They went through figures a lot
like dances; swung partners by one hand or both; advanced and retreated,
"balanced to partners" bowing and saluting; clasping hands, right and
left alternately with those they met; and balanced to places, and the
like. Sometimes they had a couple to lead them, as in the dance called
the German, of which my granddaughter tells me; but usually they were
all supposed to know the way the play went, and the words were always
such as to help. Here is the one they started off with that night:
"We come here to bounce around,
We come here to bounce around,
We come here to bounce around,
Tra, la, la!
Ladies, do si do,
Gents, you know,
Swing to the right,
And then to the left,
And all promenade!"
Oh, yes! I have seen Wades and Flemings and Holbrooks and all the rest
singing and hopping about to the tune of _We Come Here to Bounce
Around_; and also _We'll All Go Down to Rowser_; and _Hey, Jim Along,
Jim Along Josie_; and _Angelina Do Go Home_; and _Good-by Susan Jane_;
and _Shoot the Buffalo_; and _Weevilly Wheat_; and _Sandy He Belonged to
the Mill_; and _I've Been to the East, I've Been to the West, I've Been
to the Jay-Bird's Altar_; and _Skip-to-My-Lou_; and _The Juniper Tree_;
and _Go In and Out the Window_; and _The Jolly Old Miller_; and _Captain
Jinks_; and lots more of them. Boyds and Burnses and Smythes tripping
the light fantastic with them, and not half a dozen dresses better than
alpacas in the crowd, and the men many of them in drilling trousers--and
half of them with hayseed in their hair from the load on which they rode
to the party! So, ye Iowa aristocracy, put that in your pipes and smoke
it, as ye bowl over the country in your automobiles--or your airships,
as I suppose it may be before you read this!
I went round with the rest of them, for I had seen all these plays on
the canal boats, and had once or twice taken part in them.
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