Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1904-10-05
DExFERITY OF THE HiNDoos.
They Are Expert at Tumb1ing, Rope
Dancing and Legerdemain.

Dancing and Legerdemain.
1.-The dexterity of the Hindoos in
tumbling, rope-dancing and legerde-
main is so much superior to that of
Europeans and Japanese that the
statements of travellers on the subject
were much doubted until they were
brought to exhibit their Singular feats
in this country" says writer in the
New Orleans Times Democrat Moth
ing is more common in India than to
see young girls walking on their
hands and feet with the body bent
backward Another girl will bend
backward, plunge her head into hole
about eighteen inches deep, full Of
water and dirt, and bring Up between
her lips ring that was buried in the
mud The women may frequently be
seen dancing together on a rope
stretched over trestles, the one playing
on the vina, or Hindoo guitar, the 9TH
er holding two vessels brimful of
water, and capering about without
spilling q drop. A plank is sometimes
fixed to the top of pole twenty five
feet high, which is set upright; q man
then climbs UP it, springs backward,
and seats himself upon the plank.
Another mountebank balances him
self by the middle of the body on q
bamboo POLE fifteen or eighteen feet
high. He first sets it upright, and
then climbs up it, with his legs and
arms, as if it was firmly rooted tree.
On reaching the top, he clings to it
with his feet and hands, after fixing
the center of the pole in the middle
of his sash, and dances, moving about
in all directions to the sound of music,
without the pole ever losing it's equili-
bium. He then descends, takes boy
on his shoulders, climbs up the pole
again. and stands on the top on one
leg Sometimes a boy Lies across the
extremity of the bamboo and holds
himself quite stiff for considerable
time A man lifts up the pole and
the boy in that state, and moves them
the balance.
"a still more extraordinary feat IS
performed by the Hindoo women. One
of them will sometimes balance her
self in horizontal position, with her
arms extended like person swim
ming, on the top Of a bamboo pole
ninety feet high, fixed to the ground.
In short time she seems to have lost
her balance and falls, to the no small
terror of the spectators; but this is
only one of her customary movements;
she catches by one foot in rope
fastened to a bar which crosses the
middle Of the pole and remains sus-
pended, with her head downward.
''The Hindoos are not only extreme
ly dexterous themselves, but they have
found means to communicate their
dexterity to the very brutes. They
train bullocks or buffaloes, for In
stance, to the performance of very
difficult task. A. Hindoo lies down
upon the ground on his back and
places on the lower part of the stom-
ach piece Of wood cut in the shape
of a series of spools. A buffalo, at the
command of his master, sets first one
foot and then the other on this piece
of wood and then his two hinder feet
in succession and balances himself
upon it. But this is not all; the mas
for of tho buffalo nlacoS a second ped
estal by the side of the first; the ami
NAL steps upon it in like manner. and
when he has placed all four feet on
this movable column he balances him
self upon it with wonderful dexterity.
Goats are also taught to perform the
trick, in which we know not whether
most to admire the patience or the
dociFty af the animal"