Then the great egg dance, the special dance of
the season, began. A hundred eggs were scattered
over a level space covered with sand, and a
young couple, taking hands, began the dance.
If they finished without breaking an egg they
were betrothed, and not even an obdurate parent
could oppose the marriage.
After three couples had failed, midst the laugher
and shouts of derision of the on-lookers, Philibert
of Savoy, bending on his knee before Marguerite,
begged her consent to try the dance
with him. The admiring crowd of retainers
shouted in approval, "Savoy and Austria!" When
the dance was ended and no eggs were broken
the enthusiasm was unbounded.
Philibert said, "Let us adopt the custom of
Bresse." And they were affianced, and shortly
afterward married.

The indication of such a performance occurs in an old comedy, entitled
''The longer thou livest, the more Foole thou art'', by
William Wager in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, where we meet with these lines:

Upon my one foote pretely I can hoppe.
And daunce it trimley about an egge.

Dancing upon one foot was exhibited by the Saxon gleemen,
and probably by the Norman minstrels, but more especially by
the women-dancers, who might thence acquire the name of ''hoppesteres'',〔In fact there has been a scholastic discussion among Chaucer commenters about the word ''hoppesteres'' used in the expression "shippes hoppesteres"; see T. Tyrwhitt's reference.〕
which is given by Chaucer. A vestige of this denomination
is still retained, and applied to dancing, though somewhat
contemptuously ; for an inferior dancing-meeting is generally
called a hop.
Hopping matches for prizes were occasionally made in the
sixteenth century, as we learn from John Heywoode the epigrammatist.
In his ''Proverbs'' printed in 1566, are the following
lines:

Where wooers hoppe in and out, long time may bring
Him that hoppeth best at last to have the ring

But to return to the egg-dance. This performance was common
enough about thirty years back and was well received
at Sadler's Wells ; where I saw it exhibited, not by simply
hopping round a single egg, but in a manner that much increased
the difficulty. A number of eggs, I do not precisely
recollect how many, but I believe about twelve or fourteen,
were placed at certain distances marked upon the stage; the
dancer, taking his stand, was blind-folded, and a hornpipe
being played in the orchestra, he went through all the paces
and figures of the dance, passing backwards and forwards between the eggs
without touching them.