What Folk Song Says of Folk Dance

What Folk Song Says of Folk DanceAuthor(s): Violet AlfordSource: Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society, Vol. 4, No. 6 (Dec., 1945), pp. 232-246Published by: English Folk Dance + Song SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4521228 .

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What Folk Song says of Folk Dance

By VIOLET ALFORD

CAN folk song teach us anything about folk dance ? Looking through hundreds of songs for another purpose I can answer the question quite certainly. Yes. Sprinkled here and there. We can, if we look, find in verse what were and are the dances of the people who sing the songs, what sort of people dance them, on what days and for what occasions they are performed, and even what steps are used.

The simplest, the oldest, the foundation dance, is certainly the Round, a circle when closed, a chain when opened. We know it from early Greek sources, notably at- Delos when Theseus and the designated victims of the Minotaur returned from Crete; possibly from Paleolithic days, although I cannot myself subscribe to that opinion on the oft-quoted dance of hooded women about a small male figure, in the rock shelter at Cogul. The Ring dance, probably used for magic purposes such as tracing the passage of the sun across the Heavens for fertility, putting that passage into reverse, or widdershins, for blighting fertility, for seasonal rites, for civic cere- monies, lived and lives all over the world. In the Middle Ages in Europe it became so popular that everybody danced it, peasants and gentry, court and country alike- for the further one goes back the smaller the division between folk and non-folk. In Western Europe it was the Carole, in Eastern Europe the Kolo, Hora, Horo, all these but different deviations from the classical Greek name xopos, that Chorus which swung round the circular dancing floor at the Dionysiac festivals, and later round the still circular orchestra below the stage of the theatre. The Carole was extraordinarily popular all through the I3th, I4th and I5th centuries when it changed into the Branle, and some early mentions of it are found in English song, folk and otherwise. The words sung to a danced Carole of I350 begin by describing the ring formation-

Hound in hound we shalle us take, And joye and blisse schulle we make.'

The joy and bliss must have degenerated into licence, and the clerical writer of a strangely puritanical work which he called Handling Sin, of about 50 years earlier, could not express his disapproval loudly enough.

Daunces, Karols and Somour Games Of many swych come many shames,

he writes in his joy-crushing manner worthy of the puritan Stubbs of later date, and adds more vitriolic remarks about the gay clothes people delighted to wear " in Karol to go."

Greene. The 1Parly English Carols. 232



In Switzerland that name persists todav as Coraule, particularly in the Gruyere region, but it is from Denmark that we learn most about this dance. In the massed treasure of Danish balladry mention is made again and again of the Ring dance, how it was sung, who sang and danced it. The picture is chiefly of the noble way of life, the lowest rank mentioned is a Swain, a country gentleman who came below a Knight in Danish aristocracy. Knights and Princesses were the leaders and the cantors.

It was the King's daughter sang the Round.2

The King was listening and looking from his " tower strong," and to him floated the sound of dancing and singing. He asks

" Who is yon Knight who leads the dance, And louder than all the song he chants ? " 3

It is probable that the very ballads which supply our information were sung for Ring dances. Long Norwegian sagas are still used for dancing as we know, and the same thing applies to the Faroe Islands. An,other from Denmark tells us more.

Gay went the Round by Brattingsborg Where champions danced amain. There danced with oaktree in his belt Sivord, the purblind swain.4

On seeing this supernaturally strong, although apparently love-bemused hero thus decked, the Queen, leaning from hei window, merely remarked that he " had brought a bit of green." If champions danced without ladies, ladies did the same, their hanging sleeves embroidered in French knots, which must have been for their own pleasure as they were without partners to admire the effect.

.... the sleeves with knots were bound, Fifteen maidens a-dancing the Round.5

When the Round opened and turned into a single line the leader sometimes bore a cup in his right hand, his left holding his partner's right hand as she followed second in the file.

