We have been drawn to the publication of tunes and description of the old
English Morris, not primarily for the information of the archæologist and
scholar, but to help those who may be disposed to restore a vigorous and
native custom to its lapsed pre-eminence.
Whether we have erred in believing that there exists to-day a wide and
keen desire for that restoration will be plainly shown in the reception
and the result of our endeavour. How we ourselves came by the belief in
that desire is easily told.
The idea that the Morris dance might once again be known amongst us, in
town and countryside, as the ordered expression of a national spirit, was
given to us in this wise. One of us--it is not by now too much to
claim--had acquired an enthusiasm for Folk-music, and a certain knack of
finding it where it still survived in the agèd memories of the peasantry,
and of transcribing and preserving it when found. The other had also his
knack of passing on the music that pleased him to susceptible and willing
juniors, and of making them to perform the same. In a happy hour the
collector with his treasury and the teacher, pining for some fresher and
sincerer melodies, met together. The "Folk Songs from Somerset" were
given to those working girls of London town to whom this book is
dedicated. From the very start we were aware that the old songs, merry or
mournful, that until then had been looked upon by this newer generation
for the greater part with something of an antiquarian and merely curious
eye, had been given wings and a new vitality. The songs of peasant-folk
long dead, songs of love and war, parting and death, prospered and spread
in the London streets and workrooms like the news of victory. We were
very well used to find in these singers apt and willing learners; we were
also used to note that whatsoever we had found to teach them hitherto,
passed, when the performance was done, into forgetfulness: we were
totally unused to find this fertility and resonance follow, as it
followed upon the teaching of the Folk-songs. It was like a sowing and a
full harvest in a place where, until now, we had tilled all but
unavailingly.
Forbye Folk-songs, the collector had noted, some seven years before, a
set of Morris tunes from Kimber, leader of the Headington (Oxon) men;
these had lain until now unused. Seeing the Folk-music fall upon such
good ground and flourish so amazingly, even amongst these quick-witted
Londoners, strangers to the countryside, it naturally suggested itself to
him that here was the opportunity, so long desired, to wake the Morris
from its long sleep. Anybody not deaf and blind, or unobservant as a
stone, knows that the genius of dancing is born in the London girl of the
people, as surely as in children of the sun.
We had Kimber and his cousin up to town; and the result of their coming
far outran our fondest anticipations. The Morris, like that magic
beanstalk, seemed to outwit the laws of nature: we saw it in the heart of
London rise up from its long sleep before our very eyes. In connection
with this affair, the mention of that well-beloved fable is appropriate
and irresistible. The first dance that was set before these
Londoners--upon this occasion which we enthusiasts make bold to call
historic--was Bean-setting. It represents the setting of the seed in
springtime. Of course the music, its lilt and the steps that their
forefathers had footed to it in the olden time, were as little known to
these, the London born, as the tongue and ceremonial of old Peru. As
little known, yet not strange at all; it was a summons never heard until
now, yet instantly obeyed; because, though unfamiliar and unforeseen, it
was of England and came, even though it was centuries upon the way, to
kinsfolk. Let the precisian explain it as he may, that is our way of
accounting for an experience both fruitful and astounding. Within half an
hour of the coming of these Morris-men we saw the Bean-setting--its
thumping and clashing of staves, its intricate figures and steps hitherto
unknown--full swing upon a London floor. And upon the delighted but
somewhat dazed confession of the instructor, we saw it perfect in
execution to the least particular. Perfect, yet in a different order of
perfection from that attainable by men. It may be noted here and now by
all who have to do with the instruction of girls in the Morris, that the
feminine temperament inevitably robs the dance of something of its
sturdiness. It is nothing to lament; for what is lost in vigour is
assuredly more than made good in gracefulness. At any rate, there was
Bean-setting, perfect in its kind. No wonder Jack-and-the-Beanstalk came
to mind and stayed there with the memory of this evening.
It was even so with all the other dances: to see them shown was to see
them learned. And the Folk-songs had prepared us for what followed: here
was no mere fugitive delight and curiosity, as of a child with a new toy.
We had given back to these children of the city no less than a birthright
long mislaid.
