Chapter 12

See James Wilson,The Life of Charles A. Dana(New York, 1907).

DANA, FRANCIS(1743-1811), American jurist, was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts, on the 13th of June 1743. He was the son of Richard Dana (1699-1772), a leader of the Massachusetts provincial bar, and a vigorous advocate of colonial rights in the pre-revolutionary period. Francis Dana graduated at Harvard in 1762, was admitted to the bar in 1767, and, being an opponent of the British colonial policy, became a leader of the Sons of Liberty, and in 1774 was a member of the first provincial congress of Massachusetts. During a two years’ visit to England he sought earnestly to gain friends to his colony’s cause, but returned to Boston in April 1776 convinced that a friendly settlement of the dispute was impossible. He was a member of the Massachusetts executive council from 1776 to 1780, and a delegate to the Continental Congress from 1776 to 1778. As a member of the latter body he became chairman in January 1778 of the committee appointed to visit Washington at Valley Forge, and confer with him concerning the reorganization of the army. This committee spent about three months in camp, and assisted Washington in preparing the plan of reorganization which Congress in the main adopted. In this year he was also a member of a committee to consider Lord North’s offer of conciliation, which he vigorously opposed. In the autumn of 1779 he was appointed secretary to John Adams, who had been selected as minister plenipotentiary to negotiate treaties of peace and commerce with Great Britain, and in December 1780 he was appointed diplomatic representative to the Russian government. He remained at St Petersburg from 1781 to 1783, but was never formally received by the empress Catherine. In February 1784 he was again chosen a delegate to Congress, and in January 1785 he became a justice of the Massachusetts supreme court. He was chief justice of this court from 1791 to 1806, and presided with ability and rare distinction. He was an earnest advocate of the adoption of the Federal constitution, was a member of the Massachusetts convention which ratified that instrument, and was one of the most influential advisers of the leaders of the Federalist party. His tastes were scholarly, and he was one of the founders of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He died at Cambridge, Massachusetts, on the 25th of April 1811.

His son,Richard Henry Dana(1787-1879), was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on the 15th of November 1787. He was educated at Harvard in the class of 1808. Subsequently he studied law and in 1811 was admitted to practice. But all other interests were early subordinated to his love of literature, to which the greater part of his long life was devoted. He became in 1814 a member of a literary society in Cambridge, known as the Anthology Club. This club began the publication of a monthly magazine,The Monthly Anthology, which gave way in 1815 toThe North American Review. In the editorial control of this periodical he was associated with Jared Sparks and Edward T. Channing (1790-1856) until 1821, contributing essays and criticisms which attracted wide attention. In 1821-1822 he edited in New York a short-lived literary magazine,The Idle Man. He published his first volume ofPoemsin 1827, and in 1833 appeared hisPoems and Prose Writings, republished in 1850 in two volumes, in which were included practically all of his poems and of his prose contributions to periodical literature. Although the bulk of his published writings was not large, his influence on American literature during the first half of the 19th century was surpassed by that of few of his contemporaries.

Richard Henry Dana(1815-1882), son of the last-mentioned, was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on the 1st of August 1815. He entered Harvard in the class of 1835, but at the beginning of his junior year an illness affecting his sight necessitated a suspension of his college work, and in August 1834 he shipped before the mast for California, returning in September 1836. The rough experience of this voyage did more than endow him with renewed health; it changed him from a dreamy, sensitive boy, hereditarily disinclined to any sort of active career, into a self-reliant, energetic man, with broad interests and keen sympathies. He re-entered Harvard in December 1836 and graduated in June 1837. He was a student at the Harvard law school from 1837 to 1840, and from January 1839 to February 1840 he was also an instructor in elocution in the college. In 1840 the notes of his sea-trip were published under the titleTwo Years Before the Mast. The book attained an almost unprecedented popularity both in America and in Europe, where it was translated into several languages; and it came to be considered a classic. Immediately after the appearance of this book Dana began the practice of law, which brought him a large number of maritime cases. In 1841 he publishedThe Seaman’s Friend, republished in England asThe Seaman’s Manual, which was long the highest authority on the legal rights and duties of seamen. After gaining recognition as one of the most prominent members of the Suffolk bar, he became associated in 1848 with the Free Soil movement, and took a prominent part in the Buffalo convention of that year. This step, which caused him to be ostracized for a time from the Boston circles in which he had been reared, brought him the cases of the fugitive slaves, Shadrach, Sims and Burns, and of the rescuers of Shadrach. On the night following the surrender of Burns (May 1854) Dana was brutally assaulted on the Boston streets. In 1853 he took a prominent part in the state constitutional convention. He allied himself with the Republican party on its organization, but his inborn dislike for political manœuvring prevented his ever becoming prominent in its councils. In 1857 he became a regular attendant at the meetings of the famous Boston Saturday Club, to the members of which he dedicated his account of a vacation trip,To Cuba and Back(1857). He returned to America from a trip round the world in time to participate in the presidential campaign of 1860, and after Lincoln’s inauguration he was appointed United States district attorney for Massachusetts. In this office in 1863 he won before the Supreme Court of the United States the famous prize case of the “Amy Warwick,” on the decision in which depended the right of the government to blockade the Confederate ports, without giving the Confederate States an international status as belligerents. He brought out in 1865 an edition ofWheaton’s International Law, his notes constituting a most learned and valuable authority on international law and its bearings on American history and diplomacy; but immediately after its publication Dana was charged by the editor of two earlier editions, William Beach Lawrence, with infringing his copyright, and was involved in litigation which was continuedfor thirteen years. In such minor matters as arrangement of notes and verification of citations the court found against Dana, but in the main Dana’s notes were vastly different from Lawrence’s. In 1865 Dana declined an appointment as a United States district judge. During the Reconstruction period he favoured the congressional plan rather than that of President Johnson, and on this account resigned the district-attorneyship. In 1867-1868 he was a member of the Massachusetts House of Representatives, and in 1867 was retained with William M. Evarts to prosecute Jefferson Davis, whose admission to bail he counselled. In 1877 he was one of the counsel for the United States before the commission which in accordance with the treaty of Washington met at Halifax, N.S., to arbitrate the fisheries question between the United States and Great Britain. In 1878 he gave up his law practice and devoted the rest of his life to study and travel. He died in Rome, Italy, on the 9th of January 1882.

See Charles Francis Adams,Richard Henry Dana: a Biography(2 vols., Boston, Mass., 1891).

DANA, JAMES DWIGHT(1813-1895), American geologist, mineralogist and zoologist, was born in Utica, New York, on the 12th of February 1813. He early displayed a taste for science, which had been fostered by Fay Edgerton, a teacher in the Utica high school, and in 1830 he entered Yale College, in order to study under Benjamin Silliman the elder. Graduating in 1833, for the next two years he was teacher of mathematics to midshipmen in the navy, and sailed to the Mediterranean while engaged in his duties. In 1836-1837 he was assistant to Professor Silliman in the chemical laboratory at Yale, and then, for four years, acted as mineralogist and geologist of a United States exploring expedition, commanded by Captain Charles Wilkes, in the Pacific ocean (seeWilkes, Charles). His labours in preparing the reports of his explorations occupied parts of thirteen years after his return to America in 1842. In 1844 he again became a resident of New Haven, married the daughter of Professor Silliman, and in 1850, on the resignation of the latter, was appointed Silliman Professor of Natural History and Geology in Yale College, a position which he held till 1892. In 1846 he became joint editor and during the later years of his life he was chief editor of theAmerican Journal of Science and Arts(founded in 1818 by Benjamin Silliman), to which he was a constant contributor, principally of articles on geology and mineralogy. A bibliographical list of his writings shows 214 titles of books and papers, beginning in 1835 with a paper on the conditions of Vesuvius in 1834, and ending with the fourth revised edition (finished in February 1895) of hisManual of Geology. His reports onZoophytes, on theGeology of the Pacific Area, and onCrustacea, summarizing his work on the Wilkes expedition, appeared in 1846, 1849 and 1852-1854, in quarto volumes, with copiously illustrated atlases; but as these were issued in small numbers, his reputation more largely rests upon hisSystem of Mineralogy(1837 and many later editions in 1892);Manual of Geology(1862; ed. 4, 1895);Manual of Mineralogy(1848), afterwards entitledManual of Mineralogy and Lithology(ed. 4, 1887); and Corals and Coral Islands (1872; ed. 2, 1890). In 1887 Dana revisited the Hawaiian Islands, and the results of his further investigations were published in a quarto volume in 1890, entitledCharacteristics of Volcanoes. By the Royal Society of London he was awarded the Copley medal in 1877; and by the Geological Society the Wollaston medal in 1874. His powers of work were extraordinary, and in his 82nd year he was occupied in preparing a new edition of hisManual of Geology, the 4th edition being issued in 1895. He died on the 14th of April 1895.