There dances Sir Stig, as light as a wand, With a silver cup in his white hand.6

Exactly thus today the leader of the Basque Farandole carries a bouquet to mark his authority on ceremonial occasions, a wedding, a feast, or at the end of the Corpus Christi celebrations. In most parts of the Basque country this is called the String Dance, Dantza Khorda, sometimes the Street Dance, Karrika Dantza, either name denoting the long, single thread of dancers. In Provence too, supposed home of the

2 A. Olrik. A Book of Danish Ballads. I939.

3Prof. J. Steenstrup. The Medieval Popular Ballad. Trans. E. G. Cox. i8gi. 4Olrik. op. cit. 5 ibid.

Steenstrup. op. cit.

233



Farandole, a flowered stick or bouquet carried by the young leader, an unmarried spark, proud of his position as coq du village, and each of these leaders, like the Danish Sir Stig, is " as light as a wand," leaping, pirouetting, performing improvised pas battus, brise's, entrechats, in all their glorv at the head of the string. A wall-painting in Orsley Church, Denmark, of a Carole (circa I400) shows the leader and the last man carrying some sort of rosette of office, so we may infer that this is a widespread custom of long tradition.

South-western France is the country of Rondes, closed and open, and there are still leaders of the ancient dance. A verse from Poitou admonishes

Vous qui menez la Ronde Menez-la rondement; 7

Which you may be sure he did. It tells us that it is an open-air dance on the grass, which the treading will not harm, for that would be unthinkable to French peasant minds.

Foule, foule, foulons i'herbe, L'herbe foul6e reviendra.

And to make quite sure that the Ring can open into the Farandole, they sing

Sautons a la Ronde Tant que la Ronde sera longue!

Dances other than the Carole are well described in many languages. In Denmark again it was customary on certain occasions for Knights to dance with drawn swords in their hands to honour the ladies. They constantly crossed their swords-perhaps for couples or ladies to pass underneath. The Knights must " tread high " as did Anne Boleyn, and afterwards her daughter in the famous Galliard with the Earl of Leicester, and again our Ambassador to the Court of Spain, when he danced " in the English lofty manner ' at a ball at Valladolid, much to the surprise of the dignified Spaniards. The " dancing English " never had much taste for the Basse Danse, always preferring the active high treading like the Danish Knights.

They danced all on the wold, (Now tread ye high, my lordlings all) There danced the Knights so bold. The maidens must be honoured in the dance.8

And a maiden, whether through malice or by mistake we can learn from the full ballad, got wounded in the hand.

There danced the Knights of pride, With swords drawn by their side,

Out it slid, the shining brand And wounded the maid in her lily-white hand."

ILeon Pineau, Le Folk-Lore du Poitou. I892.

8 Olrik. op. cit. 9 ibid.

234



From another ballad we learn a little more.

Gay went the dance in the kirkyard there; There danced Knights with sword-blades bare, There danced maidens with hair unbound; It was the King's daughter sang the Round.10

The compiler gives a note calling this a Sword Dance, which of course it was in a sense, but not a ritual Hilt-and-Point Sword Dance as we know it. But we can gather a good deal of information from these verses. The first dance with swords was an open- air dance, out on the wold, which means, I think, one of those wind-swept heaths of Denmark, over which the gales and the brine from the Baltic work their will, and it looks as though the Knights, like the champions at Brattingsborg, performed alone, the maidens they were to honour standing round. The second took place in the Churchyard, which as we know, was frequently a meeting place for drinking, feasting and dancing, activities carried over from the days of pagan temples on the sites of which numberless Christian churches were built. Equally numberless are the ecclesiastic prohibitions against using the kirkyard for Summer Games, Robin Hood, Morris Dances and such popular rag-tag-and-bob-tail; drunken and uproarious no doubt, yet innocuous compared to that Priest of Inverkeithing, who in the I3th century himself led a fertility dance through his kirkyard, his parishioners openly carrying female fertility symbols. Witch trials up to the I7th century show how desperately people clung to the old religion, precariously keeping a foot in either camp.

