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Let us first, however, consider the dances of the period, for which we have an excellent authority in the work of Thoinot Arbeau.

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“In Spring,” we know, “the young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.” In the winter of life it would seem that an old man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of the dances that his time-stiffened limbs can no more achieve with their earlier agility and grace, and he takes to—writing about them. For it is strange but true that some of the most entertaining volumes on the subject are those written on the history of the dance by “grave and reverend seigneurs”; who, one would imagine, had long foregone all thought of youthful pastimes and turned their minds to solemner affairs. Three such, at least, I can recall—Thoinot Arbeau, Bonnet, and Baron.

Over three centuries ago—nay, nearly four, we come upon a somewhat sage and elderly gentleman, Thoinot Arbeau, whose book with its strange title, Orchésographie, was published in 1588.