Whirling Dervishes are educated for their curious calling. Mr. H. C. Ostrander is authority for the statement that an apprenticeship of a thousand days is considered a necessary preparation for proper performance of this apparently simple act of devotion. Since nothing whatever is attempted in step beyond that which the ballet-dancers call “Italian turns,” it must be supposed that the art of the Whirling Dervish has qualities that do not appear on the surface. It is taught in monasteries scattered through the mountainous regions.
The Caucasus, that land less known than fabled, has dances of a fame as persistent as it is vague. Its map is dotted with names immortalised in the Arabian Nights. It is the setting of Scheherazade and Sumurun; a region whose inhabitants declare their intention never to become Occidentalised, and whom no power is likely to push in any direction. Being under the Czar’s dominion, most of its few visitors are Russians; they alone among Occidentals possess any definite knowledge of its choreography. Princess Chirinski-Chichmatoff, at present making it an object of special study, writes the following in reply to an inquiry from the authors:
“Lezginkà, the Oriental Dance of the Caucasus, was born in the mountains of a beautiful country whose nature is wild and grandiose; among a people courageous and energetic, who have preserved much of the savagery and temperament of the Oriental races.
“The men of these people ... have the custom of never parting from the poniard. They pass the greater part of their time horseback, always prepared to meet an enemy and to defend the happiness and honour of the family. To this day they retain the custom of answering for every spilling of blood with a revenge; each victim has his victim. There still exists the custom of abducting the fiancée from the paternal house and carrying her away to one’s own. The women have all the timidity of beings who live under the strongest of despotism. They have preserved all the softness and grace of daughters of the Orient, with body accustomed to careful attention and not to any physical work; who seek only to rest, to look at themselves, and to enjoy the gifts by which they are favoured by nature and usage. Under this exterior the woman keeps covered many passions which sleep until the first moment of provocation, when they break forth like the eruption of a volcano—surrounding her with fire that sweeps with it any imprudent one that happens to be near. Passion is the principal theme in the life of an Oriental woman, and that sentiment she can vary like a virtuoso....
“You see her quiet, beautiful, relaxed, in the calm of a great fatigue, with softness enveloping face and movements. Suddenly one detects an unusual sound, a look cast, a movement—she is fired, she becomes fierce and wild like all the Nature around her. You see before you a tigress, beautiful, live and strong, ready to spring on the prey, playing and attracting, making mischief and exhausting herself at the same time. After which her movements become few, slow, tired and melancholy.”
“Thus is Oriental dancing built on contrasts; sentiments and moods change unexpectedly. Gentle, relaxed and melancholy, of a sudden it is brusque, animated, fiery. It has much coquetry, passion, and often tragedy.”
In India dancing is sharply divided into the classes of sacred and profane. In the latter division are to be
