Sayfa 662 / 896

They advanced, retreated, struck at one another's hands, clutched

at one another's heads, spun round alone, caught one another and

spun round in pairs, until many of them dropped. While those were

down, the rest linked hand in hand, and all spun round together:

then the ring broke, and in separate rings of two and four they

turned and turned until they all stopped at once, began again,

struck, clutched, and tore, and then reversed the spin, and all

spun round another way. Suddenly they stopped again, paused,

struck out the time afresh, formed into lines the width of the

public way, and, with their heads low down and their hands high

up, swooped screaming off. No fight could have been half so

terrible as this dance. It was so emphatically a fallen sport--a

something, once innocent, delivered over to all devilry--a

healthy pastime changed into a means of angering the blood,

bewildering the senses, and steeling the heart.