His sonEdward Salisbury Dana, born at New Haven on the 16th of November 1849, is author ofA Textbook of Mineralogy(1877; new ed. 1898) and aText Book of Elementary Mechanics(1881). In 1879-80 he was professor of natural philosophy and then became professor of physics at Yale.

SeeLife of J. D. Dana, by Daniel C. Gilman (1899).

DANAE,in Greek legend, daughter of Acrisius, king of Argos. Her father, having been warned by an oracle that she would bear a son by whom he would be slain, confined Danae in a brazen tower. But Zeus descended to her in a shower of gold, and she gave birth to Perseus, whereupon Acrisius placed her and her infant in a wooden box and threw them into the sea. They were finally driven ashore on the island of Seriphus, where they were picked up by a fisherman named Dictys. His brother Polydectes, who was king of the island, fell in love with Danae and married her. According to another story, her son Perseus, on his return with the head of Medusa, finding his mother persecuted by Polydectes, turned him into stone, and took Danae back with him to Argos. Latin legend represented her as landing on the coast of Latium and marrying Pilumnus or Picumnus, from whom Turnus, king of the Rutulians, was descended. Danae formed the subject of tragedies by Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Livius Andronicus and Naevius. She is the personification of the earth suffering from drought, on which the fertilizing rain descends from heaven.

Apollodorus ii. 4; Sophocles,Antigone, 944; Horace,Odes, iii. 16; Virgil,Aeneid, vii. 410. See also P. Schwarz,De Fabula Danaeia(1881).

DANAO,a town of the province of Cebú, island of Cebú, Philippine Islands, on the E. coast, at the mouth of the Danao river, 17 m. N.N.E. of Cebú, the capital. Pop. (1903) 16,173. Danao has a comparatively cool and healthy climate, is the centre of a rich agricultural region producing rice, Indian corn, sugar, copra and cacao, and coal is mined in the vicinity. The language is Cebú-Visayan.

DANAUS,in Greek legend, son of Belus, king of Egypt, and twin-brother of Aegyptus. He was born at Chemmis (Panopolis) in Egypt, but having been driven out by his brother he fled with his fifty daughters to Argos, the home of his ancestress Io. Here he became king and taught the inhabitants of the country to dig wells. In the meantime the fifty sons of Aegyptus arrived in Argos, and Danaus was obliged to consent to their marriage with his daughters. But to each of these he gave a knife with injunctions to slay her husband on the marriage night. They all obeyed except Hyperm(n)estra, who spared Lynceus. She was brought to trial by her father, acquitted and afterwards married to her lover. Being unable to find suitors for the other daughters, Danaus offered them in marriage to the youths of the district who proved themselves victorious in racing contests (Pindar,Pythia, ix. 117). According to another story, Lynceus slew Danaus and his daughters and seized the throne of Argos (schol. on Euripides,Hecuba, 886). By way of expiation for their crime the Danaïdes were condemned to the endless task of filling with water a vessel which had no bottom. This punishment, originally inflicted on those who neglected certain mystic rites, was transferred to those who, like the Danaïdes, despised the mystic rite of marriage; cf. the water-bearing figure (λουτροφόρος) on the grave of unmarried persons. The murder of the sons of Aegyptus by their wives is supposed to represent the drying up of the rivers and springs of Argolis in summer by the agency of the nymphs.

Apollodorus ii. 1; Horace,Odes, iii. 11; O. Waser, inArchiv für Religionswissenschaft, ii. Heft 1, 1899; articles in Pauly-Wissowa’sRealencyclopädieand W. H. Roscher’sLexikon der Mythologie; Campbell Bonner, inHarvard Studies, xiii. (1902).

DANBURITE,a rare mineral species consisting of calcium and boron orthosilicate, CaB2(SiO4)2, crystallizing in the orthorhombic system. It was discovered by C.U. Shepard in 1839 at Danbury, Connecticut, U.S.A., and named by him after this locality. The crystals are prismatic in habit, and closely resemble topaz in form and interfacial angles. There is an imperfect cleavage parallel to the basal plane. Crystals are transparent to translucent, and colourless to pale yellow; hardness 7; specific gravity 3.0. At Danbury the mineral occurs with microcline and oligoclase embedded in dolomite. Large crystals, reaching 4 in. in length, have been found with calcite in veins traversing granite at Russell in St Lawrence county, New York. Smaller but well-developed crystals have been found on gneiss at Mt. Scopi and Petersthal (the valley of the Vals Rhine) in Switzerland. Splendid crystals have recently been obtained from Japan.

DANBURY,a city and one of the county-seats of Fairfield county, Connecticut, U.S.A., in Danbury township, in thesouth-west part of the state, on the Still river, a tributary of the Housatonic. Pop. (1890) 16,552; (1900) 16,537 (3702 foreign-born); (1910) 20,234. In 1900 the population of the township, including that of the city, was 19,474, and in 1910, 23,502. Danbury is served by three divisions of the New York, New Haven & Hartford railway; by the Danbury & Harlem electric railway, which connects at Goldens Bridge, New York, with the Harlem division of the New York Central; and by an electric line to Bethel, Connecticut. Lake Kenosia, about 2½ m. from the centre of the city, is a pleasure resort. A state normal school was opened in Danbury in 1904, and there is a home for destitute and homeless children under private (unsectarian) control. The city has good water-power, and the municipality owns the water works. The principal industry is the manufacture of felt hats, begun in 1780, and in 1905 engaging about thirty factories, with a product for the year valued at $5,798,107 (71.9% of the value of all the factory products of the city, and 15.8% of the value of all the felt hats produced in the United States). The city ranked first among the cities of the country in this industry in 1900 and second in 1905, and in 1905 no other city showed so high a degree of specialization in it. Silver-plated ware (mostly manufactured by Rogers Bros.) is another important product. At Danbury is held annually the well-known agricultural Danbury Fair. The township was settled in 1684 by emigrants from Norwalk, and received its present name in 1687. When the War of Independence opened, Enoch Crosby, believed to be the original of Harvey Birch, the hero of J. F. Cooper’sThe Spy, was a resident of Danbury. A depot of military supplies was established in the village of Danbury in 1776; in April 1777 Governor William Tryon, of New York, raided the place, destroying the military stores and considerable private property. During his retreat he was attacked (April 26th) at Ridgefield (about 9 m. south by east of Danbury) by the Americans under General David Wooster (1710-1777), who was fatally wounded in the conflict (being succeeded by General Benedict Arnold), and to whose memory a monument was erected in Danbury in 1854. Danbury was chartered as a borough in 1832 and as a city in 1880. In 1870 theDanbury Newswas established by the consolidation of theJeffersonianand theTimes, by James Montgomery Bailey (1841-1894), from 1865 to 1870 proprietor of theTimes. He wrote for theNewshumorous sketches, which made him and the paper famous, Bailey being known as the “Danbury News Man”; among his books areLife in Danbury(1873),The Danbury News Man’s Almanac(1873),They All Do It(1877),England from a Back Window(1878),Mr Philip’s Goneness(1879),The Danbury Boom(1880), andHistory of Danbury(1896).

