deities commissioned with the vengeance of heaven, pursue and punish the crimes of the earth.This passage of history is furnished by the same authors, who tell us, that Sophocles was a genius; that nothing could withstand the eloquence of Demosthenes; that Themistocles was a hero; that Socrates was the wisest of men; and it was in the time of the most famous of theGreeksthat even upon those highly privileged souls, in sight of irreproachable witnesses, the art of dancing produced such great effects.At Rome, in the best days of this art, all the sentiments which the dancers expressed, had each a character of truth,so great a power, such pathetic energy, that the multitude was more than once seen hurried away by the illusion, and mechanically to take part in the different emotions presented to them by the animated picture with which they were struck. In the representation ofAjax in a frenzy, the spectators took such violent impressions from the acting-dancer who represented him, that they perfectly broke out, into outcries; stripped, as it were, to fight, and actually came to blows among each other, as if they had caught their rage from what was passing on the theatre.At another time they melted into tears at the tender affliction of Hecuba.And upon whom were these lively impressions produced? Upon the cotemporariesof Mecenas, of Lucullus, Augustus, Virgil, Pollio; upon men of the most refined taste, whose criticism was as severe as their approbation honorable; who never spared their censure nor their applause, where either was due. How, especially under the eyes of Horace, could any thing pass the approbation of the public, unless under the seal of excellence in point of art and good taste? Would Augustus have declared himself the special patron of a kind of entertainment that had been deficient as to probability and genius? Would Mecenas, the protector of Virgil, and of all the fine arts, have been pleased with a sight that was not a striking imitation of beautiful nature?The proofs shown of the perfection of dancing at Athens, and under the reign of Augustus, being incontestable,it is plain that what now passes for the art of dancing, is as yet only in its infancy. To display the arms gracefully, to preserve the equilibrium in the positions, to form steps with a lightness of air; to unfold all the springs of the body in harmony to the music, all these points, sufficient to what may be called private, or to assembly-dancing, are little more than the alphabet of the theatrical dances, or of pantomime execution. The steps and figures are but the letters and words of this art. A writing-master is one who teaches the mechanical part of forming letters. A mere dancing-master is an artist who teaches to form steps. But the first is not more different from what we call a man of letters, or awriter, than the second is from what may deserve on the theatre, the name of principal dancer.Besides the necessity of learning his art elementally, a dancer, like a writer, should have a stile of his own, an original stile: more or less valuable, according as he can exhibit, express, and paint with elegance a greater or lesser quantity of things admirable, agreeable, and useful.Speech is scarce more expressive, than the gestual language. The art of painting, which places before our eyes the most pathetic, or the most gay images of human life, composes them of nothing but of attitudes, of positions of the arms, expressions of the countenance, and of all these parts dancing is composed, as well as painting.But, as I have before observed, painting can express no more than an instant of action. Theatrical dancing can exhibitall the successive instants it chuses to paint. Its march proceeds from picture to picture, to which, motion gives life. In painting, life is only imitated; in dancing, it is always the reality itself.Dancing is, evidently, in its nature, an action upon the theatres; nothing is wanting to it but meaning: it moves to the right, to the left; it retrogrades, it advances, it forms steps, it delineates figures. There is only wanting to all this an arrangement of the motions, to furnish to the eye a theatrical action upon any subject whatever.The history of the art proves that the dancers of genius, had no other means or assistance in the world but this to express all the human passions, and thepossibilities of it are in all times, the very same.Both here, and in France, there have been some of these dramatic pieces in action, by dance, attempted, which have been well received by the public.Some years ago, the Dutchess of Maine ordered simphonies to be composed for the scene of the fourth act of theHoratii; in which the young Horatius kills Camilla. Two dancers, one of each sex, represented this action atSceaux; and their dance painted it with all the energy and pathos of which it was susceptible.In Italy especially many subjects of a what may be called low comedy, are very naturally expressed by dancing. In short, there is hardly any comic action butwhat they represent upon their theatres, if not with perfection, at least satisfactorily. And certainly the dance in action has the same superiority over sheer unmeaning dancing, that a fine history-piece has over cutting flowers in paper. In the last there is little more required than mechanical nicety, and, at the best, it affords no great pretention to merit. But it is only for genius to order, distribute and compose, in the other. A Raphael is allowed to take place in the Temple of Fame, by a Virgil; and the art of dancing is capable of having its Raphaels too. Pilades, and Bathillus were painters, and great ones, in their way. Picturesque composition is not less the duty of a composer of dances, than of a painter.Among the antients, thatProtheus, of whom fabulous history records such wonders, was only one of their dancers, who, by the rapidity of his steps, by the strength of his expression, and by the employment of the theatrical deceptions, seemed at every instant, to change his form. The celebratedEmpusawas a female dancer, whose agility was so prodigious that she appeared and vanished like a spirit.But it was at Rome that the Pantomime art received its highest improvement. Pilades born in Cilicia, and Bathillus of Alexandria, where the two most surprising geniuses, who, under the reigns of Augustus Cæsar, displayed their talents in their utmost lustre. The first invented the solemn, grave and pathetic dances. The compositions of Bathilluswere in the lively, gay, and sprightly stile.Bathillus had been the slave of Mecenas, who had given him his freedom in favor of his talents. Having seen Pilades in Cilicia, he engaged him to come to Rome, where he had disposed Mecenas in his favor, who, becoming the declared protector of both, procured to them the encouragement of the Emperor.A theatre was built for them: the Romans flocked to it, and saw, with surprise, a complete tragedy; all the passions painted with the most vigorous strokes of representation: the exposition, plot, catastrophe expressed in the clearest and most pathetic manner, without any other means or assistence but that of dancing, executed to the simphoniesthe best adapted, and far superior to any that had been before heard in Rome.Their surprise was not to end here. To this a second entertainment succeeded; in which an ingenious action, without needing the voice or speech, presented all the characters, all the pleasant strokes, and humorous pictures of a good comedy.And in both these kinds, the executive talents of Pilades and Bathillus corresponded to the boldness and beauty of the kind of compositions they had ventured to bring on the stage.Pilades especially, who was at the head of this project, was the most singular man that had till then appeared on the theatre. His fertile imaginationconstantly supplied him with new means of perfecting his art and embellishing his entertainments. Athenæus mentions his having written a book much esteemed on the depths and principles of his art.Before him, some flutes composed the orchestra of the Romans. He reinforced it with all the known instruments. He added choruses of dances to his representations, and took care that their steps and figures, should always have some relation or affinity to the principal action. He provided them with dresses in the highest taste of propriety, and omitted nothing towards producing, keeping up, and pushing to the highest pitch, the charm of the theatrical illusion.The actions on the Roman theatres were tragic, comic, or satirical; these last pretty nearly answering to what we understand by grotesque or farcical.Esopus and Roscius had been, from their excellence in declamation, the delight and admiration of Rome. But on their leaving no successors to their degree of merit; the taste for dramatic poetry which was no longer supported by actors equal to them, began to decline; and the theatrical dances under such great masters as Pilades and Bathillus, either by their novelty, or by their merit, or by both, made the Romans the less feel their loss of those incomparable actors. The gestual language took place of that which was declaimed; and produced regular pieces acted in the three kinds of tragedy, comedy, and farce or grotesque. Thespectators grew pleased with such an exercise of their understanding. Steps, motions, attitudes, figures, positions, now were substituted to speech; and there resulted from them an expression so natural, images so resembling, a pathos so moving, or a pleasantry so agreeable, that people imagined they heard the actions they saw. The gestures alone supplied the place of the sweetness of the voice, of the energy of speech, and of the charms of poetry.*This kind of entertainment, so new, though formed upon a ground-work already known, planned and executed by genius, andadoptedwith a passionate fondness by the Romans, was called theItalic dance; and in the transports of pleasures it caused them, they gave to the actors of it, the title ofPantomimes. This was no more than a lively, and not at all exagerated expression, of the truth of their action, which was one continual picture to the eyes of the spectators. Their motion, their feet, their hands, their arms, were but so many different parts of the picture; none of them were to remain idle; but all, with propriety, were to concur to the formation of that assemblage, from which result the harmony, and, with pardon for the expression, the happyall-togetherof the composition and performance. A dancer learned from hisvery name ofpantomime, that he could be in no esteem in Rome, but so far as he should beall the actor.And, in fact, this art was carried to a point of perfection hard to believe; but for such a number of concurrent and authentic testimonies.It appears also clearly from history, that this art, in its origin, (so favored by an arbitrary prince, and who also made some use of it, towards establishing his despotism, nay even primordially introduced by Bathillus, a slave) could no longer preserve its great excellence, than the spirit of liberty was not wholly worn out in the Roman breasts; and, like its other sister arts, gradually decayed and sunk under the subsequent emperors.Pilades gave a memorable instance of the (as yet) unextinguished spirit of liberty, when, upon his being banished Rome, for some time, by Augustus Cesar, upon account of the disturbances the pantomime parties occasioned, he told him plainly to his face, that he was ungrateful for the good his power received, by the diversion to the Romans from more serious thoughts on the loss of their liberty.