It seems an ascertained fact that in the fourteenth century dancing became involuntary and maniacal in many countries. The violent processions of the Flagellants set the first example. The great epidemics, and the terrible and lasting shock they gave to the nerves of the survivors, easily gave occasion to St. Vitus’ dance. These phenomena are, as we know, contagious. The spectacle of the convulsions acted with so much the more force, as there was nothing in men’s souls but convulsion and vertigo; and then the sick and the hale danced together promiscuously. They would catch each other violently by the hand, in the streets and the churches, and foot it round in a ring. Many a one who at first laughed at this sight, or looked on coldly, became at last bewildered, his head reeled, and he, too, reeled and danced with the rest. The rings went on multiplying, interlacing; they became bigger and bigger, more and more heady, fast, and furious, as though they were huge coiling reptiles, that momently swelled to view. There was no stopping the monster, but its joints might be lopped; the electric chain was broken by one falling with feet and fists on some one of the dancers. The rude dissonance interrupting the harmony, they found themselves free, otherwise they would have gone on reeling until utterly exhausted, and have danced themselves to death. This phenomenon of the fourteenth century does not occur again in the fifteenth; but in the latter we find, in England, France, and Germany, a strange amusement, which reminds us of those great popular dances of the sick and dying. It was called the dance of the dead, or _danse macabre_. It was a great favourite with the English, who introduced it into France. The spectacle of the dance of the dead was enacted in Paris in 1424, in the cemetery of the Innocents. That narrow space in which the enormous city for so many ages accumulated the remains of almost all its inhabitants had been at first both a cemetery and a laystall, haunted at night by robbers, and in the evening by wantons, who plied their trade among the tombs. Philip Augustus enclosed it with walls, and to purify it dedicated it to St. Innocent, a child crucified by the Jews. In the fourteenth century the churches were already very full, and it became the fashion among the good citizens to bury their dead in the cemetery. Such was the suitable theatre of the _danse macabre_. It was begun in September, 1424, when the heat had diminished, and the first rain had rendered the smell of the place less offensive. The performances lasted many months.