Page:Modern Greek folklore and ancient Greek religion - a study in survivals.djvu/243

 diameter. The method by which these bells are attached to the belt is remarkable, and is designed to permit a large number of them to be worn without being in any way muffled by contact with the cape. Each bell is fastened to one end of a curved and springy stick of about a foot in length, and the other end is inserted behind the belt from above; the curve and elasticity of the stick thus cause the bell to hang at some few inches distance from the body, free to jangle with every motion of the dancer. Some sixty or seventy of these bells, of various sizes, are worn by the best-equipped, and the weight of such a number was estimated by the people of the place as approximately a hundredweight—no easy load with which to dance over the narrow, roughly-paved alleys of 'steep Scyros.' Those however who lack either the prowess or the accoutrements to share in the glorious fatigue do not abstain altogether from the festivities; even the small boys beg, borrow, or steal a goat-bell and attach it to the hinder part of their person in lieu of a tail, or, at the worst, make good the caudal deficiency with a branch from the nearest tree.

Thus in various grades of goat-like attire the young men and boys traverse the town, stopping here and there, where the steep and tortuous paths offer a wider and more level space, to leap and dance, or anon at some friendly door to imbibe spirituous encouragement to further efforts. In the dancing itself there is nothing peculiar to this festival; the swinging amble, which is the gait of the more heavily equipped, is prescribed by the burden of bells and the roughness of roads. The purpose of the leaping and dancing is solely to evoke as much din as possible from the bells; and prodigious indeed is the jarring and jangling in those narrow alleys when the troupe of dancers leap together into the air, as high as their burdens allow, and come down with one crash.

Since I first published an account of these festivities in Scyros, similar celebrations of carnival-time have been reported from other places; at Sochos in Macedonia the scene is almost identical with that which I have described; in the district of Viza in Thrace a primitive dramatic performance was recently observed in which the two chief actors wore similar goat-skins, masks, and