Part 8
(_b_) The following is an account of the dance as it was known in Derbyshire amongst the farmers' sons and daughters and the domestics, all of whom were on a pretty fair equality, very different from what prevails in farm-houses of to-day. The "Cushion Dance" was a famous old North-country amusement, and among the people of Northumberland it is still commonly observed. The dance was performed with boisterous fun, quite unlike the game as played in higher circles, where the conditions and rules of procedure were of a more refined order.
The company were seated round the room, a fiddler occupying a raised seat in a corner. When all were ready, two of the young men left the room, returning presently, one carrying a large square cushion, the other an ordinary drinking-horn, china bowl, or silver tankard, according to the possessions of the family. The one carrying the cushion locked the door, putting the key in his pocket. Both gentlemen then went to the fiddler's corner, and after the cushion-bearer had put a coin in the vessel carried by the other, the fiddler struck up a lively tune, to which the young men began to dance round the room, singing or reciting to the music:--
Frinkum, frankum is a fine song, An' we will dance it all along; All along and round about, Till we find the pretty maid out.
After making the circuit of the room, they halted on reaching the fiddler's corner, and the cushion-bearer, still to the music of the fiddle, sang or recited:--
Our song it will no further go! The Fiddler: Pray, kind sir, why say you so? The Cushion-bearer: Because Jane Sandars won't come to. The Fiddler: She must come to, she shall come to, An' I'll make her whether she will or no.
The cushion-bearer and vessel-holder then proceeded with the dance, going as before round the room, singing "Frinkum, frankum," &c., till the cushion-bearer came to the lady of his choice, before whom he paused, placed the cushion on the floor at her feet, and knelt upon it. The vessel-bearer then offered the cup to the lady, who put money in it and knelt on the cushion in front of the kneeling gentleman. The pair kissed, arose, and the gentleman, first giving the cushion to the lady with a bow, placed himself behind her, taking hold of some portion of her dress. The cup-bearer fell in also, and they danced on to the fiddler's corner, and the ceremony was again gone through as at first, with the substitution of the name of "John" for "Jane," thus:--
The Lady: Our song it will no further go! The Fiddler: Pray, kind miss, why say you so? The Lady: Because John Sandars won't come to. The Fiddler: He must come to, he shall come to, An' I'll make him whether he will or no!
The dancing then proceeded, and the lady, on reaching her choice (a gentleman, of necessity), placed the cushion at his feet. He put money in the horn and knelt. They kissed and rose, he taking the cushion and his place in front of the lady, heading the next dance round, the lady taking him by the coat-tails, the first gentleman behind the lady, with the horn-bearer in the rear. In this way the dance went on till all present, alternately a lady and gentleman, had taken part in the ceremony. The dance concluded with a romp in file round the room to the quickening music of the fiddler, who at the close received the whole of the money collected by the horn-bearer.
At Charminster the dance is begun by a single person (either man or woman), who dances about the room with a cushion in his hand, and at the end of the tune stops and sings:--
Man: This dance it will no further go. Musician: I pray you, good sir, why say you so? Man: Because Joan Sanderson will not come to. Musician: She must come to, and she shall come to, And she must come whether she will or no.
Then the following words are sung as in the first example:--
Man: Welcome, Joan Sanderson, welcome, welcome. Both: Prinkum-prankum is a fine dance, And shall we go dance it once again, And once again, And shall we go dance it once again? Woman: This dance it will no further go. Musician: I pray you, madam, why say you so? Woman: Because John Sanderson will not come to. Musician: He must come to, and he shall come to, And he must come whether he will or no.
And so she lays down the cushion before a man, who, kneeling upon it, salutes her, she singing--
Welcome, John Sanderson, &c.
Then, he taking up the cushion, they take hands and dance round singing as before; and this they do till the whole company is taken into the ring. Then the cushion is laid down before the first man, the woman singing, "This dance," &c., as before, only instead of "come to," they sing "go fro," and instead of "Welcome, John Sanderson," &c., they sing "Farewell, John Sanderson, farewell," &c., and so they go out one by one as they came in.--Charminster (_Notes and Queries_, ii. 517, 518).