DANBY, FRANCIS(1793-1861), English painter, was born in the south of Ireland on the 16th of November 1793. His father farmed a small property he owned near Wexford, but his death caused the family to remove to Dublin, while Francis was still a schoolboy. He began to practice drawing at the Royal Dublin Society’s schools; and under an erratic young artist named O’Connor he began painting landscape. Danby also made acquaintance with George Petrie, and all three left for London together in 1813. This expedition, undertaken with very inadequate funds, quickly came to an end, and they had to get home again by walking. At Bristol they made a pause, and Danby, finding he could get trifling sums for water-colour drawings, remained there working diligently and sending to the London exhibitions pictures of importance. There his large pictures in oil quickly attracted attention. “The Upas Tree” (1820) and “The Delivery of the Israelites” (1825) brought him his election as an associate of the Royal Academy. He left Bristol for London, and in 1828 exhibited his “Opening of the Sixth Seal” at the British Institution, receiving from that body a prize of 200 guineas; and this picture was followed by two others from the Apocalypse. He suddenly left London, declaring that he would never live there again, and that the Academy, instead of aiding him, had, somehow or other, used him badly. Some insurmountable domestic difficulty overtook him also, and for eleven or twelve years he lived on the Lake of Geneva, a Bohemian with boat-building fancies, painting only now and then. He returned to England in 1841, when his sons, James and Thomas, both artists, were growing up. Other pictures by him were “The Golden Age” and “The Evening Gun,” the first begun before he left England, the second painted after his return; he had taken up his abode at Exmouth, where he died on the 9th of February 1861.

DANCE,the name of an English family distinguished in architecture, art and the drama.George Dance, the elder (1700-1768), obtained the appointment of architect to the city of London, and designed the Mansion House (1739); the churches of St Botolph, Aldgate (1741), St Luke’s, Old Street; St Leonard, Shoreditch; the old excise office; Broad Street; and other public works of importance. He died on the 8th of February 1768. His eldest son,James Dance(1722-1744), was born on the 17th of March 1722, and educated at the Merchant Taylors’ School and St John’s College, Oxford, which he left before graduating. He took the name of Love, and became an actor and playwright of no great merit. In the former capacity he was for twelve years connected with Drury Lane theatre. He wrote “an heroic poem” onCricket, about 1740, and a volume ofPoems on Several Occasions(1754), and a number of comedies—the earliestPamela(1742).

George Dance’s third son, SirNathaniel Dance-Holland, Bart. (1735-1811), was born on the 18th of May 1735, and studied art under Francis Hayman, and in Italy, where he met Angelica Kauffmann, to whom he was devotedly and hopelessly attached. From Rome he sent home “Dido and Aeneas” (1763), and he continued to paint occasional historical pictures of the same quasi-classic kind throughout his career. On his return to England he took up portrait-painting with great success, and contributed to the first exhibition of the Royal Academy, of which he was a foundation member, full-length portraits of George III. and his queen. These, and his portraits of Captain Cook and of Garrick as Richard III., engraved by Dixon, are his best-known works. Himself a rich man, in 1790 he married a widow with £15,000 a year, dropped his profession, and became M.P. for East Grinstead, taking the additional name of Holland. He was made a baronet in 1800. He died on the 15th of October 1811, leaving a fortune of £200,000.

George Dance’s fifth and youngest son,George Dance, the younger (1741-1825), succeeded his father as city surveyor and architect in 1768. He was then only twenty-seven, had spent several years abroad, chiefly in Italy with his brother Nathaniel, and had already distinguished himself by designs for Blackfriars Bridge sent to the 1761 exhibition of the Incorporated Society of Artists. His first important public work was the rebuilding of Newgate prison in 1770. The front of the Guildhall was also his. He, too, was a foundation member of the Royal Academy, and for a number of years the last survivor of the forty original academicians. His last years were devoted to art rather than to architecture, and after 1798 his Academy contributions consisted solely of chalk portraits of his friends, seventy-two of which were engraved and published (1808-1814). He resigned his office in 1815, and after many years of illness died on the 14th of January 1825, and was buried in St Paul’s. His son,Charles Dance(1794-1863), was for thirty years registrar, taxing officer and chief clerk of the insolvent debtors’ court, retiring, when it was abolished, on an allowance. In collaboration with J. R. Planché and others, or alone, he wrote a great number of extravaganzas, farces and comediettas. He was one of the first, if not the first, of the burlesque writers, and was the author of those produced so successfully by Madame Vestris for years at the Olympic. Of his farces,Delicate Ground, Who Speaks First?,A Morning Calland others are still occasionally revived. He died on the 6th of January 1863.

DANCE(Fr.danse; of obscure origin, connected with Old High Ger.danson, to stretch). The term “dancing” in its widest sense includes three things:—(1) the spontaneous activity of the muscles under the influence of some strong emotion, such as social joy or religious exultation; (2) definite combinations of graceful movements performed for the sake of the pleasurewhich the exercise affords to the dancer or to the spectator; (3) carefully trained movements which are meant by the dancer vividly to represent the actions and passions of other people. In the highest sense it seems to be for prose-gesture what song is for the instinctive exclamations of feeling. Regarded as the outlet or expression of strong feeling, dancing does not require much discussion, for the general rule applies that such demonstrations for a time at least sustain and do not exhaust the flow of feeling. The voice and the facial muscles and many of the organs are affected at the same time, and the result is a high state of vitality which among the spinning Dervishes or in the ecstatic worship of Bacchus and Cybele amounted to something like madness. Even here there is traceable an undulatory movement which, as Herbert Spencer says, is “habitually generated by feeling in its bodily discharge.” But it is only in the advanced or volitional stage of dancing that we find developed the essential feature ofmeasure, which has been said to consist in “the alternation of stronger muscular contractions with weaker ones,” an alternation which, except in the cases of savages and children, “is compounded with longer rises and falls in the degree of muscular excitement.” In analysing the state of mind which this measured dancing produces, we must first of all allow for the pleasant glow of excitement caused by the excess of blood sent to the brain. But apart from this, there is an agreeable sense of uniformity in the succession of muscular efforts, and in the spaces described, and also in the period of their recurrence. If the steps of dancing and the intervals of time be not precisely equal, there is still a pleasure depending on the gradually increasing intensity of motion, on the undulation which uniformly rises in order to fall. As Florizel says to Perdita, “When you do dance, I wish you a wave of the sea” (Winter’s Tale, iv. 3). The mind feels the beauty of emphasis and cadence in muscular motion, just as much as in musical notes. Then, the figure of the dance is frequently a circle or some more graceful curve or series of curves,—a fact which satisfies the dancer as well as the eye of the spectator. But all such effects are intensified by the use of music, which not only brings a perfectly distinct set of pleasurable sensations to dancer and spectator, but by the control of dancing produces an inexpressibly sweet harmony of sound and motion. This harmony is further enriched if there be two dancing together on one plan, or a large company of dancers executing certain evolutions, the success of which depends on the separate harmonies of all the couples. The fundamental condition is that throughout the dance all the dancers keep within their bases of gravity. This is not only required for the dancers’ own enjoyment, but, as in the famous Mercury on tiptoe, it is essential to the beautiful effect for the spectator. The idea of much being safely supported by little is what proves attractive in the posturing ballet. But this is merely one condition of graceful dancing, and if it be made the chief object the dancer sinks into the acrobat.

