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THREE DUKES |
25* |
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(d.) The action in many of these versions is described as very spirited : coquetry, contempt, and annoyance being all expressed in action as the words of the game demands. The dancing movement of the boys in the first verse to imitate riding, though belonging to the earlier forms, is, with the exception of two or three versions, only retained in those which are commenced by one player, partly, perhaps, because of the difficulty three or more players experience in " riding" or " prancing" while holding each other's hands in line form. I have seen the game played when the "prancing" of the dukes (in a game where there were a dozen or more players on each side at starting, as in the Dorset version) was as important a feature as the maidens' actions in the other verses. I think the oldest form of the game is that played by a fairly equal number of players on each side, boys on one side and girls on the other, rather than that of " one " or "three" players on the dukes' side, and all the others opposite. The game then began with the present words, " Here come three dukes; " these three each chose a girl at the same time, and when these three were wived, another three "dukes" would pair with three more of the girls, and after that another three, and so on. This form would account for the modern idea that the number of dukes increases on every occasion that the verses are sung, after the first wife has been taken over, and until all the girls have been thus chosen. This idea is expressed in some versions by the change of words: " Here's a fourth [or fifth, and so on] duke come a riding" to take a wife, the chosen maiden becoming a duke as soon as she has passed over on to the dukes' side. The process of innovation may be traced by the methods of playing. Thus, in one version played at Barnes (similar in other respects to No. 10). beginning "three dukes a riding," three girls were chosen by the three first dukes, one by each, at the same time, and all three girls walked across with the three dukes to the boys'line, and stood next their respective partners. In two imperfect versions I have obtained in Regent's Park, London, the same principle occurs. One girl began—" One duck comes a ridin', " and two girls from the opposite side walked across; the other |
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