“Ahloo! ahloo!” again cry the dance queens; and coming together in the middle of the ring, they once more lift up the arch, and stand motionless.
“Ahloo! ahloo!” Every link of the circle is broken; and the girls, deeply breathing, stand perfectly still. They pant hard and fast a moment or two; and then, just as the deep flush is dying away from their faces, slowly recede, all round; thus enlarging the ring.
Again the two leaders wave their hands, when the rest pause; and now, far apart, stand in the still moonlight like a circle of fairies. Presently, raising a strange chant, they softly sway themselves, gradually quickening the movement, until, at length, for a few passionate moments, with throbbing bosoms and glowing cheeks, they abandon themselves to all the spirit of the dance, apparently lost to everything around. But soon subsiding again into the same languid measure as before, they become motionless; and then, reeling forward on all sides, their eyes swimming in their heads, join in one wild chorus, and sink into each other’s arms.
Such is the Lory-Lory, I think they call it; the dance of the backsliding girls of Tamai.
While it was going on, we had as much as we could do to keep the doctor from rushing forward and seizing a partner.
They would give us no more “hevars” that night; and Rartoo fairly dragged us away to a canoe, hauled up on the lake shore; when we reluctantly embarked, and paddling over to the village, arrived there in time for a good nap before sunrise.
The next day, the doctor went about trying to hunt up the overnight dancers. He thought to detect them by their late rising; but never was man more mistaken; for, on first sallying out, the whole village was asleep, waking up in concert about an hour after. But, in the course of the day, he came across several whom he at once charged with taking part in the “hevar.” There were some prim-looking fellows standing by (visiting elders from Afrehitoo, perhaps), and the girls looked embarrassed; but parried the charge most skilfully.
Though soft as doves, in general, the ladies of Tamai are, nevertheless, flavoured with a slight tincture of what we queerly enough call the “devil”; and they showed it on the present occasion. For when the doctor pressed one rather hard, she all at once turned round upon him, and, giving him a box on the ear, told him to “hanree perrar!” (be off with himself.)
CHAPTER LXIV.
MYSTERIOUS
There was a little old man of a most hideous aspect living in Tamai, who, in a coarse mantle of tappa, went about the village, dancing, and singing, and making faces. He followed us about wherever we went; and, when unobserved by others, plucked at our garments, making frightful signs for us to go along with him somewhere, and see something.