Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 13, 1902.djvu/288

272 through the night the minstrels would sing old songs of war and love round the fire; and the hill-men would dance in, [sic] circles, expanding and contracting with their flowing clothes and springy gait.

These dances of the mountaineers (known as drīs) are graceful and dignified, and are accompanied by a kind of chant, a Dom playing the drum sitting in the middle of the circle. Among the camel-men from the plains, the dances (jhamar) often take a comic and less dignified form. As the fun grows fast and furious the drummer becomes inspired with a fiendish excitement, and the circle breaks up into a number of groups; some dance in couples and some singly, but all continue to revolve round the centre. Some sit down on the ground, squatting and hopping like frogs; some hop round on one foot, and all shout out "Whash en whash!" some making strange squeaking and piping noises with their mouths. But the hill-men do not indulge in these antics, but rather despise them.

The Doms belonging to the various tribes are much in evidence on these occasions, and are generally well rewarded by the chiefs. Sometimes other performers appear. I remember an old mountaineer, a Durkānī, who was celebrated for his powers as a mimic. He was known familiarly as "Gurkh," or Wolf, and had a son, a boy whom he called "Tholagh," or Jackal, who was very nearly as clever as his father: these men would personate some well-known characters among the Baloches, each impersonation being greeted with shouts of laughter. They would also imitate English officers, but this it was not easy for us to get a sight of; they were shy, and perhaps the performances were not always complimentary. But once I witnessed a representation of the great Sandeman, or Sinneman, as they called him. He had a big bag of rupees in one hand, and a thick stick in the other, and gave money to some while he whacked others, which gave a popular idea of his method of combining conciliation with punishment.