The weekly Union times. [volume] (Union C.H., South Carolina) 1871-1894, 1888-12-07
AN OLD TIME "HoE DOWN
Country Party In Canada in the Daxs
Of Long Apo

80 cohsub III Inc LAY
Of Long Ago.
Did you ever get "bid'' to q dance i
the country2 mean real, home made
hfth concessions, log house. quarter of
z century back country party. A spree,
\ noe down, a neighborhood shaker of tn,
SIMPLE, ready, rough, pioneer DAYS. Did
emf Then you will remember that on tho
morning Of the day fixed for the part,
the board partition that ran across tho
mlddle or the house was pulled down, and
the beds were piled in one corner, and
the DUNK was showed up to the end of the
mouse Deslde tho stove, and the stout
legged Kitchen table was placed against
the wall ut the other end of the room. and
stout legged chair planted on the table.
ana to that chair the fiddler was elevated,
and there he rolled his gray old head
from side to side, and whisked lightning
from his elbow and fingered in ecstatic
frenzy and beat time with his cowhido
boots, and the throb of his eager music
oouched the very inner keys of life and
strred the young blood and softened the
hardening muscles and loosed the settled
JOihts or age until the stove shook and
the dlshes rattle& on the shelves and the
peae OF the feet On the dancing floor was
nke the crashing of score Of mallets,
Seaaened as by phe sweep Of a mighty
Broom between.
How they dancedl How the fellow
VINO mad a few steps shone and capered
ana pounded the floor with his cowhidesl
ana how they swung! Round and round,
ana round and round, until the perspira-
ton rolled down the face and the breath
gasped Tor renewal of the lease. Tanned
ana degenerate days. They swing no
more. And they dance no more. The
mighty clatter of the old Scotch reel
where old people unlimbered and shook
Oil the steps of youth, and the Young
people gasped to keep pace with the
elders; and the opera rcel-they called
IL the upper reel-which the old folks
also invaded; and then the cutting out
jig, where the youths one after the
otner dld their finest steps, and the girls
aio the same, and you often got on the
track OF liking or an incipient COM
Pany Keeping by noting the time and
circumstances under which some par
tlcular girl selected to take the floor. and
VINO thus became the partner of her
choice, and the same with the malo end |
Oh the performance, where the cut out |
was much moro likely to have q signif-
canoe.
DO you remember that as bow Won
felt if you could grow up to cali off
dances, or perhaps call off and plav the
ilddle at the same time, as YOU once
knew man do, and whose image lived
IN your memory for weeks, that clerkinp
IN store or even teaching school would
pe nowhere; or perhaps you know clerk
VINO Kept store and could call off also.
ana you ached to grow up and bo az
sreaV man as he? 1t is hardly likely
you knew male teacher who could
dance much. Somehow tho worry in
the teachers head over arithmctical
problems and the confusion of dates and
lhe eccentrlcities of parsing seemed to
5el INTO tho teachers feet when he gct
!, on inc iioor or, as a native used to put
J. = IN place where once lived, his left
ooe was Methodist and mixed him !, u: INK
'lla dlsgraced him every time h.rI lay "a,
'ged to get for partner a stran; Ire;siinian e; man
'adn't been told how badly he ger who
seems fas slngguIar tng 5es1 nov whH we danced
ere woodchoppshn q,cr.s ahions S 5!!t fhS
1noludual- cases and farmers and
-1hRSSassHw hRSSaass, Wife Vfn1' the best among the
were the daughters of hotel keepers
village merchants, and very often the
so teacher was a mighty spry little
IL OH her feet, for the reason that she
almost always such great favorite
pthc dancers of the other persuasion
1t she couldn't avoid holding the floor,
ID was dancer in spite of herself
ne dances were usually kept up until 4
Egen o'clock in tho morning, and
e then closed with stupcndous
hkfast, followed by an effort to get a
/ Nection for tho fiddler. And these
| Goneer fiddlers were shockingly under
ypaid, Very often they were not paid at
jail. They had the gratitude and the ap-
probation Of the time in which they lived
But no more. They tiddled through two
generations, but the second did for them
little better than the first, and they passed
down to tho grave miscrably poor
Toronto Globe.