Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-12-24
DExTERITY OF THE .HINDoos.
They Are Expert at Tumbling, Rope
Dancing and Legerdemain.
Few Orleans es-Democrat.

From the New Orleans Times Democrat.
The dexterity of the Hindoos in tumbiing.
rope dancing and legerdemain Is so much
superior to that of Europeans and Japa-
nese that the statements of travellers on
the subject were much doubted until they
were brought to exhibit their singular feats
in this country. Nothing 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 back
ward. plunge her head into n hole about
eighteen inches deep. full of water and dirt.
and bring up between her lips a ring that
was buried In the mud The women may
frequently be seen dancing together on a
rope stretched over trestles. the one play
ing on the vina, or Hindoo guitar; the 9TH
er holding two vessels brimful OF water
and capering about without splitting a drop
A plank is sometimes fixed to the top of a
pole twenty-five feet high. which is set up
right; a man then climbs up IL, springs
backward. and seats himself upon the
plank.
Another mountebank balances himself by
the middle of the body on bamboo pole,
fifteen or eighteen feet high He first sets
1t upright, and then climbs up it. with his
legs ard arms as II it was a firmly rooted
tree. On reaching the top he clings to il
with his feet and hands after fixing the
center OF the pole in the middle of his SASH
and dances, moving about in all direc-
lions to the sound of music without the pole
ever losing its equilibrium. He then de-
sends, takes boy on his shoulders,
climbs up the pole again, and stands on the
top on one leg. Sometimes boy lies
across the extremity of the bamboo and
holds himself quite stiff for a considerable
time. A man lifts up the pole and the boy
in that state. and moves them about in all
directions without losing the balance.
A still more extraordinary feat is per-
formed by the Hindoo women One Of them
will sometimes balance herself in hori-
zontal position, with her arms extended like
a person swimming, on the top of a bam
boo pole ninety feet high, fixed to the
ground. In a 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 a rope fastened to a
bar which crosses the middle OF the pole
and remains suspended, with her head
downward.
The Hindoos are not only extremely dex-
ferrous themselves, but they have found
means to communicate their -dexterfty to
the very brutes. They train bullocks or
buffaloes, for instance, TO the performance
of a very difficult task A Hindoo lies
down upon the ground on his back and
places the lower part of the stomach a
piece of wood cut in the shape of 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 1t. But this Is not all: the
master of the buffalo places a second ped
estal by the side Of the first; the animal
steps upon II in like manner, and when he
has placed all four feet on this movable
column he balances himself upon 1t with
wonderful deXterity. Goats are also taught
to perform the trick, in which we know
not whether most to admire the patience or
the docllity of the animal