Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 5 1887.djvu/256

248 if not quite, extinct. It formed a portion of a kind of ballet which followed a drama founded on an incident in the history of Delhi in the olden time.

The performers consisted of an equal number of men and boys; long scarves of two or more colours were attached to the summit of a high pole which was erected on the stage, each person who took part in this dance held one of these scarves; whilst moving most gracefully they described certain figures, thereby causing the different scarves to entwine themselves, and form various patterns, which was of course only possible by keeping time and all making precisely the same movements. It is singular to find an almost identical dance existing in three widely-separated continents: the May-pole dance of Europe, the pole and ribbon dance of the Deccan, and the Baile de la Conta, or ribbon-dance of Yucatan, would all appear to have had a common origin. A very interesting account of the latter appeared in 1884 in the Queen newspaper.

Strutt, writing at the beginning of the present century, says that the May-games were no doubt the relic of a more ancient custom practised by the heathens in honour of the goddess Flora.

Stowe, in 1605, speaks of them thus: "In the month of May, the citizens of London of all estates generally in every parish, and in some instances two or three parishes joining together, had their several mayings ..... with good archers, morrice dancers, and other devices for pastime all day long ..... these great mayings and May-games were made by the governors and masters of the city, together with the triumphant setting up of the great shaft, or principal may-pole in Cornhill before the parish church of St. Andrew, which was thence called St. Andrew Undershaft."

Philip Stubs, a writer who was contemporary with Stowe, inveighs strongly against the maypole, which, as he says, "they covered all over with flowers and hearbes bound round with strings from the top to the bottome, and sometimes it was painted with variable colours, having two or three hundred men, women, and children following it with great devotion, it being drawn along by twentie or fourtie yoke of