““Why do not you,” says he,““let the people amuse themselves with our quarrels?”This dancer had such great powers in all his tragedies, that he could draw tears from even those of the spectators the least used to the melting mood.But in truth, the effect of these pantomimes, in general, was prodigious.Tears and sobs interrupted often the representation of the tragedy ofGlaucus, in which the pantomime Plancus played the principal character.Bathillus, in painting the amours of Leda, never failed of exciting the utmost sensibility in the Roman ladies.But what is more surprising yet,Memphir, a Pithagorean philosopher, as Athenæus tells us, expressed, by dancing, all the excellence of the philosophy of Pithagoras, with more elegance, more clearness and energy, than the most eloquent professor of philosophy could have done.Upon considering all this, one is almost tempted to say, with M. Cahusac, “We have,“upon the stage, excellentfeet, lively legs, admirable arms:“what a pity it is, that with all this we have so little of the art of dancing!”Our tragedy and our comedy have an extent and duration which are supported by the charms of speech, by the interestingness of narration, by the variety of the sallies of wit. The action is divided into acts, each act into scenes, these scenes successively present new situations, and these situations keep up the warmth of interest and attention, form the plot, lead to the conclusion or unravelment, and prepare it.Such must have been, or such must be, (but with more precision and markingness) tragedies or comedies represented by dancing; as gesture is something more marking and succinct thanspeech. There are required many words to express a thought, but one single motion may paint several thoughts, and situations.In such compositions, then, made to be danced, the theatrical action must go forward with the utmost rapidity: there must not be one unmeaning entry, figure, or step in them. Such a piece ought to be a close crouded abstract of some excellent written dramatic piece.Dancing, like painting, can only present situations to the eye; and every truly theatrical situation is nothing but a living picture.If a composer of dances should undertake to represent upon the stage any great action or theatrical subject, hemust begin by making an extract from it, of all the most picturesque situations. No other parts beside these can enter into his plan; all the others are defective or useless, they can only embarras, perplex, confound, and render it cold and insipid.Whereas, if the situations succeed one another naturally, and in great number; if their being well linked together conducts them with rapidity, from the first situation to the last, which must clearly and strikingly unravel the whole; the choice is complete, and the theatrical effect will be sure.It is that final effect, of which, in the execution, the composer and performer must never lose sight. Successive pictures must be exhibited, and animated with all the expression that canresult from the impassioned motions of the dance.This was doubtless the great secret of the art of Pilades, who so highly excelled in his ideas of theatrical expression: this is, perhaps, too for all kinds of theatrical composition, whether to be declaimed, or to be executed by dancing, a general rule that is not to be slighted.One instance of the regard shewn by Pilades to theatrical propriety is preserved to us, and not unworthy of attention. He had been publickly challenged by Hilas, once a pupil of his, to represent the greatness of Agamemnon: Hilas came upon the stage with buskins, which, in the nature of stilts, made him of an artificial height; in consequence of which he greatly over-toppedthe croud of actors who surrounded him. This passed well enough, ’till Pilades appeared with an air, stern and majestic. His serious steps, his arms a-cross, his motion sometimes slow, sometimes animated, with pauses full of meaning, his looks now fixed on the ground, now lifted to heaven, with all the attitudes of profound pensiveness, painted strongly a man taken up with great things, which he was meditating, weighing, and comparing, with all the dignity of kingly importance. The spectators, struck with the justness, with the energy and real elevation of so expressive a portraiture, unanimously adjudged the preference to Pilades, who, coolly turning to Hilas, said to him,““Young man, we had to represent a king who commanded over twenty kings:“you made him tall: I showed him great.”It was in the reign of Nero, that a cinical mock-philosopher, called Demetrius, saw, for the first time, one of these pantomime compositions. Struck with the truth of the representation, he could not help expressing the greatest marks of astonishment: but whether his pride made him feel a sort of shame for the admiration he had involuntarily shewn, or whether naturally envious and selfish, he could not bear the cruel pain of being forced to approve any thing but his own singularities; he attributed to the music the strong impression that has been made upon him: as, in that reign, a false philosophy very naturally had a greater influence than the real, this man was, it seems, of consequence enough for the managers of the dances to take notice of this partiality, or at least to be piqued enough, for their own honor, tolay a scheme for undeceiving him. He was once more brought to their theatre, and seated in a conspicuous part of the house, without his having been acquainted with their intention.The orchestra began: an actor opens the scene: on the moment of his entrance, the simphony ceases, and the representation continues. Without any aid but that of the steps, the positions of the body, the movements of the arms, the piece is performed, in which are successively represented the amours of Mars and Venus, the Sun discovering them to the jealous husband of the goddess, the snares which he sets for his faithless spouse and her formidable gallant, the quick effect of the treacherous net, which, while it compleats the revenge of Vulcan, only publishes his shame, the confusion of Venus,the rage of Mars, the arch mirth of the gods, who came to enjoy the sight.The whole audience gave to the excellence of the performance its due applause, but the Cinic, out of himself, could not help crying out, in a transport of delight;““No! this is not a representation;“it is the very thing itself.”Much about the same time a dancer represented thelabors ofHercules. He retraced in so true a manner all the different situations of that hero, that a king of Pontus, then at Rome, and who had never seen such a sight before, easily followed the thread of the action, and charmed with it, asked with great earnestness of the emperor, that he would let him have with him that extraordinary dancer, who had madesuch an impression upon him. “Do not, says he to Nero,“be surprised at my request.“I have for borderers upon my kingdom, some Barbarian nations whose language none of my people could understand, nor they learn ours.“Such a man as this dancer would be an admirable interpreter between us.”It would then surely be a great error to imagine, that an habitual dexterity, a daily practice, with their arms, their legs and feet, were the only talents of these pantomime dancers. Their execution, without doubt, required all these advantages of the body in the most eminent degree; but their compositions supposed, and indispensably implied an infinite number of combinations which belong intirely to the mind, or intellectual faculties; as for example,especially an attentive and judicious discernment of the most interesting truths of human nature. How extensive a study this exacts, it is more easy to conceive than to attain.And surely there is an evident necessity for studying men, before one can undertake to paint or represent them. It is not till after a profound examination of the passions, that one ought to flatter one’s self with characterising them purely by the powers of external signs of actions. All the passions have affinities to each other, which it is only for a great justness of understanding to seize; they have shades that distinguish them, which nothing but a nice eye can perceive, and which easily escape a superficial observer.In serious dancing, where the character of a hero is to be given, there are in his actions, in the course of his life, certain marking strokes, certain incidents or extraordinary passages, which are subjects proper for the stage, and which must be separated from others perhaps more brilliant in history, but which would infrigidate a theatrical composition.In the state of dancing of our days, the dancers, and even the composers of dances, aspire to little more than the mechanical part of their art; and, indeed, they hardly know any thing beyond that, and cannot in course, cultivate what they have no conception of.When M. Cahusac wrote, he observed that this was sufficient for thespectators, who required nothing more than a brilliant execution from the dancers in the old track of steps and capers; and this is, in fact, true of the greater number now. But lately, the taste for dances of action, animated with meaning and conveying the idea of some fable or subject, has begun to gain ground. People are less tired with a dance, in which the understanding is exercised, without the fatigue of perplexity, than by merely seeing a succession of lively steps, and cabriols, however well executed; which, in point of merit, bear no more proportion to that of a well-composed dance, than a tiresome repetition of vignettes, of head-pieces and tail-pieces, would do to the gravings of historical pieces after a Raphael, a Michael Angelo, or a Correggio.As hitherto the composer of the dances of action, have not been able to recover that height of perfection to which the antient pantomimes carried their art; the most that any composers could do, I mean with success, (for there have been some attempts made, that, for want of a proper plan and execution, failed,) was to furnish certain dances, in the nature ofpoemettior small dramatic poems, which, where the subject of action has been clearly and intelligibly executed, have ever been received with the most encouraging applause by the public.And here the ingenious author to whom I am so much obliged in this chapter, furnishes me with rules of composition for the dances of action, which can hardly be too much recommended.All theatrical compositions ought to have three essential parts.By a lively dialogue, in a piece made to be spoken, or by an incident dextrously introduced in one made for a dance in action, the spectator is to be prepared for the subject that is to be represented, and to have some acquaintance of the character, quality, and manners of the persons of the drama: this is what is calledthe exposition.The circumstances, the obstacles which ariseourof the ground-work of the subject, embroil it, and retard its march without stopping it. A sort of embarrasment forms itself out of the actions of the characters, which perplexes the curiosity of the spectators, from whose even guess-work, the manner how all is to be ultimately unravelled isto be kept as great a secret as possible: and this embarrasment is what is calledthe plot.From this embarrasment, one sees successively break forth lights, the more unexpected, the better. They unfold the action, and conduct it by insensible degrees to an ingenious conclusion: this is what is calledthe unravelment.If any of these three parts is defective, the theatrical merit is imperfect. If they are all three in due proportion, the action is complete, and the charm of the representation is infallible.As the theatrical dance then is a representation, it must be formed of these three essentially constitutive parts. Thus it will be more or less perfect, accordingas its exposition shall be more or less clear, its plot more or less ingenious, its unravelment more or less striking.But this division is not the only one that should be known and practised. A dramatic work is commonly composed of five or fewer acts; and an act is composed of scenes in dialogue or soliloquy. Now every act, every scene, should have, subordinately, its exposition, its plot, and its unravelment, just as the total of the piece has, of which they are the parts.So ought, also every representation in dancing to have those three parts, which constitute every thing that is action. Without their union, there is no action that is perfect: a fault in one of those parts will have a bad effect on theothers; the chain is broke; the picture, whatever beauty it may have in other respects, is without any theatrical merit.Besides these general laws of the theatre, which are in common to those compositions of dances, that are to be executed on it, they are subjected to other particular rules, which are derived from the primitive principles of the art.As the art of dancing essentially consists in painting by gestures and attitudes, there is nothing of what would be rejected by a painter of good taste, that the dancer can admit; and, consequentially, every thing that such a painter would chuse, ought to be laid hold of, distributed, and properly placed in a dance of action.Here, on this point, recurs that never too often repeated rule, as infallible as it is plain:let nature, in every thing, be the guide of art; and let art, in every thing, aim at imitating nature: a rule this, than which there is not one more trite, more hackneyed in the theory, nor less regarded in the practice.

