The simplest examples of purely narrative art which fulfil the technical claims of a complete work will of course appear when the text of the narration consists of some real occurrence which is represented with all its episodes and incidents. Primitive life affords many inducements to such relation. The men who have returned from war, or from a hunting or a fishing expedition, will thus often repeat their experiences in a dramatic dance performed before the women and children at home. Although in many cases there is reason to suppose that even these performances may be executed to satisfy some superstitious or religious motive, they have undoubtedly, to a certain extent, been prompted by the desire to revive and communicate the memories of eventful days. Other incidents that have made a strong impression upon the minds of the people are in the same way displayed in pantomimic action. It is sufficient here to refer to the elaborate dramas “Coming from Town” performed by Macusi children, in which all the episodes of a journey are reproduced with the utmost possible exactness,[198] to the Corrobberrees in Queensland, in which incidents of individual or tribal interests, such as hunting or war adventures, but only those of recent occurrence, are enacted,[199] and to the performance in a Wanyoro village, where M. de Bellefond’s behaviour during a recent battle was closely imitated.[200] At the dramatic entertainment held before some members of Captain Cook’s expedition an elopement scene which had in reality taken place some time previously was performed in the presence of the runaway girl herself. The play is said to have made a very strong impression upon the poor girl, who could hardly refrain from tears when she saw her own escapade thus reproduced.[201] The imitation of the real action was in this case evidently designed as punishment for the guilty spectator; and as the piece concluded with a scene representing the girl’s return to her friends and the unfavourable reception she met with from them, it tended no doubt to exercise a salutary influence. This naïve little interlude, with its satirical and moralising vein, naturally reminds us of those old farces which candidly defined themselves as adaptations of some “scandale du quartier.” Là elle fut exécutée Icy vous est representée.[202] The wordless pantomimes and dramatic dances of the modern savages give us no information of this kind. But there is no doubt that a closer investigation would reveal that a great number of the comical and heroical episodes which, are described in ethnological literature have had their prototypes in some incidents of recent occurrence.