Other Danish dances named in ballads are the Wooing Dance, a popular medieval dance-theme, and the Lucky Dance. We see the ladies and maidens dancing these alone, out of doors, while the Swains (those gentlemen of rank lower than Knights) played some ball game. Strange they were not tempted into the Wooing Dance:

Gay on the wold at eventide There danced the ladies all, With Wooing Dance and Dance of Luck, While the Swains they played at ball.

The maidens trod the Lucky Dance So lightly o'er the lea, When the King of the Wends with all his ships Came sailing in from sea.'1

These two dances are not described, but no luck came of either of them. The pagan Slav stole two of the maids, and carried them off up the Baltic to his dark, Wendish kingdom beyond the Prussian forests.

At an Albert Hall Folk Dance Festival visiting Norwegians once showed a Torch and Garland Dance, men bearing the first, women the second, all singing their own vocal accompaniment, one of those lengthy sagas already mentioned. This was not a Ring dance but was composed of procession-like figures, and was used at Norwegian weddings of old-the Kyndeldans or Torch Dance. A medieval ballad gives us a picture of a Midsummer dance by Danish Knights and Squires bearing torches, and-

10 ibid.

I1 ibid.

235



probably ladies-holding garlands of red roses. This is surely akin to the Norwegian wedding dance, but seems to have been a Ring as a Knight led it and sang the song:

Midsummer night upon the sward Knights and Squires were standing guard; In the grove a Knightly dance they tread With torches and garlands of roses red.

Then come two verses already quoted:

To the King in his tower strong Floats the noise of the dancing throng.

" Who is yon Knight who leads the dance And louder than all the song he chants ? "

More is known of the Beggar Dance, which with the Lucky Dance again appears in the ballad of " Hagen's Dance."

Stand up, stand up, my merry men And Knights so keen, And step for me a Beggar Dance In the meadows green.

So stately dances Hagen.

So merrily goes the Beggar Dance On the plains outside the wall; Maidens are stepping the Lykke-Dans And Knights are playing ball.12

And in the story of Proud Signelil and Queen Sophie we read

When to the Castle gate she chanced She saw them dancing the Beggar Dance.

Twice they danced the dance around, The Queen stood gazing at her spellbound.

Sad at heart then was the Queen When Signelil danced by the side of the King.13

So it must have been a Ring. This Beggar Dance was equally popular in Holstein, the German province which marches with Denmark, and in that country the directions were "All couples dance a Round, either clockwise or counter-clockwise, while one couple stands in the middle and mimes." A Betteltanz was still in use for weddings in Bavaria in I886 and may be still, for in spite of the bad odour of the Nazi Strength through Joy, one useful work it really did-its local organisations revived folk dances all over Germany, from valuable ceremonial performances such as the Rothenburg Shepherds' Dance to the most foolish little Reigen in the Black Forest. Whether the regimented ex-members will care ever to do them again remains to be seen. The

12 Steenstrup. op. cit. 13 ibid.

236



Betteltanz was already popular in the i6th century; its tune, given by Franz Bdhme,7 was that of a song, " The Beggar," beginning

Der reich Mann war geritten aus, Da kam ein Bettler fur sein Haus ; Der bat die Frauen um ein Gab Dass sie ihm gab von ihrer Hab.

The rich man had ridden out, There came a beggar to his house; The housewife found a gift To give him from her store.

The Beggarman was an adventurer in disguise, and the wife, left alone at home gave him many gifts, herself included. As may be imagined the words are scurrilous enough, but whether the dancers sang them, or contented themselves with the tune played on an instrument, we do not know. However, since a couple in the middle mimed some scene it seems likely the words were sung, and the coming of the Beggar- man acted. The Scottish " Gaberlunzie Man," supposed to have been written, and indeed enacted incognito, by James V, bears a strong resemblance to this German Beggar. Percy tells us this was but one of the many Beggar ballads of Scotland " too licentious to be admitted" to his collection. The theme seems to have been a favourite one in Northern Europe.