Among the many reasons for this dance of the minuet having become general, is the possibility of dancing it to so many different airs, though the steps are invariable. If one tune does not please a performer, he may call for another; the minuet still remaining unalterable.

There is no occasion however for a learner to be confined to this dance. He should rather be encouraged, or have a curiosity be excited in him, to learn especially those dances, which are of the more tender or serious character, contributing, as they greatly do, to perfect one in the minuet; independently of the pleasure they besides give both in the performance and to the sight. The dances the most in request are, theSaraband, theBretagnetheFurlana, thePassepied, theFolie d’Espagne, theRigaudon, theMinuet du DauphintheLouvre,La Mariée, which is always danced at the Opera of Roland at Paris. Some of these are performed solo, others are duet-dances. TheLouvreis held by many the most pleasing of them all, especially when well executed by both performers, in a just concert of motions; no dance affordingthe arms more occasion for a graceful display of them, or a more delicate regularity of the steps; being composed of the most select ones from theatrical dances, and formed upon the truest principles of the art. This dance is executed in most countries of Europe without any variation. It is generally followed or terminated by a minuet; and these two dances, the Louvre and the minuet, are at present the most universally in fashion, and will, in all probability, continue so, from their being both pleasing beyond all others, to the performers, as well as to the spectators, and from their not being difficult to learn, if the scholar has but common docility.

Youth being for learning this art undoubtedly the best season, for reasons as I have before observed, tooobvious to need insisting on, the master cannot pay too much attention to the availing himself of the pliancy of that age, to give his scholars the necessary instructions for preparing and well-disposing their limbs. This holds good, particularly with regard to that propensity innate to most persons of turning in their toes. I have already mentioned the expediency of curing this defect, by the directing them to acquire a habit of turning the knees outward, to which I have to add, that on the proper turn of the knee, chiefly depend the graces of the under part of the figure, that is to say, from the foot to the hip.

Frequent practice also of dancing, or of any salutary exercise, is also highly recommendable for obtaining a firmnessof body; for a tottering dancer can never plant his steps so as to afford a pleasing execution. It may sound a little odd, but, the truth is, that in dancing, sprightliness and agility are principally produced by bodily strength; while on the contrary, weakness, or infirmity, must give every step and spring, not only a tottering, but a heavy air. The legs that bear with the most ease the weight of the body, will naturally make it seem the lightest.

Cantatur et saltatur apud omnes gentes, aliquo saltem modo,Quint.

Asalmost every country has dances particular to it, or, at least, so naturalized by adoption from others,that in length of time they pass for originals; a slight sketch of the most remarkable of them may serve to throw a light upon this subject, entertaining to some, and both entertaining and useful to others.

InBritain, you have the hornpipe, a dance which is held an original of this country. Some of the steps of it are used in the country-dances here, which are themselves a kind of dance executed with more variety and agreeableness than in any part of Europe, where they are also imitatively performed, as in Italy, Germany and in several other countries. Nor is it without reason they obtain, here the preference over the like in other places. They are no where so well executed. The music is extremely well adapted, and the steps in generalare very pleasing. Some foreign comic dancers, on their coming here, apply themselves with great attention to the true study of the hornpipe, and by constant practice acquire the ability of performing it with success in foreign countries, where it always meets with the highest applause, when masterly executed. There was an instance of this, sometime ago at Venice, at an opera there, when the theatre was as well provided with good singers and dancers, as any other. But they had not the good fortune to please the public. A dancer luckily for the manager, presented himself, who danced the hornpipe in its due perfection. This novelty took so, and made such full houses, that the manager, who had begun with great loss, soon saw himself repaired, and wasa gainer when he little expected it.

It is to theHighlandersin North-Britain, that I am told we are indebted for a dance in the comic vein, called theScotch Reel, executed generally, and I believe always intrio, or by three. When well danced, it has a very pleasing effect: and indeed nothing can be imagined more agreeable, or more lively and brilliant, than the steps in many of the Scotch dances. There is a great variety of very natural and very pleasing ones. And a composer of comic dances, might, with great advantage to himself, upon a judicious assemblage of such steps as he might pick out of their dances, form a dance that, with well adapted dresses, correspondent music, and figures capable of a just performance,could hardly fail of a great success upon the theatre.

I do not know whether I shall not stand in need of an apology for mentioning here a dance once popular in England, but to which the idea of low is now currently annexed. It was originally adapted from the Moors, and is still known by the name of Morris-dancing, or Moresc-dance. It is danced with swords, by persons odly disguised, with a great deal of antic rural merriment: it is true that this diversion is now almost exploded, being entirely confined to the lower classes of life, and only kept up in some counties. What the reason may be of its going out of use, I cannot say; but am very sure, there was not only a great deal of natural mirth in it, but that it is susceptible enough ofimprovement, to rescue it from the contempt it may have incurred, through its being chiefly in use among the vulgar; though most probably it may have descended among them from the higher ranks. For certainly of them it was not quite unworthy, for the Pirrhic or military air it carries with it, and which probably was the cause of its introduction among so martial a people. Rude, as it was, it might require refinement, but it did not, perhaps, deserve to become quite obsolete.

InSpain, they have a dance, called,Les Folies d’Espagne, which is performed either by one or by two, with castanets. There is a dress peculiarly adapted to it, which has a very pleasing effect, as well as the dance itself.

InFrance, theirContre-dances, are drawn from the true principles of the art, and the figures and steps are generally very agreeable. No nation cultivates this art with more taste and delicacy. TheirProvençaledance, is most delightfully sprightly, and well imagined. The steps seem to correspond with the natural vivacity and gaiety of the Provençals. This dance is commonly performed to the pipe and tabor.

