first gentleman turns, with both hands, the lady
behind him, and her partner turns in like manner
as the first lady; then each gentleman turns his
own partner, and they trip on as before. The other
couples pair and turn in the same way and at the
same time.
It is considered a slight to pass a house and not to dance through it. Finally the train enters the Assembly Room, and there resolves itself into an ordinary waltz.
As soon as the first party has finished another goes through the same evolutions, and then another, and so on; and it is not till late at night that the town returns to its peaceful propriety.
The dancers on the first day are the gentlemen and ladies. The servants go through the same proceedings on the morrow.
I have given both the song and tune in my Songs of the West.
A few years ago the celebration was discontinued; but this provoked such dissatisfaction that it was revived with fresh zest.
The visitor to Helston may see an occasional pixy pot on a roof-ridge of an old house. This is a bulbous ornament, on which the pixies are supposed to dance, and in dancing drop luck on the house below.
Loe Pool is the largest lake in Cornwall; the only other is Dozmare. It is a beautiful sheet of fresh water cut off from the sea by a pebble ridge, which it was wont to overflow, but a culvert has been bored through the rocks to enable the Cober to