Before we leave the Rounds open and closed, we must examine one constantly mentioned in the folk songs and ballads of Catalonia. The Contrap'as is an open Round, a single file of dancers stepping a few steps one way, a few the other, hardly moving from the place on which they began. There is a leader, man or woman, who has to remember a very long divino, or sacred song, for the Contrapas, deserting its original Farandole nature, became in the early igth century a religious dance, done outside the Church after Mass, sometimes led by the parish clergy. The song was in the form of question and answer sung antiphonally, most doleful and as un- suitable for dancing as anything I have ever heard. It began in this way:

Leader or first file. For thy sins thou shalt be punished If thou dost not repent of them.

Second file. For thy sins thou shalt be punished If thou dost not confess the truth.

It is now dead or dying-although I had a copy of the words given me at Mont Louis in the French part of Catalonia-but has meanwhile given birth to the Sardana. The Ring closed up, the doleful verses gave place to the first of the Sardana tunes.'& These were plain and somewhat dull, as perhaps the dance was at first. Little by little the exciting drumbeats dominated rhythm and structure, till composed Sardana airs became hypnotic and inflammatory at the same time. It will be interesting to see what civil war and Franco have done between them to this choreographic expression of the Catalan spirit. Both the songs quoted must belong to the late iSth or early igth century, before the language was settled by its literary renaissance then

14 Geschichte des Tanzes in Deutschland. 5 See my article "The Farandole," this journal, Vol. I, No. i.

237



beginning. So the Contrap6as mentioned should have been a religious one, accompanied by its dismal Divino.

. . .ella esta a la finestra El Peyrot la va a cerca. " Baixa tu, Mariagneta, Ballarem un ContrapAs A pesar del qui feste ja." Mentres feya'l ContrapAs El Josep passa la plasseta. . . . ella que baixa'ls uvA terra.16

. . . She is at the window Young Peter goes near " Come down, Mariagneta, We will dance a Contrapas In spite of those who feast." While they danced the Contrapas Joseph went through the little plaza

. . . She turned her eyes to the ground.

Un Contrapas voldria fe. Pels Ausonenchs comensare.

(Tal la la la Tarafra) L'hereu Cumay bon brib6 n'e Y l'hereu March no hi espatlla re; El Capit6 bon mesure, En Solallonch bon cassad6 n'e, En Coll de Camps no hi espatlla r6.17

etc.

I will do a Contrapas. I will begin by " Ausonenchs."

(Tal la la la Tarafra) The Cumay heir is a good rascal And the March heir is not afraid of anything; The Captain keeps good time, Don Solallonch is a great sportsman, Don Coll de Camps is not afraid.

I must admit that neither of these reads like a Divino dance outside the Church- Joseph could not have suspected his Mariagneta of anything of an amatory nature while she was singing about her sins, and if they were all groaning under evil con- sciences how came the numerous gentlemen in the second example to sing " Tal la la la Tarafra ?

There is a greater variety of dances in Catalonia than in any country I know, not excepting prolific Andalucia. A few are named in Catalan song. One of the best known is the Ball Pla, the Low Dance, perhaps a descendant if only in name, of the medieval Basse Danse. It is often a Round, sometimes a pair dance, the couples moving round a circle. In the fastnesses of Andorra, where one might hope for purity of tradition, I found the Ball PIla confused with the Contrap6as, and called indes- criminately by either name-a sure sign of decay. Men began alone, girls were led into the second figure, and this developed from the Round into the Chain, tracing volutes about the place and ending in a tightly wound up Snail. At La Lordella the Ball Pla probably superseded a more elaborate Carnival dance-rite, for it is done only at that season, and is accompanied by two pairs of ritual characters, the con- trasted Pretty Ones, gaily dressed and dancing well, and the Dirty Ones, Brut and Bruta, ragged and dirty, parodying the first pair. The women are men of course, and such double but contrasting characters are frequently met with in folk dance- dramas, notably at Imst in Austria, where the Beautiful and Ugly Perchten match with the Basque Masquerade Beaux and Noirs.