TheFlemishdances run in the most droll vein of true rural humor. The performers seem to be made for the dances, and the dances for the performers; so well assorted are the figures to the representation. Several eminent painters in the grotesque stile, Teniers especially, have formed many divertingpictures taken from life, upon this subject.

AtNaples, they have various grotesque dances, which are originals in their kind, being extremely difficult to execute, not only for the variety of the steps, but for the intricacy and uncommonness, or rather singularity of them.

But while I am mentioning Naples, I ought not to omit that effect of dancing, which is attributed to it, upon those who are bitten with theTarantula. The original of this opinion, was probably owing to some sensible physician, prescribing such a violent motion, more likely to be kept up in the patient, by the power of music, than by any thing else, as might enable him to expel the poison, by being thereby thrown into a copious sweat, and by other benefitsfrom such a vehement agitation. This, it is supposed, was afterwards abused and turned into a mere trick, to assemble a croud and get money, either by sham bites, or by making a kind of show of this method of practice in real ones. However, that may be, the various grimaces or contortions, leaps and irregular steps, commonly used on this occasion, to be executed to that sort of music, or airs adapted to it, might afford a good subject for a grotesque dance, to be formed upon the plan of a burlesque or mock-imitation: and I am not quite sure that the idea of such a dance, has not been already carried into execution.

The castanets theNeapolitansmost frequently use, are of the largest size. It is also from Naples that we have taken the Punchinello dance.

AtFlorence, they have a dance, called,il Treschone. The country-women, in the villages, are very fond of it. They are generally speaking, very robust, and capable of holding out the fatigue of this dance, for a long time. To make themselves more light for it, they often pull off their shoes. The dance is opened by a couple, one of each sex. The woman holds in her hand a handkerchief, which she flings to him whom she chuses for her next partner, who, in his turn has an equal right to dispose of it in the same manner, to any woman of the company he chuses. Thus is the dance carried on without any interruption till the assembly breaks up.

The favorite dance of theVenetians, is what they call theFurlana, which is performed by two persons dancinga-round with the greatest rapidity. Those who have a good ear, keep time with the crossing their feet behind; and some add a motion of their hands, as if they were rowing or tugging at an oar. This dance is practiced in several other parts of Italy.

The Peasants ofTirol, have one of the most pleasant and grotesque dances that can be imagined. They perform it in a sort of holy-day dress, made of skins, and adorned with ribbons. They wear wooden shoes, not uncuriously painted; and the women especially express a kind of rural simplicity and frolic mirth, which has a very agreeable effect.

TheGrisonsare in possession of an old dance, which is not without its merit, and which they would not exchangefor the politest in Europe; they being as invariably attached to it, as to their dress.

TheHungariansare very noisy in their dances, with their iron heels, but when they are of an equal size, and dressed in their uniforms, the agility of their steps, and the regularity of dress in the performers, render them not a disagreeable sight.

TheGermanshave a dance called theAllemande, in which the men and women form a ring. Each man holding his partner round the waist, makes her whirl round with almost inconceivable rapidity: they dance in a grand circle, seeming to pursue one another: in the course of which they execute several leaps, and some particularly pleasing steps, when they turn, but sovery difficult as to appear such even to professed dancers themselves. When this dance is performed by a numerous company, it furnishes one of the most pleasing sights that can be imagined.

ThePolishnobility have a dance, to which the magnificence of their dress, and the elegance of the steps, the gracefulness of the attitudes, the fitness of the music, all contribute to produce a great effect. Were it performed here on the theatre, it would hardly fail of a general applause.

TheCossacs, have, amidst all their uncouth barbarism, a sort of dancing, which they execute to the sound of an instrument, somewhat resembling a Mandoline, but considerably larger, and which is highly diverting, from the extreme vivacity of the steps, and theoddity of the contortions and grimaces, with which they exhibit it. For a grotesque dance there can hardly be imagined any thing more entertaining.

TheRussians, afford nothing remarkable in their dances, which they now chiefly take from other countries. The dance of dwarfs with which the Czar Peter the Great, solemnized the nuptials of his niece to the Duke of Courland, was, probably rather a particular whim of his own, than a national usage.

InTurky, dances have been, as of old in Greece, and elsewhere instituted in form of a religious ceremony. TheDervisheswho are a kind of devotionists execute a dance, called theSemaatin a circle, to a strange wild-simphony, when holding one another by the hand, they turn round with such rapidity, that, with pure giddiness, they often fall down in heaps upon one another.

They have also in Turky, as well as India and Persia, professed dancers, especially of the female sex, under the name of dancing-girls, who are bred up, from their childhood, to the profession; and are always sent for to any great entertainment, public or private, as at feasts, weddings, ceremonies of circumcision, and, in short, on all occasions of festivity and joy. They execute their dances to a simphony of various instruments, extremely resembling the antient ones, thetympanum, thecrotala, thecimbals, and the like, as well as to songs, being a kind of small dramatic compositions, or what may properly be calledballads, which is a true word for a song at once sung and danced:ballaresignifying to dance; andballata, a song, composed to be danced. It is probable that from these eastern kind of dances, which are undoubtedlyvery antient, came the name, among the Romans, ofbalatrones. Nothing can be imagined more graceful, nor more expressive, than the gestures and attitudes of those dancing-girls, which may properly be called the eloquence of the body, in which indeed most of the Asiatics and inhabitants of thesouthrenclimates constitutionally excel, from a sensibility more exquisite than is the attribute of the more northern people; but a sensibility ballanced by too many disadvantages to be envied them. The Siamese, we are told, have three dances, called theCone, theLacone, and theRaban. TheConeis a figure-dance, in which they use particularly a string-instrument in the nature of a violin, with some others of the Asiatic make. Those who dance are armed and masked, and seem to be a fighting ratherthan dancing. It is a kind of Indian Pirrhic. Their masks represent the most frightful hideous countenances of wild-beasts, or demons, that fancy can invent. In theLaconethe performers sing commutually stanzes of verses containing the history of their country. The Raban is a mixed dance, of men and women, not martial, nor historical, but purely gallant; in which the dancers have all long false nails of copper. They sing in this dance, which is only a slow march without any high motions, but with a great many contortions of body and arms. Those who dance in the Raban and Cone have high gilt caps like sugar-loaves. The dance of theLaconeis appropriated to the dedication of their temples, when a new statue of theirSommona-codomis set up.

In many parts of the East, at their weddings, in conducting the bride from her house to the bridegroom’s, as in Persia especially, they make use of processional music and dancing. But, in the religious ceremonies of the Gentoos, when, at stated times, they draw the triumphal car, in which the image of the deity of the festival is carried, the procession is intermixed with troops of dancers of both sexes, who, proceed, in chorus, leaping, dancing, and falling into strange antics, as the procession moves along, of which they compose a part; these adapt their gestures and steps to the sounds of various instruments of music.

Considering withal that the Romans, in their most solemn processions, as in that called thePompa, which I have before mentioned, in which not only thePirrhic dance was processionally executed, but other dances, in masquerade, by men who, in their habits, by leaping and by feats of agility, represented satirs, theSileni, andFauni, and were attended by minstrels playing on the flute and guitar; besides which, there wereSalianpriests, andSalianvirgins, who followed, in their order, and executed their respective religious dances; it may bear a question whether not an unpleasing use might not be made, on the theatres, of processional dances properly introduced, and connected, especially in the burlesque way. In every country, and particularly in this, processions are esteemed an agreeable amusement to the eye; and certainly they must receive more life and animation from a proper intermixture of dances, than what a mere solemn march can represent, where there is nothing to amuse but a long train ofpersonages in various habits, walking in parade. I only mention this however as a hint not impossible to be improved, and reduced into practice.

But even, where it might be improper or ridiculous to think of mixing dances with a procession, though it were but in burlesque, which must, if at all, be the preferable way of mixing them, the pleasure of those who delight in seeing processions and pageantry exhibited on the theatre, might be gratified, without any violence to propriety, by making them introductory to the dances of the grandest kind. For example; where a dance in Chinese characters is intended, a procession might be previously brought in, of personages, of whom the habits, charactures, and manners might be faithfully copied from nature, and from the truth ofthings, and convey to the spectator a juster notion, of the people from which the representation was taken, of their dress and public processions, than any verbal description, or even prints or pictures. After which, the dance might naturally take place, in celebration of the festival, of which, the procession might be supposed the occasion.

