The dances usually started at 10:00 P.M., recessed for a midnight supper, and then continued until 4:00 A.M. or daybreak. At the opera house, Winschells building, the Uintah House, the Central Hotel, the Metropolitan Hotel, or at the Corinne mills — the place did not seem to matter — couples numbering from forty to two hundred crowded on the floor. The local newspaper editors often could not contain their romantic memories of the previous evening as they broke forth into extravagant praise and poetry in describing the night's events. The dance was "an uncontrolled rollicking, rolling rout . . . simply a wild romp by all, unfettered by ceremony or tone," from which the participants could not depart without a sigh.48 The poetry included such selections as: Of all the joys vouchsafed to man in life's tempestuous whirl, There's naught approaches heaven so near as dancing with a girl — A reader one hundred years removed from those congenial scenes is left with the strong impression that Corinne was a joyful town, a fun place to spend an evening. No wonder errant Mormons from nearby hamlets often drove their buggies to the Gentile town for a night of terpsichorean bliss.40 That the invitation to dance was not always reciprocated by the Saints was confirmed by at least two sleighloads of Corinnethians who traveled to North String one evening to join a ball in progress at the local Mormon schoolhouse. As the Gentile group entered the hall the Mormon leader announced, "I would inform the parties from Corinne . . . that the house is rather crowded, and their room is more desirable than their company . . . they will therefore waltz out, and that very lively, too." Adding to this paraphrase of the ejection notice, the editor of the Mail composed a full column illustrated poem beginning with: My song is but a mournful ditty, For its how the Mormons treat the whites, So please give me an ear of pity, For the poor, ill-treated Corrineites. A sequel to the story occurred in a few days when a Mormon visiting in Corinne asked one of the would-be dancers where he could find a
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