Page:Hutcheson Macaulay Posnett - Comparative Literature (1886).djvu/124

 Let us pass from the hunting-grounds of the Red Indian to the Mir, or village community, of Russia. It is a fine spring day, and the girls of the Mir have determined to hold their "circle" or Khorovod, their village festival of blended dance and song. In holiday dress they are now streaming towards the open space where the Khorovods are held—the choros, or "dancing ground," of the commune, as a Greek of the Homeric age would have called it. "When the appointed spot is reached," says Mr. Ralston, in his Songs of the Russian People, "they form a circle, take hands and begin moving this way and that, or round and round. If the village is a large one, two Khorovods are formed, one at each end of the street; and the two bands move towards each other, singing a song which changes, when they blend together, into the Byzantium-remembering chorus, 'To Tsargorod will I go, will I go; With my lance the wall will I pierce, will I pierce.'" Little dramas, too, we might see these Khorovods performing, if we had time. But we must pass on to another picture of communal song-dances; only let us note in passing how the singing and dancing are of greater import than the words or the authorship of the song. The village, like the tribal, community has far less to do with written poetry and personal authorship than with the dramatic dance.

But now we are in Sparta, spectators of the Gymnopædia, or festival of "naked youths." Large choruses of men and boys are taking part in the festival; and, as in medieval towns the burghers assisted at the mystery-plays, the general body of the Spartan citizens joins in the song and dance, and has not yet become mere onlookers at a professional performance. The boys in