In order to give a more distinct idea of this hint, I have hereto annexed theprint of a Chinese processiontaken from the description of a traveller into that country; by which a good composer would well know how to make a proper choice of what might be exhibited, and what was fit to be left out; especially according as the dance should be, serious or burlesque. In the last case;even the horses might be represented by a theatrical imitation. And certainly, bringing the personages on in such a regular procession at first, would give a better opportunity of observing their dresses, than in the huddled, confused manner of grouping them, that has been sometimes practised: to say nothing of the pleasure afforded to the eye by the procession itself.

The print annexed represents the procession of a Chinese Mandarin of the first order. First appear two men who strike each upon a copper instrument called a gongh, resembling a hollow dish without a border, which has pretty much the effect of a kettle-drum.

Follow the ensign-bearers, on whose flags are written in large charactersthe Mandarin’s titles of honour. Next fourteen standards, upon which appear the proper simbols of his office, such as the dragon, tiger, phœnix, flying tortoise, and other winged creatures of fancy, emblematically exhibited.

Six officers, bearing a staff headed by an oblong square board, raised high, whereon are written in large golden characters the particular qualities of this Mandarin.

Two others bear, the one a large umbrella of yellow silk (the imperial color) of three folds, one above the other; the other officer carries the case in which the umbrella is kept.

Two archers on horseback, at the head of the chief guard: then theguards, armed with large hooks, adorned with silk fringe, in four rows one above another; two other files of men in armor, some bearing maces with long handles; others, maces in the form of a hand, or of a serpent: others, equipped with large hammers and long hatchets like a crescent. Other guards bearing sharp axes: some, weapons like scythes, only strait. Soldiers carrying three-edged halberds.

Two porters, carrying a splendid coffer, containing the seal of his office.

Two other men, beating each agongh, which gives notice of the Mandarin’s approach.

Two officers, armed with staves, to keep off the croud.

Two mace-bearers with gilt maces in the shape of dragons, and a number of officers of justice, some equiped with bamboes, a kind of flat cudgels, to give the bastinado: others with chains, whips, cutlasses, and hangers.

Two standard-bearers, and the captain of the guard.

All this equipage precedes the Mandarin or Viceroy, who is carried in his chair, surrounded with pages and footmen, having near his person an officer who carries a large fan in the shape of a hand-fire-screen.

He is followed by guards, some armed with maces, and others with long-handled sabres; after whom come several ensigns and cornets, with agreat number of domestics on horseback, every one bearing some necessary belonging to the Mandarin: as for example, a particular Tartarian cap, if the weather should oblige him to change the one he has on.

From the above, it may appear, what scope or range a composer may have for the exhibition of processions and pageantry of other nations, as well as of the Chinese; in all which, nothing is more recommendable than adhering, in the representation, as much as the limitations of the theatre will admit, to the truth of things, as they actually pass in the countries where the scene is laid: which is but, in saying other words, in this, as in every other imitative branch, strike to nature as close as possible.

Thespirit of dancing prevails, almost beyond imagination, among both men and women, in most parts of Africa. It is even more than instinct, it is a rage, in some countries of that part of the globe.

Upon the Gold-coast especially, the inhabitants are so passionately fond of it, that in the midst of their hardest labor, if they hear a personsing, or any musical instrument plaid, they cannot refrain from dancing.

There are even well attested stories of some Negroes flinging themselves at the feet of an European playing on a fiddle, entreating him to desist, unless he had a mind to tire them to death; it being impossible for them to cease dancing, while he continued playing. Such is the irresistible passion for dancing among them.

With such an innate fondness for this art, one would imagine that children taken from this country, so strong-made and so well-limbed as they generally are, and so finely disposed by nature, might, if duly instructed, go great lengths towards perfection in the art. But I do not remember to have heard that the experimentwas ever made upon any of them, by some master capable of giving them such an improvement, as one would suppose them susceptible of.

Upon the Gold-coast, there long existed and probably still exists a custom, for the greater part of the inhabitants of a town or village to assemble together, most evenings of the year, at the market-place to dance, sing, and make merry for an hour or two, before bed-time. On this occasion, they appear in their best attire. The women, who come before the men, have a number of little bells tinkling at their feet. The men carry little fans or rather whisks in their hand made of the tails of elephants and horses, much like the brushes used to brush pictures; only that theirs are gilt at bothends. They meet usually about sunset. Their music consists of horn-blowers or trumpeters, drummers, players on the flute, and the like; being placed a-part by themselves. The men and women, who compose the dance, divide into couples, facing each other, as in our country-dances, and forming a general dance, fall into many wild ridiculous postures, advancing and retreating, leaping, stamping on the ground, bowing their heads, as they pass, to each other, and muttering certain words; then snapping their fingers, sometimes speaking loud, at other times whispering, moving now slow, now quick, and shaking their fans.

Artus and Villault add, that they strike each another’s shoulders alternately with those fans; also that the women, laying straw-ropes in circles onthe ground, jump into or dance round them; and clicking them up with their toes, cast them in the air, catching them as they fall with their hands.

They are strangely delighted with these gambols; but do not care to be seen at them by strangers, who can scarce refrain laughing, and consequently putting them out of countenance.

After an hour or two spent in this kind of exercise, they retire to their respective homes.

Their dances vary according to times, occurrences, and places. Those which are in honor of their religious festivals, are more grave and serious. There have been sometimes public dances instituted by order of their Kings, as at Abrambo,a large town in Widaw, where annually, for eight days together, there resorted a multitude of both sexes from all parts of the country. This was called the dancing-season. To this solemnity all came dressed in the best manner, according to their respective ability. The dance was ridiculous enough; but it served to keep up their agility of body. And amidst all the uncouth barbarism of their gestures and attitudes, nature breaks out into some expressions of joy, or of the passions, that would not be unworthy of an European’s observation.

They have also their kind of Pirrhic dances, which they execute by mock-skirmishing in cadence, and striking on their targets with their cutlasses.

I have already mentioned that it is from Africa, the Moresc-dances originally came. But what is somewhat surprising, the Portugueze themselves, among whom I will not however include the higher ranks of life in that nation, but, at least, the number of the people who adopted, from the Caffrees, or Negroes of their African possessions, a dance called by themLasCheganças, (Approaches) was so great that the late King of Portugal was obliged to prohibit it by a formal edict. The reason of which was, that some of the motions and gestures had so lascivious an air, and were so contrary to modesty, that the celebratedFrey Gaspar, a natural son, if I mistake not, of the late King of Portugal, represented so efficaciously to his Portugueze Majesty, the shame and scandal of this dance being any longer suffered,that it was put down by royal authority. Nor was this done without occasioning heavy complaints againstFrey Gaspar, against whom there were lampoons and ballads publickly sung, upon his having used his influence to procure that prohibition.

Inthis part of the world, so lately discovered, nothing is a stronger proof of the universality of dancing, of its being, in short, rather an human instinct, than an art, than the fondness for dancing every where diffused over this vast continent.

InBrazil, the dancers, whether men or women, make a point of dancing bare-headed. The reason of this is not mentioned: it cannot however be thought a very serious one, since nothing can be more comical than their gestures, their contortions of body, and the signs they make with the head to each other.

InMexico, they have also their dances and music, but in the most uncouth and barbarian stile. For their simphony they have wooden drums, something in form of a kettle-drum, with a kind of pipe or flageolet, made of a hollow cane or reed, but very grating to an European ear. It is observed they love every thing that makes a noise how disagreeable soever the sound is. They will also hum over something like a tune, when they dancethirty or forty in a circle, stretching out their hands, and laying them on each others shoulders. They stamp and jump, and use the most antic gestures for several hours, till they are heartily weary. And one or two of the company sometimes step out of the ring, to make sport for the rest, by showing feats of activity, throwing up their lances into the air, catching them again, bending backwards, and springing forwards with great agility. Then when they are in a violent sweat, from this exercise, they will frequently jump into the water, without the least bad consequences to their health. Their women have their dancing and music too by themselves; but never mingle in those of the men.

InVirginia, according to the author of the history of that country,they have two different kinds of dancing; the first, either single, or at the most in small companies; or, secondly, in great numbers together, but without having any regard either to time or figure.