Mila y Fontanals. Romancillo Catalan. 17 ibid.

238



In a poor-style song called " Compensation," a young lady pointed her toes so elegantly all through the Ball Pla that a whole verse is given to her pointing:

A la plassa fan balladas A la plassa d'Ampurda, Ella'l punteja, l'punteja Ella'l punteja '1 Ball Pla. Ella'l repuntaja, '1 repunta Y'l torna a repuntej A.18

On the plassa they are dancing On the plassa of AmpurdA, She points, points her toe, She points her toe in the Ball PlI She points again and points again And she comes back to point again.

Another Catalan girl uses a heel and toe step:

Mirensela comm balla De punta i de talo. El vent de sas fandillas Don ayre al ballad6.19

Look at her how she dances On her toes and on her heels. The wind from her skirts Fans her partner.

More interesting than these steps are three ceremonial dances mentioned in three folk ballads:

El fadri maj6 L'ha n'ha treta en dansa, El Mitjenseret Porta las morratxas, El mes petitet Aygua, arr6s tirava.20

The eldest young man Does not go into the dance, The middle one Carries the morratxas, The youngest one Sprinkles water and rice.

A morratxa is an elegantly shaped glass receptacle with four slender spouts used for sprinkling, the large mouth being stoppered with a bouquet or ribbons. Some- times it is footless, and as the name denotes, is one of those small and lovely objects bequeathed to Spain by Moorish craftsmen. The aygua of the song is scented water- also a Moorish legacy. I never saw rice thrown, but the custom may have died. Next we hear of ramallets, those sprigs or bouquets of artificial flowers which every man must present to his partner. They are laid out on a table and must be paid for. It is queer to see these frightful little artifieial sprays being worn with pride, or carried between the lips, when all around are roses and carnations, even orange and lemon blossom, and in the high villages exquisitely scented wild marjoram, lavender or great white and gold cistus. But Mediterranean taste often lapses. The presenting of the ramallet is a ceremonial prelude to a dance, not a dance in itself. For instance I had one presented to me with a handful of sugared almonds, by the Bear-leader at Arles- sur-Tech, before the Bear rite began. But whatever dance may follow it is apt to be called a Ball de Ramallets.

. . . .un ramallet de fl6s, Ella estava pensativa Si las prendria 6 n6.21

. .. A spray of silk flowers, She was thinking Whether to take it or no.*

(* Because its acceptance often means an engagement of marriage).

18 ibid. 19 ibid.

20 ibid. 21 ibid.

239



The third ceremonial dance I find is The Cocas: A la plassa ballen Cocas.22 In the plaSa they are dancing the Cocas.

The Cocas, cakes, like the bouquets are laid on a table, and no girl may enter the dance unless her partner has presented her with these queer insignia. A note to this song speaks of a ram de seda-a spray of silk flowers-and tells us that the dance of the Cocas was really the Ball Rodd, a Round Dance.

Catalan romances go into wonderful detail as though the singers found nothing too small to relate. I myself frequently remarked an extraordinary knowledge of, and respect for, minute details of ritual in that country, on both sides of the frontier. We hear for example that the Monday after Quinquagesima is a day of dancing:

We went to Santa Llucia To see the Aplech.23

This lkst word, full of Catalan savour, means a dance-feast, when people come pouring in from the country round on purpose to dance. El Galan Sincero, the Sincere Lover, says

Per las Carnestoltas Yo ya tornar6 En farem balladas A n'el teu carre.24

For Carnival Already I will return While they are doing dances In thy street.

and goes on to describe the correct manner of dancing three consecutive dances with the same partner-a custom which is still obeyed by polite village society, and which I experienced at a Shrove Tuesday ball on a town plafa:

La primera dansa Yo'm tu ballar6, La segona dansa Anir6 molt be, La tercera dansa Me despedir6. 25

The first dance I will dance with thee, The second dance Will go very well, The third dance I will bid farewell.