Dancing is, in fact, the universal human expression, by movements of the limbs and body, of a sense of rhythm which is implanted among the primitive instincts of the animal world. The rhythmic principle of motion extends throughout the universe, governing the lapse of waves, the flow of tides, the reverberations of light and sound, and the movements of celestial bodies; and in the human organism it manifests itself in the automatic pulses and flexions of the blood and tissues. Dancing is merely the voluntary application of the rhythmic principle, when excitement has induced an abnormally rapid oxidization of brain tissue, to the physical exertion by which the overcharged brain is relieved. This is primitive dancing; and it embraces all movements of the limbs and body expressive of joy or grief, all pantomimic representations of incidents in the lives of the dancers, all performances in which movements of the body are employed to excite the passions of hatred or love, pity or revenge, or to arouse the warlike instincts, and all ceremonies in which such movements express homage or worship, or are used as religious exercises. Although music is not an essential part of dancing, it almost invariably accompanies it, even in the crudest form of a rhythm beaten out on a drum.

Primitive and Ancient Dancing.—In Tigrè the Abyssinians dance thechasséestep in a circle, and keep time by shrugging their shoulders and working their elbows backwards and forwards. At intervals the dancers squat on the ground, still moving the arms and shoulders in the same way. The Bushmen dance in their low-roofed rooms supporting themselves by sticks; one foot remains motionless, the other dances in a wild irregular manner, while the hands are occupied with the sticks. The Gonds, a hill-tribe of Hindustan, dance generally in pairs, with a shuffling step, the eyes on the ground, the arms close to the body, and the elbows at an angle with the closed hand. Advancing to a point, the dancer suddenly erects his head, and wheels round to the starting point. The women of the Pultooah tribe dance in a circle, moving backwards and forwards in a bent posture. The Santal women, again, are slow and graceful in dance; joining hands, they form themselves into the arc of a circle, towards the centre of which they advance and then retire, moving at the same time slightly towards the right, so as to complete the circle in an hour. The Kukis of Assam have only the rudest possible step, an awkward hop with the knees very much bent. The national dance of the Kamchadale is one of the most violent known, every muscle apparently quivering at every movement. But there, and in some other cases where men and women dance together, there is a trace of deliberate obscenity; the dance is, in fact, a rude representation of sexual passion. It has been said that some of the Tasmaniancorroborieshave a phallic design. The Yucatan dance ofnaualmay also be mentioned. The Andamans hop on one foot and swing the arms violently backwards and forwards. The Veddahs jump with both feet together, patting their bodies, or clapping their hands, and make a point of bringing their long hair down in front of the face. In New Caledonia the dance consists of a series of twistings of the body, the feet being lifted alternately, but without change of place. The Fijians jump half round from side to side with their arms akimbo. The only modulation of the Samoan dance is one of time—acrescendomovement, which is well-known in the modern ball-room. The Javans are perhaps unique in their distinct and graceful gestures of the hands and fingers. At a Mexican feast called Huitzilopochtli, the noblemen and women danced tied together at the hands, and embracing one another, the arms being thrown over the neck. This resembles the dance variously known as the Greek Bracelet or Brawl,Ὅρμος, or Bearsfeet; but all of them1probably are to a certain extent symbolical of the relations between the sexes. Actual contact of the partners, however, is quite intelligible as matter of pure dancing; for, apart altogether from the pleasure of the embrace, the harmony of the double rotation adds very much to the enjoyment. In a very old Peruvian dance of ceremony before the Inca, several hundreds of men formed a chain, each taking hold of the hand of the man beyond his immediate neighbour, and the whole body moving forwards and backwards three steps at a time as they approached the throne. In this, as in the national dance of the Coles of Lower Bengal, there was perhaps a suggestion of “l’union fait la force.” In Yucatan stilts were occasionally used for dancing.

It seldom happens that dancing takes place without accompaniment, either by the dancers or by others. This is not merely because the feelings which find relief in dancing express themselves at the same time in other forms; in some cases, indeed, the vocal and instrumental elements largely predominate, and form the ground-work of the whole emotional demonstration. Whether they do so or not will of course depend on the intellectual advancement of the nation or tribe and upon the particular development of their aesthetical sensibility. A striking instance occurs among the Zulus, whose grand dances are merely the accompaniment to the colloquial war and hunting songs, in which the women put questions which are answered by the men. So also in Tahiti there is a set of national ballads and songs, referring to many events in the past and present lives of thepeople. The fisherman, the woodsman, the canoe-builder, has each his trade song, which on public occasions at least is illustrated by dancing. But the accompaniment is often consciously intended, by an appeal to the ear, to regulate and sustain the excitement of the muscles. And a close relation will be found always to exist between the excellence of a nation’s dancing and the excellence or complexity of its music and poetry. In some cases the performer himself sings or marks time by the clanking of ornaments on his person. In others the accompaniment consists sometimes of a rude chant improvised by those standing round, or of music from instruments, or of mere clapping of the hands, or of striking one stick against another or on the ground, or of “marking time,” in the technical sense. The Tasmanians beat on a rolled-up kangaroo-skin. The Kamchadales make a noise like a continuous hiccough all through the dance. The Andamans use a large hollow dancing-board, on which one man is set apart to stamp. Sometimes it is the privilege of the tribal chief to sing the accompaniment while his people dance. The savages of New Caledonia whistle and strike upon the hip.

The rude imitative dances of early civilization are of extreme interest. In the same way the dances of the Ostyak tribes (Northern Asiatic) imitate the habitual sports of the chase and the gambols of the wolf and the bear and other wild beasts, the dancing consisting mainly of sudden leaps and violent turns which exhaust the muscular powers of the whole body. The Kamchadales, too, in dancing, imitate bears, dogs and birds. TheKrudances of the Coast Negroes represent hunting scenes; and on the Congo, before the hunters start, they go through a dance imitating the habits of the gorilla and its movements when attacked. The Damara dance is a mimic representation of the movements of oxen and sheep, four men stooping with their heads in contact and uttering harsh cries. The canter of the baboon is the humorous part of the ceremony. The Bushmen dance in long irregular jumps, which they compare to the leaping of a herd of calves, and the Hottentots not only go on all-fours to counterfeit the baboon, but they have a dance in which the buzzing of a swarm of bees is represented. The Kennowits in Borneo introduce the mias and the deer for the same purpose. The Australians and Tasmanians in their dances calledcorroboriesimitate the frog and the kangaroo (both leaping animals). The hunt of the emu is also performed, a number of men passing slowly round the fire and throwing their arrows about so as to imitate the movements of the animal’s head while feeding. The Gonds are fond of dancing the bison hunt, one man with skin and horns taking the part of the animal. Closely allied to these are the mimic fights, almost universal among tribes to which war is one of the great interests of life. The Bravery dance of the Dahomans and the Hoolee of the Bhil tribe in the Vindhya Hills are illustrations. The latter seems to have been reduced to an amusement conducted by professionals who go from village to village,—the battle being engaged in by women with long poles on the one side, and men with short cudgels on the other. There is here an element of comedy, which also appears in the Fiji club-dance. This, although no doubt originally suggested by war, is enlivened by the presence of a clown covered with leaves and wearing a mask. The monotonous song accompanying the club-dance is by way of commentary or explanation. So, also, in Guatemala there is a publicbaileor dance, in which all the performers, wearing the skins and heads of beasts, go through a mock battle, which always ends in the victory of those wearing the deer’s head. At the end the victors trace in the sand with a pole the figure of some animal; and this exhibition is supposed to have some historical reference. But nearly all savage tribes have a regular war-dance, in which they appear in fighting costume, handle their weapons, and go through the movements of challenge, conflict, pursuit or defeat. The women generally supply the stimulus of music. There is one very picturesque dance of the Natal Kaffirs, which probably refers to the departure of the warriors for the battle. The women appeal plaintively to the men, who slowly withdraw, stamping on the ground and darting their short spears orassegaistowards the sky. In Madagascar, when the men are absent on war, the women dance for a great part of the day, believing that this inspires their husbands with courage. In this, however, there may be some religious significance. These war-dances are totally distinct from the institution of military drill, which belongs to a later period, when social life has become less impulsive and more reflective.2There can be little doubt that some of the characteristic movements of these primitive hunting and war-dances survive in the smooth and ceremonious dances of the present day. But the early mimetic dance was not confined to these two subjects; it embraced the other great events of savage life—the drama of courtship and marriage, the funeral dance, the consecration of labour, the celebration of harvest or vintage;3sometimes, too, purely fictitious scenes of dramatic interest, while other dances degenerated into games. For instance, in Yucatan one man danced in a cowering attitude round a circle, while another followed, hurling at himbohordosor canes, which were adroitly caught on a small stick. Again, in Tasmania, the dances of the women describe their “clamber for the opossum, diving for shell-fish, digging for roots, nursing children and quarrelling with husbands.” Another dance, in which a woman by gesture taunts a chieftain with cowardice, gives him an opportunity of coming forward and recounting his courageous deeds in dance. The funeral dance of the Todas (another Indian hill-tribe) consists in walking backwards and forwards, without variation, to a howling tune of “ha! hoo!” The meaning of this is obscure, but it can scarcely be solely an outburst of grief. In Dahomey the blacksmiths, carpenters, hunters, braves and bards, with their various tools and instruments, join in a dramatic dance. We may add here a form of dance which is almost precisely equivalent to the spoken incantation. It is used by the professional devil-dancer of the wild Veddahs for the cure of diseases. An offering of eatables is put on a tripod of sticks, and the dancer, decorated with green leaves, goes into a paroxysm of dancing, in the midst of which he receives the required information. This, however, rather belongs to the subject of religious dances.