In the first kind one person only dances, or two, or three at most. While during their performance, the rest, who are seated round them in a ring, sing as loud as they can scream, and ring their little bells. Sometimes the dancers themselves sing, dart terribly threatening looks, stamp their feet upon the ground, and exhibit a thousand antic postures and grimaces.

In the other dance, consisting of a more numerous company of performers, the dance is executed round stakes set in the form of a circle, adornedwith some sculpture, or round about a fire, which they light in a convenient place. Every one has his little bell, his bow and arrow in his hand. They also cover themselves with leaves, and thus equipped, begin their dance. Sometimes they set three young women in the midst of the circle.

InPeru, the manner of dancing has something very particular. Instead of laying any stress on the motion of the arms, in most of their dances, their arms hang down, or are wrapped up in a kind of mantle, so that nothing is seen but the bending of the body, and the activity of the feet; they have however many figure-dances, in which they lay aside their cloaks or mantles, but the graces they add, are rather actions than gestures.

ThePeruvianCreolians dance after the same manner, without laying aside their long swords, the point of which they contrive to keep up before them so that it may not hinder them from rising, or in coupeeing, which is sometimes to such a degree that it looks like kneeling.

They have a dance there, adopted from the natives, which they callZapatas, (shoes) because in dancing they alternately strike with the heels and toes, taking some steps, and coupeeing, as they traverse their ground.

Among the savages of North-America, we are told there are various dances practised, such as that of the calumet, the leaders dance, the war-dance, the marriage-dance, the sacrifice-dance, all which, respectively differ in the movements,and some, amidst all the wildness of their performance, are not without their graces. But the dance of the calumet is esteemed the finest; this is used at the reception of strangers whom they mean to honor, or of ambassadors to them on public occasions. This dance is commonly executed in an oval figure.

TheAmericans, in some parts, prescribe this exercise by way of phisic, in their distempers: a method of treatment, not, it seems unknown to the antients: but, in general, their motive for dancing, is the same as with the rest of the world, to give demonstrations of joy and welcome to their guests, or to divert themselves. On some occasions indeed, they make them part of the ceremony at their assemblies upon affairs, when eventheir public debates are preceded by dancing, as if they expected that that exercise would rouse their mental faculties, and clear their heads. The war-dance is also used by them, by way of proclamation of war against their enemies.

The foregoing summary sketch of some of the various dances, which are practised in different parts of the globe, and which, to describe universally and minutely, would fill whole volumes, may serve to show that nature has, in all parts of the inhabited world, given to man the instinct of dancing, as well as of speaking, or of singing. But it certainly depends on the nations who encourage the polite arts, once more to carry it up to that pitch of excellence, of which the history of theGreeks and Romans shows it to have been susceptible, among the antients, however the moderns may have long fallen short of it. There has indeed lately appeared a dawning hope of its recovery; which, that it may not be frustrated, is the interest of all who wish well to an innocent and even useful pleasure.

Asthis branch of the art of dancing is often mentioned, especially in this country, without a just idea being affixed to it, or any other idea than what is vulgarly taken from a species of compositions which are sometimes exhibited after the play, on the theatre here, (not to mention Sadler’swells) and go by the name of pantomime entertainments; it may not be unacceptable to the reader, my layingdown before him the true grounds and nature of this diversion, which once made so great a figure in the theatrical sphere of action.

And as, on this point, Monsieur Cahusac, an ingenious French writer, has treated the historical part of it with so much accuracy, that it was hardly possible to offer any thing new upon it, beyond what he has furnished; and that not to make use of his researches would only betray me into a fruitless affectation of originality, I am very ready to confess, that for the best and greatest part of what I am now going to offer upon this subject I am indebted to his production.

That prodigious perfection to which the antients carried the pantomime art, appeared so extraordinary to the celebratedabbot Du Bos, that, notbeingable to contradict the authorities which establish the truth of it, he was tempted to consider the art of dancing in those times as something wholly different from what is at present understood by dancing.

The chevalier Ramsay places it also among the lost arts. Both, no doubt, grounding their opinion on that deficiency of execution on the modern theatres, compared to what is incontestably transmitted to us, by history, of the excellence of the antient pantomimes.

But none have more contributed to establish the opinion of the pantomime art being an art totally different from that of dancing, and not merely an improvement of it, as was certainly the case, than some of the professors ofthe art themselves, who even exclaimed against M. Cahusac, for his attempts to give juster notions, and to recommend the revival of it.

We are too apt to pronounce upon possibilities from our own measure of knowledge, or of capacity. Nothing is more common than to hear men of a profession declare loudly against any practice attempted to be established for the improvement of their art, and peremptorily to aver such a practice being impossible, for no other reason than that their own study and efforts had not been able to procure them the attainment of it. In this too they are seconded by that croud of superficial people who frequent the theatres, and who can believe nothing beyond what themselves have seen: any thing above the reach of what they are accustomedor habituated to admire, always seems to them a chimera.

The reproach of incredulity is commonly made to men of the greatest knowledge, because they are not over-apt to admit any proposition without proof: but this reproach may, with more justice, be oftenest made to the ignorant, who generally reject, without discussion, every thing beyond their own narrow conception.

To these it may sound more than strange; it may appear incredible, that on the theatre of Athens, the dance of the Eumenides, or Furies, had so expressive a character, as to strike the spectators with irresistible terror. The Areopagus itself shuddered with horror and affright; men grown old in the profession of arms, trembled; themultitude ran out; women with child miscarried; people imagined they saw in earnest those barbarous deities commissioned with the vengeance of heaven, pursue and punish the crimes of the earth.

This passage of history is furnished by the same authors, who tell us, that Sophocles was a genius; that nothing could withstand the eloquence of Demosthenes; that Themistocles was a hero; that Socrates was the wisest of men; and it was in the time of the most famous of theGreeksthat even upon those highly privileged souls, in sight of irreproachable witnesses, the art of dancing produced such great effects.

At Rome, in the best days of this art, all the sentiments which the dancers expressed, had each a character of truth,so great a power, such pathetic energy, that the multitude was more than once seen hurried away by the illusion, and mechanically to take part in the different emotions presented to them by the animated picture with which they were struck. In the representation ofAjax in a frenzy, the spectators took such violent impressions from the acting-dancer who represented him, that they perfectly broke out, into outcries; stripped, as it were, to fight, and actually came to blows among each other, as if they had caught their rage from what was passing on the theatre.

At another time they melted into tears at the tender affliction of Hecuba.

And upon whom were these lively impressions produced? Upon the cotemporariesof Mecenas, of Lucullus, Augustus, Virgil, Pollio; upon men of the most refined taste, whose criticism was as severe as their approbation honorable; who never spared their censure nor their applause, where either was due. How, especially under the eyes of Horace, could any thing pass the approbation of the public, unless under the seal of excellence in point of art and good taste? Would Augustus have declared himself the special patron of a kind of entertainment that had been deficient as to probability and genius? Would Mecenas, the protector of Virgil, and of all the fine arts, have been pleased with a sight that was not a striking imitation of beautiful nature?

The proofs shown of the perfection of dancing at Athens, and under the reign of Augustus, being incontestable,it is plain that what now passes for the art of dancing, is as yet only in its infancy. To display the arms gracefully, to preserve the equilibrium in the positions, to form steps with a lightness of air; to unfold all the springs of the body in harmony to the music, all these points, sufficient to what may be called private, or to assembly-dancing, are little more than the alphabet of the theatrical dances, or of pantomime execution. The steps and figures are but the letters and words of this art. A writing-master is one who teaches the mechanical part of forming letters. A mere dancing-master is an artist who teaches to form steps. But the first is not more different from what we call a man of letters, or awriter, than the second is from what may deserve on the theatre, the name of principal dancer.

Besides the necessity of learning his art elementally, a dancer, like a writer, should have a stile of his own, an original stile: more or less valuable, according as he can exhibit, express, and paint with elegance a greater or lesser quantity of things admirable, agreeable, and useful.

Speech is scarce more expressive, than the gestual language. The art of painting, which places before our eyes the most pathetic, or the most gay images of human life, composes them of nothing but of attitudes, of positions of the arms, expressions of the countenance, and of all these parts dancing is composed, as well as painting.

But, as I have before observed, painting can express no more than an instant of action. Theatrical dancing can exhibitall the successive instants it chuses to paint. Its march proceeds from picture to picture, to which, motion gives life. In painting, life is only imitated; in dancing, it is always the reality itself.

