la
 
 A HISTORY OF DANCING.
 
 
 
 STHAKERS'. 
 
 8 & 9 Hayne Street, West SmithBeld, 
 London, B.C.
 
 A 
 
 History of Dancing. 
 
 n 
 
 BY 
 
 REGINALD ST-JOHNSTON. 
 
 M.R.C.S., L.R.C.P., 
 
 Author of " The Dream Face," etc. 
 W 
 
 1906. 
 
 LONDON. 
 SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT, & Co.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 jr 
 
 -_-.. 
 
 CHAP. PAGE. 
 
 I. The Muse of Dancing in Ancient Mytho- 
 logy, and her alliance with the kindred 
 arts ' ... 9 
 
 II. Dancing as a Religious Ceremony ... 17 
 
 III. Ancient Forms of Dancing in Greece, 
 
 Italy, and the East 26 
 
 IV. Some Early Forms of English Dancing ... 40 
 
 V. Allegorical Dances among Primitive 
 
 Nations 62 
 
 VI. Quaint Dances in Civilized Countries ... 77 
 
 VII. The Ballet, its origin and development ... * 93 
 
 VIII. The Stage Dancing of to-day 116 
 
 IX. Dancing as a Social Pastime 132 
 
 X A Short History of the World's Dancers 159 
 
 Literature on the subject of Dancing ... 194
 
 Miss ADELINE GKNEE. 
 (Hana). 
 
 Miss KATK VAUGHAN. 
 
 SOME MODERN STAGE DANCERS. 
 
 MR. EUGENE STRATTON. Miss TOI-SY SINDEN. 
 
 (Langfier). (Hllis). 
 
 Miss ALICE LETHBRIDGE. 
 (Chancellor). 
 
 Miss LETTY LINO. Miss MAHEL LOVE.
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 A Group of Modern Dancers Frontispiece. 
 
 * t 
 
 Dance of Joy at the Overthrow of Doubting Castle 51 
 (From an early copy of " The Pilgrim's Progress "). 
 
 A Dance in Otaheite 70 
 
 (From a first edition Capt. Cook's " Voyages "). 
 
 
 
 * 9 41 ' - 
 Signor Vestris 102 
 
 (London Magazine, April, 1781.)
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 HERE was a time in England, in the far-off 
 past, when dancing was considered as an 
 accomplishment to be acquired by every true 
 knight ; has not Chaucer himself given as the 
 quartet of courtly graces, Valour at Arms, Dancing, 
 Drawing, and Writing ? Since those days dancing has 
 both gained much and lost much, but grace is still 
 the keynote of the art, an Art that is as true a one 
 as that of Music or of Painting. Let dancing be but 
 graceful and it will always be a thing of beauty. 
 
 Of late years there has been a tendency, not only 
 on the stage, but also' in the ball-rooms, to wander 
 from " the polished graces of our ancestors," and to 
 introduce, in the former, certain styles of dancing 
 that are far from graceful, such as " cake-walks," 
 high-kicking, and other extravagant forms which can 
 only debase the art; and in the latter, a wild and 
 irresponsible romping, which has made such expres- 
 sions as " Kitchen Lancers " a bye-word. 
 
 In this book I have endeavoured to show from what 
 beautiful origins many of our dances have sprung, 
 and how the great dancers of the past were wont to 
 associate with their dances the poetry and noble 
 thoughts that were the theme round which their skill 
 revolved. 
 
 In tracing the history of the subject I have found 
 an almost entirely new field to work upon, for with 
 the exception of two books, one by a Frenchman,
 
 M. Vuillier, and the other, written more from a tech- 
 nical than a historical point of view, by Edward Scott, 
 there have been practically no works on the subject 
 since the year 1712, when Weaver published his 
 " History of Dancing." 
 
 It is a subject full of never-failing interest, and the 
 deeper I have gone into it the more curious, and to 
 me hitherto unknown, facts I have been able to bring 
 to light. 
 
 I have throughout been careful to avoid technical 
 details, for my object has been not so much to point 
 out how the various dances should be performed, as 
 to trace their gradual development from their origins, 
 and to show how beautiful and picturesque a thing a 
 dance well done may be. 
 
 REGINALD ST. JOHNSTON. 
 Cheltenham, 1905. 

 
 Hark ! The speaking strings invite ; 
 Music calls us to delight ; 
 See the maids in measure move, 
 Winding like the maze of love. 
 As they mingle madly gay 
 Sporting Hebe leads the way. 
 Love, and active Youth advance 
 Foremost in the sprightly dance. 
 As the magic numbers rise 
 Thro' my veins the poison flies, 
 Raptures not to be expressed 
 Revel in my throbbing breast. 
 Jocund as we beat the ground 
 Love and Harmony go round." 
 
 CUNNINGHAM, " The Dance" 1766.
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE MUSE OF DANCING IN 
 ANCIENT MYTHOLOGY, 
 
 AND HER ALLIANCE WITH THE KINDRED ARTS. 
 
 " Come and trip it as you go 
 On the light fantastic toe. 11 
 
 MILTON. " L' ALLEGRO." 
 
 D 
 
 ANCING A little word, and yet so 
 full of meaning. What true lovers 
 of dancing are there whose blood 
 does not rush tingling through all 
 their veins, and whose feet do not start an 
 involuntary tap, tapping on the floor, when 
 they hear the word, and its meaning flashes 
 upon them ? 
 
 To be moving, nay, rather floating through 
 the air, to the sounds of distant music; to 
 be madly rushing, now here, now there 
 with a thrill of delicious intoxication, yet 
 all the while in perfect harmony with the 
 tune ; to be now whirling round at an
 
 10 A History of Dancing. 
 
 almost incredible speed, now apparently 
 standing still, yet with the brain afire the 
 whole time ; and to hear throughout, 
 mingled with the music, the ripple of merry 
 laughter, for happiness is the reflex action 
 of dancing, such are the thoughts and 
 memories conjured up at the sound of the 
 word. 
 
 And not merely thoughts and memories 
 of our own making, but thoughts and 
 memories of a long stream of other happy 
 and merry dancers, stretching back as 
 through a long, mirror-lined room, far, far 
 away into the distant ages of the past ; 
 other dancers from whom we have inherited 
 these feelings, other dancers who Jin their 
 turn had the memories borne upon them 
 out of the far-off past, right away back to 
 the earliest ideas of primitive man ; for 
 dancing and music were the first pleasures 
 of mankind. 
 
 One can almost imagine the Earliest 
 Man walking one morning and finding the 
 sun shining, the air bright and cheerful, 
 the birds singing, and everything good to 
 see. And then, through very joy of life
 
 A History of Dancing. 11 
 
 he started dancing, and laughing at the 
 pleasure of this new sensation, he would 
 start singing and clapping his hands to 
 keep time, and thus there out in the grey 
 wilderness of Ancient Earth were the 
 two great arts of Dancing and Music first 
 brought to life. 
 
 Dancing was prevalent among all the 
 early races of the earth, and it is from the 
 Ancient Greek Mythology of thousands of 
 years ago, that we claim her who is known 
 as the present goddess of dancing, the one 
 whom, though we may not actually worship 
 her, as did the ancient Greeks, we yet hold 
 in reverence, and for whom we erect a 
 pedestal in our inmost hearts Terpsichore. 
 
 Terpsichore, how often have you been in- 
 voked in picture and song, how often have 
 the painter and the poet had good cause to 
 thank the old Greeks for creating you and 
 placing you, perhaps the first, among the 
 Sacred Nine ? O, Terpsichore ! what a 
 boon you have been to mankind ! Poetry, 
 Music, even Art, may sometimes be sorrow- 
 ful and sad, but you never. You were sent 
 into the world to cheer up our hearts, to
 
 12 A History of Dancing. 
 
 bring back the roses to the maiden's cheeks, 
 to send the warm blood coursing through the 
 bodies of all your votaries. You, with your 
 handmaids Laughter and Lyric Song, came 
 along, and lo 1 all the world was again 
 cheerful and full of smiles. Keep with us, 
 Terpsichore, and may the flame on your 
 altars never die out. 
 
 There was once upon a time (I will 
 start in the old, old way, for it is not all 
 Mythology like a beautiful old fairy tale, 
 and all the better for telling in the estab- 
 lished way ?) an infant called Zeus, who 
 was the son of Kronos, the god of Time, 
 and Rhea, who was the daughter of Father 
 Heaven and Mother Earth. That, I always 
 think, was a pretty fancy that only the 
 artistic Greeks could have thought of- 
 Time marrying the daughter of Heaven and 
 Earth. Now, Zeus, after many wonderful 
 adventures and hairbreadth escapes, grew 
 up and became King of the Gods. 
 
 And one day he fell in love with the 
 pretty goddess of Memory, whose name was 
 Mnemosyne, and marrying her, their child- 
 ren became, very naturally, the goddesses
 
 A History of Dancing. 13 
 
 of all the beautiful arts of mankind, and 
 were known as the Nine Muses; and one 
 of the chief of these was Terpsichore, the 
 goddess of Dancing. 
 
 She and her sisters of Poetry, Drama, 
 and the kindred arts, were wont to dis- 
 port themselves on the gentle slopes of 
 Parnassus, or the rugged sides of Helicon ; 
 and in every town of ancient Greece, there 
 was an altar, however small, in honour of 
 sweet Terpsichore. 
 
 Not that the Greeks were necessarily the 
 first to imagine a goddess of Dancing, for 
 probably older and more barbaric nations 
 had worshipped some Divinity of the Dance, 
 who especially watched over its votaries, 
 but I think it is to the Greeks that the 
 earliest ideas of Dancing as one of the 
 arts, one of the refining influences on man- 
 kind, may be attributed. They, as it is seen, 
 closely associated the Muse of Dancing 
 with those of Music, Poetry and the 
 Drama, and sought to show her kinship 
 more especially with the two former. 
 
 And how closely is she a sister of Music 
 and Poetry! Just as Poetry is but Music
 
 14 A History of Dancing. 
 
 without sound, so is Dancing, Poetry with- 
 out words. Plutarch was the first to really 
 understand this, and in his " Symposium " 
 he describes dancing as the " Handmaid of 
 Poetry." In every movement of the feet, 
 in every evolution of the body, there is 
 that true rhythm and concord which is the 
 mainspring, the basis, of all Poetry and 
 Music. 
 
 How often has dancing been described 
 as the "true poetry of motion," and how 
 appropriately ! Dancing in its poetry, out- 
 vies Poetry itself, if one may make use of 
 a seeming paradox. For poetry as under- 
 stood by verses, or even the placing of 
 words and sentences in a rhythmical con- 
 currence must, to be appreciated, have the 
 cool and calculating intelligence brought to 
 bear upon it, to be poetry it must also 
 have a certain meaning, a certain sequence 
 of ideas ; but dancing appeals purely and 
 simply to the imagination ; one is fascinated, 
 passively if watching, or actively if taking 
 part, by the dance, and is carried away 
 from oneself by the mere sensation of the 
 movement : the uncivilized savage, equally
 
 A History of Dancing. 15 
 
 with the most cultured person, can take a 
 delight in the quick turns and swaying 
 motions of a dance, and it is thus we can 
 see that this "rhythm of motion" is the 
 fountain-head of the later, and more civil- 
 ized, art of poetry, or the " rhythm of 
 words." 
 
 Again, in Art, is it not the chief idea, 
 the one great essential, of the picture or 
 piece of sculpture, that it should be grace- 
 ful and pleasing, and here in dancing, we 
 have grace and beautiful motion personified, 
 as of a still picture suddenly brought to 
 life and capable of movement. 
 
 For be the picture what it may I speak 
 of course in reference to the pictures por- 
 traying Nature be it sea-scape or land- 
 scape, we have in the dance, the movement 
 which is the great theme of Nature, em- 
 bodied in the movements of living persons. 
 For the artist, in catching and impressing 
 on his canvas one of the phases of moving 
 Nature, whether the swaying of trees, the 
 floating of clouds, or the rolling of the 
 billows of the ocean, is merely trying to 
 get the general effect of movement, such 

 
 16 
 
 History of Dancing. 
 
 as we see continually in the dance. And, 
 could we invent some art by which we 
 could get the continuous idea of movement 
 instead of merely one phase of it, as we 
 see in a picture, we should be more nearly 
 approaching the mental picture that we 
 ourselves make, if only for a fraction of a 
 second, of the sequence of the evolution of 
 a dance.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 DANCING AS A RELIGIOUS 
 CEREMONY. 
 
 " Rough Satyrs danced, and Fauns 
 
 with cloven hoof 
 
 From the glad sound would not be 
 absent long." 
 
 MILTON. " LYCIDAS." 
 
 F 
 
 ROM the earliest ages* dancing has 
 formed an important part of the 
 religious ceremonies ' of many 
 nations, and although, in connec- 
 tion with religion, it is now practically 
 non-existent except in remote and 
 primitive tribes it was at one time almost 
 universal among the nations which were 
 pre-eminent in the world for their civiliza- 
 tion. 
 
 Religious fanaticism affects men's minds 
 as perhaps no other emotion can do ; it 
 fills them with a sudden rush of frenzied 
 thoughts and incoherent ideas, and as a
 
 18 A History of Dancing. 
 
 result, all calm and intelligent reason is 
 swept aside, and all control over the 
 actions of the body is lost. And to work 
 off, as it were, this superfluous energy 
 created in the brain, strong muscular 
 action takes place, and unconsciously the 
 man throws himself into all sorts of par- 
 oxysms bf the body and wild motions of the 
 limbs, yet throughout, owing to a vague 
 directing impulse in his brain, he keeps his 
 balance, and consequently his frenzy de- 
 velops into a wild form of a dance. 
 
 So, probably, were the religious dances 
 of the early nations first brought about, 
 and though in the accounts we have of 
 them there was none of the absolute loss 
 of control except, perhaps in some of the 
 Dionysia of the Greeks that we see for 
 instance in the spinning Dervishes of to- 
 day, yet there is no doubt that they were 
 all of them a direct uesuli of exaltation of 
 the mind, produced by a constant dwelling 
 on religious ideas. 
 
 And these dances, once inaugurated, 
 become more and more organized and 
 methodical, till at length they gradually
 
 A History of Dancing. 19 
 
 took their place among the regular cere- 
 monial observances of each particular 
 religion. And the dance, from a dramatic 
 point of view, could express so much that 
 was necessary in the act of worship, 
 thanksgiving, praise, supplication and humili- 
 ation were all shewn by means of it that 
 there is little suprise that it should have 
 become an important factor in the history 
 of religion. One of the earliest forms of 
 religious dancing that we hear about occured 
 in the Dionysia, or festivals to Dionysus, 
 of the early Greeks. 
 
 These took place chiefly in Attica and the 
 Grecian Archipelago, and also in Asia Minor ; 
 though it must be remembered that the 
 worship of Bacchus, which was merely the 
 Roman name for Dionysus, was also carried 
 on in Italy, though at a rather later period. 
 The cult of Dionysus, under both his Greek 
 and Roman names, rapidly spread, and 
 traversing the South of Europe, passed 
 Bactria and Media, and even reached far 
 off India, so that his worship became 
 almost universal throughout the known 
 world. This his votaries explained by say-
 
 20 A History of Dancing. 
 
 ing that he himself was wont to make 
 pilgrimages, accompanied by a train of 
 Nymphs, Satyrs, and Centaurs, into distant 
 lands to teach mankind the cultivation of 
 the grape and the preparation of wine. 
 
 In Attica there were two annual festivals 
 in his honour, the Lesser and the Greater 
 Dionysia. The Lesser occurred in country 
 places where the vine was grown in Decem- 
 ber ; while the Greater took place at Athens 
 in March. Here great feasts were indulged 
 in, and a regular series of dances was per- 
 formed, in which a multitude of people took 
 part. These festivals were held to signify 
 the joy of the people at the departure of 
 Winter and the approach of Summer, for 
 Dionysus was said to have delivered his 
 people from the troubles of the cold season. 
 During the Dionysia the ancient image of 
 the god, which had been brought from Eleu- 
 thera to Athens, was conveyed in solemn 
 procession, from the sanctuary of Lenaeon 
 to another temporary shrine, and accom- 
 panying the procession were numbers of 
 priests, troops of dancers, and chorus of 
 singing boys with masks.
 
 3 History of Dancing. 21 
 
 Of a more essentially religious nature, was 
 the dancing ceremony in connection with the 
 worship of Mars at Rome. 
 
 Here, in his two shrines, the Quirinal and 
 the Palatine, were stationed twenty-four 
 priests, the twelve from the Palatine being 
 specially called the Salii or dancers ; and for 
 a number of days from March the First in 
 each year, these made a solemn dancing pro- 
 cession through the city, in full armour, 
 clashing their lances on the sacred ancillae 
 or shields, and singing votive songs to Mars. 
 
 Now it is curious to notice that, like so 
 many other heathen customs, this practice 
 only in a modified form, re-appeared at a 
 later date in our early Christian churches, 
 and though many deny that the church-danc- 
 ing had any connection with the Roman salii, 
 there seems no reason to doubt that they 
 originally arose from them. 
 
 Be as it may, the fact that dancing took 
 place as one of the religious observances of 
 the early Christian church is indisputable, 
 and special provision in the choir of the 
 building was made for it. Moreover, so 
 component a part of the religion did dancing
 
 22 A History of Dancing. 
 
 become, that, according to the early fathers, 
 the angels were continually dancing to the 
 sound of music, and the company of the 
 apostles was a glorified Chorus. And Scali- 
 ger, the Italian scholar famous for his re- 
 searches into Greek and Italian literature, 
 and who so astonished Charles V. by his 
 powers of dancing, declared that the bishops 
 were called " prsesules " because they led the 
 dance on feast days. 
 
 For many years dancing flourished in the 
 Christian church, till it was finally discredited 
 with the Agape feast, and sundry other 
 observances, at the close of the fourth cen- 
 tury. After this it became so strongly dis- 
 approved of, that St. Augustine is said to 
 have remarked Melius est fodere quam 
 saltare. " It is better to dig than to dance," 
 and some centuries later, the Albigenses and 
 the Waldenses, two religious sects in the 
 South of France, made a special point in 
 their tenets to rage against it, and called it 
 the " Devil's procession." 
 
 Yet, never-the-less, right up to the middle 
 of the 18th century, there were traces of 
 religious dancing in the cathedrals of Spain,
 
 A History of Dancing. 23 
 
 Portugal, and Rousillon, on Saints' days and 
 special Feast days, and particularly in the 
 Mussarabian Mass of Toledo, and probably 
 many of our church rites especially the 
 Roman Catholic ones whose origin is now 
 lost, came originally from this observance 
 
 The Spinning Dervishes are a remarkable 
 instance of a carefully cultivated religious 
 frenzy, for in their case the dance is not the 
 result of the frenzy, but exactly the opposite 
 takes place. They start from a stationary 
 position and gradually increasing the speed 
 of their rotation, get quicker and quicker with 
 each evolution, till they actually seem not to 
 move, so fast do they spin. 
 
 Another extraordinary form of religious 
 ceremony was the devil-dance of the Veddahs, 
 now a practically extinct tribe of people, who 
 were once a leading race in Ceylon. This 
 dance, which was the equivalent of a spoken 
 incantation, was performed as follows : 
 
 A tripod, on which were offerings of eat- 
 ables, was placed on the ground, and before 
 a concourse of people, the priest or devil- 
 dancer proceeded to dance round it, getting 
 more and more violent in his movements, till
 
 24 A history of Dancing. 
 
 he fell into a sort of paroxysm, in which state 
 he was supposed to receive from the gods the 
 information required. 
 
 In contrast to this there is a very quiet 
 form of religious ceremony in Fiji, which is 
 distinctly a dance, though the dancers do not 
 move from the ground. This is called the 
 " Hiba," or dance of seated dancers, which 
 takes place in the ceremony of Ava-drinking 
 during the preparation of that drink. The 
 men sit round in a circle, and to the sound of 
 a low chanting, move their arms and legs 
 about in rhythmical cadence till the drink is 
 ready, when, after some incantations, the 
 inbete or priest, passes the cup round and the 
 dancing ceases. 
 
 In Madagascar the women dance every day 
 while their husbands are absent, as a sort of 
 religious ceremony which is supposed to in- 
 spire the men with courage in battle : and 
 another curious custom is the funeral dance 
 of the Todas, an Indian Hill-tribe, who have 
 a peculiar dance which chiefly consists of 
 moving backwards and forwards a few steps 
 at a time, to the chanting of the wailing cry 
 " ha-ho." The origin of this was probably
 
 A History of Dancing. 25 
 
 to frighten away the evil spritssfrom the 
 presence of the dead. This idea occurs in 
 many other funeral customs of primitive 
 tribes. 
 
 So we have, in connection with religious 
 ceremonies, the custom of dancing, for the 
 following reasons : 
 
 (1). As a result of fanatical frenzy. 
 
 (2). To express by gesture : thanksgiving, 
 
 praise, supplication, and humiliation. 
 (3). To express joy at the departure of 
 Winter (though the Dionysian dances 
 were probably partly caused by wine 
 intoxication). 
 
 (4) In honour of Mars. 
 
 (5) As an incantation. 
 
 (6) To frighten away evil spirits. 
 
 And through all these primitive minds 
 for we must remember that even among the 
 civilised Greeks and Romans the origins of 
 the dances were at an early period we find 
 the one idea running, to attract the atten- 
 tion of the deity by violent exertions, and 
 to force the notice of their needs upon him 
 by the vigour of their dancing.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ANCIENT FORMS OF DANCING IN 
 GREECE, ITALY AND THE EAST. 
 
 " Memory wakes her magic trance 
 And wings me lightly through the dance" 
 MOORE. " ODES OF ANACREON." 
 
 LTHOUGH the dancing systems of 
 ancient Greece and Italy were far 
 more elaborate and carefully organ- 
 ized than those of any of the con- 
 temporary nations, and at one time reached 
 a pinnacle of perfection which has been 
 barely equalled by even the best endeavours 
 of modern times, yet in Egypt, which might 
 well be called the mother-country of all 
 civilised dancing, we must look for those first 
 traces of the art which, carried over into 
 Greece and Italy, became there polished up 
 and brightened till it shone forth as one of 
 the most refined and cultured pursuits of 
 the day. 
 
 The act of dancing has been divided under 
 three headings : Exuberant feeling, Panto-
 
 A History of Dancing. 27 
 
 mimic, and Social, though the Social division 
 might more aptly be expressed as a result 
 of exuberant feeling, or as a deliberate cul- 
 tivation of it. And to these divisions a 
 fourth may be added, namely : Dancing as 
 an Art itself ; that is to say the performance 
 of one person (for if more are dancing, it 
 developed into the pantomimic division) for 
 the gratification of on-lookers, and to show 
 a complete mastery over the art. 
 
 And it was in Egypt that this fourth 
 division first sprang up, when the dancing 
 g'rl a girl being chosen as more graceful 
 and agile than a man gave what was per- 
 haps the first " pas seul " of the world. 
 
 It seems wonderful when we come to think 
 of it, that Egypt, the Egypt as we know it 
 now, the land of the silent Sphinx and the 
 stupendous Pyramids, the land of those 
 monuments and temples at whose greatness 
 and vast size even the men of our modern 
 times pause to regard with marvelling and 
 awe, should have been at one time the centre 
 of a busy civilization such as few can realise, 
 and a civilization, be it remembered, of three, 
 four and even five thousand years ago. Yet
 
 28 A History of Dancing. 
 
 so it was, and it was here that dancing as a 
 separate art, as a resulting development 
 of the culture of men's minds, first was 
 practised. 
 
 The earliest information we can gather 
 concerning the development of the dance 
 from the spasmodic movements of exuberant 
 feeling, which was here, as everywhere else, 
 the first origin of dancing, is the mention of 
 the Maiwros, which was a slow rhythmical 
 song accompanied by the distinct movements 
 and phases of a regular dance. 
 
 Not much is known about this, but con- 
 cerning another dance, that of the panto- 
 mimic mourner who accompanied funerals, 
 and by his dancing set forth in gesture all the 
 accomplishments and deeds of the dead man, 
 we have ample evidence from a great number 
 of sculptures and pictured papyri. 
 
 Then came the wild dances of Osiris, who 
 was the Egyptian equivalent of Bacchus and 
 Dionysus ; and co-eval with them was the 
 Astronomic dance, a dance which was one of 
 a marvellous age, and about which more per- 
 haps has been written, than about any other 
 dance of the early ages.
 
 A History of Dancing. 29 
 
 Sir John Davies, the great Elizabethan 
 lawyer, has well described the Astronomic 
 dance in his long poem, the " Orchestra," 
 written in 1596. It was an intricate and 
 cleverly-executed dance, meant to represent 
 the courses of the stars, and performed by a 
 large number of dancers. Not only in Egypt, 
 but in Assyria and even Greece was this 
 dance known, and respectively around the 
 fire-surmounted altars of Ra, Baal-peor, and 
 Jove, who were the three chief, or sun-gods, 
 of these nations did the dance revolve. 
 
