The Napoleonic era stopped temporarily the development of the ballet. Pieces composed during this time gained production more easily on foreign stages than at home. Thus the brilliant _Antoine et Cléopatre_, with music by Kreutzer, lived a few performances at home, whereas it became one of the most successful ballets abroad. The same was the case with Blache’s ballets ‘Don Juan,’ ‘Gustave Vasa’ and ‘Malakavel,’ which became the favorites of the St. Petersburg audiences, while they remained unknown at home. It seems as if the political events which marked such a great step towards democratic ideas in France and Europe became a serious stumbling-stone to the evolution of the dance. Democratic England always relied on autocratic France, Italy, Austria and Russia for stimulation in dancing. All the great ballet celebrities of continental Europe found in England responsive and generous audiences, but never any serious rivals. Who of the great French _prima ballerinas_ or male dancers, from Mlle. Sallé till Carlotta Grisi, did not make pilgrimages to Drury Lane? [Illustration: Danseuses en Scène (The Ballet) _Painting by E. Degas_] Though to the period of the Renaissance and the European national awakening belong all the immortal musical geniuses, like Bach, Mozart, Gluck, Beethoven, Schubert and others, who laid the foundations of the opera and symphony, yet these men seemed to ignore the ballet (if we leave out of consideration their inferior or incidental works). Gluck wrote a few pieces of this order, and so did Mozart; but they are not the works of their inspiration. Scribe, Rossini, Auber, Weber and Meyerbeer gave occasional expression to ballet music, particularly in connection with their operas, but they regarded these works as inferior to their operas. There are two reasons for this: ecclesiastical prejudice and the revolutionary mob. Just as a fanatical clergy branded the dance as Pagan and immoral, so the mob has always regarded the ballet as an aristocratic luxury. Science seems to us essentially democratic; but from the arts there breathes an air of snobbishness and luxury. The history of civilization has not yet recorded a truly democratic art, particularly a democratic ballet. CHAPTER X THE FOLK-DANCES OF EUROPE The rise of nationalism--The Spanish folk-dances: the Fandango; the Jota; the Bolero; the Seguidilla; other Spanish folk-dances; general characteristics; costumes--England: the Morris dance; the Country dance; the Sword dance; the Horn dance--Scotland: Scotch Reel, Hornpipe, etc.--Ireland: the Jig; British social dances--France: Rondé, Bourrée and Farandole--Italy: the Tarantella, etc.--Hungary: the Czardas, Szolo and related dances; the Esthonians--Germany: the _Fackeltanz_, etc.--Finland; Scandinavia and Holland--The Lithuanians, Poles and Southern Slavs; the Roumanians and Armenians--The Russians: ballad dances; the Kasatchy and Kamarienskaya; conclusion.