This description is almost the same as a seventeenth century version. The dance is begun by a single person (either man or woman), who, taking a cushion in his hand, dances about the room, and at the end of the tune he stops and sings:--
This dance it will no further go.
The Musician answers:
I pray you, good sir, why say you so? Man: Because Joan Sanderson will not come to. Musician: She must come to, and she shall come to, And she must come whether she will or no.
Then he lays down the cushion before a woman, on which she kneels, and he kisses her, singing--
Welcom, Joan Sanderson, welcom, welcom.
Then he rises, takes up the cushion, and both dance, singing--
Prinkum-prankum is a fine dance, And shall we go dance it once again, Once again, and once again, And shall we go dance it once again.
Then, making a stop, the wo(man) sings as before--
This dance, &c. Musician: I pray you, madam, &c. Woman: Because John Sanderson, &c. Musician: He must, &c.
And so she lays down the cushion before a man, who, kneeling upon it, salutes her, she singing--
Welcom, John Sanderson, &c.
Then, he taking up the cushion, they take hands and dance round, singing as before. And thus they do till the whole company are taken into the ring. And then the cushion is laid before the first man, the woman singing, "This dance," &c. (as before), only instead of "come to," they sing "go fro," and instead of "Welcom, John Sanderson," &c., they sing "Farewel, John Sanderson, farewel, farewel;" and so they go out one by one as they came in. _Note_, that the woman is kiss'd by all the men in the ring at her coming in and going out, and the like of the man by the woman.--_The Dancing Master_: London, printed by J. P., and sold by John Playford at his shop near the Temple Church, 1686, 7th edition.
Another version gives the words as follows:--
We've got a new sister in our degree, And she's welcome into our companee, companee. Mrs. Sargesson says she weänt come to, We'll make her whether she will or no, Will or no, will or no, We'll maäke her whether she will or no.
Children form a ring with one in the middle, who lays a cushion on the ground. They sing the first two lines, and the child in the centre points at one, and the others dance round singing the other lines, the centre child dragging the imaginary Mrs. Sargesson on to the cushion by force, kissing her, and leaving her in the centre. Then Mrs. Sargesson points at one in the ring, and the game begins again.--East Kirkby, Lincolnshire (Miss Maughan). The tune sung is the same as the "Mulberry Bush."
Miss Baker (_Northamptonshire Glossary_) says the Cushion Dance is still continued, with some variations, and generally closes the evening's amusements. One of the young men endeavours secretly to bring in a cushion, and locks the doors, to prevent the escape of the young maidens; then all the party unite hands and dance round three times to the left and three times to the right, after which the company all seat themselves, except the young man who holds the cushion. He advances to the fiddler, and says--
This dance it will no further go. Fiddler: Why say you so? why say you so? Cushion-holder: Because the young women will not come to. Fiddler: They must come to, they shall come to, And tell them I say so.
The cushion-holder then goes to the girl he fancies most, and drops the cushion at her feet. She kneels down with him on the cushion, and he salutes her, and they then rise and dance round and round to the fiddler. The girls then go through the same thing, saying, "young men," and then "a young man," &c., until the whole company have gone through the same ceremony, which concludes with all dancing round three times, as at the commencement.
The Norfolk and London versions are reduced to a simple "Kiss in the Ring" game, with the following verse:--
Round the cushion we dance with glee, Singing songs so merrily; Round the cushion we dance with glee, Singing songs so merrily; Yet the punishment you must bear If you touch the cushion there.
--Sporle, Norfolk (Miss Matthews).