 I have often wondered whether this danc- 
 ing round the sun-altars might not have been 
 a possible origin of the old English myth of 
 the sun dancing at Eastertide (mentioned in 
 Suckling's " Ballade upon a Wedding) per- 
 haps brought to us by the Phoenician traders, 
 and afterwards, like the hot cross bun and so 
 many other myths, appropriated by the early 
 Christian priests. 
 
 We have also evidences from the ancient 
 hieroglyphics and paintings, that it was 
 customary to have professional dancers at 
 feasts. These were called " Almehs," and 
 they are generally depicted waving small
 
 30 A History of Dancing. 
 
 branches or beating tambourines while they 
 danced, singing the refrain, "Make a good 
 day, make a good day. Life only lasts for a 
 moment. Make a good day." Which is the 
 same idea, it will be noticed, as that of the 
 feasters in the Bible, who said, " Eat, drink, 
 and be merry, for to-morrow we die." 
 
 One thing is noticeable in reviewing the 
 customs of the ancient Egyptians, and that is, 
 that the higher classes themselves never 
 seemed to have indulged in dancing, but 
 always employed others to dance before 
 them, so that social dancing, as we under- 
 stand it now, was practically non-existent. 
 And therefore, the dancing of Miriam, the 
 sister of Moses, at the passage of the Red 
 Sea, might have been one more instance of 
 the complete subjugation that the Israelites 
 had undergone whilst with the Egyptians, 
 inasmuch as it showed an intimate acquain- 
 tance with the manners and customs of the 
 lower classes ; or else, and this seems more 
 probable, it is simply a case of exuberance of 
 feeling. 
 
 It has been suggested that the dancing on 
 this occasion, may have been a survival of
 
 A History of Dancing. 31 
 
 one of the ancient rites of the passover, but 
 there seems little ground for such a theory. 
 
 And here it may not be out of place to 
 briefly sketch what little is known about the 
 custom of dancing among the Jews, because, 
 for many generations after their captivity 
 among the Egyptians, they were so impreg- 
 nated with the ideas of Egypt, that a number 
 of their most important customs and habits 
 were practically of Egyptian origin. 
 
 Thus we gather from the Bible, and from 
 the writings of contemporary nations, that, 
 as in Egypt, no social dancing was practised, 
 though the solo or figure dancing, such as 
 carried on in Egypt, appears to have also 
 been unknown to them. Yet that dancing of 
 a kind was indulged in we have abundant 
 proof from the numerous instances in which 
 the word occurs in the sacred writings. 
 Principally, however, it seems to have been 
 connected with religious ceremonies, some to 
 us now obscure and meaningless, such as the 
 dancing of David, when the Ark was brought 
 into Zion ; others of which we have a m6re 
 or less complete knowledge, such as the danc- 
 ing in the orchards on the occasions of the 
 *
 
 32 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Feast of Tabernacles, and the Day of Atone- 
 ment, ceremonies which were carried on for 
 many years. 
 
 The only reference to what may be termed 
 " figure dancing " in the whole Bible, is the 
 dancing of Herodias' daughter before the 
 guests assembled for Herod's birthday, and 
 this due to the influx of Greek fashons which 
 began about that period. 
 
 Turning now to the art as practised among 
 the Greeks, we cannot do better than start 
 with an axiom from the lips of the great 
 master of poetry, Homer himself, who 
 speaks of dancing as the " Sweetest and 
 most perfect of human enjoyments," and 
 who particulary praises the grace and pro- 
 ficiency of the Phaiakian youths in it. Thus 
 even in his time, it must have arrived at a 
 certain standard of excellence. 
 
 The chief dances of the Phaiakians of whom 
 he speaks, were of two kinds ; the dance of a 
 number of men in slow measured time around 
 a singer stationed in the centre, and the dance 
 of two skilled dancers, who kept time with 
 each other ; a dance, in fact, which was the 
 precursor of our modern " pas de deux."
 
 A History of Dancing. 33 
 
 One of the earliest known dances among 
 the Greeks, was that of the " men in 
 armour," a very popular dance among the 
 Doric states. This was called the Hlvppl^ 
 and was essentially a mimetic dance, the per- 
 formers imitating the attack and defence of 
 armed warriors.* 
 
 At about this period, too, the Dionysia, to 
 which reference has been made in the pre- 
 ceding chapter, first began to be performed. 
 And then the country festivals to the differ- 
 ent gods became common, and the dance 
 began to be an important part of the cere- 
 monies. 
 
 In all the festivals it was practically the 
 same, and consisted of a series of measured 
 movements around the altar, generally ac- 
 companed by singing. In connection with 
 these semi-sacred dances, we have records 
 of a dance performed by noble Spartan 
 maidens to the goddess Artemis Karyatis, 
 but little is known about the mode of pro- 
 cedure. 
 
 *In a somewhat altered form this dance survived right down 
 to the time of Byron, it may exist still, when he wrote, " You 
 have the Pyrrhic dance as yet. Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx 
 gone ? "
 
 34 A History of Dancing. 
 
 A dance, however, of which we have 
 numerous records, both in the books of well- 
 known writers, and the drawings on vases 
 and friezes, was the op/u.os or Chain Dance, 
 performed by a band of young men and girls 
 placed alternately in a ring, and with hands 
 clasped. They then danced round, at the 
 same time twisting in and out, much in the 
 manner of our English Maypole Dance, and 
 a very pretty sight it must have been. 
 
 Various pantomimic dances or ballets were 
 carried on by the Greeks, such as the K<ynraq 
 and the Gymnastic dances. The former 
 represented the surprise by robbers of a 
 warrior ploughing a field, his rush for his 
 weapons, and the subsequent fight ; while the 
 gymnopaedic dances were imitations of the 
 sports of the Palastra, such as the gymnastic 
 exercises, wrestling, and leaping, and were 
 accompanied by a series of graceful rhymes 
 specially composed for the occasion, and also 
 by singing. 
 
 These ballets led to the drama, and thus we 
 find that theatrical representations had their 
 origin in the dance, and this remark applies 
 equally to the most intricate and well-staged
 
 A History of Dancing* 35 
 
 plays of the present time, for by means of 
 the connecting link of the plays of Milton, who 
 founded his dramas on the Greek model, our 
 modern English play is really a descendant 
 of the old Greek drama. 
 
 With the drama came the elaborate stage 
 dances, which served as interludes to the 
 play, and of which the best known were the 
 Delian dance of the Labyrinth, ascribed to 
 Theseus, and said to be one of the first stage 
 dances ever performed, and the dance of the 
 Eumenides or Fates, a very powerful and 
 vigorous dance, representing the Fates in 
 their different capacities. The dance of the 
 Labyrinth was also called Tepavo?, as the 
 movements resembled the flight of a flock of 
 Cranes. 
 
 These stage dances were entirely confined 
 to the Chorus, though the chorus were in 
 those days important members of the cast, 
 and not mere adjuncts as they are now ; and 
 the choric dancing resembled the modern 
 ballet, both in the rhythmical movement of 
 the feet, and in the pantomimic motions of the 
 arms and the whole body, in order to give a 
 more realistic meaning to the theme portrayed.
 
 36 A History of Dancing. 
 
 The Social dancing among the Greeks, was 
 confined to dancing of a pantomimic nature, 
 or else to the dancing of professionals at 
 feasts, though at times the guests seem to 
 have taken part in the dances, and Socrates 
 himself, so high was his opinion of dancing 
 as an art, is said to have taken lessons in it at 
 an advanced age. ::: 
 
 The Greek banquets were divided into two 
 chief stages, the feast proper, and the Sym- 
 posium, or wine concert afterwards, and it 
 was at these symposia that the dancing took 
 place. This was often of an artistic and 
 dramatic nature, and in " The Banquet " of 
 Xenophon there is an excellent description of 
 one of these dances, a representation of the 
 meeting of Ariadne and Dionysius. 
 
 Greece and Rome have always been closely 
 allied in both philosophy and art, and it is 
 therefore only to be expected that Rome 
 should have derived most of her ideas con- 
 cerning the art of dancing, from the older 
 and sister nation, Greece. The very earliest 
 forms of dancing in Rome were, however, of 
 
 *When he was sixty years old, and from one called Aspasia 
 Aspasia thus becomes probably the first known dancing-master 
 in history.
 
 A History of Dancing. 37 
 
 Etruscan origin, and were said to have 
 formed part of what was perhaps the first 
 scenic performance in Rome, when, in 
 364 B.C., a theatrical representation accom- 
 panied by mimic dances was given by cer- 
 tain Etruscan actors as a means of appeas- 
 ing divine wrath during a plague. 
 
 This performance took the public fancy, 
 and soon became popular, and later on, reci- 
 tative verses in changing metre, were added, 
 this being an idea taken from the Greek 
 model and the result was the satirical drama. 
 
 Then came, about the time of Hannibal, 
 the famous Fabulae Atellanas called after the 
 city of Atella. These were farcical burles- 
 ques, accompained by dancing, and formed 
 interludes to the regular drama, much as 
 some forty or fifty years ago, our English 
 pantomimes were often wedged in between 
 two serious plays. They were performed by 
 young citizens of good name and standing, 
 who were dressed up in various kinds of 
 hideous and grotesque masks, and who 
 carried out the theme of the play, generally a 
 rough rendering of episodes in the lives of 
 mythical gods and heroes.
 
 38 A History of Dancing. 
 
 The Pantomimus was an outgrowth of the 
 Canticum, or singing portion of the comedies, 
 and the Fabulae Atellanae ; and in this an 
 actor indicated by dramatic dancing or ges- 
 ture the subject of the song. In later repub- 
 lican times this dancing became a separate 
 branch of the art, and the pantomimic dance 
 may be said to have reached its climax when 
 performed and taught by Pylades of Cilicia 
 and Bathyllos of Alexandria, in the time of 
 the early empire. The subjects of the pan- 
 tomimus were again the myths of the gods 
 and heroes, favourite ones being "The 
 Labours of Hercules," and " The Suprising 
 of Venus and Mars by Vulcan," Vulcan being 
 always a comic part. 
 
 As a rule, when there were both male and 
 female characters in the cast, one actor 
 would double a part, taking up the female 
 character as well as his own, but occasionally 
 both male and female dancers appeared in 
 the pantomimus, especially in later times, 
 and it then became a regular dramatic ballet. 
 
 What may be considered the golden age of 
 theatrical dancing in Rome, was in the time 
 of Augustus, in whose reign so many other
 
 A History of Dancing. 39 
 
 things attained their golden epochs. At this 
 period, the stage became an imperial concern, 
 and the Italic dance of the Imperial theatre, 
 with its good music and brilliant dresses, 
 completely supplanted the older dramas. 
 
 The great aim of Augustus was to gain the 
 favour of the people, and also to drive all 
 thoughts of politics from them, so he gave 
 special attention to the theatres and other 
 means of popular amusement, and passed 
 laws for the protection of the pantomimists. 
 They were given many advantages and 
 privileges, amongst these being exemption 
 from the "Jus Virgarum," but it was not 
 long before they used this freedom against 
 the peace of the city, so that, in the times 
 of Tiberius and Domitian they were severely 
 oppressed and finally banished. 
 
 However, the reigns of Trajan and 
 Aurelius saw them once more reinstated, and 
 with increased honour, for they were now 
 made decurians, and had the title of 
 " Priests of Apollo," given to them. But 
 from this time they began to degenerate, and 
 finally sank into insignificance with the 
 general corruption of the city.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 SOME EARLY FORMS OF ENGLISH 
 DANCING. 
 
 " You jig, you amble, and you lisp. 1 ' 
 
 SHAKESPEARE." HAMLET." 
 
 W 
 
 E in England have, in times past, 
 been scoffed at in respect of our 
 dancing ; we have been told, a little 
 unjustly perhaps, that we were far 
 inferior to such nations as France, in grace, 
 style, and deportment, and it is entirely true 
 that for many years we had to employ foreign 
 dancing-masters to give that polish and touch 
 so necessary in the courtly dance ; yet in the 
 earlier periods of our history, when agility 
 abandon, and skill, combined, nevertheless, 
 with a certain amount of grace and finish- 
 were the chief essentials of the dance, we 
 could, I venture to say, hold our own with 
 anybody. And as to happiness and merri- 
 ment, which, after all, are but the origin, aim
 
 A History of Dancing. 41 
 
 and result of dancing, right worthily did the 
 little island acquire and retain its title of 
 " Merrie England." 
 
 Dancing as a means of entertainment, 
 seems to have been brought over with the 
 Saxons, and though they appear to have 
 practised it but little among themselves, yet 
 the " Glee-men " or professional singers and 
 entertainers who went about from place to 
 place were noted for their skill in it. 
 
 The Mummers, too, who seem to have now 
 altogether died out, were a distinct survival 
 of Saxon times, and though they did not do 
 much dancing, yet in some parts of their per- 
 formance a dance was sure to take place. 
 
 The last time I saw the mummers, and 
 probably the last time that mumming was 
 ever done, at all events in that part of Eng- 
 land, was in 1888 at Leckhampton, now a 
 suburb of Cheltenham, at the foot of the 
 Cotswold Hills. It was Christmas time, and 
 a band of some seven or eight youths, 
 evidently villagers from the Cotswolds, came 
 to the house where I was living, and asked if 
 they might perform the old play of "St. 
 George." They were all dressed up in fancy
 
 42 A History of Dancing. 
 
 costumes representing St. George, the 
 Dragon, the Faire Maiden, the Doctour of 
 Physike, and other characters, and with some 
 awkwardness they managed to get through 
 the performance. At intervals there was a 
 little dancing of rather a cumbersome kind, 
 but the most interesting part of the whole 
 performance was the use of many words and 
 phrases which we could none of us under- 
 stand, and which I doubt if they understood 
 themselves. These were evidently bits of 
 the pure Anglo-Saxon phraseology of the 
 play, which had been handed down unaltered 
 from father to son through all those cen- 
 turies in this little out-of-the-way spot in the 
 Severn Valley. 
 
 Coming to later times, the times of Nor- 
 man chivalry and knight-errantry, we find 
 that dancing began to be more of a refined 
 and social amusement of the upper classes, 
 and in the old romances so important a place 
 did it assume, that no hero seemed complete 
 unless he accounted it as one of his accom- 
 plishments. Thus Chaucer, in the Canterbury 
 Tales, gives as one of the courtly attributes 
 of the Squire that he could
 
 A History of Dancing. 43 
 
 " Juste and eke dance, and well pourtraie and 
 write." 
 
 Yet it was by no means absent as a pursuit 
 of the lower and middle classes, and we know 
 of many dances, some now altogether lost 
 sight of, some that were still existing up to 
 not many years ago, and some still carried on, 
 which they were wont to indulge in. 
 
 Among the amusements of the lower 
 classes which are now lost sight of, were the 
 " egg-dance " ; and another dance whose 
 name I am unable to find out which appeared 
 to be a sort of figure dance performed by two 
 girls who danced to the sound of music, now 
 side to side, now back to back, ever casting 
 glances over their shoulders at each other, 
 so that, as it is graphically described in the 
 " Roman de la Rose," 
 
 " They threw yfere 
 
 Ther mouthes, so that, through ther play 
 It seemed as they kyste alway." 
 
 The Egg-dance, or hop-egg, as it was also 
 called, was a dance generally performed by 
 women, who, in much the same manner as 
 that of the present Scottish sword-dance, 
 performed their figures about eggs placed
 
 44 A History of Dancing. 
 
 on the floor. This also has been described 
 by Chaucer, who says the performers are 
 called " hoppesteres " ; and Strutt, the emin- 
 ent antiquarian, in his " Sports and Pastimes," 
 written about 1790, mentions that the so- 
 called slang phrase, " Going to the hop to- 
 night ? " (which appears to have been old 
 even in his time) evidently came from this 
 dance ! 
 
 Among the many old institutions which 
 we must now regretfully place among the 
 class of " bye-gone customs " regretfully, 
 by reason of their picturesque beauty and 
 quaintness, apart from the memory of old 
 associations which had gathered round them 
 as around all old customs are the May- 
 pole Dance and the Morris. 
 
 The Maypole is still, I believe, existing in 
 some parts of the country, and is the oldest 
 dance we have in England, possibly in 
 Europe. For it is undoubtedly of Roman 
 origin, and came from some ceremonies con- 
 nected with the worship of Maia, the mother 
 of Mercury, and the presiding goddess of 
 that month. For many centuries it was the 
 chief dance of rustic England, and much im-
 
 A History of Dancing. 45 
 
 portance was attached to it by all classes of 
 people ; but the milk-maids, the rosy-cheeked 
 Phoebes and Phyllises of the idealist, the 
 type which now one only sees on the stage 
 of light opera, considered it their own special 
 festival, and were the most enthusiastic in 
 the keeping of it. 
 
 Tall maypoles were erected everywhere, 
 with many-coloured streamers hanging down 
 from them ; and, grasping these, a number 
 of young men and girls ranged themselves 
 alternately in a circle and commenced to 
 dance round in one direction, to the merry 
 strains of a fiddler and a piper. Intricate 
 movements were then performed, the girls 
 twisting under the arms of the men, some 
 going forward, some backward, till all the 
 streamers were wound tightly round the 
 pole. This was the signal for a change in 
 the music, and then gradually the reverse of 
 the previous figures took place, till all the 
 ribbons were unwound. 
 
 There were many other customs connected 
 with May-day, and the whole affair was con- 
 ducted with much mock ceremony ; two girls 
 were chosen by vote to preside over the
 
 46 A History of Dancing. 
 
 festivities, one being called Lady Flora, 
 queen of the flowers, and the other Lady 
 May, but in later times only one sovereign 
 was elected, the Queen of the May. 
 
 So universal was the Maypole at one time, 
 that in every village, in every community 
 almost, was one to be seen ; and actually in 
 the Strand then, as now, the heart of busy 
 London the Maypole was a noted landmark. 
 Thus Pope remarks : 
 
 " Amid the area wide they took their stand 
 Where once the Maypole overlooked the Strand." 
 
 Another quaint and equally English cus- 
 tom, and one that perhaps more than any 
 other gained for this country the title of 
 Merrie England, was the Morris Dance. 
 
 Coming originally from Spain, where it 
 is said to have derived its name from the 
 Moriscoes or Moors who then dwelt there, 
 it soon became altered and improved, and 
 twining around the hearts and affections of 
 the people, became a naturalised English 
 dance. 
 
 It is said to have been brought over in 
 the reign of Edward III. by John of Gaunt, 
 after one of his missions to Spain ; and
 
 A History of Dancing. 47 
 
 though in some slight details it differed 
 from the original Spanish Morris, it retained 
 most of the important characteristics. Thus 
 the castanets, the dancing accompaniment so 
 typical of Spain, were changed for the clash- 
 ing of swords and wooden staves, which 
 sound distinctly resembled the clicking of 
 the castanets, and also more persons were 
 introduced into the dance, showing the 
 developing tendency of its pantomimic 
 nature. 
 
 In the early forms of our English Morris, 
 five men (one being known as the " foreman 
 of the Morris "), and a boy who was dressed 
 up to represent Maid Marian, were the only 
 performers. Accompanying these were a 
 piper and tabourer ; and to the sound of 
 this music, the clashing of staves, and the 
 jingle of small bells fastened to their cos- 
 tumes, they danced their lively measures. 
 
 Later on, the characters of the " Merry 
 Men of Sherwood " were introduced, and 
 Robin Hood, Friar Tuck and Little John 
 became conspicuous figures of the dance. 
 By the reign of Henry VIII. it had become 
 widespread and universal, and representa-
 
 48 A History of Dancing. 
 
 tions of it appeared even in the stained glass 
 windows of churches ; and at Betley, in 
 Staffordshire, there is still to be seen an 
 excellent picture of it, with all the characters 
 of the Sherwood Foresters. In Beverley 
 Minster, too, there is a stone carving of a 
 Morris, but only one or two performers are 
 shown. About the time of Henry VIII. the 
 hobby-horse, that strange monstrosity that 
 so delighted our ancestors, seems to have 
 been introduced into the Morris, and mock 
 tournaments were held; though this, of 
 course, detracted from the care that had 
 hitherto been solely devoted to the dancing. 
 A special representation of the Morris was 
 given before James I. when on a visit in 
 Hertfordshire, and we are told that the per- 
 formers evinced great skill in their art ; and 
 from this time, right through the reign of 
 Charles I. up to the commencement of the 
 Commonwealth, it was enjoying the zenith 
 of its popularity; but on the accession of 
 the Puritans to power it was sternly put 
 down as an ungodly performance, and not 
 until the Restoration was it revived in the 
 slightest way.
 
 A history of Dancing. 49 
 
 With the reign of Charles II. it was resus- 
 citated, but only in a mild way ; and as the 
 gradual development of the theatres and 
 masques began to do away with the need of 
 it, many of its chief characteristics died out. 
 Thus, Maid Marian became converted into 
 a clown called Malkin, from which we pro- 
 bably get the later Grimalkin, and the other 
 personages began to gradually disappear. 
 However, as a dance, it was kept up in full 
 swing in country places for nearly two hun- 
 dred years more, being recognised as an 
 especial Whitsuntide and May-time cere- 
 mony, and not until some forty years ago 
 did it finally die out. 
 
 Like the mummers and many other old 
 customs, it died hard in the district of the 
 Cotswold Hills, and I was not long ago given 
 an account, by an eye-witness, of the last 
 time it was apparently danced in the town 
 of Cheltenham, about forty years ago. 
 
 He told me that the performers appeared 
 in knee-breeches, tall or " box " hats, as he 
 called them, and short jackets with white 
 sleeves. They were about twenty in number, 
 and formed up in two lines facing each other.
 
 50 A History of Dancing. 
 
 The music was supplied by two men with 
 long tin whistles, and also by the clashing 
 of the two Wooden sticks of the dancers, the 
 last remnants of the pipes and sword-staves 
 of the earlier Morris. The Sherwood fores- 
 ters had been reduced to two clowns or 
 fools, who, armed with inflated bladders, 
 cut capers and went about among the on- 
 lookers demanding contributions. Yet, with 
 all these differences, it was still the old 
 morris, the morris of centuries ago, and it 
 is only with regret that we can watch all 
 these quaint and interesting old customs 
 slowly dying away. 
 
 Two more curious old dances of the 
 Middle Ages were the Roundel and the Hay. 
 The former, synonymous with the Rondelay 
 or song written for accompaniment to this 
 dance, was chiefly a measure for the country 
 people, and was danced in two ways, either 
 all joining hands in a ring and revolving, now 
 in one direction, now in another, and chang- 
 ing steps to the music ; or else all following 
 one person, and varying the step as he com- 
 manded, in much the same way as the school- 
 boy game of " follow-my-leader."
 
 DANCE OF JOY AT THK OVERTHROW OF DOUBTING CASTLE. 
 From an eurly copy of " The Pilgrim's Progress."
 
 A History of Dancing. 53 
 
 The Hay is said to be the same as the 
 older Chaucerian " Reye," and was also 
 danced in a ring. Little is known about 
 this dance now, but it seems probable, mainly 
 from the evidence of Shakespeare in " Love's 
 Labour Lost," that it was either a dance for 
 the upper classes, or else one of a more in- 
 tricate nature than the Roundel; for Dull, 
 the constable, is made to say : 
 
 " I'll make one in a dance or so, or 
 I will play on the tabor to the worthies, and 
 let them dance the Hay." 
 
 In those times the dance formed a great 
 part of the festivities at weddings, and 
 dancing nearly always took place in the in- 
 terval between the wedding breakfast and 
 supper, though it must be remembered that 
 the breakfast was a very late meal, and the 
 supper a very early one. Numerous dances 
 were indulged in the Jig, the Brawl or 
 Brantle, the Galliard, and the Cushion 
 Dance, being the favourites ; and with all 
 the people decked out in their best, the 
 gentlemen as well as the ladies clothed in 
 a gorgeous array of colours, it must have 
 been a dazzling sight ; and one can under-
 
 54 A History of Dancing. 
 
 stand the full scorn and bitterness of 
 Katherine's remark in reference to her sister 
 in the " Taming of the Shrew " 
 
 " 1 must dance barefoot on her wedding day." 
 
 A curious and apparently at times dis- 
 agreeable custom at these wedding dances 
 was that of the bride being compelled to 
 dance with everyone present ; and as open 
 house was often kept at the time of a wed- 
 ding, the result was sometimes the reverse 
 of pleasant. 
 
 In an old book, Christen's " State of Matri- 
 mony," 1543, a remarkable passage occurs 
 illustrating this 
 
 " Then must the poor bryde kepe foote with a' dancers, 
 and refuse none, how scabbed, foule, droncken, rude, and 
 shameless soever he be " ; 
 
 and though the writer, being puritanically 
 inclined against dancing, is perhaps a little 
 too prone to exaggerate, yet he must have 
 had good grounds for such a statement. 
 
