as to that point my memory
is unstored with instance or authority--it will at least be conceded
that he was an admirable reporter, with his heart in the business.
Somewhat to lessen the force of the objection that he puts the foregoing
lines into a not very respectable mouth, on a not altogether reputable
occasion, I append the following passage from the same poem, supposed to
be spoken by the good spirit who had brought a lady and her two brothers
through many perils, restoring them to their parents:

Noble lord and lady bright
I have brought ye new delight
Here behold so goodly grown
Three fair branches of your own
Heaven hath timely tried their youth
Their faith their patience and their truth
And sent them here through hard assays
With a crown of deathless praise
To triumph in victorious dance
O'er sensual folly and intemperance

The lines on dancing--lines which themselves dance--in "L'Allegro," are
too familiar, I dare not permit myself the enjoyment of quotation.

Lord Herbert of Cherbury, one of the most finished gentlemen of his
time, otherwise laments in his autobiography that he had never learned
to dance because that accomplishment "doth fashion the body, and gives
one a good presence and address in all companies since it disposeth the
limbs to a kind of _souplesse_ (as the French call it) and agility
insomuch as they seem to have the use of their legs, arms, and bodies
more than many others who, standing stiff and stark in their postures,
seem as if they were taken in their joints, or had not the perfect use
of their members." Altogether, a very grave objection to dancing in the
opinion of those who discountenance it, and I take great credit for
candor in presenting his lordship's indictment.

In the following pertinent passage from Lemontey I do not remember the
opinion he quotes from Locke, but his own is sufficiently to the point:

The dance is for young women what the chase is for young men: a
protecting school of wisdom--a preservative of the growing passions.
The celebrated Locke who made virtue the sole end of education,
expressly recommends teaching children to dance as early as they are
able to learn. Dancing carries within itself an eminently cooling
quality and all over the world the tempests of the heart await to
break forth the repose of the limbs.

In "The Traveller," Goldsmith says:

Alike all ages dames of ancient days