It is impossible here to enumerate either the names or the forms of the sacred dances which formed so prominent a part of the worship of antiquity. A mystic philosophy found in them a resemblance to the courses of the stars. This Pythagorean idea was expanded by Sir John Davies, in his epic poemOrchestra, published in 1596. They were probably adapted to many purposes,—to thanksgiving, praise, supplication and humiliation. It is only one striking illustration of this widespread practice, that there was at Rome a very ancient order of priests especially named Salii, who struck their shields and sangassamentaas they danced. The practice reappeared in the early church, special provision being made for dancing in the choir. Scaliger, who astonished Charles V. by his dancing powers, says the bishops were calledPraesules, because they led the dance on feast days. According to some of the fathers, the angels are always dancing, and the glorious company of the apostles is really achorusof dancers. Dancing, however, fell into discredit with the feast of theAgapae. St Augustine says, “Melius est fodere quam saltare”; and the practice was generally prohibited for some time. No church or sect has raged so fiercely against the cardinal sin of dancing as the Albigenses of Languedoc and the Waldenses, who agreed in calling it the devil’s procession. After the middle of the 18th century there were still traces of religious dancing in the cathedrals of Spain, Portugal and Roussillon—especially in the Mozarabic Mass of Toledo. An account of the numerous secular dances, public and private, of Greece and Rome will be found in the classical histories, and in J. Weaver’sEssay towards a History of Dancing, (London, 1712), which, however, must be revised by more recent authorities. The Pyrrhic (derived from the Memphitic) in all its local varieties,the Bacchanalia and the Hymenaea were among the more important. The name of Lycurgus is also associated with the Trichoria. Among the stage dances of the Athenians, which formed interludes to the regular drama, one of the oldest was the Delian dance of the Labyrinth, ascribed to Theseus, and calledΓέρανος, from its resemblance to the flight of cranes, and one of the most powerful was the dance of the Eumenides. A further development of the art took place at Rome, under Augustus, when Pylades and Bathyllus brought serious and comic pantomime to great perfection. The subjects chosen were such as the labours of Hercules, and the surprise of Venus and Mars by Vulcan. The state of public feeling on the subject is well shown in Lucian’s amusing dialogueDe Saltatione. Before this Rome had only very inferior buffoons, who attended dinner parties, and whose art traditions belonged not to Greece, but to Etruria.4Apparently, however, the Romans, though fond of ceremony and of the theatre, were by temperament not great dancers in private. Cicero says: “Nemo fere saltat sobrius, nisi forte insanit.” But the Italic dance of the imperial theatre, supported by music and splendid dresses, supplanted for a time the older dramas. It was the policy of Augustus to cultivate other than political interests for the people; and he passed laws for the protection and privilege of the pantomimists. They were freed from thejus virgarum, and they used their freedom against the peace of the city. Tiberius and Domitian oppressed and banished them; Trajan and Aurelius gave them such titles as decurions and priests of Apollo; but the pantomime stage soon yielded to the general corruption of the empire.

Modern Dancing.—In modern civilized countries dancing has developed as an art and pastime, as an entertainment. Its direct application to arouse emotion or religious feeling tends to be obscured and finally dropped out.

Italy, in the 15th century, saw the renaissance of dancing, and France may be said to have been the nursery of the modern art, though comparatively few modern dances are really French in origin. The national dances of other countries were brought to France, studied systematically, and made perfect there. An English or a Bohemian dance, practised only amongst peasants, would be taken to France, polished and perfected, and would at last find its way back to its own country, no more recognizable than a piece of elegant cloth when it returns from the printer to the place from which as “grey” material it was sent. The fact that the terminology of dancing is almost entirely French is a sufficient indication of the origin of the rules that govern it. The earliest dances that bear any relation to the modern art are probably thedanses bassesanddanses hautesof the 16th century. Thedanse bassewas the dance of the court of Charles IX. and of good society, the steps being very grave and dignified, not to say solemn, and the accompaniment a psalm tune. Thedanses hautesorbaladineshad a skipping step, and were practised only by clowns and country people. More lively dances, such as theGaillardeandVolta, were introduced into France from Italy by Catherine de’ Medici, but even in these the interest was chiefly spectacular. Other dances of the same period were theBranle(afterwards corrupted toBraule, and known in England as the Brawle)—a kind of generic dance which was capable of an almost infinite amount of variety. Thus there were imitative dances—Branles mimés, such as theBranles des Ermites,Branles des flambeauxand theBranles des lavandières. TheBranlein its original form had steps like theAllemande. Perhaps the most famous and stately dance of this period was thePavane(of Spanish origin), which is very fully described in Tabouret’sOrchésographie, the earliest work in which a dance is found minutely described. ThePavane, which was really more a procession than a dance, must have been a very gorgeous and noble sight, and it was perfectly suited to the dress of the period, the stiff brocades of the ladies and the swords and heavily-plumed hats of the gentlemen being displayed in its simple and dignified measures to great advantage. The dancers in the time of Henry III. of France usually sang, while performing thePavane, achanson, of which this is one of the verses:

“Approche donc, ma belle,Approche-toi, mon bien;Ne me sois plus rebelle,Puisque mon cœur est tien;Pour mon âme apaiser,Donne-moi un baiser.”

“Approche donc, ma belle,

Approche-toi, mon bien;

Ne me sois plus rebelle,

Puisque mon cœur est tien;

Pour mon âme apaiser,

Donne-moi un baiser.”