 The " Gush ion -Dance," often corrupted 
 into " Kissing-Dance," and also known by 
 the name of " Joan Sanderson," was a lively 
 and mirth-provoking dance, which has now 
 quite died out. There is an excellent de-
 
 A History of Dancing. 55 
 
 scription of it in the " Dancing Master," an 
 old manual on dancing of 1698, which runs 
 as follows : 
 
 " Joan Sanderson, or the Cushion Dance. An old 
 Round Dance." 
 
 " This Dance is begun by a single person 
 (either man or Woman), who, taking a 
 Cushion in his hand, dances about the 
 Room, and at the end of the Tune, he stops 
 and sings, ' This Dance it will no farther 
 go.' ' The Musician answers, ' 1 pray you, 
 good Sir, why say you so ? ' Man : ' Because 
 Joan Sanderson will not come too.' Music. : 
 ' She must come too, and she shall come too, 
 and she must come whether she will or no.' 
 
 " Then he lays down the Cushion before 
 a Woman, on which she kneels, and he kisses 
 her, singing, ' Welcom, Joan Sanderson, wel- 
 com, welcom.' Then she rises, taking up the 
 Cushion, and both dance singing, ' Prinkum- 
 prankum is a fine Dance, and shall we go 
 dance it once again, and once again, and 
 shall we go dance it once again ? ' Then 
 making a stop, the Woman sings as before, 
 ' The Dance it will no farther go.' Music. : 
 ' I pray you, Madam, why say you so ? '
 
 56 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Woman : * Because Joan Sanderson will not 
 come too.' Music. : * He must come too,' etc. 
 (as before). And so she lays down the 
 Cushion before a Man, who, kneeling upon 
 it, salutes her, she singing ' Welcom, Joan 
 Sanderson/ etc. Then he taking up the 
 Cushion, they all three take hands and Dance 
 round singing as before, and thus they do 
 till the whole Company are taken into the 
 Ring." 
 
 All our sovereigns of the Tudor and Stuart 
 periods, with the exception perhaps of the 
 austere Mary, took a keen delight in dancing, 
 and were often past-masters in the art ; 
 while Henry VIII. in his younger days was 
 especially noted for it, and so keen was his 
 enthusiasm about it that he often wrote 
 dance tunes, and danced to his own 
 compositions. Dances, too, formed a large 
 part of the festivities of the " Field of the 
 Cloth of Gold," when Henry and Francis I. 
 met in a splendour the memory of which 
 will never die out. 
 
 The reign of Elizabeth, famous for so 
 many wonderful and beneficent impulses to- 
 wards the growth of the nation, might with-
 
 A History of Dancing; 57 
 
 out these yet have been noted as the epoch 
 during which the social dance, the founder 
 of all our present-day society dancing, came 
 into existence. 
 
 In this reign, dancing was a special feature 
 at court functions, and the stately Pavane 
 and Cinq Pace, the lively Coranto and La 
 Volta, and Trenchmores, Fancies, and Mea- 
 sures of all sorts were the order of the day. 
 Elizabeth took a special delight in dancing, 
 and was apt to rather pose her courtiers by 
 asking them point-blank whether her dancing 
 was not better than that of Mary of Scot- 
 land, who was her great rival, and also a 
 very good dancer. 
 
 The Pavane, the most recent innovation of 
 all these figures, was a slow and dignified 
 dance, and is sometimes considered to be 
 the progenitor of the 18th century Minuet ; 
 while the " La Volta " seems to have been 
 a much more spirited and lively affair, and 
 one also requiring no little dexterity and 
 skill. 
 
 For, as its name implies, it consisted of 
 a remarkable progression of leaps and entre- 
 chats, in which the man, holding his partner's
 
 58 A History of Dancing. 
 
 hands, assisted her to spring into the air, and 
 at the same time revolved on his own axis, 
 thus bringing her round to the other side, 
 and then he himself gave a spring in the 
 same manner, and after one or two steps 
 the process was repeated, all being, of course, 
 in time to the music. We can get some idea 
 of its leaping motion from the words of 
 the Duke of Bourbon in Shakespeare's 
 " Henry V. " :- 
 
 " They bid us to the English dancing schools, 
 And teach la voltas high, and swift corantos ;" 
 
 and again, Sir John Davies, in the " Orches- 
 tra," calls it 
 
 "A lofty jumping or a leaping round, 
 Where arm in arm two dancers are entwined, 
 And whirl themselves with strict embracements 
 
 bound, 
 And still their feet an anapest do sound." 
 
 James I. was a great patron of the dance, 
 though this was probably due to the influence 
 of his queen, Anne, who was one of its most 
 enthusiastic votaries. 
 
 This reign, too, saw the creation of those 
 masques and acting dances, about whose 
 splendour and magnificence even now we 
 marvel. The first masque ever written by
 
 3 History of Dancing. 59 
 
 Ben Jonson was performed at Court, and 
 we are told that the queen herself, together 
 with other noble ladies, came out of a huge 
 shell and " danced the Coranto." 
 
 These masques might well be wonderful 
 and beautiful productions, with Ben Jonson 
 as author, Inigo Jones as scenic artist, and, 
 in later times, Henry Lawes as composer of 
 the music. Surely no such three men will 
 ever again be gathered together in the colla- 
 boration of one single piece. 
 
 It was a very necessary thing for a cour- 
 tier in those days to be an expert and grace- 
 ful dancer, if he wished to keep in favour 
 with the king. An amusing illustration of 
 this is given in a letter written by the chap- 
 lain of the Venetian ambassador in the time 
 of James I., who describes a scene that took 
 place at a masque got up by Prince Charles 
 in 1617, as follows : 
 
 " the dancers were now getting tired, when 
 
 the King shouted out, ' Why don't you dance ? What 
 did you make me come here for? Devil take you dance ! ' 
 Whereupon Buckingham sprang forward and cut a 
 score of lofty and very minute capers with so much 
 grace and agility that the King was delighted. '
 
 60 3 history of Dancing. 
 
 All through the early history of social 
 dancing, it was customary for the gentleman 
 to kiss his partner at the conclusion of a 
 dance, and he would have been considered 
 uncouth and gauclie had he not paid this 
 delicate compliment. Thus, in " Henry VIII." 
 the King remarks : 
 
 " I was unmannerly to take you out and not to kiss 
 you"; 
 
 while an old book on dancing has this verse 
 in it, a verse which seems to imply that the 
 kiss was a reward of valour for dancing, 
 which depends on the lady 
 
 " But some reply, what fool would daunce 
 
 If that when daunce is doone, 
 He may not have at ladyes lips 
 That which in daunce he woon ? " 
 
 In 1634, Prynne, the notorious lawyer and 
 pamphleteer, had both his ears cut off- " in 
 that he did write a violent book against the 
 masque, well knowing that the Queen and 
 Lords Council approved of it." 
 
 But a great reaction was to come with the 
 supremacy of Parliament and the rule of the 
 Puritan ; for all theatres were closed, and no 
 masques or dancing of any description were 
 allowed under pain of heavy penalties. No
 
 History of Dancing. 
 
 61 
 
 sooner, however, had Charles II. ascended 
 the throne than dancing returned with full 
 force, and became as before the chief pas- 
 time of the Court. 
 
 At first the old dances, such as the Coranto, 
 the Brawl, and the Hay, were in favour ; but, 
 as Pepys, our accurate and minute historian 
 of the times, informs us, in about 1666 
 French dances began to be introduced, and 
 from that time onwards society dancing lost 
 its essentially English character, and could 
 not again be called thoroughly English till 
 nearly two centuries later.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ALLEGORICAL DANCES AMONG 
 PRIMITIVE NATIONS. 
 
 " What do you dance ? " 
 
 (Saying among African tribes.) 
 
 LIVINGSTONE. " TRAVELS." 
 
 D 
 
 ANCING has always played a great 
 part in the everyday life of primitive 
 peoples; and inasmuch as it is al- 
 ways easier, and, to a limited intel- 
 ligence, more natural, to express ideas by 
 gesture than by speech, we can hardly be 
 surprised by their predilection for it. 
 
 Moreover, since an appreciation of rhythm 
 and musical sound is a fundamental prin- 
 ciple of man's nature, and is as much the 
 inherited right of the savage as of the man 
 of civilization, one would naturally expect, 
 as music and dancing are inevitably bound 
 together, to find the latter also among even 
 the most primitive races of mankind.
 
 3 History of Dancing. 63 
 
 And so one does ; for the Bushman and 
 Hottentot, the Kaffir and South Sea Islander, 
 alike have their national dance ; and, indeed, 
 dancing is a far more important one might 
 almost say necessary, part of their life than 
 it ever has been or ever can be with us. 
 
 An illustration of the regard in which 
 dancing is held by many of the tribes of 
 Central Africa is given in the quotation at 
 the head of this chapter. As Livingstone 
 tells us in his " Travels," this is the phrase 
 used when any stranger from another tribe 
 is encountered. He is asked, " What do you 
 dance ? " and this is simply another way of 
 asking him to what tribe he belongs ; for the 
 different tribes are known by their different 
 dances, and by this question the man's 
 nationality is ascertained. 
 
 In practically all the primitive communities 
 the dance is the most important part of any 
 ceremony which may take place ; and at any 
 political meeting between two great chiefs, 
 at a reception of any foreign envoys,' or at 
 any great coronation or wedding ceremony, 
 a dance is sure either to commence or ter- 
 minate the proceedings.
 
 64 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 And these dances, especially the great 
 allegorical dances that so many primitive 
 nations possess, dances that have been per- 
 formed by their ancestors from time imme- 
 morial and which are generally accompanied 
 by a chanting record of the deeds of the 
 nation, are of inestimable value to them, far 
 more than they ever dream of ; for they 
 form that bond of sympathy and union among 
 them which is replaced in more civilized 
 nations by the magic word " patriotism." 
 
 Take some of the peoples of the South 
 Sea Islands, for instance. Unread, un- 
 educated, and without the intellectual abili- 
 ties of the white races, it is only in these 
 great dances, when a man can feel the rhyth- 
 mical sway of his body moving in perfect 
 unison with two or three hundred of his 
 fellow-countrymen, and can hear recited the 
 deeds of his ancestors and the past glories 
 of his tribe, that he can fully appreciate the 
 idea of " L 1 'Union fait La Force'' and can 
 understand that he is but a unit in the wel- 
 fare of the nation. 
 
 Most of the great dances of the primitive 
 nations are either allegorical in character,
 
 A History of Dancing. 65 
 
 representing the triumph of War, Death or 
 Love ; or else pantomimic, imitating the 
 manners and customs of men and animals. 
 We generally find that those dances imitative 
 of the pursuits of man are performed by 
 peoples more highly developed than those 
 who tell of the ways of animals, just as, in 
 the same manner, the drama is but the result 
 of the intellectual growth of those races 
 who imitated man in their dances. 
 
 The chief forms of pantomimic dance in 
 which the habits of man are portrayed are 
 those imitating the everyday occurrences of 
 life, such as hunting, fighting, courtship and 
 marriage, funerals, labour, and harvest or 
 vintage ; while of the imitations of animals, 
 we have representations of them feeding, at 
 play, fighting among themselves, fighting 
 against or pursued by man, or wandering 
 about in herds. 
 
 A theory has been advanced, and with 
 very good foundation, that many of the 
 positions and figures of modern society 
 dances are but the remains of hunting and 
 war-dance movements of the early primitive 
 dances, movements whose origin we have
 
 66 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 now quite forgotten, and for which there is 
 now no reason, but which we still go on 
 doing from hereditary instinct in just the 
 same way as a dog will walk round and 
 round trampling down imaginary grass on 
 the hearth rug before lying down, after the 
 manner of his ancestors when out on the 
 prairies. 
 
 So many of the allegorical dances are 
 mixed up with those representing man and 
 his actions, that it is difficult to pick out any 
 that are totally representative of abstract 
 ideas. The one which would have best 
 illustrated this form of dance is the " Astro- 
 nomic Dance," mentioned in a previous 
 chapter ; but this is now extinct, as is also 
 the " big dance before the Inca," which was 
 once one of the features of ancient Peru. 
 
 This latter was a dance representing the 
 idea of " Union is Strength," and, moreover, 
 it was given solely with a view to emphasiz- 
 ing that phrase, and was not an accidental 
 result of the movements of certain figures, 
 as dances representing the same idea among 
 other primitive nations often are. Though, 
 as a matter of fact, we cannot call the
 
 3 History of Dancing. 67 
 
 ancient and now extinct races of Peru 
 primitive, for they appear to have been highly 
 developed and civilized. 
 
 On the other hand, a tribe of Lower 
 Bengal, called the " Coles," who really are 
 primitive in their ideas, have also a dance 
 representing this idea. 
 
 Another allegorical dance, but one about 
 whose origin and meaning we know very 
 little, is that of the Santal women. In this 
 all the performers join hands, and form into 
 a figure resembling the arc of a circle, to 
 and from the centre of which, with slow and 
 graceful movements, they alternately advance 
 and retire. At the same time the whole line 
 moves slowly round to the right, so that 
 the circle is completed within the hour. 
 The meaning of this dance has never been 
 satisfactorily investigated, but it seems not 
 improbable that it may have a common origin 
 with the Astronomic Dance, the idea of which 
 extended at one time over a great part of the 
 world ; and the act of revolving round a 
 central point in the exact space of an hour 
 certainly seems to point to a connection with 
 the movements of the heavenly bodies.
 
 68 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 A very curious dance which may be alle- 
 gorical in nature, and which has a reference 
 to some forgotten chapter in past history, is 
 the public " baile " or dance of Guatemala. 
 
 Here all taking part are dressed up in 
 skins and wear head-dresses composed of 
 the horns of various animals, some savage 
 and fierce, some retiring and timid. A mock 
 combat between the beasts takes place, and, 
 contrary to expectation, the timid deer are 
 always made to be the conquerors. 
 
 At the end of the fight a symbolical cere- 
 mony takes place, in which the victors trace 
 in the sand with a long pole a picture of 
 some strange-looking animal. No one seems 
 to know what this is meant to be, nor can 
 any guess be made as to the nature of the 
 event which is thus so strangely celebrated. 
 
 The natives of the Pacific Islands have 
 always been noted for their dances, and 
 many of their ballets are not far behind the 
 best efforts of civilized countries. Of re- 
 cent years, however, there have been great 
 changes in the customs of these islanders, 
 and many of the older dances are now lost ; 
 though, thanks to the excellent descriptions
 
 3 History of Dancing. 69 
 
 that Captain Cook has left us in the account 
 of his voyages, we are enabled to see what 
 alterations have been made in the dances, 
 and to compare them with those now in 
 existence. 
 
 *In one place, Hapsee, in the Friendly 
 Islands, a special notice is made of how 
 splendidly drilled the performers were, mov- 
 ing " with an exactness and dexterity far 
 surpassing what they (the natives) had seen 
 of our military manoeuvres." 
 
 A description then follows : " ... A 
 dance performed by men, in which one hun- 
 dred and five persons were engaged; each 
 having a paddle or an instrument resembling 
 a paddle, about two and a half feet long, 
 with a thin blade and a small handle. With 
 
 A 
 
 these instruments various flourishes were 
 made, each of which was accompanied with 
 a different movement, or a different attitude 
 of the body. 
 
 ' At first, the dancers ranged themselves 
 in three lines, and so changed their stations 
 by different evolutions, that those who had 
 
 * The following extracts are taken from an early copy of " A 
 Voyage to the Pacific Ocean," 1784.
 
 70 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 been in the rear came into the front. At 
 one part of the performance they extended 
 themselves in one line ; afterwards they 
 formed themselves into a semi-circle ; and 
 then into two square columns. During the 
 last movement, one of them came forward 
 and performed an antic dance before Captain 
 Cook, with which the entertainment ended." 
 
 In these islands there appears to have 
 been a certain amount of figure dancing 
 also, and an illustration, from the same 
 book, of two Otaheite girls performing a 
 pas de deux is here given. 
 
 At another time, he tells us, a perform- 
 ance was given by women dancers, and it 
 is interesting to note that here was a very 
 similar idea to that of the ancient Greek 
 singing and dancing chorus. In the Captain's 
 own words: ". . . Twenty women en- 
 tered the circle, whose heads were adorned 
 with garlands of crimson flowers ; and many 
 of their persons were decorated with leaves 
 of trees, curiously scolloped, and ornamented 
 at the edges. 
 
 " They encircled those of the chorus, with 
 their faces towards them, and began by
 
 SB. 
 
 s
 
 3 History of Dancing. 71 
 
 singing a soft air, to which responses were 
 made by the chorus ; and those were alter- 
 nately repeated. The women accompanied 
 their song with many graceful motions of 
 their hands, and continually advancing and 
 retreating with one foot, while the other 
 remained fixed. After this, they turned their 
 faces to the assembly, and having sung some 
 time, retreated slowly in a body, and placed 
 themselves opposite the hut where the spec- 
 tators sat. One of them next advanced from 
 each side, two of whom returned; but the 
 other two remained, and to these from each 
 side came one by intervals, till they all had, 
 once more, formed a circle about the 
 chorus." 
 
 Among dances imitative of mankind and 
 his actions, the war-dance will always be 
 found to be the most numerous. For, next 
 to that of eating, the great idea of every 
 primitive mind despite the moralists is to 
 have a fight with his neighbour. 
 
 And in these dances, a very accurate de- 
 scription is given of the methods of warfare, 
 so that, apart from the rhythmical beauty 
 which a number of them possess, many are
 
 72 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 of historical value, for in almost all cases 
 the dance outlives the method of fighting, 
 and in places where civilized weapons, and 
 the resulting difference of tactics, may have 
 been introduced, we are able to have, never- 
 theless, a life-like picture of the old fighting 
 weapons and customs. Thus, I believe, in 
 remote parts of Mexico the natives still per- 
 form a war-dance, showing traces of the 
 once famous " Rabinal Achi " of their ances- 
 tors, the fierce Aztecs. 
 
 Again, the Bhils, the war-like people who 
 were once the terror of Central India, have 
 a dance which was originally a war-dance, 
 but which has now degenerated into a per- 
 formance by professional players, who go 
 on a tour through the country, giving their 
 show at the different villages they come to. 
 
 And this, which started by being a fierce 
 imitation of war, has become a sort of 
 comic pantomime, in which men fight against 
 women, the men using short clubs and the 
 women being provided with long poles, 
 though what is the origin of these peculiar 
 weapons is not absolutely known. 
 
 Men dance very little in India, but the
 
 3 History of Dancing. 73 
 
 grace and dexterity of the Nautch girls is 
 well known. Girls are employed, too, at 
 most of the temples, for the ceremonial 
 dancing, being often devoted to the use of 
 the temple in babyhood by their mothers 
 as a thank-offering. 
 
 A curious war-dance is performed by the 
 Natal Kaffirs. A war-dance in every sense 
 of the word, being performed just as they 
 are going off to battle, it seems to have a 
 symbolical meaning, and probably signifies 
 that they will be all-conquering. For the 
 men form up in ranks, and, turning their 
 backs in the direction of the enemy, face 
 the village and the assembled women. These 
 women, in a singing tone, appeal to them to 
 stay ; but they only answer by darting their 
 assegais towards the sky, and then slowly 
 withdraw to the sound of chanting, step by 
 step, and always facing the women ; thus 
 giving a picture of what they will, or hope 
 to, be like after they have met the enemy, 
 showing a bold front and with full ranks. 
 
 Nearly all the primitive war-dances are 
 recitative in character, and either the chorus 
 sing of the past events of the nation, or else
 
 74 A History of Dancing. 
 
 the performers will tell, somewhat boastfully 
 as a rule, of their own deeds. Among two 
 such dissimilar peoples as the natives of 
 Tasmania and the North American Indians, 
 this idea of singing one's own prowess is 
 alike carried out in the dance, the women 
 giving special facilities to it, by purposely 
 taunting the men of cowardice. 
 
 Many tribes celebrate the act of hunting 
 in their dances ; but there is, I believe, only 
 one people where women go through a big 
 pantomimic dance concerning their own 
 hunting and domestic operations. This 
 dance is also of Tasmania, though now fast 
 dying out, and in it the women describe 
 their daily life, the clambering for opossum, 
 diving for shell-fish, digging for roots, and 
 shade of Mrs. Caudle! quarrelling with 
 their husbands. 
 
 A number of dances that were originally 
 of a warlike character grow, with the peace- 
 ful instincts of the people, into mere games 
 and amusements, and thereby lose, in a great 
 measure, their dancing nature. Thus in 
 Yucatan there is a dance, or rather a game, 
 in which one man shuffles in a cowering
 
 A History of Dancing. 75 
 
 position round a circle, catching on a stick 
 the bohordos or canes thrown at him by a 
 ring of other men seated around. This is 
 probably a survival of the catching of arrows 
 or spears on a shield during a war-dance. 
 
 In Fiji, also, there is a club-dance, a pas 
 seul of a comic nature, in which the per- 
 former is dressed up in a complete frame- 
 work of leaves, and has also a mask on his 
 face. This is the same idea as the now fast 
 disappearing Jack-in-the-Green of our own 
 country, though the Fiji dance has probably 
 a very different origin. 
 
 Animals have always been favourite things 
 to imitate in dances ; but, as these so-called 
 dances are seldom more than a series of 
 uncouth leaps and falls, they are hardly 
 worth mentioning. Those of the Ostyaks 
 of Northern Asia, who imitate the wolf and 
 the bear, the people of the Congo Free 
 State, who act the gorilla and its movements 
 when attacked, and the dance of the Deme- 
 rara natives, in which four men covered with 
 skins stoop with their heads in contact to 
 represent an ox, which is continually being 
 annoyed and teased by another performer
 
 76 History of Dancing. 
 
 dressed as a baboon, are perhaps more highly 
 developed than the rest, but even they are 
 without the rhythm which should typify a 
 true dance. 
 
 A curious instance of origin and develop- 
 ment is that of the " cake-walk," the dance 
 which a year or two ago created such a 
 furore on its first introduction from America. 
 This, of course, came from the plantation 
 negroes, whose ancestors were imported 
 many generations ago from Africa. 
 
 Now a friend of mine, lately returned from 
 Africa, told me only to-night that many of 
 the special movements of the cake-walk, the 
 bending back of the body, and the dropping 
 of the hands at the wrists, amongst others, 
 were a distinct feature in certain of the 
 Kaffir dances, and that he had been at once 
 struck by the marked similarity between 
 them.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 QUAINT DANCES IN CIVILIZED 
 COUNTRIES. 
 
 " On with the dance, let joy be unconfined, 
 No sleep till Dawn, when Youth and 
 
 Pleasure meet" 
 
 BYRON. 
 
 F all a country's customs, its national 
 dance is the last to die out. And 
 it is seldom, if ever, that a nation 
 will adopt a new dance and acclaim 
 the foundling as its national custom, so that, 
 in almost all dances of the people, we find 
 a history of considerable antiquity. 
 
 In seeking for a national dance, we have 
 to enquire for the dances performed by the 
 people, especially the rustic population, and 
 not for those devoted to the upper classes. 
 For the dances of the upper classes, who 
 travel into different countries and mix with 
 the social pursuits of other nations, become 
 like their performers, cosmopolitan in nature.
 
 78 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Thus, in nearly all civilized countries, we find 
 now the waltz, the polka, the lancers, and 
 other social dances, just as we have at home. 
 But in the rural districts the people go on 
 dancing what has been danced by their 
 fathers for centuries upon centuries, and 
 there we find the real national dance. 
 
 In England, however, although by no 
 means under a republican form of govern- 
 ment, the habits and customs of the people 
 have become so assimilated with those of 
 the upper classes, especially during the last 
 fifty years or so, that all distinctive charac- 
 teristics of the commons are rapidly dying 
 out. 
 
 Thus, we cannot now find, even among 
 the rural population, any traces of what 
 might be called a national dance. Certain 
 dances, such as the Maypole and the Morris, 
 described in a former chapter, might, had 
 they still been kept up, have been termed 
 national dances ; but now even these are 
 dead, and the country-folk dance the waltz, 
 the polka, or the lancers, just as the upper 
 classes do, albeit generally with more aban- 
 don and fun. Turning, however, to another
 
 3 History of Dancing. 79 
 
 portion of the population, " they who go 
 down to the sea in ships," the music-loving 
 and frolicsome Jack Tar, we find a dance 
 that might almost be called a national 
 dance namely, the Hornpipe. 
 
 This is said to have been originally an in- 
 land dance, and one performed at fairs and 
 merry-makings in the country ; but for the 
 last two or three hundred years it has been 
 almost exclusively associated with the sea. 
 Danced, as every one knows, by one per- 
 former, or at the most two facing each 
 other, it is perhaps the liveliest and most 
 interesting of all English dances to watch. 
 Necessarily lively, as the music is in very 
 quick time, the feet move so rapidly that 
 they literally seem to twinkle ; yet all the 
 time the body is kept perfectly rigid, and 
 in this lies the charm and skill of the 
 dance ; for, with arms folded and an air of 
 perfect repose in the features, the performer 
 gives one the idea that the upper half of his 
 body and the lower belong to two different 
 persons, so that the dance has a novel and 
 strange effect on the observer. At intervals 
 in the music, however, the whole of the
 
 A History of Dancing. 
 
 man becomes endowed with movement, and 
 the performer goes through the various 
 motions of his ship's duties, such as loosen- 
 ing an imaginary rop here, tightening one 
 there, hauling at a pulley, etc. 
 
