DANCING MANIA, an epidemic of frequent occurrence, especially in German towns, during the Middle Ages, of the nature of hysteria, showing itself in convulsive movements beyond the control of the will, and in delirious acts, sometimes violently suicidal; the most signal occurrence of the mania was at Aix-la-Chapelle in July 1374.

DANCOURT, FLORENT CARTON, French dramatist, a prolific author; a favourite of Louis XIV.; wrote comedies, chiefly on the follies of the middle classes of the time (1661-1725).

DANDIE DINMONT, a humorous, jovial store-farmer in “Guy Mannering.”

DANDIN, GEORGE, one of Moliere’s comedies, illustrative of the folly a man commits when he marries a woman of higher rank than his own, George being his impersonation of a husband who has patiently to endure all the extravagant whims and fancies of his dame of a wife.

DANDIN, PERRIN, a simple citizen in the “Pantagruel” of Rabelais, who seats himself judge-wise on the first stump that offers, and passes offhand a sentence in any matter of litigation; a character who figures similarly in a comedy of Racine’s, and in a fable of La Fontaine’s.

DAN`DOLO, a Venetian family that furnished four Doges to the Republic, ENRICO being the most illustrious; chosen Doge in his eighty-fourth year, assisted the Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade with ships; joined them, when blind and aged 90, in laying siege to Constantinople; led the attack by sea, and was the first to leap ashore; was offered the imperial crown, but declined it; died instead “despot” of Roumania in 1205, at 97.

DANEGELT, originally a tax imposed on land to buy off the Danes from the shores of England, and subsequently for other objects, such as the defence of the coast; abolished by Henry II., though re-imposed subsequently under other names.

DANELAGH, a district in the E. of England, N. of the Thames; dominated at one time more or less by the Danes; of vague extent.

DANGEAU, MARQUIS, author of “Memoirs” affecting the court of Louis XIV. and its manners (1638-1720).

D’ANGOULEME, DUCHESSE, daughter of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette; was released from restraint after the execution of her parents in exchange for prisoners in the Royalist’s hands; fled to Vienna, where she was driven forth; married her cousin, to whom she was early betrothed; could find no place of safe refuge but in England; returned to France on Napoleon’s exile to Elba, and headed a body of troops against him on his return; after Waterloo, returned to France and stayed till July 1830, and lived to see Louis Philippe, in 1848, driven from the throne; Napoleon called her “the only man of her family”; left “Memoirs” (1778-1851).

DANGS, THE, a forest district in the N. of the Presidency of Bombay, occupied by fifteen wild tribes, each under a chief.