And, from Northanger Abbey, we remember that in Jane Austin's time two consecutive Country dances were always danced with the same partner-one more small corroboration of the constant influenee of town on country and vice versa. Other days for dancing are sung:

For St. Anthony dances there are; For St. Maurice the Cobla comes.

and On St. Mark's Day they dance on the pla9a; Every Sunday and feast day we have grand balls.26

Dancing Catalans indeed! a title shared with the English whose 13th century Carole says

Ledd I the daunce a Mysomur Day I made smale trips soth for to say.27

22 Pelay Briz. Cansons de la Terra. 23 Mila y Fontanals. op. cit. 24 ibid.

25 ibid. 26 ibid. 27 Greene. op. cit.

240



Catalans are not so much concerned with dancing on Midsummer Eve as with lighting their thousand bonfires and leaping through them, rolling blazing brushwood down steep slopes, and brandishing huge torches, swinging them round and round following the track of the sun. I have seen Rondes danced round the summer solstice fire after the leaping over it, but this was at the Basque end of the Pyrenees, and it finished with the much-used

Rentrez en danse, Faites une r6verence; Faites un pas, joli pas, Qui tu veux t'embrassera.

This suddenly opened into a long Farandole which instantly disappeared down the street out of the firelight into the dark, in a mysterious and exciting manner. I never saw them come back. Perhaps they never did.

The Ball de Bastons is the Bacca Pipes jig of Catalonia. It is danced over two crossed sticks as its name shows. None of the Bacca Pipes analogous dances are half so tricky as ours, for you cannot snap sticks in two, nor a couple of crossed belts, by touching them with your toe, neither will a sword and scabbard break in pieces. This sort of " little " dance is chiefly used in inns for amusement, and for a show of skill, and the copla or verse which mentions the Catalan example is actually sung during the performance. It and the dance are called El Hereu Riera, the Heir of the Riera family.

Lo ball de bastons qu'l sabra ball. ?

L'hereu del Riera que'l sabrA ballA.

The Stick Dance, who will know how to dance it ?

The Riera heir, he will knowhowto dance it.

Catalans occasionally deign to look beyond their own rich traditions. Well-known dances from other parts of the Peninsula are sometimes indulged in. For instance we read of " Cansons y de Follias," and

Si volen ballar Corrandas Veneu al nostre carrer, Que las Xicas s'enamoran Dels fadrins que ballan be.28

If you want to dance Corantos Come into our street, That the girls may fall in love With the young men who dance well.

These are not Catalan specialities, for Follias are known in the south and west of Spain, and occasionally in Portugal. They are gay, not to say wild dances, and need a feast day and food and drink to work the people into the right mood for them. The Corranda may be a rustic descendent of the Coranto, which besides being a Court dance was a dance-form used by many composers.

We also hear of the wide-spread Fandango and the old fashioned ballroom dance, the Allemande.

Sab balla lo pardalet, lo fandango y I'Allemanya, ab la punteta del peu lo sarrell ne voleabe.29

She knows how to dance does the little Sparrow The Fandango and the Allemande, With a pointed foot Her skirt flies round her.

28 Pelay Briz. op. cit. 29 Mila y Fontanals. op. cit.

24I



And in a Catalan romance called " To the tune of a Zapateado" we hear of the Chacona and the Sarabande. The Zapateado is both an Andalucian folk dance and a gipsy dance consisting largely of complicated and rapid shoe-tapping, as the name denotes. This, like so many of the amazingly conventionalised traditional dances of southern Spain, was already well developed in the days of Cervantes, for at a wedding in the country he saw young men " playing tricks with the soles of their shoes when they dance." A Country dance is mentioned in the song about going to the Aplech, of which I now quote more.

SonA una Contradansa Perque'ns puga alegra - El Batile de San Marti Quiere impedir que bailen.

A Country dance was played To make us happy; The Churchwarden of St. Martin Would like to prevent us.dancing.

A French mention of the Country dance shows us an old lady forgetting her place and meeting with the disdain, even hatred, so often meted out to their elders by cruel "jeunesse" in that douce France.