 Originally, as its name implies, it was 
 danced to the music of the pipe, the particu- 
 lar one, the hornpipe, having a horn bell 
 or rim attached to the open end. After- 
 wards, as in Nelson's time, the violin was 
 generally used, and this instrument is still 
 a favourite one, although the more prosaic 
 concertina and mouth-organ occasionally take 
 its place.* 
 
 Scotland, that delightful country of para- 
 doxes and surprises, presents one of its 
 most striking contrasts in relation to danc- 
 ing. For the people, the staid and sober 
 Scotch folk of fiction, aye, and of reality too, 
 at the first sound of the bagpipe or fiddle, 
 burst into dances so spirited and lively as 
 to be hardly equalled in vigour and wildness 
 by any other nation's dance, save perhaps 
 the Irish jig. 
 
 * Captain Cook, in his account of his voyages, specially attri- 
 butes the immunity of his crew from disease to their taking 
 xercise and their dancing of the hornpipe.
 
 A History of Dancing. 81 
 
 Yet even in their wildest dances there is an 
 incongruity ; for, as we are told by an historian 
 of Scotch customs, the dance is entered into, 
 especially on the part of the men, with the 
 greatest gravity and decorum, and the perfor- 
 mers go through it heroically from beginning 
 to end, however long and arduous it may be, 
 without that laughter and amusement which 
 generally characterises the dance. 
 
 The two chief dances of Scotland, and 
 these are really woven into one, are the 
 Reel and the Strathspey. 
 
 A curious thing about the reel is that it 
 was at one time an important dance in Den- 
 mark, and is still danced there to a slight 
 extent. This is but one more link in the 
 chain which binds the people of the High- 
 lands with those of Denmark, for they were 
 originally of the same race. 
 
 The Reel is a very beautiful dance to 
 watch, as its smooth and gliding motion 
 gives one the pleasant though rather strange 
 impression of rest and vivacity combined 
 Hogarth probably had this idea in his mind 
 when he instanced the reel as exemplifying 
 the line of beauty.
 
 82 A History of Dancing. 
 
 It is danced by two couples or more, and oc- 
 casionally a circular form of the dance is intro- 
 duced, when the performers do most of the 
 steps on the points of the toes. The music is 
 generally in common time of four crotchets in a 
 measure, though sometimes in " Jig-time " of 
 six quavers. It was probably after hearing 
 this latter music, that Gilbert rather aptly des- 
 cribed them in the " Bab Ballads" as" Jiggetty 
 Reels." The Strathspey, said to have origin- 
 ally been danced in the Strath or Vale of the 
 river Spey first took up a position as a re- 
 gular dance about the year 1750. It is danced 
 alternately with the reel, but with slower 
 movements ; yet, at the same time, it is more 
 arduous and exhaustive than its companion 
 dance, as the motions are very jerky, and 
 without the smoothness which characterises 
 the reel. It was at one time very popular, 
 and its peculiar rhythm caught the ear of 
 the people in a way that no other dance had 
 done. Its tunes were hummed everywhere, 
 and it was a common thing for the dancers 
 to sing some words to it while it was being 
 performed. Burns, among others, wrote 
 several songs for the Strathspey.
 
 A History of Dancing. 83 
 
 The Jig we always associate with Ireland", 
 though, when we come to think that the 
 Celts of Ireland, and those of, at all events, 
 the west and south-west of Scotland, are of 
 one and the same race, there is no reason 
 why it should not be one of the dances of 
 Scotland too. 
 
 And so it was, though being an indefinite 
 sort of thing at the best, and of no fixed 
 steps or movements, it is now difficult to 
 trace it in any of the Scottish dances. 
 Shakespeare makes a special mention of it 
 as a Scotch dance, though whether he was 
 mixing it up with the Reel or not we cannot 
 say. His description certainly seems to tally 
 with the dance as we now know it in Ire- 
 land, for he says 
 
 " Hot and hasty, like a Scotch jig." 
 
 "Much Ado about Nothing," ii. 1. 
 
 There is but one more of the well-known 
 Scotch dances, and that is the " Sword- 
 dance." This is really more a test of skill 
 and agility than a social amusement, since 
 only one person dances it at a time ; yet it 
 is a cherished Highland custom, and, if 
 danced in the correct way, with sharpened
 
 84 A History of Dancing. 
 
 swords and but thin covering for the feet, 
 not without the additional excitement of the 
 chance of getting a serious wound. 
 
 It is a most picturesque dance ; and if 
 one has had the good fortune to witness it 
 up in the Highlands, with the flaring lights 
 in the roof, and the ring of people sitting 
 around the central performer, who, dressed 
 in all the glory of his tartan colours, goes 
 through the quick and difficult steps between 
 the crossed swords, it is a sight he will not 
 readily forget. 
 
 The dance itself is of considerable anti- 
 quity, and originated with the great North 
 Scandinavian race, and thus, via the German 
 Saxons, came over to England as well as 
 going direct to Scotland. In the time of 
 Tacitus, even, it was of some importance as 
 a dance, and was described by him with 
 much detail in his " De Morib. Ger.," cap. 24. 
 
 Spain, the land of warmth, of sunshine, 
 of music, of art, can justly claim pre-emin- 
 ence among the nations for her graceful 
 and beautiful dances. 
 
 Not perhaps so vigorous, nor yet of such 
 intricate and involved movements, as those
 
 A History of Dancing. 85 
 
 of her Northern sisters, they are neverthe- 
 less the acme of all that is pleasing and 
 artistic in the rhythm of motion. Dancing 
 comes as naturally to her daughters, as 
 swimming to the Polynesians, or singing to 
 the Germans ; while Cervantes, who had 
 such a keen insight into the natures of the 
 Spanish people, was undoubtedly thinking of 
 his countrywomen when he said, " There 
 ne'er was born a woman yet, but she was 
 born to dance." 
 
 Yet, even now, while she is a nation laid 
 low amongst those whom she once despised, 
 she can still claim a great distinction, for 
 it is from Spain that those dancers come 
 who by the grace and perfection of their 
 dancing become the wonder and admiration 
 of every capital of Europe. 
 
 The dances peculiar to Spain are mostly 
 of Moorish extraction ; but the interval has 
 been so long, and the dances have been so 
 added to and improved by the people them- 
 selves, that there is now but little trace of 
 their ancient origin. Andalusia is the classic 
 home of the dance, and it is there that one 
 sees the best displays of the national dances.
 
 86 A History of Dancing. 
 
 These are three in number the Fandango, 
 the Bolero, and the Seguidillas, though, of 
 these, the Seguidillas is really only the Fan- 
 dango or the Bolero danced by a greater 
 number of people. The Fandango, which 
 means literally, " Go and dance," is danced 
 .n slow six-eight time, by two people facing 
 each other. It is the prototype of all the 
 others, and is the most popular of the 
 Spanish dances. In this, as in all the 
 others, the arm movements play an impor- 
 tant part, and much of the peculiar grace 
 and charm of the Spanish dance is due to 
 them. The performers hold castanets in 
 their hands, and often the clicking of these, 
 and the rhythmical hand-clapping of the on- 
 lookers, is all the music they have, though 
 sometimes a mandolin or a guitar is added. 
 
 There is a curious old story in connection 
 with the Fandango, which nearly all the 
 Spanish historians vouch for as true. It is 
 said that in the year 1700 the Sacred Col- 
 lege, or. Ecclesiastical Court from Rome, 
 condemned the Fandango as an irreligious 
 performance, and were about to forbid the 
 dancing of it anywhere.
 
 A history of Dancing. 87 
 
 But some enthusiastic votaries of it asked 
 to be allowed to have it performed before 
 the Court, to show the learned members 
 how harmless it was. So some dancers 
 started it, and so contagious was the music 
 and the rhythm of it, that eventually the 
 whole Court joined in, and there was to be 
 seen the unusual spectacle of the Sacred 
 College dancing the Fandango, which they 
 had specially met to prohibit ! 
 
 The Bolero is a more modern dance, and 
 is found less in the Southern than in the 
 Northern districts, as it is of French ex- 
 traction and was introduced from Provence, 
 passing through the Basque country into the 
 North of Spain. It is a dance for a solo 
 performer, almost always a woman, and 
 the hand and arm movements are a great 
 feature in it. It consists of sharp turns and 
 revolutions of the body, of short quick 
 rushes of two or three steps, now to one 
 side, now to the other, the feet always 
 stamping on the floor in time to the music, 
 while at intervals, when there is a sudden 
 pause in the tune, the dancer stops rigid in 
 a picturesque pose, with the body bent
 
 88 A History of Dancing. 
 
 slightly backwards, the hands on the hips, 
 and the head erect and defiant. 
 
 The Seguidillas is in quicker time than 
 the Fandango or Bolero, and is a combined 
 dance of eight people. The performers 
 range up in two files, with three or four 
 paces interval between them, and commence 
 dancing to the usual accompaniment of cas- 
 tanets, guitar, etc. It is a very exact and 
 definite dance, and the bars of the music 
 are counted for each fresh movement. Thus, 
 on the fourth bar the dancing begins, on 
 the ninth there is a pause, while at intervals, 
 just as in the Bolero, the performers stop 
 in a rigid and immovable pose, this, if good, 
 being especially applauded by the on-lookers. 
 
 There are numerous other minor dances 
 of Spain, among which the Sarabanda, made 
 historic by its performance by Cardinal 
 Richelieu to please Anne of Austria, La 
 Cambelas, and the Chacona, are the most 
 important. 
 
 There is also the Cachucha, which is a 
 comparatively modern dance, brought into 
 prominence by Fanny Elssler, the famous 
 premiere on the Paris Opera stage.
 
 A History of Dancing. 89 
 
 About this dance James Russell Lowell, 
 the American writer and statesman, re- 
 marked in his account of the wedding cele- 
 brations of the late King of Spain : " By 
 far the prettiest and most interesting feature 
 of the week was the dance, in the Plaza des 
 Armas, before the Palace, of deputations 
 from all the provinces of Spain, in their 
 picturesque costumes. The dances were 
 curious rather than graceful, and it was odd 
 that the only one which we are accustomed 
 to consider pre-eminently Spanish, the 
 Cachucha, was performed by two pro- 
 fessional dancers. The rest had, however, 
 higher interest from their manifest antiquity 
 and almost rudimentary characters." 
 
 A famous dance of Naples is the Taran- 
 tella, a dance with surely the most strange 
 and curious history of any. For it is said 
 to have originally been invented $o cure a 
 disease, Tarentism, from which it got its 
 name ! This peculiar remedy was organized 
 as early as 1374, when the disease, which 
 was the terrible " dancing mania," a form 
 of hysterical madness which once spread 
 over the whole of Germany, first made its
 
 90 A History of Dancing. 
 
 appearance. This Tarentism was for a long 
 time thought to be the result of a bite from 
 the Tarantula spider, owing probably to a 
 confusion of names ; but it is now practically 
 certain that it was merely a form of nervous 
 hysteria, of which the better known " St. 
 Vitus' Dance " is a distant branch. 
 
 In France, the great revolution having 
 removed the sharp dividing line between the 
 upper classes and the lower, there is now 
 no real national dance ; for, just as in Eng- 
 land, the dances of the country people have 
 become assimilated with those of the upper 
 classes. 
 
 In remote country districts, it is true, 
 one may still find occasionally the " contre 
 danse," a dance not unlike our own Sir 
 Roger de Coverley, and of which our old- 
 fashioned " country dance " is a corruption, 
 while there is, of course, in Paris, the 
 " Can-can " ; but, apart from these, one 
 may safely say that the present dancing of 
 France is in all respects similar to that of 
 England. 
 
 Not so in Russia. Here we have dances 
 of a wilder and more vigorous kind than are
 
 A History of Dancing. 91 
 
 to be found in any other European nation. 
 And I think it may be regarded as a general 
 rule, that the colder the climate of a country 
 may be, the more vigorous will be its dancing. 
 
 The dances of Russia (I am not speaking 
 of their society dances, which are, of course, 
 the same as those of any other civilized 
 country) are of many varieties, as is only 
 natural in a country so large, and divided 
 into so many provinces ; but through them 
 all runs one general type. 
 
 I was tmce fortunate enough to see some 
 Russians performing one of their national 
 dances, and was struck by the really difficult 
 and exhausting nature of the movements. 
 Some seven or eight men and girls took 
 part in the performance, though most of the 
 time only one of them would be dancing, 
 the others meanwhile standing round and 
 making the music by clapping their hands, 
 singing, and beating tambourines ; although 
 at certain intervals they would all join in, 
 passing and repassing each other, dancing 
 the whole time, till some fresh performer 
 commenced a solo once more. 
 
 This, the solo performance, seemed the
 
 92 A History of Dancing. 
 
 most difficult to do, as it was danced through- 
 out in a crouching position, as if a man almost 
 sitting on his heels were to suddenly start 
 dancing, keeping his body bent at an angle the 
 whole time. Occasionally he would straighten 
 out and leap up in the air, and then go through 
 one or two steps in an upright position, also 
 making one or two very swift revolutions on 
 the points of his toes, but only again to resume 
 the original crouching pose. It is this bending 
 of the body that is typical of all Russian peasant 
 dances ; and, though it may not sound so, it is 
 in reality very picturesque to look at. 
 
 For, in performing this dance, the people 
 put on all their best and brightest-coloured 
 clothes ; and to see a group of them danc- 
 ing to the sound of the tambourines and 
 the singing of their companions is a very 
 pretty sight. In Germany the waltz is 
 really the national dance of the people, and 
 it was from the German peasants originally 
 that the waltz, the one delight of our 
 English ball-rooms, came. Also the Gallo- 
 pade, from which, in a slightly altered form, 
 we get our modern Gallop ; but both of 
 these I shall deal with in another chapter.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE BALLET: ITS ORIGIN AND 
 DEVELOPMENT. 
 
 " To brisk notes in cadence beating 
 Dance tJieir many twinkling feet." 
 GRAY. " PROGRESS OF POESY," Part II., 3, 6, 10. 
 
 |ERHAPS the nearest approach to 
 perfection which dancing as an art 
 ever reached, was to be found in 
 the ballet. The only detracting 
 circumstance being that the dancing in the 
 ballet was of a mechanical rather than an 
 inspired nature. So that, while from a 
 purely artistic point of view one can hardly 
 regret the decadence of this form of danc- 
 ing, yet when one remembers the great im- 
 petus it gave to dancing in general, and that 
 without it our stage dancing of to-day might 
 never have existed, we cannot help feeling 
 grateful for the important part it has played 
 in the history of dancing.
 
 94 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Giving, as it did, such splendid chances 
 for acting, for expression, and for minute 
 and intricate movement, it naturally came 
 to be regarded as the climax of all forms 
 of dancing ; yet in itself it was unreal and 
 artificial, and had none of the artistic 
 effects, the ideas of waves, clouds, and 
 swaying trees, which the long skirted 
 dancers of to-day, in their nearer approach 
 to the old Greek style, are able to give. It 
 has been pleaded for the ballet that it was 
 eloquent, dramatic, full of gesture ; so it was, 
 but so are also such well-known plays as 
 " L' Enfant Prodigue," and moreover, in these 
 the art of acting is confined to its proper 
 sphere, the drama. It is no plea, I think, for 
 the ballet, as a form of dancing, that its act- 
 ing was so superb. 
 
 The ballet has a long and ancient history of 
 its own, extending right away from Roman 
 times, through mediaeval Italy and France, 
 eighteenth and nineteenth century England, 
 up to the present day ; though in speaking now 
 we generally carry in our minds a picture of 
 the ballet of the late Georgian and earl 
 Victorian times, when it was at its zenith.
 
 A History of Dancing. 95 
 
 But the ballet, if we regard it in its real 
 meaning as a dance in rhythmical time by 
 a number of persons who combine gesticula- 
 tion and acting with their dancing, was un- 
 doubtedly performed among the Romans, 
 and in the later Augustan times had arrived 
 at a considerable standard of excellence. 
 The first ballets given at Rome were simply 
 comedies helped out to a considerable ex- 
 tent by gesture, and similar in nature to 
 the old comedies of the Fabulae Atellanae, 
 on which, indeed, they were founded ; the 
 only difference being that the ballets had 
 a larger number of performers and included 
 both male and female dancers. Then, in 
 time, the dancing began to take the first 
 place in the performance, the acting being 
 helped out by the Chorus singing Cantica 
 describing the plot and occurrences of the 
 play after the Greek manner. These ballets 
 became immensely popular, and the chief 
 poets in Rome were called upon to write 
 the songs and words for them, and several 
 librettos by Lucan, written for the 
 ballets about the year 65 A.D., may still 
 be read.
 
 96 A History of Dancing. 
 
 From the late Roman period there is a 
 long gap till the fifteenth century, when in 
 Italy again appeared the ballet, though of 
 a different and much more artistic nature 
 than the old Roman performances. Indeed, 
 the Italy of mediaeval times may be regarded 
 as its original home ; and with that country 
 must always be associated the idea of the 
 ballet as a separate art in itself. The very 
 name ballet is derived from the late Latin 
 "ballare, through the Italian "balletto"; 
 and our English word ballad, literally " a 
 song for dancing," is drawn from the same 
 source. 
 
 The first revivals of the ballet in Italy 
 were without doubt founded on the perform- 
 ances of the old Roman pantomimi, and pro- 
 bably these performances had been carried 
 on among the country towns in a but slightly 
 altered manner through all the interval be- 
 tween the Augustine period and the fifteenth 
 century ; but about the latter date more 
 attention began to be paid to dancing in 
 general, and particularly to this form of 
 dramatic dancing. So that, in the year 
 1489, matters were ripe for a sudden revival
 
 A History of Dancing. 97 
 
 of popular feeling in favour of the ballet, 
 brought about by a big spectacular per- 
 formance arranged by one Bergonzio di 
 Botta, in celebration of the marriage of the 
 Duke of Milan, at Tortona. This was a 
 magnificent affair, and the performance of 
 it was spread over many hours. Five great 
 spectacles were set forth in it, namely, the 
 Siege of Troy, the Judgment of Paris, the 
 Seasons, the Conquests of Alexander, and 
 a Carnival, each of these shows being in 
 five acts, and each act having three, six, 
 nine or twelve entries for dancers ; singing 
 and recitation going on the whole time. 
 This was the precursor of many similar 
 ballets in Italy, some of them fine perform- 
 ances, but none being quite equal to 
 di Botta's. 
 
 Soon, however, the best ideas, and some 
 of the best dancers also, of the ballet, were 
 imported into France, then the most civilized 
 country in the world, and from that time 
 France established that reputation for danc- 
 ing which with the centuries has gone on 
 steadily increasing, and which she has never 
 lost.
 
 98 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Katherine de MedicisSvas the first to in- 
 troduce the ballet into France, originally 
 with the idea of withdrawing the mind of 
 her son, the king, from affairs of state, in 
 the hope that she might get thereby more 
 power into her own hands. It soon became 
 exceedingly popular with the Court, and 
 performances were given on every possible 
 occasion. Baltazarini, the ballet master 
 whom Katherine had brought over from 
 Italy, reorganized and introduced a uni- 
 formity into the ballet, which now 
 began to run on fixed and regular 
 lines, and from this time the modern 
 history of the ballet may be said to have 
 commenced. / 
 
 In 1581 a great ballet, the " Ballet Comique 
 de la Reine,7 was given at the marriage of 
 the Due de Joyeuse, and this was a note- 
 worthy event, in that a few months later 
 a printed book about it, the first book on 
 the ballet ever written, was published ; and 
 in this is described, at some length, the 
 music, dialogue, and plot, illustrated by 
 pictures of the various movements and the 
 dresses.
 
 
 A History of Dancing. 99 
 
 Henry IV. of France was a great sup- 
 porter of the ballet, no less than eighty 
 special performances being produced be- 
 tween the years 1590 and 1610, while Louis 
 XIII. and Louis XIV. were equally zealous 
 in their patronage of it. Indeed, both of 
 these monarchs danced publicly in the ballet, 
 and so enthusiastic was the latter that he 
 founded an Academy of Dancing, placing 
 Quinault as the Director, and Lully as the 
 chief composer. A great innovation, the 
 introduction of female , dancers, took place 
 in the ballet in 1681*; Lully, "with the true 
 eye of the artist, foreseeing the far more 
 graceful effect which would be produced by 
 this. The new scheme was a great success, 
 and from that time the ballet has never 
 had to entirely rely on the heavier and 
 naturally more clumsy dancing of men only. 
 The first ballet, in 1681, in which ladies took 
 part, was one called " Le Triomphe de 
 TAmourf^ the music of which was written 
 by Lully; but it was not till some years 
 later that female dancers in any number 
 took part in the performances. In this year 
 also, a book, " Des Ballets Anciens et
 
 100 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Modernes," was written by a Jesuit, Le 
 Pere Menestrier, and for a long time this 
 book was the great authority on dancing. 
 
 Louis XIV. now becoming too stout to 
 dance in person, the ballets for a time went 
 out of favour, and for some thirty years 
 matters were at a standstill with regard to 
 their development. However, in the earlier 
 part of the eighteenth century, two female 
 dancers, Mdlles. Salle' and Camargo.* sprang 
 into fame and caused a sudden revival of 
 interest in the ballet. Thousands flocked 
 to see them, and Voltaire himself made 
 special mention of them in his writings. 
 Mdlle. Salle paid a triumphant visit to Eng- 
 land in 1741, this being the first record we 
 have of any noted danseuse appearing in 
 London. 
 
 About this time, too, Vestris, the great 
 Gastano Vestrisi^ first came upon the scene, 
 and by his methods quite revolutionized the 
 ballet. He followed close in the footsteps 
 of another male dancer, Dupre, but his own 
 fame quite overshadowed that of his fore- 
 
 * Camargo was said to be able to do no less than eight tntre- 
 (hats before retouching the ground, undoubtedly a record up till 
 that time, and probably still a record.
 
 SIONOR VESTRIS. 
 London Magazine, April, 1781.
 
 A History of Dancing. 103 
 
 runner. He, in company with Mdlle. Cam- 
 argo, created a sensation in Paris in the 
 year 1775, by a new ballet, " Leandre et 
 Hero,'' in which they took the two name- 
 roles; this ballet was a noteworthy per- 
 formance, and is also especially interesting 
 in that Mdlle. Camargo^wore for the first 
 time the short-skirted' ballet costume, all 
 previous dancers having worn full-length 
 dresses. 
 
 Contemporary with Vestris was another 
 great dancer, Jean Georges Noverre^ who 
 was noted for the great wealth of acting 
 and expression he put into his dancing. Up 
 till Noverre's time the ballets had been 
 performed in much the same manner as 
 they were under Katherine de Medicis. 
 Each act had been introduced by fresh 
 dancers, and nearly always by a different 
 style of dancing ; while sin variably a dialogue 
 explaining the plot had been carried on 
 throughout the whole*'"performance by the 
 Chorus. Songs, also, had been introduced 
 at frequent intervals, and indeed the dancing 
 had always been more or less of secondary 
 importance compared to the acting and sing-
 
 104 A History of Dancing. 
 
 ing. Noverrd changed all this, and produced 
 what has ever since been known as the 
 " ballet d'actiorff ' the unravelling of a plot 
 by dancing and gesture pure and simple. 
 With him was revived the true art of 
 pantomime, such as had been made use of 
 by the old Roman mimes when at their 
 best ; and from the time of Noverre the 
 new school of dancing, which lasted all 
 through the remaining life of the ballet, 
 may be said to have commenced. Noverre 
 was accustomed to say that genius and a 
 power of acting were essential to a good 
 dancer, and in a book he wrote, " Lettres 
 sur la Dance et les Ballets," he lays much 
 stress on this. 
 
 In 1772, a new dancer, Maximilian Gardel, 
 appeared, and under his auspices a further 
 important change took place in the ballet. 
 This was no less than the removal of the 
 masks which all dancers had hitherto been 
 in the habit of wearing. This, a relic of 
 Roman times, had been considered a sine 
 qua non, to the complete equipment of a 
 dancer, and when Gardel first ventured to 
 appear without one, it was the cause of
 
 A History of Dancing. 105 
 
 considerable surprise and questioning. He 
 nearly lost his popularity through its disuse, 
 but in time people became more accustomed 
 to it ; other dancers copied his example, and 
 in twb or three years the masks disappeared 
 altogether. 
 
 During the period of the French Directory, 
 and after the retirement of Noverre, there 
 was an inclination to introduce a patriotic 
 note into the " grand ballet," as it was now 
 called, and the theatre was much made use 
 of by the authorities to keep up the national 
 spirit among the populace. Some very fine 
 ballets, notably one named the " Marsellaise," 
 were performed at this time ; and though 
 there were no individually great dancers, 
 yet the general standing of the ballet was 
 never more brilliant. 
 
