Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 5 1887.djvu/303

Rh dances with quick steps; both the dance and its accompaniment remind one of the Scotch reel, and the music which belongs to it; another dance is very like the Highland sword-dance. Occasionally the women dance alone, forming two long lines advancing to and receding from each other. One man sometimes acts as their leader, and directs the figures; the procession winds and unwinds itself like the coils of a serpent. We have here an exact representation of one of the secular dances of Ladakh or Western Tibet. According to the code of etiquette observed by these Greek peasants, no man is permitted to touch the hand of a girl, therefore each of these latter carries in her waistband a small white silk scarf, embroidered at both ends with red and blue silk; when a man dances with her, she holds one end of this scarf and he the other. The greater the number of embroidered aprons a Greek peasant woman or maiden can show the greater is her presumed wealth or her diligence. We were told that a girl's value in the matrimonial market is estimated by this standard. On occasions like the one described above, the women and girls bring their whole stock of aprons with them: they go aside and change them between each dance. The movements of the women are necessarily slow, for they wear what we call Turkish slippers, which have no heels to them; but some of the men, when dancing with them, put a great deal of animation into their steps.

We have drawn attention to the great similarity which some of the secular dances of Greece bear to those of Asia. We will now turn to Spain,—a country which, in the physical aspect of its southern portion, and in many of the customs of its inhabitants, forcibly recalls Eastern lands and Oriental manners. So strong is the resemblance, that when travelling in the south of Spain it is difficult to imagine ourselves still in Europe; we think and speak of France, Germany, and Italy as Europe, and their inhabitants as Europeans, but we