In thePavaneandBranle, and in nearly all the dances of the 17th and 18th centuries, the practice of kissing formed a not unimportant part, and seems to have added greatly to the popularity of the pastime. Another extremely popular dance was theSaraband, which, however, died out after the 17th century. It was originally a Spanish dance, but enjoyed an enormous success for a time in France. Every dance at that time had its own tune or tunes, which were called by its own name, and of theSarabandthe chevalier de Grammont wrote that “it either charmed or annoyed everyone, for all the guitarists of the court began to learn it, and God only knows the universal twanging that followed.” Vauquelin des Yveteaux, in his eightieth year, desired to die to the tune of theSaraband, “so that his soul might pass away sweetly.” After thePavanecame theCourante, a court dance performed on tiptoe with slightly jumping steps and many bows and curtseys. TheCouranteis one of the most important of the strictly modern dances. The minuet and the waltz were both in some degree derived from it, and it had much in common with the famousSeguidillaof Spain. It was a favourite dance of Louis XIV., who was an adept in the art, and it was regarded in his time as of such importance that a nobleman’s education could hardly have been said to be begun until he had mastered theCourante.

The dance which the French brought to the greatest perfection—which many, indeed, regard as the fine flower of the art—was theMinuet. Its origin, as a rustic dance, is not less antique than that of the other dances from which the modern art has been evolved. It was originally abranleof Poitou, derived from theCourante. It came to Paris in 1650, and was first set to music by Lully. It was at first a gay and lively dance, but on being brought to court it soon lost its sportive character and became grave and dignified. It is mentioned by Beauchamps, the father of dancing-masters, who flourished in Louis XIV.’s reign, and also by Blondy, his pupil; but it was Pécour who really gave the minuet its popularity, and although it was improved and made perfect by Dauberval, Gardel, Marcel and Vestris, it was in Louis XV.’s reign that it saw its golden age. It was then a dance for two in moderate triple time, and was generally followed by the gavotte. Afterwards the minuet was considerably developed, and with the gavotte became chiefly a stage dance and a means of display; but it should be remembered that the minuets which are now danced on the stage are generally highly elaborated with a view to their spectacular effect, and have imported into them steps and figures which do not belong to the minuet at all, but are borrowed from all kinds of other dances. The original court minuet was a grave and simple dance, although it did not retain its simplicity for long. But when it became elaborated it was glorified and moulded into a perfect expression of an age in which deportment was most sedulously cultivated and most brilliantly polished. The “languishing eye and smiling mouth” had their due effect in the minuet; it was a school for chivalry, courtesy and ceremony; the hundred slow graceful movements and curtseys, the pauses which had to be filled by neatly-turned compliments, the beauty and bravery of attire—all were eloquent of graces and outward refinements which we cannot boast now. The fact that the measure of the minuet has become incorporated in the structure of the symphony shows how important was its place in the polite world. TheGavotte, which was often danced as a pendant to the minuet, was also originally a peasant’s dance, adanse des Gavots, and consisted chiefly of kissing and capering. It also became stiff and artificial, and in the later and more prudish half of the 18th century the ladies received bouquets instead of kisses in dancing the gavotte. It rapidly became a stage dance, and it has never been restored to the ballroom. Grétry attemptedto revive it, but his arrangement never became popular. Other dances which were naturalized in France were theÉcossaise, popular in 1760; theCotillon, fashionable under Charles X., derived from the peasantbranlesand danced by ladies in short skirts; theGalop, imported from Germany; theLancers, invented by Laborde in 1836; thePolka, brought by a dancing-master from Prague in 1840; theSchottische, also Bohemian, first introduced in 1844; theBourrée, or French clog-dance; theQuadrille, known in the 18th century as theContre-danse; and theWaltz, which was danced as avolteby Henry III. of France, but only became popular in the beginning of the 19th century. We shall return to the history of some of these later dances in discussing the dances at present in use.

If France has been the nursery and school of the art of dancing, Spain is its true home. There it is part of the national life, the inevitable expression of the gay, contented, irresponsible, sunburnt nature of the people. The form of Spanish dances has hardly changed; some of them are of great antiquity, and may be traced back with hardly a break to the performances in ancient Rome of the famous dancing-girls of Cadiz. The connexion is lost during the period of the Arab invasion, but the art was not neglected, and Jovellanos suggests that it took refuge in the Asturias. At any rate, dances of the 10th and 12th centuries have been preserved uncorrupted. The earliest dances known were theTurdion, theGibidana, thePié-de-gibao, and (later) theMadama Orleans, theAlemanaand thePavana. Under Philip IV. theatrical dancing was in high popularity, and ballets were organized with extraordinary magnificence of decoration and costume. They supplanted the national dances, and theZarabandaandChaconawere practically extinct in the 18th century. It is at this period that the famous modern Spanish dances, theBolero,Seguidillaand theFandango, first appear. Of these theFandangois the most important. It is danced by two people in 6-8 time, beginning slowly and tenderly, the rhythm marked by the click of castanets, the snapping of the fingers and the stamping of feet, and the speed gradually increasing until a whirl of exaltation is reached. A feature of theFandangoand also of theSeguidillais a sudden pause of the music towards the end of each measure, upon which the dancers stand rigid in the attitudes in which the stopping of the music found them, and only move again when the music is resumed. M. Vuillier, in hisHistory of Dancing, gives the following description of theFandango:—“Like an electric shock, the notes of the Fandango animate all hearts. Men and women, young and old, acknowledge the power of this air over the ears and soul of every Spaniard. The young men spring to their places, rattling castanets or imitating their sound by snapping their fingers. The girls are remarkable for the willowy languor and lightness of their movements, the voluptuousness of their attitudes—beating the exactest time with tapping heels. Partners tease and entreat and pursue each other by turns. Suddenly the music stops, and each dancer shows his skill by remaining absolutely motionless, bounding again into the full life of the Fandango as the orchestra strikes up. The sound of the guitar, the violin, the rapid tic-tac of heels (taconeos), the crack of fingers and castanets, the supple swaying of the dancers, fill the spectator with ecstasy. The measure whirls along in a rapid triple time. Spangles glitter; the sharp clank of ivory and ebony castanets beats out the cadence of strange, throbbing, deepening notes—assonances unknown to music, but curiously characteristic, effective and intoxicating. Amidst the rustle of silks, smiles gleam over white teeth, dark eyes sparkle and droop and flash up again in flame. All is flutter and glitter, grace and animation—quivering, sonorous, passionate, seductive.”

TheBolerois a comparatively modern dance, having been invented by Sebastian Cerezo, a celebrated dancer of the time of King Charles III. It is remarkable for the free use made in it of the arms, and is said to be derived from the ancientZarabanda, a violent and licentious dance, which has entirely disappeared, and with which the later Saraband has practically nothing in common. The step of theBolerois low and gliding but well marked. It is danced by one or more couples. TheSeguidillais hardly less ancient than theFandango, which it resembles. Every province in Spain has its ownSeguidilla, and the dance is accompanied bycoplas, or verses, which are sung either to traditional melodies or to the tunes of local composers; indeed, the national music of Spain consists largely of these coplas. Baron Davillier, among several specimens ofSeguidillas, gives this one

“Mi corazon volandoSe fué á tu pecho;Le cortaste las alas,Y quédo dentro.Por atrevidoSe quedará por siempreEn el metido.”5

“Mi corazon volando

Se fué á tu pecho;

Le cortaste las alas,

Y quédo dentro.

