that the Tarantella can now be seen to best advantage. Of the
three islands that lie close to Naples, Procida is the least known or
visited by strangers, so that when the Tarantella is danced by the
Procidani, the old-fashioned popular orchestra is employed to give the
necessary music. This consists of five quaint instruments (obviously of
Oriental origin as their counterparts can still be seen amongst the
Kabyles of Northern Africa): the first being a fife (_siscariello_); the
second a tin globe covered with skin pierced by a piece of cane
(_puti-puti_); the third a wooden saw and a split stick, making a
primitive bow and fiddle (_scetavaiasse_); the fourth an arrangement of
three wooden mallets, that are rattled together like a gigantic pair of
bones (_tricca-ballache_); and the fifth a Jew's harp
(_scaccia-pensieri_). A tarantella danced to the accompaniment of so weird
a medley of instruments and by real peasants full of gaiety is naturally a
thing altogether diverse from the stilted, though graceful and decorous
performance that can be observed any day for payment in a Sorrentine or
Neapolitan hotel; yet it must ever be borne in mind that the Tarantella
proper, whether danced _con amore_ by Procidan peasants or performed for
lucre by costumed professionals, is no vulgar frenzied _can-can_, but a
musical love-dance expressive of primitive courtship.

"The Tarantella is a choregraphic love-story, the two dancers representing
an enamoured swain and his mistress. It is the old theme--'the quarrel of
lovers is the renewal of love.' Enraptured gaze, coy side-look, gallant
advance, timid retrocession, impassioned declaration, supercilious
rejection, piteous supplication, softening hesitation; worldly goods
oblation, gracious acceptation; frantic jubilation, maidenly resignation.
Petting, wooing, billing, cooing. Jealous accusation, sharp recrimination,
manly expostulation, shrewish aggravation; angry threat, summary
dismissal. Fuming on one side, pouting on the other. Reaction,
approximation, exclamation, exoneration, reconciliation, osculation,
winding up with a grand _pas de circomstance_, expressive of confidence
re-established and joy unbounded. That's about the figure of it; but no
word-painting can give an idea of the spirit, the 'go' of the tarantella
when danced for love and not for money."(9)

On a modest scale Sorrento can lay claim to be called an eternal city, for
the Surrentum of the ancient Romans was a pla