smaller number to the upper; an ambitious crown to the whole is sometimes seen in the form of a peacock with spread wings. The structure is supported by a rod running down the bearer’s back, and fastened to him by belts. Its weight prohibits any movement to which the word “dancing” applies except as a convenience; but a series of slow and necessarily careful evolutions performed by the wearers of these displays is called a dance, nevertheless. Meantime the “fierce Perchten,” made up with masks as demoniac as possible, run about among the legs of the crowd and do their best to startle people. The spirit accompanying the celebration is levity, modified only by the sincere admiration considered due the serious decorations. They represent a great deal of work and considerable money.
In various parts of Savoy is performed on St. Roch’s Day what is called the Bacchu-ber. On a platform erected in front of a church, and decorated with garlands and fir-trees, a group of men dance with short swords; passing under bridges of swords, forming chains by grasping one another’s weapons, and so on. That its origin is pre-Christian seems a reasonable conjecture; but nothing specific is known about it.
Munich celebrates with dancing an episode connected with an epidemic of cholera: the guild of coopers decided that the care the people were taking against exposure was defeating its purpose, since it was keeping them indoors to the detriment of health. They therefore went out and enjoyed themselves as usual, for the sake of example. Others did the same, and the plague ceased. Periodically the brave coopers are honoured, therefore, by dances of large companies of people, who carry garlanded arches and execute triumphal figures.
