Note 73 — ESSAYS.
Reading edition
This dance, which was originally called the Morisco dance is supposed to have been derived from the Moors of Spain; the dancers in earlier times blackening their faces to resemble Moors. It was probably a corruption of the ancient Pyrrhic dance, which was performed by men in armor, and which is mentioned as still existing in Greece, in Byron’s “Song of the Greek Captive:”—
“You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet.”
Attitude and gesture formed one of the characteristics of the dance. It is still practised in some parts of England.—Rabelais, Pantag. ii. 7.