 The leadership of the dancing world was 
 next taken up by Vincenzo Galleotti, a 
 dancer who secured much fame in Copen- 
 hagen, and after him Bournonville, a pupil 
 of his, became the acknowledged head of 
 the profession. Bournonville was made 
 Director of the Academy at Copenhagen 
 between the years 1830 and 1836, and during
 
 106 A History of Dancing. 
 
 that time he produced many famous ballets, 
 among them being the ballet of " Napoli," 
 at that time considered to be the finest the 
 world had ever seen. 
 
 It will be noticed that all the names yet 
 mentioned have been those of foreigners, 
 for we in England have never been able to 
 lay claim to any of the world's dancers, and 
 indeed even the English history of the ballet 
 is but the history of foreign dancers who 
 have appeared in this country. The ballet 
 was practically unknown in England till the 
 appearance of Vestris in 1741 ; and, though 
 ever since that time the English have always 
 been great patrons and admirers of the 
 ballet, they have never been able to produce 
 any dancers equal to those of the Italian or 
 French schools. The first English ballet 
 we have mention of was one called " The 
 Tavern Bilkers," performed at Drury Lane 
 in 1702. This was a descriptive ballet, but 
 danced, of course, in the old style, with 
 songs and dialogue illustrating the plot. 
 As early as 1667, Dryden uses the word 
 " balette " as an English word, but with 
 the exception of this one in 1702 there
 
 A History of Dancing. 107 
 
 seem to have been no ballets worthy of the 
 name till about 1740. The earlier Italian 
 operas in London were performed without 
 the ballet, and this was one reason why the 
 continent was so much more advanced than 
 England in respect to its dancing ; for with 
 the history of the opera is entwined that of 
 the ballet. But with the further develop- 
 ment of the opera in England, and the 
 accompanying introduction of the ballet as 
 in the Continental manner, we arrive at a 
 period that stands out by itself as the 
 golden age of the ballet in this country, 
 namely, the first half of the nineteenth 
 century. 
 
 Not so very long ago, perhaps indeed, 
 the latter part of that period is well within 
 the memory of many still living ; but the 
 ballet is now a thing of the past, and so 
 sharp is the boundary line dividing the days 
 of the opera, of the early Victorian dandies 
 and all their accompanying environment, 
 from the matter-of-fact people of to-day, 
 that the period seems to have been placed 
 almost in another world. The names of 
 Taglioni, Fanny Elssler, Cerito, are merely
 
 108 A History of Dancing. 
 
 names to most of us names of once cele- 
 brated people, it is true, but for all that 
 nothing more to our ears than are the 
 places on a map to one who has never tra- 
 velled; and it is difficult for us to imagine 
 the magic influence, the magnetic power, 
 which once surrounded them. 
 
 Those were the days when the Haymarket, 
 Her Majesty's, or Covent Garden, were but 
 patronized for the ballets that were staged 
 there ; and when one who had not witnessed 
 the last success of Taglioni, or had not 
 helped to applaud the new performance of 
 Duvernay, was of no account, and but little 
 better than a barbarian. How they flocked 
 to the opera, and how they crowded the 
 boxes and promenades night after night, 
 these bucks of the D'Orsay period, staring 
 through their quizzing glasses at the newest 
 premiere, or bowing with well-measured 
 grace to some fair leader of society in the 
 opposite box ! And, sheltered under the 
 protecting wing of fashion, which, contrary 
 to her usual manner, remained unchanged 
 for some thirty years, the ballet made great 
 advances towards perfection, and at the
 
 A History of Dancing. 109 
 
 end of Taglioni's reign had become as 
 artistic an affair as mechanical skill could 
 ever hope to make it. 
 
 Taglioni ! Name to conjure with ! Can 
 any of our modern celebrities claim to have 
 created the sensation that was caused when- 
 ever the great Taglioni was announced to 
 appear ? Her name was upon everyone's 
 lips, songs were composed about her, books 
 and music dedicated to her, while " Taglioni " 
 hats, dresses, overcoats, were common signs 
 in all the shop windows. Many, though 
 fewer every year, are yet able to recall 
 scenes of the nightly thronged houses, when 
 the theatres kept on absorbing more and more 
 eager enthusiasts, till they seemed swollen 
 almost to a bursting point ; many still living 
 are able to proudly say they saw Taglioni 
 at her prime ; yet now her name is almost 
 forgotten, so complete has been the extinc- 
 tion of the ballet ! 
 
 Another great danseuse, who, if her skill 
 was not so great, was said to have possessed 
 an even greater personal attraction than 
 Taglioni, was Fanny Elssler. The story of 
 how these two competed for fame on the
 
 110 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Paris Opera stage, first one gaining the 
 acknowledged supremacy, then the other, 
 is one of the romances in the annals of 
 dancing. And to see Elssler dance the 
 Cachucha ! That was the one thing to live 
 for in those days. What a perfect furore 
 it caused, and what storms of applause 
 used to greet her appearance every night ! 
 It was said that Fanny Elssler could do 
 anything with her feet that it was in mortal 
 power to do. Oliver Wendell Holmes' ad- 
 miration for her is shown in the sentence 
 he puts into the mouth of the " Master," 
 in the " Poet at the Breakfast Table." He 
 says : "I have seen the woman who danced 
 the cap-stone on to Bunker Hill Monument, 
 as Orpheus moved the rocks by music, 
 the Elssler woman, Fanny Elssler." 
 
 But with the retirement of Taglioni an4 
 Elssler, both in the year 1845, the ballet, 
 having lost its two most brilliant stars, 
 began to fade into insignificance, and though 
 for nearly thirty years afterwards it still 
 retained its original characteristics, it was 
 never quite the same again. The name of 
 Henriette d'Or stands out among the last
 
 
 A History of Dancing. Ill 
 
 of the old school of the ballet, but from 
 the time of Taglioni the premieres who 
 could lay any claim to the title " famous " 
 might be counted on one hand. 
 
 About thirty years ago, however, the ballet 
 received a new impetus with the production 
 at the Variety Halls, such as the Alhambra, 
 and, a few years later, the Empire, of per- 
 formances which, if not exactly ballets of 
 the old school, were still sufficiently like 
 them to deserve the name. This new school, 
 which was distinguished by the transforma- 
 tion of the short-skirted coryphees into a 
 radiantly-coloured chorus dressed in tights, 
 a chorus whose chief duties seemed to be 
 those of looking nice and marching about 
 with military precision, had, and still has, 
 a strong leaning towards the spectacular 
 effect, and each year the dancing became 
 more subservient to this, until it is now of 
 quite secondary importance compared to 
 the rest. That fine effect is gained by all 
 this wealth of colour and display of dazzling 
 dresses cannot be denied, but it is effect 
 gained at the expense of dancing ; and 
 though the scene becomes like a coloured
 
 112 A History of Dancing. 
 
 picture, a painting that an artist might 
 delight in, it is in reality the destruction of 
 a high form of one art for the sake of an 
 inferior form of another. 
 
 The stages of the Alhambra and the Em- 
 pire have for the last thirty years or more 
 been noted for their ballets, and many fine 
 performances have been produced there. At 
 the Alhambra in 1860 was produced a ballet, 
 41 Yolande," by Alfred Thompson, which was 
 just on the boundary line between the old 
 and the new schools, having many of the 
 characteristics of the old style, combined 
 with the brilliant spectacular and coloured 
 effects of the new. And that it should have 
 had this display of colour was but natural, 
 as it was a Japanese ballet, the first ever 
 produced in England, and was dressed in 
 all the bright colour and scenery for which 
 Japan is famous. 
 
 The Empire, and the Alhambra too, have 
 of recent years, with the introduction of 
 the electric light effects, produced some 
 wonderful ballets, among the best known 
 at the former place being " Faust," " Round 
 the Town," " Les Papillons," etc., of which
 
 A History of Dancing. 113 
 
 the staging and colour effects have all been 
 arranged by Mr. C. Wilhelm, who has had 
 much experience in that work. For many 
 years Madame Katti Lanner has been a 
 famous director of the ballets at the Empire, 
 and it is in a great measure due to her that 
 the dancing has retained that degree of im- 
 portance which it still holds. 
 
 Nowadays the premieres are all that are 
 left to remind us of the once famous ballets 
 of the " forties." They still preserve the old 
 style of costume, and many of them go far 
 towards preserving the old excellence of 
 dancing, Mdlle. Adeline Genee, one of the 
 latest arrivals at the Empire, recalling much 
 of the grace of Fanny Elssler. But, for all 
 that, the ballet is now a thing of the past, 
 and, with the modern change of ideas, a 
 thing that is never likely to be resuscitated, 
 And in a way it is perhaps as well, for, as 
 I have said elsewhere, a forced and mechan- 
 ical style cannot contribute to the further- 
 ance of the real art of dancing, and move- 
 ments such as walking on the extreme 
 points of the toes can only be regarded as 
 unnatural.
 
 114 A History of Dancing. 
 
 From the point of view of acting, it has 
 no doubt been of inestimable service to that 
 kindred art, for it has taught us how much 
 can be performed by mere gesticulation, and 
 that, to an actor, speech is really of secon- 
 dary importance compared to the acting 
 itself, the correct movements of the limbs 
 and features. An interesting story is told 
 of how Roscius, the great Roman actor, and 
 Cicero, the famous orator, once had a dis- 
 pute as to whether gesticulation or elocution 
 could best convey meaning. Finding that 
 their arguments led to nothing, they decided 
 to hold a trial of their respective arts, before 
 certain friends who were to be the judges. 
 After some time, the prize was awarded to 
 Roscius, and so delighted was he at the 
 result that he went off and wrote a book 
 on the subject of gesticulation. 
 
 The ballet was without doubt the school 
 of pantomimic acting, but from the point 
 of view of dancing itself, it can never be 
 compared to the free and natural style of 
 the best dancers of to-day. And though 
 with its decay a great amount of the in- 
 terest devoted to the art of Terpsichore
 
 A History of Dancing. 115 
 
 has been withdrawn, and popular favour 
 much diminished, yet in the best interests 
 of dancing no one can really regret the 
 wane of the Ballet.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 THE STAGE DANCING OF TO-DAY. 
 
 " // ne sait sur quel pied danser." 
 
 OLD FRENCH PROVERB. 
 
 N heading this chapter, "The Stage 
 Dancing of "to-day," I intend the 
 words " to-day " to be used in their 
 widest sense, that is, as referring 
 to the present generation. 
 And the stage dancing of the present 
 generation, the graceful skirt-dancing which 
 is now the chief, if not the sole, type of 
 the art, and which has collected to itself all 
 that was most beautiful of the bygone forms, 
 may be said to have sprung, Phoenix-like, 
 from the ashes of its immediate progenitor, 
 the Ballet. For there is no distinct line of 
 demarcation between modern skirt-dancing 
 and the ballet of the old Italian school, 
 different as at first sight they seem ; this
 
 A History of Dancing. 117 
 
 fact Miss Alice Lethbridge, one of the finest 
 exponents of our modern skirt-dancing, has 
 expressed as follows : "As long as dancing 
 continues, the special movements of the 
 older ballet, its entrechats, pirouettes, and 
 countless other steps, must also exist, for 
 they are but the great groundwork of it all." 
 
 In dealing, therefore, with the present-day 
 dancing, I shall commence with the birth 
 of that particular form known as skirt- 
 dancing. 
 
 To most people the word " skirt-dancing " 
 will at once call to mind the Gaiety Theatre, 
 and not without reason ; for with the Gaiety 
 Theatre (I may say with both the Gaiety 
 Theatres, for the new one is, so far, well 
 carrying out the plans of the old) skirt- 
 dancing has ever had its closest ties. From 
 the time of that ever-memorable four, known 
 to all as " The Gaiety Quartette," namely, 
 Edward Terry, E. W. Royce, Kate Vaughan, 
 and Nellie Farren, when Kate Vaughan 
 revolutionized the stage world by her long- 
 skirted dancing, down to the moment at 
 which I write, this, perhaps the most skilful, 
 and certainly the most beautiful form of
 
 118 A History of Dancing. 
 
 the Terpsichorean art, has been the great 
 tradition of the Gaiety. 
 
 It is unnecessary here to go into the pre- 
 vious history of the old Gaiety, beyond 
 remarking that the building was originally 
 the " Strand Music Hall," but was converted 
 into the " Gaiety Theatre " under John 
 Hollinshead's management in 1868, being 
 then devoted to musical burlesques, a form 
 of play which was carried on in an almost 
 unbroken line for nearly thirty years. But 
 the date 1876 marked a great epoch in the 
 history of the theatre, for it was in this 
 year that the " quartette " was formed, a 
 quartette which instantly became famous, 
 and which was the foundation stone for that 
 success which has never since deserted the 
 Gaiety. 
 
 Nellie Farren, Kate Vaughan, Edward 
 Terry, and E. W. Royce ! Those were 
 indeed the days of " Stars." Nellie Farren, 
 affectionately known to the whole of England 
 as " Our Nellie," the greatest burlesque 
 actress, and the brightest and kindliest 
 woman that ever lived ; Kate Vaughan, who 
 created a new era in the world of dancing,
 
 A History of Dancing. 119 
 
 whom thousands came to see for the grace 
 of her art, and of whom the late John 
 Hollinshead wrote : "In all the troubles and 
 worries of rehearsals she was never once 
 known to be wanting in patience and perfect 
 courtesy," a tribute that could be rendered 
 to but few; Edward Terry, equally clever 
 in song, dialogue, or dance, and whose fame 
 as a burlesque actor is now only equalled 
 by his later fame and reputation in the 
 higher comedies ; and " Teddy " Royce, 
 acknowledged at the time to be the finest 
 dancer in England, if not in the world ! 
 
 Kate Vaughan, by her institution of the 
 long-skirted form of dancing, took by storm 
 the hearts of all theatre-goers, for the grace 
 and charm of the new style could not be 
 denied, and the superiority, if only from an 
 artistic point of view, of this form of danc- 
 ing, built on the old Greek model, over the 
 stiff and conventional movements of the 
 Italian school was so evident that from that 
 time ballet-dancing began to lose a popu- 
 larity which it has never since regained. 
 
 " Ars est celare artem" and this must have 
 surely applied to Kate Vaughan ; for though,
 
 120 A History of Dancing. 
 
 in discarding the old form of dancing-dress, 
 she was prevented from displaying her skill 
 and mastery over the movements and steps 
 particularly associated with the Italian 
 school, she nevertheless gave such an artis- 
 tic performance that all beholders were 
 delighted with the innovation, and the 
 degree of refinement that was thence- 
 forward associated with stage dancing has 
 more than made up for any loss sustained 
 in point of actual technical skill. On the 
 model of Kate Vaughan's style is built prac- 
 tically all that is best in the stage dancing of to- 
 day, and had it not been for^her happy inspira- 
 tion a very different type of dancing might now 
 be in vogue. She was one of those who are 
 born to dance, dancing because they must, 
 and in whom there is a distinct inspiration ; 
 and though through a strange perversity she 
 suddenly, in the zenith of her fame, threw 
 everything on one side and invaded the do- 
 main of Old English Comedy, yet in later years 
 she again sought her first love, and when I last 
 saw her, only a few years before her death, 
 she even then showed herself a complete 
 mistress of her art.
 
 A History of Dancing. 121 
 
 The skirt-dancer is not solely dependent 
 on her steps or the manipulation of her 
 skirts for effect, as is sometimes thought, 
 for a great portion of the skill consists in 
 the proper attention paid to arm movement ; 
 though in a good dancer this is so sub- 
 merged in the tout ensemble that it is hardly 
 noticeable. The importance of this arm 
 movement, the x/ l ' A" a of the Greeks, can 
 only be realized when we try for a moment 
 to imagine how strange and harsh would be 
 the effect if the arms were kept stiff and 
 motionless through an entire dance. Ovid 
 understood the artistic effect of the arm- 
 movement, and was much impressed by it, 
 saying, " Si vox est, canta ; si mollia brachia, 
 salta" which is literally, "If you have a 
 voice, sing ; but if you have good arms, then 
 go in for dancing." 
 
 Much of the grace, too, of skirt-dancing 
 depends upon the body-postures, and on the 
 perfect balance that is so necessary to a 
 good dancer. In fact, many of the most 
 difficult movements are only possible to 
 those who possess this gift of balancing to 
 a marked degree, while even the ordinary 
 
 H
 
 122 A History of Dancing. 
 
 movements are much beautified and added 
 to in grace by those with an obvious facility 
 of balance. It is to this additional power 
 that much of the skill and success of Miss 
 Alice Lethbridge is due, and many of the 
 movements which have made her name 
 famous, such as that wonderful revolving 
 movement of which she is said to be the 
 sole mistress, are in a great measure de- 
 pendent on it. This revolving movement 
 was one which she first introduced in a 
 dance when playing the part of Pepita in 
 " Little Christopher Columbus " at the Lyric. 
 She has given it no special name, merely 
 calling it the " waltz movement," as it is 
 in this form of dance that she has been in 
 the habit of introducing it ; but it is an open 
 secret that many have tried to imitate her 
 in it without success. 
 
 The movement itself consists of, while 
 still dancing the ordinary waltz, suddenly 
 bending the body backwards, till it is almost 
 at a right angle, and in this position slowly 
 rotating the body around its own axis, mak- 
 ing all the correct steps of the dance, and 
 moving round in a big circle the whole time.
 
 A History of Dancing. 123 
 
 The swaying of the body in slow time to 
 the rapid movements of the feet, and the 
 effect of the waving skirts, lend an air of 
 grace to the dance such as has seldom been 
 equalled. One of the critics at the time 
 wrote : " She looked like a big white poppy 
 in that ceaseless revolving movement round 
 such a large circle, and the amateur won- 
 dered how the dancer could possibly preserve 
 her balance." 
 
 Her dancing in " Little Christopher Colum- 
 bus " was one of the sensations of the thea- 
 trical year, and from that time her name 
 was assured, though even earlier, when little 
 more than a child, her dancing in " Mynheer 
 Jan " at the Comedy Theatre had caused 
 her to be declared by many critics the finest 
 dancer on the stage, since Kate Vaughan 
 had some years before retired from the field 
 of burlesque. All her dancing shows great 
 knowledge of both the practical and theore- 
 tical sides of the art, and she is without 
 doubt the most graceful exponent of dancing 
 we now have. 
 
 Returning to the early Gaiety days, men- 
 tion must be made of another dancer of the
 
 124 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Kate Vaughan type, and one who was 
 closely associated with all the Gaiety pro- 
 ductions immediately succeeding her Miss 
 Sylvia Grey. Miss Grey appeared in most 
 of the famous burlesques of the " eighties " 
 and early " nineties," and her dancing, con- 
 trasted with that of Miss Florence Levy, 
 another Gaiety favourite who was in almost 
 all the same pieces, was an object lesson of 
 the wide differences that the art of dancing 
 could range over. 
 
 For the dancing of Miss Levy was of the 
 " high-kicking " type, and clever and difficult 
 of execution as it undoubtedly was, it yet 
 could hardly be called artistic, and merely 
 served as a foil to show up the far more 
 graceful effect of the other style. The high- 
 kicking type, which for a time threatened to 
 become very popular, is now fortunately 
 dying out, and is only seen occasionally in 
 some of the " Halls." 
 
 Two other artists who, like Miss Grey, 
 have now apparently retired from the danc- 
 ing world, are Miss Letty Lind and Miss 
 Mi mi St. Cyr. The latter always had a 
 predilection for the foreign styles of dancing,
 
 A History of Dancing. 125 
 
 and though at one time a pupil of Mr. J. 
 D'Auban, who taught such true English 
 dancers as Miss Grey, Miss Lethbridge, and 
 Miss Sinden, it was in her expositions of 
 the Tarantella dances that she made herself 
 famous, while her Spanish Castanet dance 
 5n the part of La Frivolini in " La Cigale " 
 will long be remembered. 
 
 Miss Mabel Love, another pupil of Mr. 
 D'Auban, has of late years been directing 
 her attention away from the Terpsichorean 
 field, and practically the only good dancers 
 we now have are Miss Alice Lethbridge, 
 Miss Topsy Sinden, and, the latest addition 
 to the ranks, Miss Winifred Hart-Dyke. 
 Miss Hart-Dyke is a pupil of Madame Caval- 
 lazzi, and was dancing in the last of the 
 " Savoy " pieces, coming to the front by her 
 performance in " Merrie England," where 
 she gave a very excellent pas seul in the 
 second act. 
 
 Miss Topsy Sinden, who up till recently 
 was connected with Daly's Theatre, would 
 be far the most graceful dancer on the stage 
 to-day, were she not a little too apt to 
 sacrifice some of the charm of her perform-
 
 126 A History of Dancing. 
 
 ance to occasional bursts of step-dancing, 
 almost of clog-dancing, and at times a slight 
 suggestion of high-kicking, both of which 
 are fatal to the artistic effect. She has, 
 however, some wonderful dancing to her 
 credit, and her performances in " San Toy," 
 " The Country Girl," and other musical 
 plays, left little to be desired. 
 
 She started young, as all the best dancers 
 have done, commencing in one of Sir Augustus 
 Harris' Covent Garden pantomimes, at the 
 early age of five. 
 
 The question of allowing young children 
 to perform on the stage has been much 
 discussed of late years, and though at one 
 time stage children may not have had that 
 proper care and attention which should have 
 been bestowed on them, the same cannot 
 be said now; and with the present system 
 of magisterial control to supervise their 
 school education, and benevolent manager- 
 esses such as Miss Ellaline Teriss to look 
 after their pleasures, the lot of a stage child 
 is generally a much-envied one. And for 
 quite seventy per cent, of the plays pro- 
 duced, children are a necessary part of the
 
 A History of Dancing. 127 
 
 performance, for nothing looks more out of 
 place than a grown-up person trying to take 
 the part of a child, while for pantomimes 
 and spectacular plays large numbers of 
 children are required. As pantomime fairies 
 they are most appropriate, for many of the 
 pretty children one sees engaged might have 
 come straight from the " fairy rings," of 
 the light-footed blue-eyed elves which so 
 appealed to the imaginations of our fore- 
 fathers. 
 
 Dancing was the " little people's " recrea- 
 tion, and the fairies would have lost half 
 their charm in the minds of their believers, 
 had they not indulged in their merry moon- 
 light capers. And with their love of danc- 
 ing was associated everything that was 
 bright and cheerful and pretty. Fairies 
 were always represented as bedecked with 
 posies and garlands of flowers. 
 
 " The dances ended, all the fairy train 
 For pinks and daisies search the scattered plain." 
 
 POPE. 
 
 And so also we, the more prosaic mortals, 
 always deck our dances with bright dresses 
 and colours, for with dancing everything 
 must be cheerful.
 
 128 A History of Dancing. 
 
 But to return to the children. It is set 
 forward by every authority on the subject 
 of dancing, that the only way to succeed in 
 the art is to commence young, and for this 
 reason alone we might advance the cause 
 of the stage children. But when we see 
 how the little ones really enjoy themselves 
 while at their duties, and look forward so 
 eagerly to the time when the curtain goes 
 up, and when we know also that the extra 
 money they earn adds little comforts that 
 would otherwise be denied to many a home, 
 we can look on it with sincere approval. 
 
 It has been said that all good dancers 
 start young, but it must be added also that 
 all good dancers work hard. Just as in 
 every profession, it is hard work that brings 
 the best to the front ; but to those dancers 
 who enter their profession because they feel 
 attracted to it, it is a labour of love. That 
 they do have to work hard there is no doubt, 
 for the keen eye of the public is ever upon 
 them, and they must be therefore in a sort 
 of perpetual training. Especially was this 
 applicable to the ballet-dancer, and Oliver 
 Wendell Holmes has remarked in his " Poe
 
 3 History of Dancing. 129 
 
 at the Breakfast Table" "Yet they have 
 been through such work to get their limbs 
 strong and flexible and obedient, that a 
 cart-horse lives an easy life compared to 
 them while in training " ; but, at the same 
 time, this hard training has always had in- 
 estimable advantages from the point of view 
 of the worker's health, for it is no doubt 
 the finest exercise in the world, and keeps 
 the body in a state of suppleness, and the 
 muscles in a condition that nothing else will 
 do. And through the body we approach the 
 mind. " Mens sana in corpore sano" The 
 ancients were strongly of the opinion that 
 dancing developed character. Plato put 
 forward a theory as to dancing in regard to 
 the development of both mind and body, 
 and Lucian also, in his " Essay on Dancing," 
 gives a very high value to the art. 
 
 But there must be moderation in all 
 things, and some of the forms of dancing 
 on the stage to-day cannot be considered 
 in any way as of health-giving value. I 
 refer to those in which strange and un- 
 natural postures are brought into use, such 
 as an American form of dancing I have
 
 130 A History of Dancing. 
 
 lately heard of, called " Rock Dancing." 
 This is practically a dance of the ballet 
 movements of the Italian school, performed 
 almost entirely on the instep, a painful and 
 ungraceful proceeding which might justly 
 cause the performers to be called contor- 
 tionists rather than dancers. 
 
