This blandly named "Polish Dance" was published by expatriate English dancing master William George Wells in The danciad, or companion to the modern ball room in Montreal in 1832. I have my doubts about whether there is anything authentically Polish about it, but the dance itself is...interesting. Let me start with a transcription.
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POLISH DANCE
To be danced by an unlimited number of couples, and placed exactly in the same situation as for the Original Gallopade.
WALTZ TIME.
Fig.— Promenade = = Poussette = = sett and turn partners = ladies’ hands across and back. joining hands to partners’, forming a cross = = all promenade in a cross and turn partners to places = = all the couples now fall into Quadrille parties of four, and perform La Pantalon, still in Waltz time = sauteuse = =.
[This may be repeated at the pleasure of the party.]
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I've previously discussed both Wells' "Original" Gallopade and the possibly-more-original Original Gallopade published by J. S. Pollock. It's clear that the Polish Dance is performed in a circle of couples. The reference is also a reminder that Wells was not necessarily the originator of many (any?) of the dances in his book; see here for another example.
So, the Polish Dance should be done in a circle of couples, specifically, in an even number of couples, since in the second part of the dance, they form half-quadrille sets, couple-facing-couple, to perform the Pantalon figure of the French quadrille. There are some minor reconstruction problems with the dance, but before going on to those, let's take a look at the basic structure of the dance:
- the couples move around the room, promenading and doing figures as a group
- they do a quadrille figure in pairs
- they end with sauteuse waltz
Does this remind you of anything?
Think about G.M.S. Chivers' La Grande Polonaise, which I recently discussed here. The dancers:
- move around the room, promenading and doing figures as a group
- do quadrille figures in pairs
- end with a sauteuse waltz
And, of course, the Polonaise is obviously, by its very name, a Polish dance. And it is in 3/4 time, which someone not terribly familiar with fine musical distinctions might well call "waltz time". Other dances in Wells' book make it clear that he was aware of at least some of Chivers' publications. Is this "Polish Dance" his reinterpretation of La Grande Polonaise? If so, while it is still not all that much like an actual polonaise, he's outdone Chivers by at least getting the time signature right.
Moving on to my reconstruction.
The most significant problem is the musical structure The double bars (=) represent eight bars of music; two sets of them (= =) means sixteen bars. No matter how clever and graceful the dancers, I find it very unlikely that they could manage to perform La [sic] Pantalon in eight bars, even in waltz time. Sixteen might be possible, but I think the standard thirty-two bars is more realistic. So that has to be changed. I'll give my reconstruction before talking about the other problem.
Polish Dance (32b x4 of waltz for once through)
waltz for an even number of couples in a circle
8b Introduction
16b All promenade round
16b All waltz round (see notes below)
8b All set and turn partners
16b All ladies moulinet by right hands, back by left, taking partners to form a grand moulinet
16b All promenade in grand moulinet formation (12b) and turn partners to places (4b)
(every other couple should about-face in this turn so that the circle becomes couple-facing-couple)
32b All dance Le Pantalon in waltz time
8b Chaîne anglaise (right and left)
8b Set & turn partners
8b Chaîne des Dames (ladies' chain)
8b Half promenade, half chaîne anglaise home
16b All sauteuse waltz
Repeat from the beginning if desired
Reconstruction notes
Most of this is quite straightforward; all I've done is give Pantalon a full thirty-two bars and add an eight-bar introduction to balance out the strains. Unlike Chivers' dance, there is no need for a change of music or time signature. It's useful if the couples dancing figure out in advance if they are the couples who turn around for Pantalon or not, perhaps literally counting off. Otherwise there may need to be some filler while the dancers get themselves sorted. The music can always be extended for extra time in the sauteuse to even things out.
There is one notable problem in the original instructions: what to do during the poussette? By this time in the 19th century, the term usually means to dance around another couple, often with a waltz step. That's difficult to apply here, however, since prior to the Pantalon segment, there are no obvious pairs of couples, and I don't think adding another segment in which the dancers have to shuffle around to get into pairs is a good idea. Nor can I think of any way this could gracefully occupy sixteen bars of music. So what did Wells have in mind? Looking through his other dances, there are examples of poussettes in the country dance figures; presumably they are the standard version. And there is one quadrille in waltz time, the Bavarians, in which Wells uses it in two different ways. In the first figure, there's a typical "top and bottom couples poussette" in eight bars. But in the third figure the term is used more ambiguously. I'll give the entire figure for reference:
Grand chain half round = pousette [sic] to places = ladies hands across and back = promenade in a star and turn to places = 4 ladies waltz round the center to the right = 4 gents same to the left = pousette [sic] all 8 round to places = = finish with grand promenade = quick time.
It looks to me very much like "poussette" in this case means to move around the circle ("all 8 round") to places. And given that the poussette in this era was associated with waltzing around, and this quadrille is also in waltz time, I think what Wells intended was to waltz as couples back to places. That is why in my reconstruction I have replaced "poussette" with "waltz".
Steps
Wells gave no hint as to steps, so those given below are my own artistic choices. I'm not going to spell out the technical details; for that, an in-person workshop is better. But I'll summarize for dancers with experience in the period.
- For the promenades at the beginning and in the grand moulinet: a march step (one step per bar) or possibly an actual polonaise step, should the dancers happen to know it.
- For the waltz: the valse à trois temps.
- For the setting: a pas de basque step.
- For the turning, ladies' moulinet, and the Pantalon figures: three little steps per bar, like a pas de bourrée without its initial plié.
- For the sauteuse waltz: the sauteuse step as described by Thomas Wilson, that being the closest description available. Leap-slide-close, leap-run-run.
Music
As noted above, my reconstruction fits neatly into 32 bars of waltz repeated four times. I don't think there was specific music for this, though it's hard to be certain. Musicians willing to put in the effort to arrange music and/or style the various parts to provide contrasting polonaise and waltz sections would be a delight.
A Final Note
W. G. Wells was a London dancing master resident in Quebec, where he published his book. That makes the connection to England a bit tenuous, though not impossible. I'm not aware of any group reenacting dance in Montreal in the 1830s!
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