(_c_) Selden, in his _Table Talk_, thus refers to this game:--"The Court of England is much altered. At a solemn dancing first you have the grave measures, then the Cervantoes and the Golliards, and this is kept up with ceremony. At length to Trenchmore and the _Cushion Dance_; and then all the company dance, lord and groom, lady and kitchen-maid, no distinction. But in King Charles's time there has been nothing but Trenchmore and the Cushion Dance," &c. The "Whishin Dance" (an old-fashioned dance, in which a cushion is used to kneel upon), mentioned by Dickinson (_Cumberland Glossary_), is probably the same game or dance, "whishin" meaning cushion. Brockett (_North Country Words_) mentions "Peas Straw," the final dance at a rustic party; something similar to the ancient "Cushion Dance" at weddings. It is also recorded in Evans' _Leicestershire Glossary_, and by Burton in the following passage from the _Anatomy of Melancholy_: "A friend of his reprehended him for dancing beside his dignity, belike at some cushen dance." In the version from East Kirkby, Lincolnshire, the expression "in our degree" in the first line of the verse is apparently meaningless, and it is probably a corruption of "highdigees, highdegrees," a dialect word for roystering, high spirits, merriment, dancing, romping. Elworthy (_Somerset Words_) gives this word, and quotes the following line from Drayton:--
Dance many a merry round and many a highdegy.
--_Polyolbion_, Bk. xxv., l. 1162.
(_d_) The transition from a dance to a pure game is well illustrated by the different versions, and the connection of the dance with the ceremony of marriage is obvious. A curious account of the merry-makings at marriages is given in Coverdale's _Christen State of Matrimony_, 1543: "After the banket and feast there beginneth a mad and unmannerly fashion; for the bride must be brought into an open dauncing-place. Then is there such a running, leaping, and flinging among them that a man might think all these dauncers had cast all shame behinde them, and were become starke mad, and out of their wits, and that they were sworne to the devil's daunce. Then must the bride keep foote with all dauncers, and refuse none, how scabbed, foule, drunken, rude, and shameless soever he be. . . . After supper must they begin to pipe and daunce again of anew. And though the young persons come once towards their rest, yet can they have no quietness."--1575 edit., fol. 59, rev. 60. Edward L. Rimbault, writing in _Notes and Queries_, vi. 586, says it was formerly the custom at weddings, both of the rich as well as the poor, to dance after dinner and supper. In an old Court masque of James I.'s time, performed at the marriage ceremony of Philip Herbert and Lady Susan (MS. in the writer's possession), it is directed that, at the conclusion of the performance, "after supper" the company "dance a round dance." This was "dancing the bride to bed." William Chappell (_Notes and Queries_, ii. 442) says, "I have a tune called 'A round dance to dance the bride to bed.' It dates from about 1630, or earlier, and resembles that of 'The Hunt is up.'" Dancing was considered so essential at weddings (according to Grose) that if in a family the youngest daughter should chance to be married before her elder sisters, they must dance at her wedding without shoes. May not the custom of throwing of old and worn-out shoes after the bride have arisen from the practice of dancing? The danced-out shoes may have been the ones used. It is curious that the cushion is used in the marriage ceremonies of the Brahmins. Mr. Kearns, in his _Marriage Ceremonies of the Hindoos of the South of India_, p. 6, says that a stool or cushion is one of the preparations for the reception of the bridegroom, who on entering the apartment sits down on the stool which is presented to him. He says, "I step on this for the sake of food and other benefits, on this variously splendid footstool." The bride's father then presents to him a cushion made of twenty leaves of cúsa grass, holding it up with both hands and exclaiming, "The cushion! the cushion! the cushion!" The bridegroom replies, "I accept the cushion," and taking it, places it on the ground under his feet, while he recites a prayer. It is probable that we may have in the "Cushion Dance" the last relics of a very ancient ceremony, as well as evidence of the origin of a game from custom.
Cutch-a-Cutchoo
Children clasp their hands under their knees in a sitting posture, and jump thus about the room. The one who keeps up longest wins the game.--Dublin (Mrs. Lincoln).
(_b_) In _Notes and Queries_, x. 17, "E. D." says this amusement was fashionable sixty years ago, and from the low dresses worn then by ladies he mentions its indecency. He gives extracts from a satire called _Cutchacutchoo, or the Jostling of the Innocents_, 2nd ed., Dublin, in which the game and position are mentioned--
Now she with tone tremendous cries Cutchacutchoo. Let each squat down upon her ham, Jump like a goat, puck like a ram.