 There are other forms of modern stage- 
 dancing which are as far removed from the 
 best, the long-skirted type, as what is known 
 as " the illegitimate performance," from the 
 true drama, in the sister profession. Among 
 these may be mentioned such dances as 
 Plantation Dances, Cake Walks, and other 
 innovations which have unfortunately crept 
 in of late. The old-fashioned Clog Dancing 
 is without doubt very clever, and one cannot 
 but admire the skill shown in a good per- 
 formance ; but it is not graceful, and relies 
 more on the sense of sound than of sight 
 for a proper appreciation of it. 
 
 As opposed to this essentially " foot- 
 dancing " is the equally definite "arm- 
 dancing of the Serpentine Dance, that dance 
 which has given name and fame to La Loie 
 Fuller. Wonderful and beautiful effects are
 
 A History of Dancing. 131 
 
 produced in this Serpentine Dance, " mats il 
 rfest pas la guerre" All things considered, 
 there is only one true form of dancing on the 
 stage to-day, and that is what, for want of a 
 better name, is known as " skirt-dancing." 
 
 And this skirt-dancing, what is it ? 
 
 A vision of laughing eyes and twinkling feet, 
 a swift rushing of floating draperies through 
 the air, a twirl, a whirl, now here, now there, 
 yet all with a certainty and precision whose 
 very apparent absence declares its art ; then, 
 as the music slows down, a delicate fluttering, 
 like a butterfly hovering among the flowers, 
 and lastly, as a soft falling snow-flake, silently 
 she sinks to the ground. Is not this something 
 worth living for, to be able to dance it, to be 
 able to see it ? You, who are now learning 
 your art, and who are to carry on the traditions 
 of your seniors, and you others, who would 
 rush to any new forms, any momentary 
 crazes, if they but took the popular fancy, 
 keep to the paths of the true art, for they 
 are assuredly the best, and avoid, as you 
 value your chances of success, as you value 
 your art for its own sake, such things as 
 " Cake Walks " and " Rock Dances."
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 DANCING AS A SOCIAL PASTIME. 
 " God match me with a good dancer" 
 
 MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING," ii. 1. 
 
 WONDER how many times this 
 ejaculation of the fair Margaret's 
 has been unconsciously repeated by 
 the frequenters of our modern ball- 
 rooms, when by some mischance an ungainly 
 or awkward partner has been encountered. 
 For there can be nothing more out of place 
 in a ball-room than a bad dancer ; if one 
 cannot dance well, it is better to refrain 
 altogether ; one can gain more enjoyment 
 by watching the good dancers, and by one's 
 very abstinence can give them an equal 
 amount of pleasure. From the early Planta- 
 genet times, down to the present day, a 
 certain skill in the technical parts of the 
 dances, and polished and courtly movements 
 in general, have been essentials, and it is a
 
 3 History of Dancing. 138 
 
 pity to think that these centuries-old traditions 
 should be so often disregarded in the dances 
 of to-day. But in a modern hurrying world, 
 where Turveydrops no longer reign, we must 
 be satisfied to think that what still survives 
 of the old-time courtesy of manners, regarded 
 as an out-of-date custom, perhaps, but yet 
 present, is to be found in the ball-room. 
 
 What may be called Society Dancing, 
 really commenced with the Danses Basses, 
 or Court Dances, as distinguished from the 
 Danses Hautes, or Country Dances, in the 
 sixteenth century, though dancing at Court 
 had been of course in vogue for many years 
 before this, witness the famous ball in the 
 reign of Edward III., where we are told the 
 Order of the Garter was instituted ; and 
 there is also said to have been a form of 
 the Contre Danse existing at the Court of 
 William the Conqueror. But the Danses 
 Basses, or dances of the upper classes, were 
 the real beginnings of our social dances of 
 to-day, and they were dances of France, 
 from the mirror of which country our own 
 dances have been but one long reflection 
 ever since.
 
 134 A History of Dancing. 
 
 One of the earliest of the courtly dances 
 was the Pavane, according to one theory 
 the original form of the Minuet. The name 
 of this dance is probably derived from the 
 Latin pavo, a peacock, because of the state- 
 liness of its movements, but some say it 
 takes its name from Padua in Italy. This, I 
 think, is refuted by the fact that the Pavane 
 was almost undoubtedly of Spanish origin. 
 There was a Spanish proverb, perhaps it 
 still exists, " Every Pavane must have its 
 Galliard," the Galliard being a short lively 
 dance coming at the end of the more sober 
 Pavane. Ben Jonson, too, in " The Alche- 
 mist," speaks of the Spanish Pavin. Con- 
 cerning the stateliness of the dance, Sir 
 John Hawkins has written in his " History 
 of Music," " It is a grave and majestic 
 dance ; the method of dancing it anciently, 
 was by gentlemen dressed with caps and 
 swords, by those of the long robe in their 
 gowns, by the peers in their mantles, and 
 by the ladies in gowns with long trains, the 
 motion whereof in dancing resembled that 
 of a peacock." 
 
 The Pavane was common in England after
 
 3 History of Dancing. 135 
 
 about 1540, and it is no doubt to this dance 
 that Sir John Suckling refers in his " Ballade 
 upon a Wedding," in the famous lines 
 
 " Her feet beneath her petticoat 
 Like little mice stole in and out 
 
 As if they feared the light ; 
 But, oh, she dances such a way, 
 No sun upon an Easter Day 
 
 Is half so fine a sight I " 
 
 Shakespeare himself was probably an 
 ardent votary of dancing, to judge by the 
 frequency with which he introduces it into 
 his plays, and the Pavane was certain to be 
 the one he mostly danced. That he was 
 well versed in its technicalities we may 
 judge by the words he puts into the mouth 
 of Sir Andrew Aguecheek in answer to Sir 
 Toby's question, " What is thy excellence in 
 a galliard ? " " Faith, I can cut a caper, and 
 I think I have the back-trick simply as 
 strong as any man in Illyria." 
 
 But in another part of " Twelfth Night," 
 he would seem to have mixed up, perhaps 
 intentionally, the Pavane with the Passa- 
 mezzo, an Italian dance of a different form. 
 For he makes Sir Toby speak of the surgeon 
 as a " passy-measure pavin," but Reed, in
 
 136 A History of Dancing. 
 
 his work on Shakespeare's Plays, suggests 
 that either Sir Toby in his drunken babbling 
 may have meant to say, " a past measure 
 panicin," or else that the reading of the line 
 is incorrect, and should be " a passy measure 
 or a pavin." 
 
 Following the Pavane, and according to 
 the Parson in Washington Irving's " Christ- 
 mas Day," founded upon it, was the Minuet. 
 
 But the more commonly accepted theory 
 of the Minuet is that it was derived from 
 the Courante, an argument in favour of 
 which being that it was at first a quick 
 dance, and therefore far more like the "swift 
 Coranto " than the stately Pavane. It was 
 called the Minuet because of the small steps, 
 and at its very commencement was a rustic 
 dance, a brawle or branle of Poitou. In 
 the year 1650 it was introduced in Pans, 
 and three years later was given a musical 
 setting by the great Lully, but it did not be- 
 come really popular till some years after this. 
 
 About this time, dancing as a social pas- 
 time was becoming more frequent in France, 
 and in 1662 the King founded a Royal Aca- 
 demy of Dancing, putting Beauchamp, a
 
 A History of Dancing. 137 
 
 noted dancing-master, at the head of it. 
 The King himself took lessons for over 
 twenty years in dancing, and often danced 
 in Minuets at the Court functions. In 
 Beauchamp's time, however, the Minuet 
 had hardly come into favour, and it was 
 left to Pecour, a later dancer, to bring it 
 to the front as the first dance in France. 
 From that time its popularity never failed, 
 and for over a hundred and fifty years every 
 State Ball, not only in France but in all the 
 civilized countries of Europe, was opened 
 with a Minuet. 
 
 The Minuet, surely the most famous of 
 dances, was essentially a product of the age, 
 and a dance that only such an age could 
 have produced. When the correct method- 
 of proffering a snuff-box, or doffing one's 
 hat, were actions ruled by certain definite 
 formulae, and only to be attained after years 
 of practice, one can hardly be surprised at 
 the stateliness and constrained movements 
 of the Minuet. It was an age of artificiality, 
 and this was a make-believe dance, at least 
 so far as the generally adopted axioms of 
 dancing, which declare for a combination of
 
 138 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 vigorous movements, would have it. Yet 
 they would seem to have enjoyed this 
 mathematically precise game of walking 
 about, those powdered and satin-clad ladies 
 and gentlemen ; they must have, or they 
 would not have done it, nor would its popu- 
 larity have lasted in so marvellous a manner. 
 Mimicked in the play, written of in books, 
 and set down in pictures more times than 
 anyone can number, it has yet rarely under- 
 gone the humiliation of buffoonery, its cold 
 superiority repelling all but the hardiest 
 mockers. The caricaturists of the day laid 
 hands upon it, it is true, and in many of 
 the cartoons of Bunbury, Rowlandson and 
 Gillray, we find the Minuet occurring ; but 
 they caricatured the people rather than the 
 dance, for to them there was nothing 
 strange or out of place in a dance that 
 was solemnly walked. And to us it has 
 been handed down as the outstanding type 
 of that age, and whether it be the cover of 
 a chocolate box, a painted fan, or a Christ- 
 mas almanac, we always find these Georgian 
 dandies in the act of dancing a Minuet. 
 The earliest form of the Minuet was a
 
 3 History of Dancing. 139 
 
 dance for two people in moderate triple 
 time, and their movements over the ground 
 covered the shape of a letter S. Later on, 
 the angles were turned more abruptly, and 
 the figure became that of a Z, and shortly 
 after this the whole dance was enlarged, 
 and was followed by the Gavotte, in itself 
 originally a stage dance. In the early 
 French days the dances were often held 
 out of doors, on one of the lawns, and con- 
 sequently the gliding movements of the feet 
 when a fresh step was taken were not 
 brought into such prominence as they were 
 later on. It is the Minuet of these early 
 days, danced in the sunny afternoons out 
 on the green swards, that Watteau, Lancret 
 and Bourcher have loved to portray. In the 
 time of Marie Antoinette, there were four 
 Minuets commonly danced, but one, known 
 as the " Menuet de la Cour," arranged by 
 Gardel, was the favourite one. 
 
 The golden age of the Minuet in England 
 was undoubtedly during that period when 
 Beau Nash was Master of the Ceremonies 
 at Bath. It may not be out of place to 
 give here a short sketch of Beau Nash,
 
 140 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 one of the most interesting figures of the 
 eighteenth century. 
 
 The son of a Welsh country gentleman, 
 he entered the army while still in his teens, 
 but after a short period of magnificent 
 riotousness resigned his commission because 
 "he did not care to be trammelled by the 
 narrowness of a military life." Even at 
 this time he was one of the acknowledged 
 leaders of the day, and his horses, clothes, 
 and dinners, had begun to set their mark 
 on the " beau monde." Living, as he did, 
 upon no apparent income whatever, it is 
 little wonder that at times his companions 
 suspected him of being a highwayman. 
 Probably he won large sums by gambling, 
 and he would also have been merely follow- 
 ing the custom of the day in owing his 
 tradesmen for everything. In whatever way 
 his income was derived, he certainly stands 
 out as one of the greatest " chevaliers 
 d'industrie " in an age when this was 
 almost one of the fashionable professions. 
 
 Moving with certain other society leaders 
 to Bath, his wonderful organizing powers 
 soon found scope for themselves here also,
 
 3 History of Dancing. 141 
 
 and he started those famous evening func- 
 tions and balls with which his name will 
 always be connected. It was he who en- 
 gaged the band of musicians, who at a sign 
 from him at the close of the evening in- 
 stantly stopped playing, thus causing all 
 dancing to end ; and so much was his name 
 feared, that no one would have dared to go 
 against his wishes. He was appointed by 
 his own desire, " Master of the Ceremonies," 
 and once being elected he ruled the assem- 
 blies with an iron hand. The well-known 
 " Code of Etiquette at Bath " was drawn 
 up by him, and was posted in the dancing 
 rooms, and woe betide any hapless person 
 who broke its rules. He himself started 
 all the balls by taking a lady out to dance 
 the Minuet, the rest of the evening being 
 always carried out on the lines of a fixed 
 precedent. At eleven o'clock to the minute, 
 he held up his finger, and the music stopped, 
 and after a short interval for final refresh- 
 ment, all the guests left the building. 
 
 Brewer describes him in three words as 
 a " notorious diner-out," but so great was 
 the wonderful personality of the man, that
 
 142 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 I have no ^ doubt, had he chosen to devote 
 
 
 
 his fine organizing powers to the services 
 of the country instead of to the fads of 
 society, he would have become one of the 
 leading statesmen of the time. However, 
 his name, as Beau Nash, Master of the 
 Ceremonies of Bath, has been handed down 
 to us in a perhaps more permanent manner 
 than it would have been had he been a 
 statesman only, and will probably last longer. 
 As a dramatic contrast to this life of almost 
 regal magnificence, he ultimately died, des- 
 titute, friendless, and in rags. 
 
 The Minuet can hardly be called a dance 
 at all, but it was without doubt one of the 
 finest schools of courtesy and deportment 
 ever invented. Pope was, I am sure, think- 
 ing of the Minuet when he wrote 
 
 " True ease in writing conies from art, not chance, 
 As those move easiest who have learnt to dance." 
 
 It is interesting also to note that in the 
 days when no gentleman could be seen in 
 public without a sword, special short 
 " dancing-swords " were made, which made 
 the carrying of a sword possible and yet
 
 3 History of Dancing. 143 
 
 did not interfere with the freedom of the 
 movements for dancing. 
 
 One of the dances that followed the 
 Minuet was the Quadrille, or " Quadrille de 
 Centre Danse," to give its full name. This 
 was one of the " Square " dances that used 
 to delight our ancestors, and about which 
 we so often read in old-fashioned books. 
 Quadrille was originally a card game for 
 four people, but the name was given to a 
 dance introduced into the French ballets 
 about 1745. The dance itself was probably 
 a direct descendant of that contre danse in 
 use at the Court of William the Conqueror. 
 It did not, however, become popular as an 
 ordinary dance until some sixty years after 
 its appearance in the ballets, and it was not 
 until 1808 that it was introduced into England 
 by a Miss Berry, to be ultimately taken up by 
 the Duke of Devonshire and made fashion- 
 able about 1813. This is on the authority of 
 Raikes, but others would have it that it was 
 not danced in England till the famous Lady 
 Jersey, Lady Castlereagh, and other society 
 leaders, brought it over from Paris, and 
 danced it in Almack's rooms in 1815.
 
 144 A History of Dancing. 
 
 The French Quadrille was for two, four, 
 or any number of couples, but four pairs 
 seem to have been the ideal number in 
 England. The dance itself was divided into 
 figures, usually five, being Le Pantalon, 
 L'Ete, La Poule, La Tremise, and Le Final, 
 and with each figure there were appropriate 
 movements and phases of almost a panto- 
 mimic nature as, for instance, during the 
 figure La Poule, the performers clucked 
 like a hen ; but later on these adjuncts were 
 left out, though the figures remained, as 
 names only, for a very long time afterwards. 
 Each pair of dancers remained always vis- 
 a-vis, and only danced with each other, 
 thereby differing from the more modern 
 Lancers, and the whole dance in its later 
 years often ended with a galop. The Quad- 
 rille was a far more lively dance than the 
 Minuet, and was thus paving the way for 
 that great revolution in social dancing, 
 the Waltz. 
 
 What a sensation the Waltz must have 
 caused to those who witnessed its first 
 invasion of England. Sweeping all pre- 
 cedent on one side, and overturning all
 
 A History of Dancing. 145 
 
 the old thoughts and ideas on dancing, the 
 Waltz came and conquered, but not without 
 the severest opposition that a dance has 
 ever had. Such a distinct departure from 
 all established forms was bound to be re- 
 garded with disfavour by those of conserva- 
 tive ideas, for it must be remembered that 
 this was practically the first time in the 
 history of dancing that two people had ever 
 danced with each other and together ; and, 
 to crown all, it was considered by many to 
 be positively immodest ! Byron took this 
 latter point of view in a half-mocking, half- 
 serious way, in his famous " Apostrophe to 
 the Waltz," which he wrote anonymously 
 from Cheltenham at the end of the year 
 1812, when that town was rapidly becoming 
 a leading fashionable resort, and where he 
 would probably have seen it danced for the 
 first time. He was afterwards inclined to 
 disown this poem, not considering it up to the 
 usual standard of his writing ; but, for all that, 
 it contains many charming and memorable 
 lines, such as the ones where he describes 
 the ship coming across the seas bearing 
 various things to England, among them
 
 146 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 " her fairest freight 
 
 Delightful waltz on tiptoe for a mate." 
 
 To Baron Neuman is attributed the 
 honour of first introducing the Waltz into 
 England, and though it was so strongly 
 opposed at first, we nevertheless find Byron 
 writing at the end of 1812 the very year 
 in which it was first seen in England 
 
 " To one and all the lovely stranger came, 
 And every ball-room echoes with her name." 
 
 but it was nearly three years before it finally 
 overcame all opposition, and was brought 
 to the front place among English dances by 
 its public performance at Almack's Rooms 
 by the Emperor Alexander, Princess Ester- 
 hazy, Lord Palmerston, and other society 
 leaders. The stamp of fashion once on it, 
 it became all the rage, and was danced 
 nightly at Almack's, Willis's, the Pantheon, 
 and other famous dancing rooms. 
 
 Byron addresses it as " Imperial Waltz ! 
 imported from the Rhine," for its original 
 home was in Western Bavaria, where it 
 was called Dreker, " the turner," while the 
 other name given it, Waltz, also signifies a 
 turning. At first it was in very slow time,
 
 3 History of Dancing. 147 
 
 compared to the way it is danced now, and 
 yet it was the first of the quick-step dances ! 
 There have been many innovations since 
 then, slight variations in the manner of 
 dancing it, such as the hop-waltz, and, of 
 course, the system of reversing, but the 
 main idea has remained the same since 
 the beginning, and it is still the queen of 
 our ball-room dances. 
 
 A curious thing about this reversing is 
 that though in England it was introduced 
 merely as a variation to relieve the mono- 
 tony of continually turning in one direction, 
 in Germany the dance is always from right 
 to left, the opposite to the hands of a watch, 
 or what an Irishman might call " continuous 
 reversing." In some dancing rooms I went 
 to in Cologne, I was surprised to see the 
 dancers, after every certain number of bars, 
 take their partners' hands and walk a few 
 steps forwards, after the manner of the 
 pas-de-quatre, reverting to the ordinary 
 Waltz almost immediately. Whether this 
 was typical of the German Waltz, or merely 
 some local variation, I could not ascertain. 
 
 The " Dreamy Waltz " has inspired many
 
 148 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 of the greatest musicians to write for it, 
 Schubert, Chopin, Weber, and Strauss, all 
 contributing their share, but the Waltzes of 
 the last-named will always remain as the 
 finest examples of dance music ever 
 written. 
 
 The Galop or Galopade was the next 
 dance to be introduced to England. This 
 was, and is, a dance in very quick time, but 
 beyond the fact that it was usually danced 
 as a finish to some other dance, it is of 
 little interest. It came to us from Hungary, 
 translated, like most of our other dances, 
 via the channels of Paris, and though intro- 
 duced some seventy years ago, and never 
 at any time very popular, it is still occasion- 
 ally seen in our ball-rooms. 
 
 In striking contrast to the somewhat cool 
 reception of the Waltz, was the open-armed 
 enthusiasm with which the Polka was re- 
 ceived. It is true that all Paris had gone 
 mad over it in a way that only Frenchmen 
 can, but the staid English people were 
 quickly endeavouring to outdance even the 
 French, and the new excitement spread 
 like wildfire.
 
 3 History ot Dancing. 149 
 
 The way in which the Polka was dis- 
 covered is somewhat romantic. Up in the 
 wilds of Bohemia, in 1835, Joseph Neruda 
 whose discovery of this alone might have 
 brought him fame found a peasant girl 
 dancing and singing to herself, and a dance 
 such as he had never seen before. He got 
 her to repeat it, and seeing the great possi- 
 bilities of it, took it down to Prague and 
 and afterwards Vienna. It was an instan- 
 taneous success, and the Polka, or half-step, 
 as it was then called, took the public fancy 
 as no other dance had done. Paris was 
 still too full of the Waltz to heed other 
 dances, and it was not until 1840 that the 
 Polka assailed the capital of the dancing 
 world. But the quaint and captivating 
 " half-step " once inside the walls of Paris, 
 it immediately secured a following, which 
 was almost fanatical in nature. M. Cellarius, 
 a professional dancer, performed it one 
 evening on the stage of the Odeon, and the 
 next day it was being danced in half a dozen 
 of the best Paris Salons. A few days later 
 it became more general, and it was not many 
 months before all Paris had run Polka-mad.
 
 150 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 It was danced publicly in the streets and 
 boulevards, not only in the evenings, but all 
 day long ; traffic was disorganized, and its 
 tunes were whistled and sung on all sides. 
 New phrases were coined, and the word 
 " polkeur " was upon everyone's tongue. 
 Even the sober " Times " plaintively declared 
 it could get no news through from Paris, 
 except accounts of the Polka! When it 
 did come to London, it came as an already 
 established dance, and though the excite- 
 ment did not run wild in the streets, as in 
 Paris, it was enthusiastically received, and 
 without a shadow of opposition. The " Illus- 
 trated London News" on May llth, 1844, 
 reported the first Polka at Al mack's, and 
 the description I will give in its own words. 
 
 " ' La Polka/ like its predecessors, the 
 Waltz and the Galop, is a 'danse a deux,' 
 couples following each other in the salle de 
 danse, commencing at pleasure, and adopt- 
 ing of the following figures that which 
 pleases them most at the moment. All those 
 anxious to shine in La Polka will dance the 
 whole of them, returning from time to time 
 by way of rest to the first figure.
 
 A History of Dancing. 151 
 
 " The measure is 2-4, but to facilitate our 
 definitions, we subdivide each measure or 
 bar into 1-2-3-4, the accent on the 2, to be 
 played not so fast as the Galop. 
 
 "The steps are two, and the following 
 description may in some measure convey 
 them to our readers. We commence with 
 the first and most general. At the one, hop 
 on the right leg, lifting or doubling the left 
 at the same moment : at two, put your left 
 leg boldly forward on the ground : at three, 
 bring your right toe to the left heel: at 
 four, advance your left foot a short step 
 forward. Now is the ' one ' in the next bar 
 or measure of the tune. Hop on the left 
 leg, doubling or lifting up your right leg, 
 and so on proceeding in this step with 
 your arm circling your partner's waist round 
 the room. 
 
 " In conclusion, we would observe that 
 La Polka is a noiseless dance. There is 
 no stamping of heels or toes, or kicking the 
 legs at sharp angles forward. This may be 
 very well at the threshold of a Bohemian 
 auberge, but it is inadmissible into the 
 salons of London or Paris. The Polka as
 
 152 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 danced in Paris and now adapted by us, is 
 elegant, graceful and fascinating in the 
 extreme." 
 
 Even then there were apparently traces 
 of that rowdyism which is unfortunately 
 seen too often in our ball-rooms to-day. 
 
 The Polka was very wella dapted for a 
 stage dance, and there may be some now 
 living who can remember seeing Perrot 
 and Carlotta Grisi first dance the Polka at 
 the Opera in Slavonic dress. It was after- 
 wards introduced into many of the ballets 
 as a pas de deux, and always met with 
 success. 
 
 " Punch," of course, had his say in the 
 matter, and during the year 1844 there 
 were many pictures and humorous refer- 
 ences to the dance in his pages. There is 
 one excellent parody on the " Maid of 
 Athens " in which the Polka is the central 
 theme. In connection witht he Polka should 
 be mentioned the Schottische, which also 
 claimed Bohemia as its home, and which 
 was at first called the "Polka tremblante." 
 
 About this time, in 1845 to be exact, there 
 was also introduced to England a Polish
 
 A History of Dancing. 153 
 
 dance called the Mazurka, and though it 
 was at one time fairly popular, and was 
 occasionally seen in our ball-rooms, till a 
 very few years ago, it never really attained 
 the success which came to its contem- 
 poraries. It has been called "the melan- 
 choly Mazurka," possibly owing to the sad 
 strains of some music that Chopin set to 
 it ; but it must be remembered that much 
 of Chopin's so-called dance music was never 
 really meant to be danced to. The mazurka 
 is one of the oldest Polish dances, being 
 invented in the sixteenth century, and it is 
 still, I believe, common in Poland, but it 
 can no longer be called an English dance. 
 