Por atrevido

Se quedará por siempre

En el metido.”5

M. Vuillier quotes acoplawhich he heard at Polenza, in the Balearic Islands. This verse is formed on the rhythm of theMalagueña:

“Una estrella se ha pardidaEn el ciel y no parece;En tu cara se ha metido;Y en tu frente resplandece.”6

“Una estrella se ha pardida

En el ciel y no parece;

En tu cara se ha metido;

Y en tu frente resplandece.”6

TheJotais the national dance of Aragon, a lively and splendid, but withal dignified and reticent, dance derived from the 16th-centuryPassacaille. It is still used as a religious dance. TheCachucais a light and graceful dance in triple time. It is performed by a single dancer of either sex. The head and shoulders play an important part in the movements of this dance. Other provincial dances now in existence are theJaleo de Jerez, a whirling measure performed by gipsies, thePalotéa, thePolo, theGallegada, theMuyneria, theHabas Verdes, theZapateado, theZorongo, theVito, theTiranoand theTripola Trapola. Most of these dances are named either after the places where they are danced or after the composers who have invented tunes for them. Many of them are but slight variations from theFandangoandSeguidilla.

The history of court dancing in Great Britain is practically the same as that of France, and need not occupy much of our attention here. But there are strictly national dances still in existence which are quite peculiar to the country, and may be traced back to the dances and games of the Saxon gleemen. The Egg dance and the Carole were both Saxon dances, the Carole being a Yule-tide festivity, of which the present-day Christmas carol is a remnant. The oldest dances which remain unchanged in England are the Morris dances, which were introduced in the time of Edward III. The name Morris or Moorish refers to the origin of these dances, which are said to have been brought back by John of Gaunt from his travels in Spain. The Morris dances are associated with May-day, and are danced round a maypole to a lively and capering step, some of the performers having bells fastened to their knees in the Moorish manner. They are dressed as characters of old English tradition, such as Robin Hood, Maid Marian, Friar Tuck, Little John and Tom the Piper. All the true country dances of Great Britain are of an active and lively measure; they may all, indeed, be said to be founded on the jig; and the hornpipe, which is a kind of jig, is the national dance of England. Captain Cook, on his voyages, made his sailors dance hornpipes in calm weather to keep them in good health. A characteristic of English dances was that they partook to a great extent of the nature of games; there was little variety in the steps, which were nearly all those of the jig or hornpipe, but these were incorporated into various games or plays, of which the Morris dances were the most elaborate. Richard Baxter wrote that “sometimes the Morris dancers would come into the church in all their linen and scarves and antic dresses, with Morris bells jingling at their legs; and as soon as Common Prayer was read, did haste and presently to their play again.” May-day has always been celebrated in England with rustic dances and festivities. Before the Reformation there were noreally national dances in use at court; but in the reign of Elizabeth the homely, domestic style of dancing reached the height of its popularity. Remnants of many of these dances remain to-day in the games played by children and country people; “Hunt the Slipper,” “Kiss in the Ring,” “Here we go round the Mulberry Bush,” are examples. All the Tudor dances were kissing dances, and must have been the occasion of a great deal of merriment. Mrs Groves gives the following description of the Cushion dance:—“The dance is begun by a single person, man or woman, who, taking a cushion in hand, dances about the room, and at the end of a short time stops and sings: ‘This dance it will no farther go,’ to which the musician answers: ’I pray you, good sir, why say so?’ ‘Because Joan Sanderson will not come to.’ ‘She must come to whether she will or no,’ returns the musician, and then the dancer lays the cushion before a woman; she kneels and he kisses her, singing ‘Welcome, Joan Sanderson.’ Then she rises, takes up the cushion, and both dance and sing ‘Prinkum prankum is a fine dance, and shall we go dance it over again?’ Afterwards the woman takes the cushion and does as the man did.” Other popular dances—generally adapted to the tunes of popular songs, the nature of some of which may be guessed from their titles—were the Trenchmore, Omnium-gatherum, Tolly-polly, Hoite cum toite, Dull Sir John, Faine I would, Sillinger, All in a Garden Green, An Old Man’s a Bed Full of Bones, If All the World were Paper, John, Come Kiss Me Now, Cuckholds All Awry, Green Sleeves and Pudding Pies, Lumps of Pudding, Under and Over, Up Tails All, The Slaughter House, Rub her Down with Straw, Have at thy Coat Old Woman, The Happy Marriage, Dissembling Love, Sweet Kate, Once I Loved a Maiden Fair. Dancing practically disappeared during the Puritanrégime, but with the Restoration it again became popular. It underwent no considerable developments, however, until the reign of Queen Anne, when the glories of Bath were revived in the beginning of the 18th century, and Beau Nash drew up his famous codes of rules for the regulation of dress and manners, and founded the balls in which the polite French dances completely eclipsed the simpler English ones. An account of a dancing lesson witnessed by a fond parent at this time is worth quoting, as it shows how far the writer (but not his daughter) had departed from the jolly, romping traditions of the old English dances:—“As the best institutions are liable to corruption, so, sir, I must acquaint you that very great abuses are crept into this entertainment. I was amazed to see my girl handed by and handing young fellows with so much familiarity, and I could not have thought it had been my child. They very often made use of a most impudent and lascivious step calledsettingto partners, which I know not how to describe to you but by telling you that it is the very reverse ofbacktoback. At last an impudent young dog bid the fiddlers play a dance calledMoll Patley, and, after having made two or three capers, ran to his partner, locked his arms in hers, and whisked her round cleverly above ground in such a manner that I, who sat upon one of the lowest benches, saw farther above her shoe than I can think fit to acquaint you with. I could no longer endure these enormities, wherefore, just as my girl was going to be made a whirligig, I ran in, seized my child and carried her home.” What we may call polite dancing, when it became fashionable, soon invaded London, its first home being Madame Cornely’s famous Carlisle House in Soho Square. Ranelagh and Vauxhall and Almack’s were all extensively patronized, and the rage for magnificent entertainment and dancing culminated in the erection of the palatial Pantheon in Oxford Street—a place so universally patronized that even Dr Johnson was to be found there. White’s and Boodle’s were also famous assembly rooms, but the most exclusive of all these establishments was Almack’s, the original of Brooks’s Club.

The only true national dances of Scotland are reels, strathspeys and flings, while in Ireland there is but one dance—the jig, which is there, however, found in many varieties and expressive of many shades of emotion, from the maddest gaiety to the wildest lament. Curiously enough, although the Welsh dance often, they have no strictly national dances.

Dancing in present-day society is a comparatively simple affair, as five-sixths of almost all ball programmes consists of waltzes. The origin of the waltz is a much-debated subject, the French, Italians and Bavarians each claiming for their respective countries the honour of having given birth to it. As a matter of fact the waltz, as it is now danced, comes from Germany; but it is equally true that its real origin is French, since it is a development of theVolte, which in its turn came from theLavoltaof Provence, one of the most ancient of French dances. TheLavoltawas fashionable in the 16th century and was the delight of the Valois court. TheVoltedanced by Henry III. was really aValse à deux pas; and Castil-Blaze says that “the waltz which we took again from the Germans in 1795 had been a French dance for four hundred years.” The change, it is true, came upon it during its visit to Germany, hence the theory of its German origin. The first German waltz tune is dated 1770—“Ach! du lieber Augustin.” It was first danced at the Paris opera in 1793, in Gardel’s balletLa Dansomanie. It was introduced to English ballrooms in 1812, when it roused a storm of ridicule and opposition, but it became popular when danced at Almack’s by the emperor Alexander in 1816. The waltzà trois tempshas a sliding step in which the movements of the knees play an important part. Thetempois moderate, so as to allow three distinct movements on the three beats of each bar; and the waltz is written in 3-4 time and in eight-bar sentences. Walking up and down the room and occasionally breaking into the step of the dance is not true waltzing, and the habit of pushing one’s partner backwards along the room is an entirely English one. But the dancer must be able to waltz equally well in all directions, pivoting and crossing the feet when necessary in the reverse turn. It need hardly be said that the feet should never leave the floor in the true waltz. Gungl, Waldteufel and the Strauss family may be said to have moulded the modern waltz to its present form by their rhythmical and agreeable compositions. There are variations which include hopping and lurching steps; these are degradations, and foreign to the spirit of the true waltz.

