lyrical drama, as we find it in the extant works of Æschylus, arose out of the Dithyrambic hymns sung at the sacred festivals of the ancient Hellenes in honour of their god Dionysus, or, as he is vulgarly called, Bacchus; hymns which were first extemporized under the influence of the stimulating juice of the grape,[f3] and then sung by a regularly trained Chorus, under the direction of the famous Methymnean minstrel, Arion.[f4] The simplest form which such hymns, under such conditions, could assume, was that of a circular dance by a band of choristers round the statue or the altar of the god in whose honour the hymn was sung. This is not a matter peculiar to Greece, but to be found at all times, and all over the world, wherever there are men who are not mere brutes. So in the description of the religious practices of the ancient Mexicans, our erudite poet SOUTHEY has the following beautiful passage, picturing a sacred choral dance round the altar of sacrifice:-- Round the choral band The circling nobles gay, with gorgeous plumes, And gems which sparkled to the midnight fire, Moved in the solemn dance; each in his hand, In measured movements, lifts the feathery shield, And shakes a rattling ball to measured sounds; With quicker steps, the inferior chiefs without, {14} Equal in number, but in just array, The spreading radii of the mystic wheel Revolved; and outermost, the youths roll round, In motions rapid as their quickened blood. Now, according to the general tradition of old Greek commentators and lexicographers, the Dithyramb or Bacchic Hymn was also called a _Circular Hymn_[f5] an expression which a celebrated Byzantine writer has interpreted to mean "_a hymn sung by a chorus standing in a ring round the altar._"[f6] It is, no doubt, true that the phrase χορὸς κύκλιος, or circular chorus, does not necessarily mean a chorus of this description; the term, as has been ingeniously observed,[f7] like our own word _roundelay_, and the German _Rund-gesang_, being capable of an equally natural application to a hymn composed of parts, that run back to the point from which they started, and form, as it were, a circle of melody. But, whatever etymologists may make of the word, the fact that there were hymns sung by the ancient Greeks in chorus round the altars of their gods is not denied; and seems, indeed, so natural and obvious, that we shall assume it as the first form of the "goat-song," in which form it continued up to a period which it is impossible to define; the only certainty being that, whereas, in olden times, it was composed of fifty men, it was afterwards diminished to twelve or fifteen, and arranged in the form of a military company in regular rank and file.[f8] Such a chorus, therefore, was the grand central trunk out of which the Attic tragedy branched and bloomed to such fair luxuriance of verbal melody. We shall now trace, if we can, the natural steps of progress.