 A square dance which we still have, and 
 one which has caused so much discussion 
 of late years, is the Lancers. In itself a 
 most picturesque and pleasing dance, it un- 
 fortunately gives opportunities for conduct 
 which, to say the least, is not that of a 
 ball-room, and which almost justifies the 
 dance being sometimes called " the break- 
 neck Lancers," or again " Kitchen Lancers." 
 This is a great pity, as there is something 
 very fascinating in a set of lancers well
 
 154 A History of Dancing. 
 
 danced, and the constantly kaleidoscopic 
 changing of the positions is a very charming 
 thing even to watch. The Lancers, with 
 its quaint old-fashioned phrases, " Set to 
 Corners," "Grand Chain," and "Visiting," 
 and those courtly movements which seem 
 to bring with them a faint aroma of the 
 past, has always been a favourite of mine; 
 and to see a dozen people careering madly 
 down the room, knocking aside all who may 
 come in their way, at once destroys all the 
 poetry of it. It is said that on more than 
 one occasion a broken limb has resulted 
 from this rough and tumble play, and in no 
 way could one call the Lancers as now too 
 often danced " Mannerly modest, as a mea- 
 sure full of state and ancientry." 
 
 The Lancers was introduced to France 
 by M. Laborde in 1836, and in 1850 it made 
 its first appearance in England, a set being 
 composed by Lady Georgina Lygon, and 
 seven other ladies and gentlemen. It is 
 certainly not now so popular as it was a 
 decade or so ago, but it still holds three or 
 four places in most ball programmes. 
 
 The Cotillon can be almost disregarded as
 
 A History of Dancing. 155 
 
 a dance, as it has become merely a medley 
 of movements, and is only occasionally intro- 
 duced by some hostess as a novelty, or as 
 a means of distributing small gifts. It was 
 started in the reign of Charles X. of France, 
 and was for some time a popular dance at 
 the French court, but in modern France as 
 in England it is now seldom seen. 
 
 One of the last dances to be invented was 
 the " Pas de Quatre," said to have derived 
 its name from the fact that it was at first 
 danced to the tune of the famous Pas de 
 Quatre of the Gaiety, composed by the late 
 Meyer Lutz, for so many years conductor at 
 that theatre. This was for a time exceed- 
 ingly popular, as it came as a welcome 
 relief to the monotony of the Waltz, but 
 the last two or three years it seems to 
 have gone out of favour again, and is now 
 not often seen. It was also at first called 
 the Barn Dance, through some idea that it 
 was a revival of a peasant dance, but beyond 
 a slight likeness to the old form of Schot- 
 tische, and that in only a few of its move- 
 ments, it has broken fresh ground in every 
 way.
 
 156 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Two dances have of late years been 
 brought over from America : one the 
 Washington "Post, enjoying an enthusiastic 
 but short-lived popularity, while the other, 
 the Two-step, a variation on the Waltz, has 
 as yet not had time to seek a fair judgment. 
 It is certain that our American cousins are 
 fonder of dancing than we are, and it is to 
 them that we must look for any new dances, 
 praying only that they will not send us 
 another cake-walk ! 
 
 The only other dance that is still some- 
 times seen in our ball-rooms is the dear old 
 Sir Roger de Coverley. This is the only 
 genuine survival of our old English dances, 
 and it is one of the prettiest of them. 
 Founded, of course, on the Centres Danses, 
 or Country Dances, it has retained enough 
 of their movements to give us a general 
 idea of what they were like. Perhaps it 
 will not be inapropos to give here the fable 
 of how the Country Dances began, as told 
 by the poet Jenyns in the verses on dancing 
 which he dedicated to Lady Fanny Fielding, 
 said to have been the finest dancer of the 
 early eighteenth-century ball-rooms :
 
 A History of Dancing. 157 
 
 " Then let the jovial country dance begin, 
 And the loud fiddlers call each straggler in : 
 But e'er they come permit me to disclose 
 How first, as legends tell, this pastime rose. 
 In ancient times (such times are now no more), 
 When Albion's crown illustrious Arthur wore, 
 In some fair op'ning glade each summer's night, 
 Where the pale moon diffused her silver light, 
 On the soft carpet of a grassy field, 
 The sporting fairies their assemblies held : 
 Some lightly tripping with their pigmy queen, 
 In circling ringlets marked the level green, 
 Some with soft notes made mellow pipes resound, 
 And music warble through the groves around ; 
 Oft lonely shepherds by the forest side, 
 Belated peasants oft their revels spyed, 
 And home returning, o'er their nut-brown ale, 
 Their guests diverted with the wondrous tale, 
 Instructed hence, throughout the British isle, 
 And fond to imitate the pleasing toil, 
 Round where the trembling Maypole fixed on high 
 Uplifts its flow'ry honours to the sky, 
 The ruddy maids and sunburnt swains resort, 
 And practise every night the lovely sport ; 
 On every side Aeolian artists stand, 
 Whose active elbows swelling winds command ; 
 The swelling winds harmonious pipes inspire, 
 And blow in every breast a gen'rous fire. 
 Thus taught, at first the country-dance began, 
 And hence to cities and to courts it ran."
 
 158 
 
 A History of Dancing. 
 
 In a curious old book, " Playford's Danc- 
 ing Master," published about 1690, the music 
 of the Sir Roger is printed, with full dancing 
 instructions. Though an English dance, it 
 was taken over to France and introduced 
 into the French ballets in 1745, the same 
 year as the Quadrille ; and, like the Quad- 
 rille, it became popular as a ball-room dance 
 at the beginning of the last century. On 
 the rare occasions on which we now see it, 
 it is used to finish up the evening, and in 
 the same way, with this, the last of the ball- 
 room dances, I will end the present chapter.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 A SHORT HISTORY OF THE WORLD'S 
 DANCERS. 
 
 " When you do dance I wish you 
 A wave o' th' sea, that you might ever do 
 Nothing but that." 
 
 " WINTERS TALE," Act iv. 3. 
 
 HISTORY of dancing necessarily in- 
 volves an account, however small, 
 of those men and women who by 
 their individual genius and skill 
 have assisted in the making of that history. 
 For as the life history of each great dancer 
 of the world was unrolled, so too did the 
 history of dancing itself advance, for each 
 of the dancers brought their tribute in the 
 shape of some fresh movement, some hitherto 
 unknown step, or some new invention for the 
 general good of the art, and with each name 
 is thus associated a page in the history of 
 dancing.
 
 160 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Pylades and Bathyllos, the great Roman 
 dancers, Scaliger the scholar and antiquarian, 
 even Henry VIII. and Anne, wife of James I., 
 have all helped in their several ways ; while 
 musicians, directors of ceremonies, and ballet- 
 masters innumerable, have also added their 
 quota to the general store; but it is only 
 when we come to the later periods, the 
 times when dancing began to be regarded 
 more seriously, to be regarded as a distinct 
 and not unimportant art, that the real 
 makers of its history came upon the scene. 
 
 To France, as is only right, belongs Jhe 
 earliest of the notable dancers, Noverre, 
 who was born in Paris in 1727. He made 
 his debut at Fontainebleau, at the Royal 
 Theatre, in 1743, when only sixteen years 
 old, and within a year had become famous. 
 In 1755 he came over to London at the 
 special invitation of Garrick, and remained in 
 England for two years, dancing in most of the 
 important operas produced during that period. 
 After leaving London he lived for some time 
 in Lyons, holding a post as Director of 
 Ballets, and while there he published his 
 " Lettres sur la Danse et les Ballets."
 
 A History of Dancing. 161 
 
 At length, in 1775, he gained the coveted 
 post of " Maitre des Ballets " at the Paris 
 Academy, which he held till the time of the 
 Revolution, when he lost money, position, 
 everything, and had to retire in comparative 
 poverty to St. Germain, where he died 
 in 1810. 
 
 Noverre will always be remembered as 
 the founder of the true ballet, the " ballet 
 d'action," and it is in a great measure due 
 to him that dancing took the important 
 position it did. Himself a good actor, he 
 enfolded the necessity of good acting upon 
 all those under him, for without capable 
 histrionic powers it would have been im- 
 possible to do away with the recitations 
 and descriptive songs hitherto in vogue, 
 and the outcome of this was the pantomime 
 ballet. 
 
 Gaetano Vestris was an Italian, born in 
 Florence, the original home of the ballets, in 
 1729, two years after the birth of Noverre. 
 In his own time he was acknowledged to 
 be the best male dancer the world has^ver 
 seen, and many now say that no one has 
 ever since equalled him. And, knowing his
 
 162 A History of Dancing. 
 
 fame, he was unable to resist the temptation 
 of being inordinately vain about it. People, 
 in speaking of him, were wont to describe 
 him as " the best dancer and the vainest 
 man that ever lived." He himself took the 
 title of " Le Dieu de la danse," and an 
 anecdote is related of him that once, when 
 the conversation turned on the subject of 
 European celebrities, someone asked him 
 whom he considered to be the greatest man 
 in Europe ; Vestris turned round with a 
 bow, and said, " There are only three great 
 men in Europe myself, Voltaire, and the 
 King of Prussia." 
 
 Vestris is credited with being the inventor 
 of the spinning movement known as the 
 Pirouette, but Gardel, a later dancer, so 
 altered and brought this to perfection that 
 he is now generally regarded as its author. 
 
 He had a son, Marie Augustus Vestris, 
 who also became a great dancer, though he 
 was never quite able to achieve the success 
 of his father. Madame Vestris, the cele- 
 brated English actress of half a century 
 later, was also a connection of his. He 
 died, an old man of eighty, in 1808.
 
 A History of Dancing. 163 
 
 Gardel, as the first to do away with the 
 face masks, and also as the perfecter of the 
 pirouette, and Mdlle. Camargo, as the first 
 danseuse to wear the ballet dress, are 
 worthy of mention, but little is really known 
 about their lives, and even their feats of 
 dancing were quite overshadowed by those 
 who came immediately after them. 
 
 Carlo Blasis, however, was at one time 
 a celebrated dancer, though he is now more 
 generally remembered for his writings on 
 the subject, and for the ballets which he 
 composed. Born at Naples in 1803, he 
 seems to have been able to dance almost 
 before he could walk, and in 1815, when 
 only twelve years old, he was actually prin- 
 cipal dancer at Marseilles. 
 
 From Marseilles he went to Paris, and 
 there studied under Maximilian Gardel, 
 taking part in some well-known ballets pro- 
 duced at that time, and in which he had 
 as partners two noted danseuses, MdleL 
 Gosselin and Mdlle. Le Gallois. 
 
 He next made a success at La Scala, 
 Milan, and in 1826 proceeded to England. 
 Meanwhile his sister, Mdlle. Blasis, was
 
 164 A History of Dancing. 
 
 making a name for herself by her magni- 
 ficent singing at the Italian Opera, and in 
 her spare moments writing music of all 
 sorts, for she was a clever musician, and 
 incidentally helping her brother, who was 
 devoted to her, by setting some of his 
 ballets to music. 
 
 While in England, Carlo Blasis wrote his 
 " Code of Terpsichore," an exhaustive trea- 
 tise on the technical details of the ballet, 
 which was published with some music by 
 his sister, and a little later translated into 
 English. It was in England also that the 
 accident occurred that terminated his career 
 as a dancer, for he so severely injured his 
 leg while rehearsing a pas de trois with 
 Mmes. Bougnoti and Vaguemoulin, that he 
 never publicly appeared again. He was 
 able, however, to take charge of and direct 
 the ballets for many years after, and as 
 a director of ballets he even achieved more 
 fame than he had as a dancer. 
 
 In 1837, he became Director of the 
 Imperial Academy at Milan, then a very 
 important post in the dancing world, and 
 ten years later he came to England once
 
 3 History of Dancing. 165 
 
 more as " Composer of the Ballets " at 
 Drury Lane, afterwards holding the same 
 appointment at Covent Garden, this latter 
 being the last post of any consequence he 
 held before his death. 
 
 Antonius Augustus Bournonville is chiefly 
 noted as being Denmark's greatest dancer, 
 and also the producer of some very famous 
 ballets. 
 
 Born in Copenhagen in 1805, and brought 
 up in an atmosphere of dancing from the 
 first, being the son of a ballet-master in 
 that city, he soon showed signs of great 
 dancing powers, and after taking some good 
 engagements in his own country he made 
 his debut in Paris at the age of twenty-one. 
 Four years later he was made Director and 
 Ballet-master of the Academy at Copen- 
 hagen, and it was there that he produced 
 those ballets for which his name will ever 
 be remembered. Waldemar, Les Noces, 
 Faust, and the famous Napoli, were among 
 the best known, and they disclosed a new 
 field in the management of the ballet, namely 
 the extent to which perfection in the staging 
 and dressing of it might be carried out.
 
 166 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Next in order come the names of Taglioni 
 and Elssler, perhaps the greatest in the 
 annals of dancing, certainly so in the annals 
 of the ballet. These two great dancers 
 seem by a curious fate to have been brought 
 together all their lives, and the coincidence 
 in relation to them, though not so much 
 noticed during their lives, became very 
 remarkable when looked back to from after 
 years. Taglioni was born in 1809, Elssler 
 a few months later in 1810. Both made 
 their debut in Vienna ; both competed for 
 fame on the Paris Opera stage, and at the 
 same time ; both came over to England, 
 and both appeared at Her Majesty's Theatre 
 under Lumley's management in 1842; both 
 of them left the stage in 1845, and having 
 thus been thrown together at most of the 
 important points of their lives, they both 
 died, old women, in the same year, 1884. 
 
 Taglioni, slightly the elder of the two, was 
 born at Stockholm. The daughter of an 
 Italian ballet-master, her future was cut 
 out for her from the beginning. It seemed 
 destined by fate that she should be a great 
 danseuse, but the stern determination of
 
 A History of Dancing. 167 
 
 her father had also a great influence on 
 her ultimate career. He subjected her to 
 the severest discipline, and from her baby- 
 hood almost she was accustomed to practise 
 a great many hours a day, and to rule her 
 every mode of life with the one view of 
 dancing constantly before her. At length, 
 after ten years of arduous training, she was 
 considered fit to make her debut, and ap- 
 peared in Vienna in June 1822. She made 
 an instantaneous success, which was re- 
 peated at Berlin and other cities in Germany, 
 till in 1827 she reached what was then the 
 culminating point of a dancer's ambition, the 
 Paris Opera. Here she created a perfect 
 furore of excitement, her new style taking 
 all beholders by storm. She was in the 
 habit of wearing "her dancing dress much 
 longer than was the usual custom, and this, 
 combined with certain novel steps and 
 movements of her own, and the fact that 
 by her skill she was able to give a much 
 improved rendering of the routine steps of 
 previous dancers, gave the impression to 
 those observing her that they were watching 
 an entirely new style. Indeed, one writer
 
 168 A History of Dancing. 
 
 in speaking of her has remarked, " She 
 revealed a new form of dancing, a virginal 
 and diaphanous art instinct with an origina- 
 lity all her own, in which the old traditions 
 and time-honoured rules of choreography 
 were merged." 
 
 In 1832 she married the Comte de Voisins, 
 and by this time, too, she had amassed a 
 considerable fortune, which was greatly aug- 
 mented by her English engagements, when 
 for dancing at Her Majesty's and Covent 
 Garden she was said to have received the 
 largest sums ever yet paid to any dancer. 
 Some years later, however, she was drawn 
 into speculation, and lost the whole of her 
 fortune with the exception of a small sum, 
 which she eked out by becoming a teacher 
 of deportment. She spent the latter part 
 of her life at Marseilles, and died there in 
 1884. 
 
 In "Guillaume Tell" and " Robert le 
 Diable " she made her two greatest hits, 
 though Thackeray in " The Newcomes ' 
 especially praises the graces of her dancing 
 in " La Sylphide " ; but for her performances 
 of the Tyrolienne and the Pas de Fascination
 
 A History of Dancing. 169 
 
 in the two former, if for nothing else, the 
 name of Marie Taglioni will always be 
 remembered. 
 
 Fanny Elssler, her great contemporary, 
 was born in Vienna in June, 1810, making 
 her first appearance in the same city at the 
 age of six. Then, and for the next twelve 
 years or so, she danced in company with 
 her sister Theresa, who was slightly her 
 senior, though by no means so skilful in the 
 art, and it was in a great measure due to 
 this elder sister's generous self-effacement 
 that Fanny's splendid dancing became so 
 evident. This sister eventually became the 
 Baroness Von Barnim, though not till some 
 little time after she had ceased dancing in 
 company with Fanny. 
 
 They appeared together in Naples in 1827, 
 and it was here that Fanny made that 
 success which was the means of her getting 
 her first big engagement at Berlin in 1830. 
 Four years later she arrived at the Paris 
 Opera, and by her dancing of the Spanish 
 Cachucha at once sprang into fame. Taglioni 
 was at the same time engaged there, and 
 so there arose a natural rivalry between
 
 170 A History of Dancing. 
 
 them, which was sustained by the fact that 
 neither could for any length of time outvie 
 the other in popularity. 
 
 In 1840, Elssler sailed for New York, and 
 there for two years repeated her European 
 triumphs, after which she made a tour of 
 the capitals of Europe for some years, and 
 then, while still in the height of her fame, 
 she retired and settled in Hamburg, dying 
 many years later in her native home of 
 Vienna. 
 
 Of what may be called the intervening 
 dancers, those who filled in the time between 
 the last of the ballet performers and the 
 dancers of the present day, the figure that 
 stands out clear against the background of 
 all the rest is that of Kate Vaughan. As 
 the pioneer of a new style of dancing, as the 
 inventor, the creator, of all that is best in 
 the dancing of to-day, she would alone have 
 been worth all the admiration and praise we 
 can bestow upon her. But when in addition 
 we remember that her dancing was so 
 superb, so graceful, and so artistic, that in 
 a moment it could sweep aside all the rooted 
 prejudice of years in favour of ballet danc-
 
 A History of Dancing. 171 
 
 ing, and could assert its superiority by sheer 
 force of its own merits, we must unhesitat- 
 ingly place Kate Vaughan as the greatest 
 dancer of her time. And as such her con- 
 temporaries justly proclaimed her. She and 
 Nellie Farren were the great mainstays of 
 the old Gaiety Theatre, and to them prima- 
 rily was its great success due. 
 
 In the recent biography of her husband, 
 Lady Burne-Jones has written, " Another 
 and different vision also flits across my 
 mind in the form of the wonderful dancer, 
 Kate Vaughan * Miriam Ariadne Salome 
 Vaughan/ as Edward called her. Never 
 shall I forget seeing him and Ruskin fall 
 into each other's arms in rapture upon acci- 
 dentally discovering that they both adored 
 her." And a critic reviewing this says, 
 " That Ruskin and Burne-Jones should fall 
 into each other's arms in a transport of 
 enthusiasm for a skirt-dancer seems incon- 
 gruous to us only because we forget that 
 dancing is as natural an expression of emo- 
 tion secular or religious as singing." 
 
 Night after night the theatre drew the 
 eager public to its doors, to see these two
 
 172 A History of Dancing. 
 
 wonderful women, whose personality was so 
 great as to shine out, strong and resplendent, 
 through all the tawdry glitter and make- 
 believe of the stage, and whose many un- 
 recorded acts of kindness to the needy and 
 distressed will perhaps never be known in 
 full, and yet who, when old age at last 
 overtook them, were allowed to sink, one 
 in actual want, and the other with a mere 
 pittance, to the grave. 
 
 This is one of the saddest phases of stage 
 life, this contrast of the successful period of 
 a popular favourite's career, with the too- 
 often latter ending in misery and want. 
 People without thinking are apt to say, 
 " Serves them right, they should have put 
 something by. Look at us ; we are pros- 
 perous in our old age, because we saved." 
 But they forget the very different conditions 
 under which they lived ; they forget that the 
 people of the stage have seldom had that 
 business training, that mercantile sense 
 which almost naturally impels a habit of 
 thrift ; they forget that in the precarious 
 nature of the profession judgment by appear- 
 ances is unfortunately one of the leading
 
 A History of Dancing. 173 
 
 factors of success, and that a certain style 
 has to be kept up even when it is often at 
 heart not wished for ; and lastly, they do 
 not know that from many of these appar- 
 ently glittering incomes commissions of a 
 most usurious and almost incredible nature 
 are too often extracted by theatrical agents, 
 in whom rests practically the sole power of 
 obtaining engagements for them. On the 
 top of all this, it is but little understood 
 that nearly three months in the year, during 
 the summer, there is for seventy-five per 
 cent, of those on the stage no work to do 
 at all, and that, year in and year out, nine 
 months' income has to suffice for twelve 
 months' living, a state of things that surely 
 exists in no other profession. 
 
 But to return to Kate Vaughan. Her 
 theatrical history practically starts with her 
 appearance in the Gaiety Quartette in 1876, 
 though she had been on the stage, occasion- 
 ally dancing and occasionally acting, for 
 some years before this. Her maiden name 
 was Candelon, but she, in company with 
 her sister Susie, took the name of Vaughan, 
 when they helped to form the "Vaughan
 
 174 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Dancing Company," a well-known combina- 
 tion in the early seventies. She had before 
 this studied dancing and acting under Mrs. 
 Conquest at the famous " Grecian," and her 
 first appearance in the "legitimate drama" 
 was with Miss Litton's company at the 
 Court Theatre in 1872. 
 
 Appearing at the Gaiety with Edward 
 Terry, E. W. Royce, and Nellie Farren, in 
 " Little Don Cassar de Bazan," she met 
 with instantaneous success, and from that 
 time forward became the supreme ruler in 
 the Terpsichorean field. Then came that 
 quick succession of burlesques from the 
 pens of some of the readiest and wittiest 
 winters of the day. The names of H. J. 
 Byron, F. C. Burnand, and Robert Reece, 
 will always be associated with the time 
 when the Gaiety was, par excellence, the 
 home of the burlesque ; while later, A. C. 
 Torr, the nom-de-plume of poor Fred Leslie, 
 was constantly found beneath the title of 
 the play. 
 
 In all of these Kate Vaughan won her way 
 into the hearts of the people, and no one was 
 more sorry than her Gaiety audiences when
 
 A History of Dancing. 175 
 
 she relinquished the dancing shoe for the 
 buskin, and joined in her lot with the drama. 
 Had not her dancing prowess so completely 
 overshadowed her efforts in this direction, 
 she might have made a big name for herself 
 as an actress also. As it was, her rendering 
 of Peg Woffington in " Masks and Faces " 
 drew forth the genuine praise of the critics, 
 and in many other parts she showed that 
 she had the capabilities of a great actress. 
 
 But it was in the Gaiety burlesques that 
 her people loved to see her, and many will 
 recall the tumultuous applause that greeted 
 her as Alice in " Dick Whittington " one 
 of her big hits when she made her bow 
 dressed in a lilac-tinted early Victorian cos- 
 tume, with white furs and a big white muff. 
 
 How different was all this to her last 
 days, forgotten and almost unknown, in 
 far-off Johannesburg ! Though she would 
 have been happy to know that some of her 
 old comrades accompanied her to the grave, 
 and among them Edward Terry, the com- 
 panion of her first triumphs, who by a 
 fortunate coincidence was in South Africa 
 at the time.
 
 176 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Among the dancers of the period, or a 
 little later, was Miss Sylvia Grey. She was 
 closely associated at the Gaiety with the 
 productions of " Little Jack Sheppard," 
 " Ruy Bias," and " Cinderellen-up-too-late," 
 to mention some of the best known ; while 
 as Flo Fanshawe she achieved a success at 
 the Prince of Wales' in " In Town." Her 
 dancing was graceful in the extreme, and 
 she wisely understood that to dance with 
 the feet alone does not constitute the whole 
 of the Terpsichorean art. A critic in the 
 " Savoy," an art magazine of ten years ago, 
 wrote, " Sylvia Grey's dance is perfect, from 
 the waist upwards, swan-like in the holding 
 and slow movement of the head and neck, 
 exquisite in the undulations of the torso." 
 Such dancing masters and mistresses as 
 D'Auban, Espinosa, and Madame Katti 
 Lanner can lay claim to a reflected part of 
 her success, for she studied under all of 
 them, and at the last, retiring from the 
 stage, she in her turn began to impart her 
 knowledge to other younger aspirants for 
 dancing fame. 
 
 Of Florence Levy there is little to be
 
 A History of Dancing. 177 
 
 said, except that she contributed her due 
 share as a burlesque actress and dancer to 
 the brightness and general excellence of the 
 Gaiety's performances. 
 
 Katie Seymour was more of a step-dancer 
 than a danseuse of the best type, but so 
 intimately was she connected with all the 
 later Gaiety productions that it would be 
 unfair to pass over her without comment. 
 Originally in a music-hall sketch with the 
 Brothers Home, her dancing, slight as the 
 opportunities were, attracted general notice, 
 and she quickly found a place for herself 
 in the realm of musical comedy. She ap- 
 peared in " Blue Ey'd Susan " at the Prince 
 of Wales', and afterwards in " Joan of Arc " 
 at the Opera Comique. When this latter 
 production was transferred to the Gaiety in 
 1891, she went with it, and from that time was 
 in all the Gaiety pieces until 1901, when she 
 went to America with the " Casino Girl." On 
 her return, she essayed business on her own 
 account, and took a troupe of dancers with her 
 round the " Halls " ; but for some time she had 
 been in failing health, and she died, regretted 
 by all who knew her, in the autumn of 1903.
 