TheQuadrilleis of some antiquity, and a dance of this kind was first brought to England from Normandy by William the Conqueror, and was common all over Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries. The term quadrille means a kind of card game, and the dance is supposed to be in some way connected with the game. A species of quadrille appeared in a French ballet in 1745, and since that time the dance has gone by that name. Like many other dances, it came from Paris to Almack’s in 1815, and in its modern form was danced in England for the first time by Lady Jersey, Lady Harriet Butler, Lady Susan Ryder and Miss Montgomery, with Count Aldegarde, Mr Montgomery, Mr Harley and Mr Montague. It immediately became popular. It then consisted of very elaborate steps, which in England have been simplified until the degenerate practice has become common of walking through the dance. The quadrille, properly danced, has many of the graces of the minuet. It is often stated that the square dance is of modern French origin. This is incorrect, and probably arises from a mistaken identification of the terms quadrille and square dance. “Dull Sir John” and “Faine I would” were square dances popular in England three hundred years ago.

An account of the country-dance, with the names of some of the old dance-tunes, has been given above. The word is not, as has been supposed, an adaptation of the Frenchcontre-danse, neither is the dance itself French in origin. According to theNew English Dictionary,contre-danseis a corruption of “country-dance,” possibly due to a peculiar feature of many of such dances, like Sir Roger de Coverley, where the partners are drawn up in lines opposite to each other. The earliest appearance of the French word is in its application to English dances, which are contrasted with the French; thus in theMemoirs of Grammont, Hamilton says: “On quitta les danses françaises pour se mettre aux contre-danses.” The English “country-dances” were introduced into France in the early part of the 18th century and became popular; later French modifications were brought backto England under the French form of the name, and this, no doubt, caused the long-accepted but confused derivation.

TheLancerswere invented by Laborde in Paris in 1836. They were brought over to England in 1850, and were made fashionable by Madame Sacré at her classes in Hanover Square Rooms. The first four ladies to dance the lancers in England were Lady Georgina Lygon, Lady Jane Fielding, Mdlle. Olga de Lechner and Miss Berkeley.

ThePolka, the chief of the Bohemian national dances, was adopted by Society in 1835 at Prague. Josef Neruda had seen a peasant girl dancing and singing the polka, and had noted down the tune and the steps. From Prague it readily spread to Vienna, and was introduced to Paris by Cellarius, a dancing-master, who gave it at the Odéon in 1840. It took the public by storm, and spread like an infection through England and America. Everything was named after the polka, from public-houses to articles of dress. Mr Punch exerted his wit on the subject weekly, and evenThe Timescomplained that its French correspondence was interrupted, since the polka had taken the place of politics in Paris. The true polka has three slightly jumping steps, danced on the first three beats of a four-quaver bar, the last beat of which is employed as a rest while the toe of the unemployed foot is drawn up against the heel of the other.

TheGalopis strictly speaking a Hungarian dance, which became popular in Paris in 1830. But some kind of a dance corresponding to the galop was always indulged in afterVoltesandContre-danses, as a relief from their grave and constrained measures.

TheWashington Postand several varieties ofBarn-danceare of American origin, and became fashionable towards the end of the 19th century.

ThePolka-Mazurkais extremely popular in Vienna and Budapest, and is a favourite theme with Hungarian composers. The six movements of this dance occupy two bars of 3-4 time, and consist of a mazurka step joined to the polka. It is of Polish origin.

ThePolonaiseandMazurkaare both Polish dances, and are still fashionable in Russia and Poland. Every State ball in Russia is opened with the ceremonious Polonaise.

TheSchottische, a kind of modified polka, was “created” by Markowski, who was the proprietor of a famous dancing academy in 1850. TheHighland Schottischeis a fling. The Fling and Reel are Celtic dances, and form the national dances of Scotland and Denmark. They are complicated measures of a studied and classical order, in which free use is made of the arms and of cries and stampings. TheStrathspeyis a slow and grandiose modification of the Reel.

Sir Roger de Coverleyis the only one of the old English social dances which has survived to the present day, and it is frequently danced at the conclusion of the less formal sort of balls. It is a merry and lively game in which all the company take part, men and women facing each other in two long rows. The dancers are constantly changing places in such a way that if the dance is carried to its conclusion everyone will have danced with everyone else. The music was first printed in 1685, and is sometimes written in 2-4 time, sometimes in 6-8 time, and sometimes in 3-9 time.

TheCotillonis a modern development of the French dance of the same name referred to above. It is an extremely elaborate dance, in which a great many toys and accessories are employed; hundreds of figures may be contrived for it, in which presents, toys, lighted tapers, biscuits, air-balloons and hurdles are used.

Ballet, &c.—The modern ballet (q.v.) seems to have been first produced on a considerable scale in 1489 at Tortona, before Duke Galeazzo of Milan. It soon became a common amusement on great occasions at the European courts. The ordinary length was five acts, each containing severalentrées, and eachentréecontaining several quadrilles. The accessories of painting, sculpture and movable scenery were employed, and the representation often took place at night. The allegorical, moral and ludicrous ballets were introduced to France by Baïf in the time of Catherine de’ Medici. The complex nature of these exhibitions may be gathered from the title of one played at Turin in 1634—La verità nemica della apparenza, sollevata dal tempo.Of the ludicrous, one of the best known was the Venetian ballet ofI a veritá raminga. Now and then, however, a high political aim may be discovered, as in the “Prosperity of the Arms of France,” danced before Richelieu in 1641, or “Religion uniting Great Britain to the rest of the World,” danced at London on the marriage of Princess Elizabeth to the elector Frederick. Outside the theatre, the Portuguese revived an ambulatory ballet which was played on the canonization of Carlo Borromeo, and to which they gave the name of the Tyrrhenic Pomp. During this time also the ceremonial ball (with all its elaborate detail ofcourante, minuet and saraband) was cultivated. The fathers of the church assembled at Trent gave a ball in which they took a part. Masked balls, too, resembling in some respects the Roman Saturnalia, became common towards the end of the 17th century. In France a ball was sometimes diversified by a masquerade, carried on by a limited number of persons in character-costume. Two of the most famous were named “au Sauvage” and “des Sorciers.” In 1715 the regent of France started a system of public balls in the opera-house, which did not succeed. Dancing, also, formed a leading element in the Opéra Français introduced by Quinault. His subjects were chiefly marvellous, drawn from the classical mythologies; and the choral dancing was not merelydivertissement, but was intended to assist and enrich the dramatic action of the whole piece.

Musical Gymnastics.—Dancing is an important branch of physical education. Long ago Locke pointed out (Education, §§ 67, 196) that the effects of dancing are not confined to the body; it gives to children, he says, not mere outward gracefulness of motion, but manly thoughts and a becoming confidence. Only lately, however, has the advantage been recognized of making gymnastics attractive by connecting it with what Homer calls “the sweetest and most perfect of human enjoyments.” The practical principle against heavy weights and intense monotonous exertion of particular muscles was thus stated by Samuel Smiles (Physical Education, p. 148):—“The greatest benefit is derived from that exercise which calls into action the greatest number of muscles, and in which the action of these is intermitted at the shortest intervals.” It required only one further step to see how, if light and changing movements were desirable, music would prove a powerful stimulus to gymnastics. It touches the play-impulse, and substitutes a spontaneous flow of energy for the mechanical effort of the will. The force of imitation or contagion, one of the most valuable forces in education, is also much increased by the state of exhilaration into which dancing puts the system. This idea was embodied by Froebel in hisKindergartenplan, and was developed by Jahn and Schreber in Germany, by Dio Lewis in the United States, and by Ling (the author of theSwedish Cure Movement) in Sweden.

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