Dancing is, evidently, in its nature, an action upon the theatres; nothing is wanting to it but meaning: it moves to the right, to the left; it retrogrades, it advances, it forms steps, it delineates figures. There is only wanting to all this an arrangement of the motions, to furnish to the eye a theatrical action upon any subject whatever.

The history of the art proves that the dancers of genius, had no other means or assistance in the world but this to express all the human passions, and thepossibilities of it are in all times, the very same.

Both here, and in France, there have been some of these dramatic pieces in action, by dance, attempted, which have been well received by the public.

Some years ago, the Dutchess of Maine ordered simphonies to be composed for the scene of the fourth act of theHoratii; in which the young Horatius kills Camilla. Two dancers, one of each sex, represented this action atSceaux; and their dance painted it with all the energy and pathos of which it was susceptible.

In Italy especially many subjects of a what may be called low comedy, are very naturally expressed by dancing. In short, there is hardly any comic action butwhat they represent upon their theatres, if not with perfection, at least satisfactorily. And certainly the dance in action has the same superiority over sheer unmeaning dancing, that a fine history-piece has over cutting flowers in paper. In the last there is little more required than mechanical nicety, and, at the best, it affords no great pretention to merit. But it is only for genius to order, distribute and compose, in the other. A Raphael is allowed to take place in the Temple of Fame, by a Virgil; and the art of dancing is capable of having its Raphaels too. Pilades, and Bathillus were painters, and great ones, in their way. Picturesque composition is not less the duty of a composer of dances, than of a painter.

Among the antients, thatProtheus, of whom fabulous history records such wonders, was only one of their dancers, who, by the rapidity of his steps, by the strength of his expression, and by the employment of the theatrical deceptions, seemed at every instant, to change his form. The celebratedEmpusawas a female dancer, whose agility was so prodigious that she appeared and vanished like a spirit.

But it was at Rome that the Pantomime art received its highest improvement. Pilades born in Cilicia, and Bathillus of Alexandria, where the two most surprising geniuses, who, under the reigns of Augustus Cæsar, displayed their talents in their utmost lustre. The first invented the solemn, grave and pathetic dances. The compositions of Bathilluswere in the lively, gay, and sprightly stile.

Bathillus had been the slave of Mecenas, who had given him his freedom in favor of his talents. Having seen Pilades in Cilicia, he engaged him to come to Rome, where he had disposed Mecenas in his favor, who, becoming the declared protector of both, procured to them the encouragement of the Emperor.

A theatre was built for them: the Romans flocked to it, and saw, with surprise, a complete tragedy; all the passions painted with the most vigorous strokes of representation: the exposition, plot, catastrophe expressed in the clearest and most pathetic manner, without any other means or assistence but that of dancing, executed to the simphoniesthe best adapted, and far superior to any that had been before heard in Rome.

Their surprise was not to end here. To this a second entertainment succeeded; in which an ingenious action, without needing the voice or speech, presented all the characters, all the pleasant strokes, and humorous pictures of a good comedy.

And in both these kinds, the executive talents of Pilades and Bathillus corresponded to the boldness and beauty of the kind of compositions they had ventured to bring on the stage.

Pilades especially, who was at the head of this project, was the most singular man that had till then appeared on the theatre. His fertile imaginationconstantly supplied him with new means of perfecting his art and embellishing his entertainments. Athenæus mentions his having written a book much esteemed on the depths and principles of his art.

Before him, some flutes composed the orchestra of the Romans. He reinforced it with all the known instruments. He added choruses of dances to his representations, and took care that their steps and figures, should always have some relation or affinity to the principal action. He provided them with dresses in the highest taste of propriety, and omitted nothing towards producing, keeping up, and pushing to the highest pitch, the charm of the theatrical illusion.

The actions on the Roman theatres were tragic, comic, or satirical; these last pretty nearly answering to what we understand by grotesque or farcical.

Esopus and Roscius had been, from their excellence in declamation, the delight and admiration of Rome. But on their leaving no successors to their degree of merit; the taste for dramatic poetry which was no longer supported by actors equal to them, began to decline; and the theatrical dances under such great masters as Pilades and Bathillus, either by their novelty, or by their merit, or by both, made the Romans the less feel their loss of those incomparable actors. The gestual language took place of that which was declaimed; and produced regular pieces acted in the three kinds of tragedy, comedy, and farce or grotesque. Thespectators grew pleased with such an exercise of their understanding. Steps, motions, attitudes, figures, positions, now were substituted to speech; and there resulted from them an expression so natural, images so resembling, a pathos so moving, or a pleasantry so agreeable, that people imagined they heard the actions they saw. The gestures alone supplied the place of the sweetness of the voice, of the energy of speech, and of the charms of poetry.*

This kind of entertainment, so new, though formed upon a ground-work already known, planned and executed by genius, andadoptedwith a passionate fondness by the Romans, was called theItalic dance; and in the transports of pleasures it caused them, they gave to the actors of it, the title ofPantomimes. This was no more than a lively, and not at all exagerated expression, of the truth of their action, which was one continual picture to the eyes of the spectators. Their motion, their feet, their hands, their arms, were but so many different parts of the picture; none of them were to remain idle; but all, with propriety, were to concur to the formation of that assemblage, from which result the harmony, and, with pardon for the expression, the happyall-togetherof the composition and performance. A dancer learned from hisvery name ofpantomime, that he could be in no esteem in Rome, but so far as he should beall the actor.

And, in fact, this art was carried to a point of perfection hard to believe; but for such a number of concurrent and authentic testimonies.

It appears also clearly from history, that this art, in its origin, (so favored by an arbitrary prince, and who also made some use of it, towards establishing his despotism, nay even primordially introduced by Bathillus, a slave) could no longer preserve its great excellence, than the spirit of liberty was not wholly worn out in the Roman breasts; and, like its other sister arts, gradually decayed and sunk under the subsequent emperors.

Pilades gave a memorable instance of the (as yet) unextinguished spirit of liberty, when, upon his being banished Rome, for some time, by Augustus Cesar, upon account of the disturbances the pantomime parties occasioned, he told him plainly to his face, that he was ungrateful for the good his power received, by the diversion to the Romans from more serious thoughts on the loss of their liberty.““Why do not you,” says he,““let the people amuse themselves with our quarrels?”

This dancer had such great powers in all his tragedies, that he could draw tears from even those of the spectators the least used to the melting mood.

But in truth, the effect of these pantomimes, in general, was prodigious.Tears and sobs interrupted often the representation of the tragedy ofGlaucus, in which the pantomime Plancus played the principal character.

Bathillus, in painting the amours of Leda, never failed of exciting the utmost sensibility in the Roman ladies.

But what is more surprising yet,Memphir, a Pithagorean philosopher, as Athenæus tells us, expressed, by dancing, all the excellence of the philosophy of Pithagoras, with more elegance, more clearness and energy, than the most eloquent professor of philosophy could have done.

Upon considering all this, one is almost tempted to say, with M. Cahusac, “We have,“upon the stage, excellentfeet, lively legs, admirable arms:“what a pity it is, that with all this we have so little of the art of dancing!”

Our tragedy and our comedy have an extent and duration which are supported by the charms of speech, by the interestingness of narration, by the variety of the sallies of wit. The action is divided into acts, each act into scenes, these scenes successively present new situations, and these situations keep up the warmth of interest and attention, form the plot, lead to the conclusion or unravelment, and prepare it.

Such must have been, or such must be, (but with more precision and markingness) tragedies or comedies represented by dancing; as gesture is something more marking and succinct thanspeech. There are required many words to express a thought, but one single motion may paint several thoughts, and situations.

In such compositions, then, made to be danced, the theatrical action must go forward with the utmost rapidity: there must not be one unmeaning entry, figure, or step in them. Such a piece ought to be a close crouded abstract of some excellent written dramatic piece.

Dancing, like painting, can only present situations to the eye; and every truly theatrical situation is nothing but a living picture.

If a composer of dances should undertake to represent upon the stage any great action or theatrical subject, hemust begin by making an extract from it, of all the most picturesque situations. No other parts beside these can enter into his plan; all the others are defective or useless, they can only embarras, perplex, confound, and render it cold and insipid.

Whereas, if the situations succeed one another naturally, and in great number; if their being well linked together conducts them with rapidity, from the first situation to the last, which must clearly and strikingly unravel the whole; the choice is complete, and the theatrical effect will be sure.