The Morris-men came in October. In the following February, 1906, the
songs and dances were performed before a company of friends. The
audience, if very friendly, was also very critical; and there was
represented in it, literally, every element in contemporary society. And
every element, or representatives of each, exhorted us to give our
performance in public, since it was so good that the world in general
must know of it.
In April, 1906, we did so. The performance was given very nearly in the
height of the concert season; in no announcement of it was any mention
made of charity, or any lack or need of funds: the entertainment was run
as a public affair. And the public responded so that we filled the hall
to the doors and were reluctantly constrained to refuse admittance to a
host beside. The entertainment has since then been repeated several
times; and every repetition brought substantial evidence of continually
increasing public interest.
It should be mentioned here that Miss Mary Neal, of the Espérance Working
Girls' Club, not only made the venture possible in the beginning, but,
with her powers of help and organization, gave it a reach and strength
that neither of us could have given.
But outside appreciation did not end here--one might really say that it
only began. Inquiries poured in from every quarter of the Kingdom, from
every class and kind of person. They all wanted to know how they also
might be shown the way to do as we had done--revive these traditional
English songs and dances in their neighbourhood, amongst the rising
generation of English men and women. One of the inquiries, as to how the
Morris dances might be imported there, came from Japan, where all things
typically English are in so great request.
[Illustration: FROM THE FRONTISPIECE OF "KEMP'S NINE DAIES WONDER,
PERFORMED ON A JOURNEY FROM LONDON TO NORWICH."]
In the case of the Folk-songs, it was easy enough to instruct the anxious
inquirer. But as to the Morris dances it was otherwise. Here there were
no handbooks to recommend, for the sufficient reason that not one
existed. With ourselves, and with the few--Alas! very few--traditional
Morris-men left in England, there reposed the only practical knowledge of
the dances in existence. With all the goodwill in the world we could only
give them to others as the Morris-men gave them to us--by example, since
in the shape of printed precept there was nothing. So far as possible
this demand for tuition of the dances has been, and is being, met. Some
of the girls already mentioned are teaching or have taught the dances in
many London centres and here and there in eight counties at least,
including Monmouth and Derby, Devon and Norfolk, and the Home
Counties. But the demand is great and growing, the supply is obviously
limited. In London alone it might be met, or nearly so; but in the
provinces, with existing or possible resources, it cannot be, even if we
could command the services of the spirited, historic Kemp, who danced the
Morris all the way from London to Norwich--_see_ plate opposite. This
indefatigable traveller, incidentally, is somewhat curiously figurative
of this latter-day revival of the Morris--of its restoration by townsfolk
to dwellers in the country.
Thus we were faced with a sudden demand and very limited means wherewith
to meet it. In these circumstances we naturally bethought ourselves of
possible expedients. To us it seemed practicable to meet it only in one
way--through the writing of a book on Morris dancing, by the help of
which even those who had never seen the dances performed might be enabled
to learn them, and so pass them on. The result of our endeavours must
declare itself in the efforts of others to make use of this little
handbook. That there is a demand for it is very sure: whether we have
succeeded in putting together an intelligible and a workable manual of
dances--notoriously a very hard thing to do--will be told presently in
the tally of practising Morris-dancers in England--and Japan. We have
aimed at simplicity, brevity and clearness in the description.
As to the extent of the demand and its constant tendency to increase, so
far, there can be no doubt. As to the permanence of the demand, as to
whether the Morris dance is likely to become again, as once it was, a
feature of our national life, one can only surmise. For ourselves, we
believe absolutely in the permanence of this revival, and that these
astounding results of our efforts hitherto are evidence, not of a
fleeting phase or vogue but of no less than that we have restored to our
own people a rightful inheritance, a means and method of self-expression
in movement, native and sincere, such as is offered by no other form of
dancing known to us.
The outstanding feature of all our English institutions is their
continuity: to have continuity you must have age and a hallowed
tradition: these we have in everything national, save only in our songs
and dances. These, although we are anything but an imitative race, we
have imported from un-English lands, with the inevitable result that in
dance and music we express everybody but ourselves. We shall go on doing
so until the treasure-house of our Folk-music and dances--now for several
generations mysteriously closed to us--shall be re-opened. In this
handbook we have tried to do something towards restoring that forsaken
repository to its rightful pre-eminence.