THE LAW OF EVOLUTION CONTINUED. 365 



rate things. Among various existing barbarous tribes we 

 find them still united. The dances of savages are accompa- 

 nied by some kind of monotonous chant, the clapping of 

 hands, the striking of rude instruments : there are measured 

 movements, measured words, and measured tones; and the 

 whole ceremony, usually having reference to war or sacri- 

 fice, is of governmental character. In the early records of 

 the historic races we similarly find these three forms of 

 metrical action united in religious festivals. In the Hebrew 

 writings we read that the triumphal ode composed by Moses 

 on the defeat of the Egyptians, was sung to an accompani- 

 ment of dancing arid timbrels. The Israelites danced and 

 sung " at the inauguration of the golden calf. And as it is 

 generally agreed that this representation of the Deity was 

 borrowed from the mysteries of Apis, it is probable that the 

 dancing was copied from that of the Egyptians on those oc- 

 casions." There was an annual dance in Shiloh on the 

 sacred festival; and David danced before the ark. Again, 

 in Greece the like relation is everywhere seen: the original 

 type being there, as probably in other cases, a simultaneous 

 chanting and mimetic representation of the life and ad- 

 ventures of the god. The Spartan dances were accompa- 

 nied by hymns and songs; and in general the Greeks had 

 " no festivals or religious assemblies but what were ac- 

 companied with songs and dances " both of them being 

 forms of worship used before altars. Among the Romans, 

 too, there were sacred dances: the Salian and Lupercalian 

 being named as of that kind. And even in Christian coun- 

 tries, as at Limoges in comparatively recent times, the people 

 have danced in the choir in honour of a saint. The 



incipient separation of these once united arts from each 

 other and from religion, was early visible in Greece. Prob- 

 ably diverging from dances partly religious, partly warlike, 

 as the Corybantian, came the war-dances proper, of which 

 there were various kinds; and from these resulted secular 

 dances. Meanwhile Music and Poetry, though still united, 