"Uneda," at same reference (x. 17), speaks of it as a known game in Philadelphia. The analogy which this game has to some savage dances is curious; a correspondent in _Notes and Queries_, ix. 304, draws attention to the illustration, in Richardson's _Expedition to Arctic Shores_ (vol. i. p. 397), of a dance by the "Kutchin-Kutcha" Indians, a parallel to the name as well as the dance which needs some research in America.
See "Curcuddie," "Hop-frog."
Cutters and Trucklers
A remembrance of the old smuggling days. The boys divide into two
## parties; the Trucklers try to reach some given point before the Cutter
catches them.--Cornwall (_Folk-lore Journal_, v. 60).
Dab
Dab a prin in my lottery book; Dab ane, dab twa, dab a' your prins awa'.
A game in which a pin is put at random in a school-book, between the leaves of which little pictures are placed. The successful adventurer is the person who puts the pin between two leaves including a picture which is the prize, and the pin itself is the forfeit (_Blackwood's Magazine_, Aug. 1821, p. 36). This was a general school game in West London in 1860-1866 (G. L. Gomme).
Dab-an-thricker
A game in which the _dab_ (a wooden ball) is caused to spring upwards by a blow on the _thricker_ (trigger), and is struck by a flat, bottle-shaped mallet fixed to the end of a flexible wand, the distance it goes counting so many for the striker.--Ross and Stead's _Holderness Glossary_.
This is the same as "Knur and Spell."
Dab-at-the-hole
A game at marbles (undescribed).--Patterson's _Antrim and Down Glossary_.
Dalies
A child's game, played with small bones or pieces of hard wood. The _dalies_ were properly sheep's trotters.--Halliwell's _Dictionary_.
Evidently the same game as "Fivestones" and "Hucklebones."
Davie-drap
Children amuse themselves on the braesides i' the sun, playing at "Hide and Seek" with this little flower, accompanying always the hiding of it with this rhyme, marking out the circle in which it is hid with the forefinger:--
Athin the bounds o' this I hap, My black and bonny davie-drap; Wha is here the cunning yin My davie-drap to me will fin.
--Mactaggart's _Gallovidian Encyclopædia_.
The davie-drap is a little black-topped field-flower.
Deadily
A school game, not described.--Mactaggart's _Gallovidian Encyclopædia_.
Diamond Ring
My lady's lost her diamond ring; I pitch upon you to find it!
Children sit in a ring or in a line, with their hands placed together palm to palm, and held straight, the little finger down-most between the knees. One of them is then chosen to represent a servant, who takes a ring, or some other small article as a substitute, between her two palms, which are pressed flat together like those of the rest, and goes round the circle or line placing her hands into the hands of every player, so that she is enabled to let the ring fall wherever she pleases without detection. After this she returns to the first child she touched, and with her hands behind her says the above words. The child who is thus addressed must guess who has the ring, and the servant performs the same ceremony with each of the party. They who guess right escape, but the rest forfeit. Should any one in the ring exclaim "I have it!" she also forfeits; nor must the servant make known who has the ring until all have guessed under the same penalty. The forfeits are afterwards cried as usual.--Halliwell's _Nursery Rhymes_, p. 223.
(_b_) This game was a general favourite at juvenile parties years ago. The hands were held in the posture described by Halliwell, but any child was pitched upon for the first finder, and afterwards the child in whose hands the ring was found had to be finder. There was no guessing; the closed hands were looked into (A. B. Gomme). Mr. Addy has collected a similar game called "My lady's lost a gold ring," and Mr. Newell (_Games and Songs of American Children_, p. 150) has another, "Hold fast my gold ring."
Dibbs
A game played with the small knuckle-bones taken from legs of mutton; these bones are themselves called "dibs" (Lowsley's _Glossary of Berkshire Words_). Holloway's _Dictionary_ says five of these bones are used by boys, with which they play a game called "Dibs" in West Sussex.
See "Check-stones," "Fivestones," "Hucklebones."
