Page:Popular Music of the Olden Time, Volume 1.pdf/189

 The tunes of Cushion-Dances (like Barley-Breaks) have the first part in, and the last in time. The earliest printed copy I have found is in Tablature de Luth, intitulé Le Secret des Muses, 4to., Amsterdam, 1615, where it is called Gaillarde Anglaise. In Nederlandtsche Gedenck-Clanck, Haerlem, 1626, the same air is entitled Gallarde Suit Margriet, which being intended as English, may be guessed as “Galliard, Sweet Margaret.’ It is the following:—

The Galliard (a word meaning brisk, gay; and used in that sense by Chaucer) is described by Sir John Davis as a swift and wandering dance, with lofty turns and capriols in the air. Thoinot Arbeau, in his Orchesographie, 1589, says that, formerly, when the dancer had taken his partner for the galliard, they first placed themselves at the end of the room, and, after a bow and curtsey, they walked once