. . . .thrust herself into the dance At the gay young people's ball; She dragged into the Country dance The most charming young man of them all.30

We find also many references to music for dancing, and to the instruments used. One verse already quoted says

For St. Maurice Day the Cobla comes.

The Cobla, as I have written elsewhere, is the regional band composed of tiny fiavioles (pipes) and miniature drums. Added to these pixy-like sounds are the strident prima and tenor which give such a flavour to outdoor performances, a comet and other brass, and oddly enough a doublebass. This mixture of instruments is known on both sides of the frontier, in French and Spanish Catalonia, and is at its most exciting when playing Sardanas. Another song says

When I was very young, Flaviole and drum, The flaviole of gold The drum of fine silver.

To turn to a Spanish romance in the Castillian language we read of

An Aragonese girl who played her guitar So well that the King might dance to it. The Chacona and the Zaraband; Not very pretty nor very plain, Not very dark nor very fair, Not very tall nor very small, Not very ignorant nor very learned.3'

In fact very ordinary but a good guitarist.

30 Syl. Tr6bucq. La Vie Rurale. *3 Duran. Romancero General, No. 1727.

242



The old Spanish bagpipes, still played in Galicia, Aragon and a few other provinces, are not forgotten, the tambourine and castanets of course come into play.

To the bagpipes danced Gila Played by Anton Pascual; If dancing makes one changeable Oh, how well she will dance! Dance strongly, dance softly, That's the way to dance; To leap about all the time Will tire out anybody. Gila took the tambourine, But the sound comes ill And she would like the pipes again But she cannot find them. Snaps the castanets does Gila And with the rattle of them Gives a stab to Bartolo, A disdainful look at the others, At Traguada and Juan Polaina, Both of them her admirers.32

Here we have a miniature portrait, a little jewel of caustic observation. Exactly thus do southern Spanish girls in their flounced and trained dresses, dotted with spots as big as five-shilling pieces, a carnation in their hair, another between their lips, flout their partners. The " cross-overs " in a Sevillana are marked, not by any sign of pleasure or acceptance of adoration, but by a heavy frown, a tragic mien, a furious flash from passionate dark eyes. The patient, agile man spreads wide his arms to frame his dazzling bailarina, falls on a knee, even full length at her feet, while he never cease to hammer out the syncopated rhythm, but no smile will part her sullen lips. The atmosphere of the small, stifling dancing-booths on the fair-ground is thunderous. It is impossible for northerners to grasp the meaning of so strange a dance-soul.

The Hungarian fiddler, however, watchfully nursing his herdsman dancer, gazing into his face, feeling into his feelings, understands the desperate conception of the dance which makes the Spanish Flamenco and its accompanying Cante Jondo so tragical an expression of popular art.

Play Gypsy, play more loud and faster, Play till your tight strings break; Though feet may fail the dance shall last For the mad music's sake.33

To this we may add the uncontrollable yearning for the dance depicted in many songs. A widespread example of which is " Sur le Pont du Nord." The daughter, mad to go dancing, forbidden or warned by her mother, is joined by her brother. They put out in a small boat to join the dancers and both are drowned. This tragedy

32 ibid. No. i86i. 33 A. M. Wiliams. Studies in Folk Song and Poetry.

243



" for the mad music's sake" occurs in many languages. An equally desperate cry is that of the girl in the Springel Tanz, both German and Danish.

0 Mother to the dance I must, Dear Mother I must go; For hark, how beat the much-loved drums And how the pipers blow.34

A more sophisticated, not to say malicious, longing is felt by a Pyrenean bride.

Up on the mountain, my mother, Up on the mountain, I hear the sound of the fiddle.

If you go dancing, my daughter, If you go dancing Your husband will beat you.

Let him beat if he will, my mother, Let him beat if he will, I will beat back.

Says the mother warningly,

If you beat back, my daughter, If you beat back The ass will run.

