From all modern observations and ancient records it is evident that the Arabs’ dances differed essentially from their Eastern neighbors. Spain undoubtedly is the only Occidental country that has preserved in its vivid national dances, _Jotas_, _Boleros_, _Seguidillas_ and _Fandangos_, the mutilated and deformed elements of the vanished choreography of Cadiz. Though the Moor has left so few records of his highly cultivated art of dancing, yet his spectral shadow hangs over the race beyond the Pyrenees. Of all the living civilized nations the Spaniards, more than any others, are justly the very incarnation of the vanished magic Arabs in dance. A studious observer finds in Spanish dances all the hysteria, magic, seductiveness and softness that was practiced by mediæval Arab dancers. And then the costumes--most picturesque and romantic--that the Spanish women use in their dances are similar in their lines and colors to those that were worn by the Moorish girls who entertained with their magic dances a Cleopatra and a Cæsar. CHAPTER VI DANCING IN ANCIENT GREECE Homeric testimony; importance of the dance in Greek life; Xenophon’s description; Greek religion and the dance; Terpsichore--Dancing of youths, educational value; Greek dance music; Hyporchema and Saltation; Gymnopœdia; the Pyrrhic dance; the Dipoda and the Babasis; the Emmeleia; the Cordax; the Hormos--Greek theatres; comparison of periods; the Eleusinian mysteries; the Dionysian mysteries; the Heteræ; technique. I Best known to us of all the ancient and exotic dances are those of the Greeks. In Greece dancing was an actual language, interpreting all sentiments and passions. Aristotle speaks of Saltators whose dances mirrored the manners, the passions and the actions of men. About three hundred years before the Augustan era dancing in Greece had reached an apotheosis that it has never reached in any other country in the history of ancient civilization. Accurate information about the ancient Greek dances is given not only in numerous fresco paintings, reliefs and sculptures, but in the works of Homer, Aristotle, Plato, Lucian, Aristophanes, Hesiod and many others.