St. Patrick's Day ~ RSCDS
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St. Patrick's Day ~ RSCDS is a Scottish Country Dance. It was published by W. Smyth in 1830 in A Pocket Companion for Young Ladies and Gentlemen Containing Directions for the Performance of Quadrilles, Scotch, English, Irish, French, and Spanish Country Dances, Reels, &c.. It was interpreted by RSCDS in 1926 and published in RSCDS Book 3. It is a proper Duple Minor dance. J24. An online description of the dance may be found here.
The RSCDS attributes this to Allan's Ball-Room Guide, ~1880, but it appeared earlier.
Rutherford published a dance with this name in 1756, but it does not match this figure.
Wilson's A Companion to the Ball Room (London, 1816), page 113 contains a figure that might be related:
Hands across quite round with the 2d. Cu: set & back again lead down the middle up again turn your partner & lead outsides
Smyth writes:
Four hands across half round and pousette, back to places, the first couple down the middle and turn half round and up again, four hands round at top, then turn to proper sides.
The Lowes write something similar:
Cross hands half round and pousette back to places; the first couple down the middle, and turn half round; up again and hands four at top; then turn to proper sides.
Finally Allan writes:
- First and second couples right hand across and half round, back to places with pousette.
- First couple down the centre, turning half round and up again.
- First and second couples right hands across and round turning into places.
Courtesy of National Library of Scotland, licensed under:
There are descriptions of what "poussette" and "down the middle and up" meant when Smyth was writing in NLS MS 3860. A half poussette (which is what is used here) is progressive and leaves everyone proper. "down the middle and up" is also progressive, and leaves the 1s in 2nd place.
The animation plays at 120 counts per minute normally, but the first time through the set the dance will often be slowed down so people can learn the moves more readily. Men are drawn as rectangles, women as ellipses. Each couple is drawn in its own color, however the border of each dancer indicates what role they currently play so the border color may change each time through the minor set.
| 1-4 | Right hands across half |
| 5-8 | Half Poussette |
| 9-16 | 1s lead down the middle, turn, and lead back |
| 17-20 | Right hands across half |
| 21-24 | Partner right hand turn once and a half to own side |
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The dance itself is out of copyright, and is in the public domain. The interpretation is out of copyright in the US, but I'm not sure of other jurisdictions. My visualization of this dance is copyright © 2024 by George W. Williams V and is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
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My work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Most of the dances have more restrictive licensing, see my notes on copyright, the individual dance pages should mention when some rights are waived.