The Highwayman

The London Magazine writes:

The man casts off, his partner follows him; she back again, and her partner follows her; the woman back to back with the second man, whilst her partner does the same, with the second woman; the first couple back to back, then all four hands round, and right and left half way.

The music is marked 3/8 and has two 6 bar strains and one 8 bar strain and is marked DC. In his Introduction, Thomas Wilson defines Da Capo which signifies, after the Parts that compose the tune are played through, the first is played again. Unfortunately that doesn't seem to fit the figure, so provisionally, I'm ignoring the Da Capo.

Rutherford published the same figure and music in ~1756.

The 1s casting down and back should leave them in the same place they started. But the neighbor back to backs suggest one couple should be improper... But improper duple minors had died out by 1750. Or perhaps both corners go at once in a tightly controlled muddle in the middle. I think it'll work.

If the circle four goes all the way round, the the half rights and lefts will leave people progressed but improper. If the circle four goes halfway round then the half rights and lefts leaves people unprogressed but proper.

One solution is to guess that the dancing master/typesetter left out the final figure of the dance which will make use of the Da Capo strain. A half-poussette would work nicely (the term poussette was probably not in use until 1779, but the movement was nicely described by the Neals in 1726).

However, Colin Hume pointed out that a much simpler change is to make the rights and lefts be three quarters instead of half, and that solves the progression problem. And that can take up the 6 bars of A3. Leaving us with 8 bars for all four hands round which is a lot a single circle. People could circle twice, but more common is to have a circle left followed by a circle right...

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