Show of TRADITION th bartl on of ab ia kw pal in it coiner it is paid alie of writing ahe icer ry and atara aro beaure the school roaster wait as he ia nowa now a it veua to meet with 1 of roero uriz ing capacity among person tf who read bor write coni could be kept by the aid of a only anil the memory of many a email farmer or petty rural shopkeeper waa his only ledger anil order book it is certain that scinco the art of writing haa become an almost universal ac the faculty of memo ry being leas needed is less culli bated ionoff after the invention 0 dellera our forefathers fore fathera rested oa oral tradition aal Karia usaa bert eliat one of the ancient i acea oi italy ed no written language and where written character charac ten wre w re in use of fanned funned au important supplement to them folklore tales and ballads haat been handed down from lip to hii for with curious fidelity when oral tradition was recognized as a vehicle tar actual information more care was tadeu regarding ila accuracy than would ba the case in these days the old jealously guarded a time torin of even in their prose narratives kreton peasants botu bly who possess a talent as raconteurs will repeat a legend or a story with scrupulous fidelity to the in they have always heard ahe related and will always check a traveler who attempts to deviate from lie orthodox nay maii ier the etory should begin thua repeating the regular formula of the tale the story teller devio ancs laule in his time honored recitals of lillys of love adventure and magic we recognize all our old friends from the arabian nighta it we halt to laiten to a professional raconteur in he streets of any ori town in the days of war against proscribed book faithful roe mories were often utilized to prax berve prohibited works from oblivion deriu the persecution of the waldense in ane thirteenth century then version of the scriptures was prohibited and destroyed wherever found their mia aisters committed whole books of the sacred volume u memory and repeated at their religious meetings it would be tedious to enumerate the many instances in chith tradition has preserved what aritte histories were forbidden to on the whole oral tra di tion are strangely accurate strangely when we consider how bacu facu are altered and distorted when ire related by successive story tellers the childs bame of rubian Rua ian scandal in which a secret whispered to one person and repeated to a circle ot others ia usually altered out of recognition aheu repeated aloud by the lat hearer ia played every dav in society and yet local tradition will faithfully chronicle the site of a battle llie burial place of a hero the date of a siege and afler generations genera tiona of historians and have at the unreliable local legend a later investigation will discover that the despised traditional story was the true one after all centuries of repetition may have slightly added to the incidents or distorted some of the fact but the main tale 13 strictly exact the reputed treasure trove may prove but a trifling hoard the battle field smaller iu extent the graves of the heroes less numerous but in each case local tradition is true regarding the facca that occurred and the locale where they look place may at leant claim to be as as history though this per hapa is faint braue oral tradition is usually freo from conscious party bia the repeaters of traditional lore carry on the tale as they heard it but how many an eloquent historian appears to as sume a brief fur une aide or another in every party contest and to write bis history with a view not of elucidating ci pacts but of representing certain historical characters as angels or the reverse such writers are always the to read an impartial id badly dull as a rule but when a biased writer playa the part of clio tra dilion may often prove aba eater guide of the two folklore folk lore if not au altogether reliable 1 ulie is seldom totally at fault in ita statement of bacu facu and tradition baa frequently kept alive memories which might otherwise have perished altogether books may be destroyed and hia tory wilfully garbled but it 9 less easy to extinguish local una ealy wa alik we ta tt catoria blieu h 01 a clise slie for t when lilii iwaoka atia dune to when hiie imd children she raw binm |