DANCES. 
215 
their great meetings or national festivals. In 
these, and in feasting, the hours of the day were 
spent. 
Their dances were numerous and diversified; 
and were performed by men and women- —in many 
the parties did not dance together. Their move¬ 
ments were generally slow, but regular and exact; 
the arms, during their dances, were exercised as 
much as their feet. The drum and the flute were 
the music by which they were led ; and the dance 
was usually accompanied by songs and ballads. 
Ori is the native word for dance, but each kind of 
dance had a distinct name. The least objection¬ 
able was the hura , which appears to have been the 
kind of dance witnessed by Captain Cook in Hua- 
hine. The hura was sometimes a pantomimic ex¬ 
hibition, with dancing at intervals during the per¬ 
formance ; but the most decent and respectable was 
that which consisted principally of dancing. It 
was practised from a motive which many will think 
manifested a decisive elevation above savage life. 
The families of the distinguished chiefs in the 
neighbourhood were always invited to witness the 
hura. They usually came arrayed in their best ap¬ 
parel, followed by numbers of their attendants. It 
was generally designed to bring into notice the 
daughters of the chiefs, and recommend them to 
young men of rank and station equal or superior 
to their own, who, it was hoped, might be so charm¬ 
ed by their dancing, as to become their future 
husbands. 
The daughters of the chiefs, who were the 
dancers on these occasions, at times amounted 
to five or six, though occasionally only one exhi¬ 
bited her symmetry of figure, and gracefulness of 
action. Their dress was singular, but elegant. 