 178 A History of Dancing. 
 
 Miss Letty Lind came to the front by a 
 lucky chance, and it was by the merest 
 accident that we have her as a dancer at 
 all. When she was still unknown to fame, 
 in the days when she was a member of 
 Mrs. Saker's company, she had a song given 
 her in one of the plays. Her voice was, to 
 say the least, never powerful, and she asked 
 if she might do a dance instead. The result 
 was magnificent, and from that time her 
 career was marked out. She had small 
 parts in the Gaiety productions, but in the 
 second edition of " Cinderellen " she took 
 up with great success the name-role, which 
 had been created by Miss Kate James a few 
 months before. From that time she took 
 the leading part at Daly's and other theatres 
 devoted to musical plays, and in whatever 
 little dances she has had to do, has always 
 shown herself a finished performer. 
 
 Of the dancers of to-day, Miss Alice Leth- 
 bridge is in many opinions far in advance of 
 any other dancer on the stage, both in 
 technique and grace, and it is she to whom 
 future generations will look back, as those 
 of the present do to Kate Vaughan.
 
 A History of Dancing. 179 
 
 Learning the stage business and technical 
 details (I was almost saying, " learning her 
 art," but that was surely born in her) under 
 Mr. John D'Auban, she commenced to study 
 while yet a child, and her first engagement 
 in the revival of " Rip Van Winkle " at the 
 Comedy was a child's minor part, in which 
 she had very little to do, though even then 
 a solo dance as a little Dutch girl in wooden 
 sabots caused a genuine applause, and had 
 to be encored. 
 
 Some years later, at the age of fourteen, 
 she appeared in " The Commodore," taking 
 up a part originally created by Miss Phyllis 
 Broughton, and with this company she went 
 to America, in a short-lived tour of seven 
 weeks. Earlier in that year she had been 
 engaged for the part of " Boboski " in the 
 famous comic opera " Falka," an old favourite 
 by that time, in which the chief singing part 
 was undertaken by Herbert Sims Reeves, 
 the son of the famous tenor, and when the 
 piece reached the grand total of a thousand 
 nights she played in the special performance 
 of it given at the Comedy Theatre. 
 
 But it was in the beautiful production of
 
 180 A History of Dancing. 
 
 " Mynheer Jan " at the Comedy that as a 
 dancer she first came to the front, and 
 people began to know that somebody had 
 at last arrived worthy of taking up the old 
 traditions of the art. " Mynheer Jan " took 
 the public fancy from the first, and the 
 opening night saw this bright and tuneful 
 piece firmly set on the path of success. The 
 spectators were most enthusiastic, and their 
 enthusiasm was perhaps raised to its highest 
 pitch when in the second act a novel and 
 difficult dance was brilliantly executed by 
 this new danseuse. Storms of applause 
 greeted her, and they would have encored 
 her many times, but the strain and excite- 
 ment proved too much for the young and 
 then unknown girl, and she fainted while 
 still on the stage. Next morning the papers 
 were full of the new piece, and were un- 
 animous in praise of her dancing, and she, 
 like Byron, awoke to find herself famous. 
 The leading theatrical critic wrote : " But 
 the loudest applause heard throughout the 
 three acts came of the Salterello dance, 
 splendidly executed by Miss Alice Leth- 
 bridge, in the second act. It * brought
 
 A History of Dancing. 181 
 
 down the house,' it had to be repeated, and 
 the delighted spectators clamoured for it 
 a third time, and were only quieted when 
 Mr. Harry Paulton announced that the 
 clever young lady, overcome by her efforts 
 and by the excitement of the occasion, had 
 fainted in the wings." 
 
 Following this well-deserved success, she 
 attracted attention in " Carina " at the Opera 
 Comique, and in " La Prima Donna " at the 
 Avenue, in the cast of the latter piece Albert 
 Chevalier, Harry Gratton and Joseph Tapley 
 being also prominent names. Then came a 
 provincial tour in the musical farce of 
 11 Venus"; Harry Nicholls, Kitty Loftus, 
 Agnes Delaporte, and the famous Belle 
 Bilton (Lady Dunlo) filling a bill of excep- 
 tional strength, and in this her dancing as 
 " Euphrosyne " was one of the features of 
 the performance. 
 
 In " Joan of Arc " she appeared in two 
 roles, as the Duchess d'Alencon in the first 
 edition of the play at the Opera Comique, 
 and as Catherine de Rochelle when, in the 
 zenith of its success, it was transformed to 
 the Gaiety. Other well-known dancers in
 
 182 3 History of Dancing. 
 
 this play were Phyllis Broughton, Katie 
 Seymour, and Willie Warde ; and in the 
 "Era "account of the first night of "Joan 
 of Arc " at the Gaiety special mention was 
 made of the generally excellent dancing in 
 this piece, and among other remarks was the 
 following : " Miss Alice Lethbridge brought 
 down the house by her dainty dancing as 
 Catherine de Rochelle, and some very pretty 
 saltatory exercises were introduced by Miss 
 Katie Seymour, who, with Mr. Willie Warde, 
 the " Bishop of Bovril," won great applause 
 for a remarkable pas de deux in the second 
 act." 
 
 After a brief appearance in the succeeding 
 Gaiety piece of " Cinderella," curtailed be- 
 cause of the Australian engagement, she 
 left England for that famous tour of the 
 Gaiety Company to Australia and New 
 Zealand, which, arranged for twenty weeks, 
 extended to over sixty, and which then only 
 returned on compulsion of other engage- 
 ments at home. What a programme of 
 " stars " that was : E. J. Lonnen, Marion 
 Hood, Bert Haslem, Robert Court ridge, 
 Alice Lethbridge, and other names which
 
 A History of Dancing. 183 
 
 would make any manager's mouth water to 
 mass together now. And how the colonial 
 papers raved about her dancing ; indeed, 
 she had many lucrative offers to remain out 
 there simply as a teacher of the art, but she 
 preferred to stay on in the profession, and 
 so returned to England, and took up the part 
 of Pepita in " Little Christopher Columbus." 
 
 It was in this that she first invented that 
 wonderful " waltz movement " that I have 
 spoken of elsewhere, and it is in this play 
 also that she and E. J. Lonnen dancea their 
 " Marionette Dance," which was one of the 
 biggest hits of the piece, and the popularity 
 of which may be judged from the fact that 
 it was so freely copied in contemporary and 
 succeeding plays. 
 
 Next followed a tour in South Africa, in 
 a dancing sketch with E. J. Lonnen ; and 
 on her return there was a big offer to go to 
 Paris,, where, in the home of dancing, her 
 art might have been appreciated even more 
 than in England; but this she refused, 
 preferring to remain on the English stage. 
 Then came numerous theatrical engage- 
 ments in the provinces ; and, in the inter-
 
 184 A History of Dancing. 
 
 vening times, tours with the big productions 
 of George Edwardes' musical comedies ; and 
 dancing solos in " San Toy," " The Toreador," 
 and " The Country Girl," are among her latest 
 successes. 
 
 Miss Lethbridge, as well as being one of 
 the most graceful of dancers, is also one of 
 the most vivacious, two things that are com- 
 patible only in those who have a perfect 
 mastery over the art, and, far from dancing 
 with her feet only, she literally seems to 
 dance all over, the quick movements of her 
 arms, hands, and even her eyes, being all 
 in perfect accord with the rhythm of the 
 music. Sallust once blamed a woman for 
 dancing too well ; what would he have said 
 could he have seen her ! And with all this 
 vivacity there is so much refinement in her 
 dancing that her name has become typical 
 for all that is best in the dancing of to-day. 
 
 Her usual dances are, of course, waltzes 
 and gavottes, as these lend themselves best 
 to her style ; and among her chief per- 
 formances have been the revolving waltz 
 movement, her marionette dance, a wonder- 
 ful " fire-dance " in a Christmas production
 
 A History of Dancing. 185 
 
 at the Theatre Royal, Birmingham, and 
 some very clever and beautifully executed 
 " Shadow Dances," by means of reflected 
 lights. 
 
 Miss Topsy Sinden has by sheer hard 
 work pluckily won for herself a permanent 
 place in musical comedy, and has proved 
 herself quite worthy of the position. Her 
 first appearance was in one of Sir Augustus 
 Harris' pantomimes at Covent Garden, after 
 which she appeared in the musical extrava- 
 ganza of "The Old Guard" at the Avenue 
 in 1887. She then had small dancing parts 
 in some of the Gaiety pieces, " Cinderella," 
 4< Don Juan," etc. ; and in " In Town," at 
 the Prince of Wales'. At the Prince of 
 Wales' also she appeared in " The Gaiety 
 Girl," and, coming to the front as a dancer, 
 was transferred to Daly's, where she has 
 had big parts since. 
 
 Miss Mabel Love should, of all people, 
 have excelled in the art, for she is the 
 daughter of a former danseuse at the Gaiety. 
 A pupil of Mr. D'Auban for dancing, and of 
 Miss Carlotta Leclerq for gesture and the 
 dramatic art, she had all that could be
 
 
 186 A History of Dancing. 
 
 
 
 desired to help her, and it was not surprising 
 when her dancing performances began to 
 attract attention. She appeared in one or 
 two pieces at the Gaiety, and then obtained 
 two big parts at the Lyric, succeeding Miss 
 St. Cyr and Miss Lethbridge in "La Cigale " 
 and " Little Christopher Columbus " respec- 
 tively. Since then she has appeared in 
 several other musical plays, and has had a 
 number of pantomime engagements ; but 
 lately she has taken to the drama, and at 
 the time of writing is appearing in " Sweet 
 and Twenty " in the provinces. 
 
 " Place aux dames," I find, has been my 
 motto in this chapter, and up till now I 
 have left the gentlemen severely alone. 
 Perhaps this is because one is apt to forget 
 that there are such things as male dancers, 
 since so few men take up as a profession 
 stage-dancing purely and simply. Nearly all 
 of them combine with it either teaching or 
 else singing and low-comedy business. But 
 one cannot leave an account of the later 
 dancers, without mentioning such names as 
 John D'Auban, E. W. Royce, Willie Warde, 
 and E. J. Lonnen.
 
 A History^ of Dancing. 187 
 
 Mr. D'Auban has been for many years 
 ballet-master and director of the dances at 
 Drury Lane, besides* frequently taking a 
 leading part in them himself. I remember 
 seeing a particularly fine performance of his 
 in a " dance of the savages " in one of the 
 pantomimes there a few years back, and 
 was much struck by his agility. Irrdeed, 
 " Punch " once wrote a little verse about 
 him, which went as follows : 
 
 " Mr. Johnny D'Auban, 
 He's so quick and nimble 
 He'd dance on a thimble 
 He's more like an elf than a man." 
 
 But it is as a dancing master that his 
 name is best known, and so famous have 
 his pupils become that a certain type of 
 dancing is now always known as that of the 
 " D'Auban scfiool." Practically all the stage 
 dancers I have mentioned in this chapter 
 have been pupils of his, and among those 
 whose fame has not been won by dancing 
 the names of Mrs. Langtry, Miss Mary 
 Anderson, a/id Mr. W. S. Gilbert, may be 
 mentioned as having appeared on his books. 
 
 The reminiscenced of Mr. E. W. Royce
 
 188 A History of Dancing. 
 
 naturally extend back over a number of 
 years, though he did not actually appear on 
 the stage until after he had reached " years 
 of discretion," as he had not been brought 
 up with any thought of dancing as a profes- 
 sion. His first appearance was at the old 
 Lyceum in 1860 under Oscar Byrne in the 
 '* Peep o' Day," and at that time, of course, 
 the Italian Opera dancing was in full swing, 
 and naturally his sympathies lie with the 
 old-fashioned ballet. And from a male 
 dancer's point of view, his advocacy of the 
 ballet over the present stage dancing is un- 
 doubtedly right, as it gave opportunities of 
 dancing such as a man never gets on the 
 stage to-day : but I must still repeat that 
 for a woman the ballet was, to my mind, 
 ungraceful and inartistic in the extreme. 
 
 Referring to the dancers of former years, 
 he has often told me that in his opinion the 
 secret of their success was that they knew 
 when to leave off. They executed their 
 pirouettes, their entrechats, their arabesques, 
 and then, before they had time to get stale in the 
 eyes of the audience, they made their bow, 
 and the dancing for the evening was finished.
 
 
 3 History of Dancing. 189 
 
 But in those days the dancing was the 
 feature of the performance, and the people 
 were on the qui vive to watch for new steps, 
 new movements ; and with the cheering 
 knowledge that every single person in the 
 audience was interested in one's perform- 
 ance, it must have been an easier thing to 
 be a dancer then than it is now. As a 
 writer in one of the weekly papers recently 
 wrote : " Then singing was not the sole 
 attraction of the opera, for the great dan- 
 cers had as great a following as the singers 
 of to-day. In those times dancing was an 
 art, and was studied affectionately. Its tradi- 
 tions were respected and handed down." 
 
 Mr. Royce's last appearance in the Italian 
 Opera was under the management of Gyes 
 in 1876, and later in the same year he went 
 to the Gaiety to help form the famous 
 " Quartette." 
 
 From that time he became known as the 
 greatest dancer in England, and, old as he 
 now is, he might have been dancing yet had 
 not he been stricken with paralysis in the 
 height of his fame. The attack, though not 
 severe, was sufficient to destroy any ideas
 
 190 A History of Dancing. 
 
 of continuing on the stage as a dancer, and 
 though he returned to the Gaiety in 1864, 
 he found he was t unable to perform the 
 movements which he had formerly executed 
 with ease. He then turned his attention to 
 the drama, and to the teaching of dancing, 
 in both of which pursuits he has met with 
 considerable success. He has had the train- 
 ing of many now famous pupils, and on the 
 stage his performance of the Miser (Shiel 
 Barry's great part) in " Les Cloches de 
 Corneville," has elicited the greatest praise. 
 
 Mr. Willie Warde is a brother-in-law of 
 Mr. D'Auban, which alone might certify to 
 his knowledge of the art of dancing, but it is 
 as composer of the ballets at the Gaiety that 
 his name has become a great one in the danc- 
 ing world. He himself, like most dancing 
 masters, is also an expert dancer, and many 
 of his performances at the Gaiety and the 
 Empire will be remembered. 
 
 Of the late E. J. Lonnen it is impossible to 
 say too much, for though an actor rather 
 than a dancer nor would he have ever 
 termed himself a dancer his dancing powers 
 were most marked. Directly he commenced
 
 3 History of Dancing. 191 
 
 any dancing steps, whether merely as a break- 
 down accompaniment to a song or as a pas 
 seul pure and simple, one could see that he 
 was a finished performer. Born and reared 
 to the stage, he knew the ins and outs of the 
 profession better than any other actor of his 
 time, and having in addition an undoubted 
 genius for acting, it is no wonder that he 
 achieved the success he did. 
 
 His first part in a musical play was in 
 " Falka,'' at the Avenue, where his metier was 
 quickly discovered, and from henceforward 
 comic opera, or its later development, musical 
 comedy, held him right up to the time of his 
 death. The mere mention of such plays as 
 " Miss Esmeralda," " Faust- up-to-date," and 
 " Carmen-up-to-date," will at once recall him 
 to whoever saw them, for whether in a minor 
 part or in a leading one, his personality on the 
 stage was sure to impress itself on the spec- 
 tator ; while such songs as " Killaloe " or 
 " The Bogie-man " have not quite died away 
 yet, and the life of a comic song usually ends 
 with the run of the piece. 
 
 Other dancers who are also actors are 
 Fred Wright, Junior ; Harry Grattan, equally
 
 192 A History of Dancing. 
 
 clever with pen, pencil, dancing or acting; 
 Bert Sinden, a brother of Topsy Sinden ; and 
 that veritable genius, Fred Storey, whose 
 magnificent acting of " Rip Van Winkle," is 
 said to almost equal Jefferson at his best, 
 whose scenic paintings for some of the big 
 productions at " His Majesty's " and else- 
 where are works of real art, and whose 
 dancing, though eccentric, is skilful in the 
 extreme. 
 
 Lastly a word as to Eugene Stratton. 
 This clever comedian is always regarded as 
 an actor and comic singer, but few people 
 realise that had he never sung a song or done 
 any acting, he must still have made a name 
 for himself as a dancer. His dancing is per- 
 haps the most graceful of anyone now on 
 the stage, and for lightness of movement he 
 is unequalled. One seems unconsciously to 
 listen for some slight sound of his footsteps 
 on the boards, but they never make any, they 
 are absolutely inaudible, and like the leaves 
 fluttering down from the trees, they float 
 about and finally settle without a sound.
 
 A History of Dancing. 
 
 193 
 
 With this account, scanty as it is, of those 
 who have helped to make the history of 
 dancing, I must say " finis " ; satisfied if, in 
 bringing before you the dances of the past, I 
 have also been able to show you what a 
 beautiful thing good dancing still may be.
 
 194 A History of Dancing. 
 
 LITERATURE. 
 
 TabourePs Orchesographie. Said to have 
 been written by a monk under an anagram. 
 1589. 
 
 Orchestra. A poem on dancing, by Sir John 
 Davies. 1596. 
 
 Chorography or Orchesography. The art of 
 dancing notation. Re-written in 1700 by 
 M. Feuillet and translated into English in 
 1700 by Weaver. 1598. 
 
 Des Ballets Ancient et Modernes. By Le 
 Pere Menestrier. 1681. 
 
 An Essay towards a History of Dancing. 
 By Weaver. 1712. 
 
 Pamphlets on Orchesography. By Sir John 
 Gallini. 1726. 
 
 Lettres sur La Danse et Les Ballets. By J. 
 G. Noverre. 1760. 
 
 La Dance, Ancienne et Moderne. By M. de 
 Cahusac. 1754.
 
 3 History of Dancing. 195 
 
 L,e Maitre a Danser. By Rameau. 1760, 
 Le Triomphe de Grace. By Querlon. 1774. 
 
 Code of Terpsichore. By Carlo Blasis, 1830, 
 and a second series in 1847. 
 
 A Book on Ball-room Dances. By M. 
 Cellarius. 1894. 
 
 The Theory of Theatrical Dancing. By 
 Stewart D. Headlam. 1888. 
 
 Also 
 De Saltatione. By Lucian. 
 
 De Arte Gymnastica. By Hieronymus 
 Mercurialis. % 
 
 Lettres sur les Arts Imitateurs. By Noverre ; 
 and books on dancing by Edward Scott 
 and M. Vuillier.
 
 196 
 
 A History of Dancing. 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Albigenses 
 
 22 
 
 Fabula: Atcllamc 
 
 37 
 
 Alhambra 
 
 111-112 
 
 Fairies, Dancing of.... 
 
 127 
 
 " Almack's " 
 
 146-150 
 
 Fandango 
 
 86 
 
 Almetis 
 
 29 
 
 Fiji, Dances of 
 
 24-75 
 
 Astronomic Dance 
 
 29 
 
 
 
 
 
 "Gaiety Quartette," 
 
 
 Bacchanalian Dances 
 
 19 
 
 the 
 
 117 
 
 Baltazarini 
 
 98 
 
 Gaiety Theatre 
 
 118 
 
 Batbyllos 
 
 38 
 
 Galop 
 
 148 
 
 Beau Nash 
 
 139 
 
 Galleotti, Vincenzo.... 
 
 105 
 
 Beauchamp 
 
 136 
 
 Gardel, Maximilian.... 
 
 104-163 
 
 Bergonzio di Bottn.... 
 
 97 
 
 Genee, Adeline 
 
 113 
 
 Bhils 
 
 72 
 
 German Waltzing 
 
 147 
 
 Blasis 
 
 163 
 
 Gleemen 
 
 41 
 
 Bolero 
 
 86-87 
 
 Grattan, Harry 
 
 191 
 
 Bournonville 
 
 105-165 
 
 Grey, Miss Sylvia 
 
 124-176 
 
 Byron 
 
 145 
 
 Guatemala, Bailc, the 
 
 68 
 
 Cachucha 
 
 88-89 
 
 Hart-Dyke,Miss Wini- 
 
 
 Cake- Walk 
 
 76 
 
 fred 
 
 125 
 
 Camargo 
 
 100-163 
 
 Haye, the 
 
 51 
 
 Cellarius 
 
 149 
 
 Herodias' Daughter... 
 
 32 
 
 Cerito 
 
 107 
 
 Hornpipe 
 
 79 
 
 Chaucer 
 
 42 
 
 
 
 Children, Dancing of.. 
 
 126 
 
 Jig, the 
 
 83 
 
 Cicero 
 
 114 
 
 
 
 Clog-dancing 
 
 130 
 
 Kaffir Dancing 
 
 73 
 
 Cotillon 
 
 154 
 
 Karpeia 
 
 34 
 
 Cushion Dance 
 
 52 
 
 Kissing 
 
 60 
 
 
 
 " Kissing- Dance," the 
 
 52 
 
 David, Dancing of 
 
 31 
 
 
 
 D'Auban 
 
 187 
 
 Lanncr, Madame 
 
 113 
 
 De Medicis, Katherine 
 
 98 
 
 Lancers 
 
 153 
 
 Dervishes 
 
 23 
 
 LaVolta 
 
 55 
 
 Dionysia 
 
 19 
 
 Lethbridge, Miss Alice 
 
 117-122 
 
 Duvernay 
 
 108 
 
 Levy,MissFlorencel24 
 
 ,178-184 
 
 
 
 Lind, Miss Letty 
 
 124-178 
 
 Egg Dance 
 
 43 
 
 Lonnen, E. J 
 
 183-190 
 
 Elsster 
 
 109-169 
 
 Louis XIV. & XV 
 
 99-100 
 
 Empire 
 
 112 
 
 Love, Miss Mabel 
 
 125-185 
 
 Etruscan Dances 
 
 37 
 
 Lucian 
 
 129 
 
 Eumcnidcs, Dance of 
 
 35 
 
 Lully 
 
 99
 
 A History of Dancing. 
 
 197 
 
 
 PAOE. 
 
 
 PAOE. 
 
 Madagascar, Dancing 
 
 
 St. Cyr, Miss Mimi.... 
 
 124 
 
 in 
 
 24 
 
 Salii, the 
 
 21 
 
 Maneros 
 
 28 
 
 Salle, Mademoiselle... 
 
 100 
 
 Masks, Dancing 
 
 104 
 
 Santal Dance 
 
 67 
 
 Masques 
 
 56 
 
 Saraband 
 
 88 
 
 Maypole, the 
 
 44 
 
 Scaliger 
 
 22 
 
 Mazurka 
 
 153 
 
 Seguidillas 
 
 88 
 
 Menestrier 
 
 100 
 
 Serpentine Dance 
 
 130 
 
 Minuet 
 
 136 
 
 Seymour, Miss Katie 
 
 177 
 
 Miriam, Dancing of.... 
 
 30 
 
 Sinden, Miss Tops}'.... 
 
 125-185 
 
 Morris, the 
 
 46 
 
 Sir Roger de Coverley 
 
 156 
 
 ' Mummers," the 
 
 41 
 
 Socrates 
 
 36 
 
 
 
 Storey, Fred 
 
 192 
 
 Noverre 
 
 103-160 
 
 Strathspey 
 
 82 
 
 
 
 Stratton, Eugene 
 
 192 
 
 Osiris 
 
 28 
 
 Sword-Dance 
 
 83 
 
 Ovid 
 
 121 
 
 
 
 Pacific Islands, Dan- 
 
 
 Taglioni 109-166, 
 Tarantella 
 
 167-168 
 89 
 
 cing of 
 Pas de Quatre 
 Passamezzo 
 
 68 
 155 
 135 
 
 Tasmania, Dancing in 
 Terpsichore 
 Terry, Edward 
 
 74 
 13 
 119 
 
 Pavane 
 
 134 
 
 Todas 
 
 24 
 
 Peruvian Dance 
 
 66 
 
 
 
 Phuiakians, Dance of 
 
 32 
 
 Vaughan, Miss Kate. 
 
 
 Plato 
 
 129 
 
 118-120, 
 
 170-173 
 
 " Playford's Dancing- 
 
 
 Veddahs, the 
 
 23 
 
 Master " 
 
 158 
 
 Vestris 
 
 100-161 
 
 Polka, the 
 
 148 
 
 
 
 Pylades 
 Pyrrhic Dance 
 
 38 
 33 
 
 Washington Post, the 
 Wright, Fred 
 
 126 
 191 
 
 
 
 Waldenses 
 
 22 
 
 euadrille 
 
 143 
 
 Waltz 
 
 144-146 
 
 uinault 
 
 99 
 
 Warde, Willie 
 
 190 
 
 
 
 Wedding Dances* 
 
 51 
 
 Reel, the 
 
 81 
 
 Willis' Rooms 
 
 146 
 
 Rock-Dancing 
 
 130 
 
 
 
 Roscius 
 Roundel 
 
 114 
 50 
 
 Xenophon 
 
 36 
 
 Royce, E. W 
 
 117 
 
 
 
 Russian Dances., 
 
 91 
 
 Yucatan, Dance of 
 
 74
 

 
 
 I 
 
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