he cannot dance_; his dance, and with it his social status, passes to
another and a younger.

* * * * *

Magical dancing still goes on in Europe to-day. In Swabia and among the
Transylvanian Saxons it is a common custom, says Dr. Frazer,[5] for a
man who has some hemp to leap high in the field in the belief that this
will make the hemp grow tall. In many parts of Germany and Austria the
peasant thinks he can make the flax grow tall by dancing or leaping high
or by jumping backwards from a table; the higher the leap the taller
will be the flax that year. There is happily little possible doubt as
to the practical reason of this mimic dancing. When Macedonian farmers
have done digging their fields they throw their spades up into the air
and, catching them again, exclaim, "May the crop grow as high as the
spade has gone." In some parts of Eastern Russia the girls dance one by
one in a large hoop at midnight on Shrove Tuesday. The hoop is decked
with leaves, flowers and ribbons, and attached to it are a small bell
and some flax. While dancing within the hoop each girl has to wave her
arms vigorously and cry, "Flax, grow," or words to that effect. When she
has done she leaps out of the hoop or is lifted out of it by her
partner.

Is this art? We shall unhesitatingly answer "No." Is it ritual? With
some hesitation we shall probably again answer "No." It is, we think,
not a rite, but merely a superstitious practice of ignorant men and
women. But take another instance. Among the Omaha Indians of North
America, when the corn is withering for want of rain, the members of the
sacred Buffalo Society fill a large vessel with water and dance four
times round it. One of them drinks some of the water and spirts it into