What did all that stuff mean?

There's a lot of information in the "Juice of Barley" posting--stuff that tells you the dance formation, moves, etc.

Longways set: Imagine a line of men standing shoulder to shoulder. Now imagine a line of women standing shoulder to shoulder, parallel to the men and facing them. That's a longways set. Each man's partner is the woman facing him. It's also a proper set, because all the man are on one side and all the women are on the other.

Duple minor: This term just means that, within the longways set, the first two couples dance with each other, and the next two dance with each other, etc., down to the end of the line. Duple minor dances are progressive. This means that after you done the dance through one time, you find that you've moved down the longways set to the next couple. So you dance with them, then move on to the next couple, and so on.

Hands-four: This starts many many dances, although it's not actually a part of the dance. The first two couples in the longways set join hands to form a ring. The next two couples do the same, all the way to the end of the longways set. In a duple minor set, this shows you who you're dancing with first.

OK, it's time to go home. More to come later on!!