Dinah
[Music]
No one in the house but Dinah, Dinah, No one in the house I know, I know; No one in the house but Dinah, Dinah, Playing on the old banjo.
A ring is formed, and a girl stands blindfolded inside. As the verse is sung and finished, Dinah goes to any one in the ring, and, if successful in guessing her name, takes her place, the other taking the place of Dinah, the game going on as before.--Earls Heaton (Herbert Hardy).
"Dinah" was a Christy Minstrel song in the "fifties." It is probable that the game, which resembles "Buff," has been played to the tune of the song. Singing a chorus would soon follow.
See "Buff," "Muffin Man."
Dip o' the Kit
A rustic game, undescribed and marked as obsolescent.--Peacock's _Manley and Corringham Glossary_.
Dish-a-loof
A singular rustic amusement. One lays his hand down on a table, another clashes his upon it, a third his on that, and so on (fig. 1). When all the players have done this, the one who has his hand on the board pulls it out and lays it on the one uppermost (fig. 2): they all follow in rotation, and so a continual clashing and dashing is kept up; hence the name "Dish." Those who win the game are those who stand out longest--viz., those who are best at enduring pain. Tender hands could not stand it a moment: one dash of a rustic "loof" would make the blood spurt from the tip of every finger. It is a piece of pastime to country lads of the same nature as "Hard Knuckles" (Mactaggart's _Gallovidian Encyclopædia_). This is a well-known game for small children in London. After each child's hands have been withdrawn and replaced on top as many times as possible without deranging the order, a general scramble and knocking of hands together ends the game (A. B. Gomme). Jamieson (_Etymological Dict._) gives this as a sport of children.
[Illustration: Fig. 1. Fig. 2.]
See "Dump," "Green Grass," "Hot Cockles."
Doddart
A game played in a large level field with a bent stick called "doddart." Two parties, headed by two captains, endeavour to drive a wooden ball to their respective boundaries (Halliwell's _Dictionary_). Brockett (_North Country Words_) adds to this that the captains are entitled to choose their followers by alternate votes. A piece of globular wood called an "orr" or "coit" is thrown down in the middle of the field and driven to one of two opposite hedges--the alley, hail-goal, or boundary. The same game as "Clubby," "Hockey," "Shinney," "Shinneyhaw."
Doncaster Cherries
One boy kneels, holding a long rope, the other end of which is held by another boy; the other players stand round about with handkerchiefs in hands, knotted. The one who holds the rope-end and standing cries out--
Doncaster cherries, ripe and sound; Touch 'em or taste 'em-- Down, you dogs!
--Earls Heaton, Yorkshire (H. Hardy).
This is evidently a version of "Badger the Bear," with a different and apparently degraded formula.
Dools
A school game. The dools are places marked with stones, where the players always remain in safety--where they dare neither be caught by the hand nor struck with balls. It is only when they leave these places of refuge that those out of the doons have any chance to gain the game and get in; and leave the doons they frequently must--this is the nature of the game. Now this game seems to have been often played in reality by our ancestors about their doon-hills.--Mactaggart's _Gallovidian Encyclopædia_.
Down in the Valley
I. Down in the valley where the green grass grows Stands E---- H----, she blows like a rose. She blows, she blows, she blows so sweet. In came F---- S---- and gave her a kiss. E---- made a pudding, she made it nice and sweet, F---- took a knife and fork and cut a little piece. Taste of it, taste of it, don't say nay, For next Sunday morning is our wedding day. First we'll buy a money box, Then we'll buy a cradle; Rock, rock the bottom out, Then we'll buy another. Bread and cheese all the week, cork on Sunday, Half a crown on Saturday night, and a jolly good dance on Monday.
--Cowes, Isle of Wight (Miss E. Smith).
II. Down in the meadows where the green grass grows, To see ---- blow like a rose. She blows, she blows, she blows so sweet. Go out, ----; who shall he be? ---- made a pudding, She made it so sweet, And never stuck a knife in Till ---- came to eat. Taste, love, taste, love, don't say nay, For next Monday morning is your wedding day. He bought her a gown and a guinea gold ring, And a fine cocked hat to be married in.