1789.—"... dancing girls who display amazing agility and grace in all their motions."—Munro, Narrative, 73.
c. 1812.—"I often sat by the open window, and there, night after night, I used to hear the songs of the unhappy dancing girls, accompanied by the sweet yet melancholy music of the cithára."—Mrs. Sherwood's Autobiog. 423.
[1813.—Forbes gives an account of the two classes of dancing girls, those who sing and dance in private houses, and those attached to temples.—Or. Mem. 2nd ed. i. 61.]
1815.—"Dancing girls were once numerous in Persia; and the first poets of that country have celebrated the beauty of their persons and the melody of their voices."—Malcolm, H. of Persia, ii. 587.
1838.—"The Maharajah sent us in the evening a new set of dancing girls, as they were called, though they turned out to be twelve of the ugliest old women I ever saw."—Osborne, Court and Camp of Runjeet Singh, 154.
1843.—"We decorated the Temples of the false gods. We provided the dancing girls. We gilded and painted the images to which our ignorant subjects bowed down."—Macaulay's Speech on the Somnauth Proclamation.
(a). A boatman. The term is peculiar to the Gangetic rivers. H. and Beng. ḍānḍi, from ḍānḍ or ḍanḍ, 'a staff, an oar.'
1685.—"Our Dandees (or boatmen) boyled their rice, and we supped here."—Hedges, Diary, Jan. 6; [Hak. Soc. i. 175].
1763.—"The oppressions of your officers were carried to such a length that they put a stop to all business, and plundered and seized the Dandies and Mangies' [see [MANJEE]] vessel."—W. Hastings to the Nawab, in Long, 347.