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REIGN OF CHARLES II. TO WILLIAM III. G01 |
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I could be Jemmy can,
Right blythe and jolly ; With pretty Nancy
Melancholy Please his fancy ; Ne'er should be Jemmy can,
My fatal destiny, ' . Tho' not so blythe a man,
If I might Have his will,
But have my love in sight, Kiss and delight her still,
Whose angel-beauty bright While I on each green hill,
Was ever my delight. Weep and lament my fill.
Have I not, ^ I'll not wear
In Moggy's dances The wreath of willow;
Seen those glances, Floramella,
Which have shot, Charming fair,
And, like a fowler, caught Shall ease me of my care :
My poor heart ? Who can tell,
Yes, and I feel the smart But she may please as well 1
Of Cupid's fatal dart, No longer will I dwell
Since we have been apart. In love's tormenting cell.
HOBBY-HORSE DANCE. " For, O, for, O, the hobby-horse is forgot."—Samlet, act Hi., sc. 2.
" At Abbot's, or now Paget's, Bromley," says Dr. Plott, " they had, within memory, a sort of sport, which they celebrated at Christmas (on New-Year and Twelfth Day), called The Hobby-Horse Dance, from a person that carried the image of a horse between his legs, made of thin boards, and in his hand a bow and arrow, which, passing through a hole in the bow, and stopping upon a shoulder it had in it, he made a snapping noise as he drew it to and fro, keeping time with the musick. With this man danced six others. . . . They danced the Hays,a and other country dances. To this Hobby-Horse Dance there also belonged a pot, which was kept by turns by four or five of the chief of the town, whom they called Reeves, who pounded cakes and ale to put in this pot; all people who had any kindness for the good intent of the institution of the sport, giving pence a-piece for themselves and families, and so foreigners too that came to see it; with which money (the charge of the cakes and ale being defrayed) they not only repaired their church, but kept their poor too; which charges are not now perhaps so cheerfully borne."—Natural History of Staffordshire, fol., 1686, p. 434.
There are several hobby-horse dances extant: one in MusicFs Delight on the Githren, 1666, in Apollo's Banquet, 1669 to 1693, and in some later collections ; a second in Pills to purge Melancholy, i. 19, 1719; a third in the Antidote to Mdancholy, 1719.
In the Bagford Collection, there is a ballad to the first, entitled " A new ballad of a famous German Prince [Rupert] and a renowned English Duke [of Albemarle], who, on St. James's Day, 1666, fought with a beast with seven heads called Provinces, not by land, but by water. Not to be said, but sung." It begins :— " There happened of late a terrible fray,
Begun upon our St. James's Day." |
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* The Hay is described by Strutt as a rustic dance, where they lay hold of hands, and dance round in a ring., |
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