“Do but observe how much the form of salutation, particular to our nation, has by its facility made kisses, which Socrates says are so powerful and dangerous for stealing hearts, of no esteem. It is a nauseous and injurious custom for ladies, that they must be obliged to lend their lips to every fellow that has three footmen at his heels, how nasty or deformed soever; and we do not get much by the bargain; for, as the world is divided, for three pretty women we must kiss fifty ugly ones, and to a tender stomach like those of my age, an ill kiss overpays a good one.” KISSING DANCES. A correspondent of “The Spectator” (No. 67, an. 1711) having bitterly complained of the lascivious character of the dancing of the period, Budgell, in the course of his reply, remarks: “I must confess I am afraid that my correspondent had too much reason to be a little out of humor at the treatment of his daughter; but I conclude that he would have been much more so had he seen one of those kissing dances, in which Will Honeycomb assures me they are obliged to dwell almost a minute on the fair one’s lips, or they will be too quick for the music and dance quite out of time.” Long before, Sir John Suckling had said, in his “Ballad on a Wedding:” “O’ th’ sudden up they rise and dance; Then sit again, and sigh, and glance; Then dance again, and kiss.” While on this subject it may not be amiss to advert to a passage in the _Symposium_, or Banquet, of Xenophon, which Burton, in his “Anatomy of Melancholy,” quotes with his usual gusto: