The others scrambled to their feet and began a country-dance, a sort of combination of a Morris dance and Sir Roger de Coverley, for they fluttered their handkerchiefs as they danced, and at the same time ran in couples up and down between two lines formed by the other dancers. The muslin dresses and coal-scuttle bonnets of the girls, and the smocks of the young men, together with their fluttering handkerchiefs and their hands gaily clasped high as they turned and twisted beneath, made a coloured and merry patch on the top of the hill, like a lot of butterflies. Job fiddled with increasing energy, and as he fiddled he tried to beat time for the dancers with his bow, so that every now and then he would miss out a bar while he waved his bow to re-establish order in the dance which threatened to become confused. At last they all fell exhausted upon the grass, and cider was passed round, and the old White Horse, who had been temporarily revealed during the dance, was once more hidden from view by the spreading frocks and sprawling limbs. There were other preparations now in evidence, for to emulate the scouring of the greater White Horse of Berkshire the youth of King’s Avon indulged themselves in more or less organised games, which again were but a cloak to their braggart vanity towards the girls. A rude platform was erected on trestles on the flat summit of the hill, and towards this the whole company surged, leaving the white scar of the Horse once more exposed and placid upon the hillside. The direction of the games was in the hands of young Gorwyn; he beat a small drum to call his audience to order; he marshalled the competitors; he posted tow-headed Lackland with his fiddle to strike up a tune during the intervals. The competitors stood in a group to one side, suddenly sheepish; the audience, which by now consisted almost entirely of girls, ranged themselves beneath the platform with the nudges and upturned faces of anticipation. Clare could only see the crowns of their hats and sunbonnets. Half a dozen young men stood up on the platform, exposed to the jokes and encouragements of their friends; in their embarrassment they did not know what expression to assume; some scowled, some tried to stare with an indifferent gaze out over the distance, some sought the faces of their special friends among the audience and grinned awkwardly. All were in the same predicament as to how to dispose of their hands and feet; some stood stiff and erect, with arms folded severely across their chests; others thrust their hands down into the pockets of their breeches; others bent to fidget with a bootlace. Some were for wrestling, others for the races; the bolder spirits, and the most admired, were for broadstick. Gorwyn himself, the broadstick champion of the village, was, as the last and principal event of the day, to challenge the winner.