This, of course, means that the age-old Charivari or Rough Music, will come out, and that the wife-beaten husband will be compelled to ride the donkey seated back- wards looking towards its tail. The dance-bewitched bride cares nothing for such a disgrace. She may as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb, and instantly replies

If the ass runs, my mother, He shall carry horns on his head.

-in place of the husband.

We will end as we began, in old England. The I4th century Carole told us " hand in hand we shall us take," and three hundred years later in a well-known song of the early part of the reign of Charles II we see the Ring dance as popular as ever. But it has developed not a little from the hand-in-hand Round. Now it boasts Up the Middle and Back, Sides All and Arms All. Scoffing, in the amusing but deeply in- grained manner of all Northerners at all Southerners all over Europe, the North Country Lass sings complacently

They never can be half so merry as we When we are a-dancing of Sellenger's Round! 35

34 Prior. Ancient Danish Ballads. 35 Chappell's Popular Music of the Olden Time, Vol 2.

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This more elaborate style of the old thing was so much liked that it appears again and again, notably in the composed but popiular " Come Lasses and Lads " of I672.

" Begin," says Hal, "Aye, aye," says Mall, " We'll lead up Packington's Pound." " No, no," says Noll and so says Doll, " We'll first have Sellenger's Round." Then every man began To foot it round about, And every girl did jet it, jet it, Jet it in and out.38

Packington's Pound," a highly popular tune appears in Queen Elizabeth's Virginal Book, and several i6th and I7th century collections. Many sets of words were written to it, but Chappell gives no directions as to its figures. But if they " led up " it must have opened with Up a Double. The " jet it, jet it in and out " sounds some- thing like a jete, but means I think, a hey without handing. This is another develop- ment and does not occur in Sellenger's Round. A verse from " Round about our Coal Fire," I734, gives the name of the historical " Cuckolds all a-row," now more politely called " Hey Boys up go we," which, the well known reference tells us,8" Pepys saw danced at Court by King Charles himself; This Country dance for fo'ur was followed by a Branle and a single Coranto, that dance we heard of even in Catalan folk song.

The Coal Fire words given by Chappell for this tune run

Then to the hop we'll go Where we jig and caper, Cuckolds all in a row, Who will pay the scraper ?

A composed ballad of Elizabeth's day (I569) gives us a good picture of the Morris with their Whiffler or Piper, comparing this ritual dance with the recreational Round much to the detriment of the latter. It is not of the folk and betrays its lettered authorship.

A band of bells in bawdrick wise Would deck us in our kind-a, A shirt after the Morris guise, To flounce it in the wind-a; A Whiffler for to make the way And May brought in with all-a Is braver than the sun I say, And passeth Round or Braul-a. 38

The same thing is done for the Country dance, in one of that spate of songs and ballads composed through the I7th century in admiration of simple English things, though generally in an artificial vein. " Joan to the Maypole " draws the interesting

36 ibid.

37 Diary, Dec. 3 I, I662. 38 Chappell. op. cit. Vol I.

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comparison already mentioned between French low steps and the " high and composed" manner of the English.

Lately I went to a MIasque at Court Where I saw dances of every sort; There they did dance with time and measure, But none like a Country dance for pleasure; They did dance as in France, Not like the English lofty manner. 39

Another version of the same verse is worth quoting for it brings out further points.

Joan, shall we have a Hay or a Round, Or some dance that is new-found ? Lately I went to a Masque at Court Where I saw dances of every sort, Many a dance made in France, Many a Braule and many a Measure. 40

Of the Scottish Lowland " Cockelbie Sow'" I will not write for it would need an article to itself, and is moreover as " composed " as the ballads quoted above. Strange it is, but beyond such lines as

Each lad takes his lass All on the green grass,

and a very few other vague acknowledgements that Country people do dance, I find not a single detailed reference to the dancing of the Dancing English in their own folk songs.

39 ibid., quoting from Pills to Purge Melancholy. 40 ibid.

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Documents

What Folk Song Says of Folk Dance