Mean Temperature 59·67.
June 15.
Summer Merriment.
To the Editor of the Every-day Book.
Sir,—You have inserted in vol. i. p. 559, an interesting account of the Morris Dance in the “olden times,” and I was rather disappointed on a perusal of your extensive Index, by not finding a “few more words” respecting the Morris Dancers of our day and generation. I think this custom is of Moorish origin, and might have been introduced into this country in the middle ages. Bailey says, “the Morris Dance is an antic dance performed by five men and a boy, dressed in girl’s clothes.” The girlish part of it is, however, more honoured in “the breach than the observance.”
In June, 1826, I observed a company of these “bold peasantry, the country’s pride,” in Rosoman-street, Clerkenwell. They consisted of eight young men, six of whom were dancers; the seventh played the pipe and tabor; and the eighth, the head of them, collected the pence in his hat, and put the precious metal into the slit of a tin painted box, under lock and key, suspended before him. The tune the little rural-noted pipe played to the gentle pulsations of the tabor, is called
“Moll in the wad and I fell out,
And what d’ye think it was about”
This may be remembered as one of the once popular street songs of the late Charles Dibdin’s composition. The dancers wore party-coloured ribands round their hats, arms, and knees, to which a row of small latten bells were appended, somewhat like those which are given to amuse infants in teeth-cutting, that tinkled with the motion of the wearers. These rustic adventurers “upon the many-headed town,” came from a village in Hertfordshire. Truly natural and simple in appearance, their features, complexion, dress, and attitude, perfectly corresponded. Here was no disguise, no blandishment, no superhuman effort. Their shape was not compressed by fashion, nor did their hearts flutter in an artificial prison. Nature represented them about twenty-five years of age, as her seasoned sons, handing down to posterity, by their exercises before the present race, the enjoyment of their forefathers, and the tradition of happy tenantry “ere power grew high, and times grew bad.” The “set-to,” as they termed it, expressed a vis-à-vis address; they then turned, returned, clapped their hands before and behind, and made a jerk with the knee and foot alternately,