It is that final effect, of which, in the execution, the composer and performer must never lose sight. Successive pictures must be exhibited, and animated with all the expression that canresult from the impassioned motions of the dance.

This was doubtless the great secret of the art of Pilades, who so highly excelled in his ideas of theatrical expression: this is, perhaps, too for all kinds of theatrical composition, whether to be declaimed, or to be executed by dancing, a general rule that is not to be slighted.

One instance of the regard shewn by Pilades to theatrical propriety is preserved to us, and not unworthy of attention. He had been publickly challenged by Hilas, once a pupil of his, to represent the greatness of Agamemnon: Hilas came upon the stage with buskins, which, in the nature of stilts, made him of an artificial height; in consequence of which he greatly over-toppedthe croud of actors who surrounded him. This passed well enough, ’till Pilades appeared with an air, stern and majestic. His serious steps, his arms a-cross, his motion sometimes slow, sometimes animated, with pauses full of meaning, his looks now fixed on the ground, now lifted to heaven, with all the attitudes of profound pensiveness, painted strongly a man taken up with great things, which he was meditating, weighing, and comparing, with all the dignity of kingly importance. The spectators, struck with the justness, with the energy and real elevation of so expressive a portraiture, unanimously adjudged the preference to Pilades, who, coolly turning to Hilas, said to him,““Young man, we had to represent a king who commanded over twenty kings:“you made him tall: I showed him great.”

It was in the reign of Nero, that a cinical mock-philosopher, called Demetrius, saw, for the first time, one of these pantomime compositions. Struck with the truth of the representation, he could not help expressing the greatest marks of astonishment: but whether his pride made him feel a sort of shame for the admiration he had involuntarily shewn, or whether naturally envious and selfish, he could not bear the cruel pain of being forced to approve any thing but his own singularities; he attributed to the music the strong impression that has been made upon him: as, in that reign, a false philosophy very naturally had a greater influence than the real, this man was, it seems, of consequence enough for the managers of the dances to take notice of this partiality, or at least to be piqued enough, for their own honor, tolay a scheme for undeceiving him. He was once more brought to their theatre, and seated in a conspicuous part of the house, without his having been acquainted with their intention.

The orchestra began: an actor opens the scene: on the moment of his entrance, the simphony ceases, and the representation continues. Without any aid but that of the steps, the positions of the body, the movements of the arms, the piece is performed, in which are successively represented the amours of Mars and Venus, the Sun discovering them to the jealous husband of the goddess, the snares which he sets for his faithless spouse and her formidable gallant, the quick effect of the treacherous net, which, while it compleats the revenge of Vulcan, only publishes his shame, the confusion of Venus,the rage of Mars, the arch mirth of the gods, who came to enjoy the sight.

The whole audience gave to the excellence of the performance its due applause, but the Cinic, out of himself, could not help crying out, in a transport of delight;““No! this is not a representation;“it is the very thing itself.”

Much about the same time a dancer represented thelabors ofHercules. He retraced in so true a manner all the different situations of that hero, that a king of Pontus, then at Rome, and who had never seen such a sight before, easily followed the thread of the action, and charmed with it, asked with great earnestness of the emperor, that he would let him have with him that extraordinary dancer, who had madesuch an impression upon him. “Do not, says he to Nero,“be surprised at my request.“I have for borderers upon my kingdom, some Barbarian nations whose language none of my people could understand, nor they learn ours.“Such a man as this dancer would be an admirable interpreter between us.”

It would then surely be a great error to imagine, that an habitual dexterity, a daily practice, with their arms, their legs and feet, were the only talents of these pantomime dancers. Their execution, without doubt, required all these advantages of the body in the most eminent degree; but their compositions supposed, and indispensably implied an infinite number of combinations which belong intirely to the mind, or intellectual faculties; as for example,especially an attentive and judicious discernment of the most interesting truths of human nature. How extensive a study this exacts, it is more easy to conceive than to attain.

And surely there is an evident necessity for studying men, before one can undertake to paint or represent them. It is not till after a profound examination of the passions, that one ought to flatter one’s self with characterising them purely by the powers of external signs of actions. All the passions have affinities to each other, which it is only for a great justness of understanding to seize; they have shades that distinguish them, which nothing but a nice eye can perceive, and which easily escape a superficial observer.

In serious dancing, where the character of a hero is to be given, there are in his actions, in the course of his life, certain marking strokes, certain incidents or extraordinary passages, which are subjects proper for the stage, and which must be separated from others perhaps more brilliant in history, but which would infrigidate a theatrical composition.

In the state of dancing of our days, the dancers, and even the composers of dances, aspire to little more than the mechanical part of their art; and, indeed, they hardly know any thing beyond that, and cannot in course, cultivate what they have no conception of.

When M. Cahusac wrote, he observed that this was sufficient for thespectators, who required nothing more than a brilliant execution from the dancers in the old track of steps and capers; and this is, in fact, true of the greater number now. But lately, the taste for dances of action, animated with meaning and conveying the idea of some fable or subject, has begun to gain ground. People are less tired with a dance, in which the understanding is exercised, without the fatigue of perplexity, than by merely seeing a succession of lively steps, and cabriols, however well executed; which, in point of merit, bear no more proportion to that of a well-composed dance, than a tiresome repetition of vignettes, of head-pieces and tail-pieces, would do to the gravings of historical pieces after a Raphael, a Michael Angelo, or a Correggio.

As hitherto the composer of the dances of action, have not been able to recover that height of perfection to which the antient pantomimes carried their art; the most that any composers could do, I mean with success, (for there have been some attempts made, that, for want of a proper plan and execution, failed,) was to furnish certain dances, in the nature ofpoemettior small dramatic poems, which, where the subject of action has been clearly and intelligibly executed, have ever been received with the most encouraging applause by the public.

And here the ingenious author to whom I am so much obliged in this chapter, furnishes me with rules of composition for the dances of action, which can hardly be too much recommended.

All theatrical compositions ought to have three essential parts.

By a lively dialogue, in a piece made to be spoken, or by an incident dextrously introduced in one made for a dance in action, the spectator is to be prepared for the subject that is to be represented, and to have some acquaintance of the character, quality, and manners of the persons of the drama: this is what is calledthe exposition.

The circumstances, the obstacles which ariseourof the ground-work of the subject, embroil it, and retard its march without stopping it. A sort of embarrasment forms itself out of the actions of the characters, which perplexes the curiosity of the spectators, from whose even guess-work, the manner how all is to be ultimately unravelled isto be kept as great a secret as possible: and this embarrasment is what is calledthe plot.

From this embarrasment, one sees successively break forth lights, the more unexpected, the better. They unfold the action, and conduct it by insensible degrees to an ingenious conclusion: this is what is calledthe unravelment.

If any of these three parts is defective, the theatrical merit is imperfect. If they are all three in due proportion, the action is complete, and the charm of the representation is infallible.

As the theatrical dance then is a representation, it must be formed of these three essentially constitutive parts. Thus it will be more or less perfect, accordingas its exposition shall be more or less clear, its plot more or less ingenious, its unravelment more or less striking.

But this division is not the only one that should be known and practised. A dramatic work is commonly composed of five or fewer acts; and an act is composed of scenes in dialogue or soliloquy. Now every act, every scene, should have, subordinately, its exposition, its plot, and its unravelment, just as the total of the piece has, of which they are the parts.

So ought, also every representation in dancing to have those three parts, which constitute every thing that is action. Without their union, there is no action that is perfect: a fault in one of those parts will have a bad effect on theothers; the chain is broke; the picture, whatever beauty it may have in other respects, is without any theatrical merit.

Besides these general laws of the theatre, which are in common to those compositions of dances, that are to be executed on it, they are subjected to other particular rules, which are derived from the primitive principles of the art.

As the art of dancing essentially consists in painting by gestures and attitudes, there is nothing of what would be rejected by a painter of good taste, that the dancer can admit; and, consequentially, every thing that such a painter would chuse, ought to be laid hold of, distributed, and properly placed in a dance of action.

Here, on this point, recurs that never too often repeated rule, as infallible as it is plain:let nature, in every thing, be the guide of art; and let art, in every thing, aim at imitating nature: a rule this, than which there is not one more trite, more hackneyed in the theory, nor less regarded in the practice.

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