Book of Old English Ballads , page 9 by George Wharton Edwards
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nts sing their songs upon every occasion of domestic or local interest; and sowing and harvesting, birth, christening, marriage, the burial, these notable events in the life of the country side are all celebrated by unknown poets; or, rather, by improvisers who give definite form to sentiments, phrases, and words which are on many lips. The Russian peasant tells his stories as they were told to him; those heroic epics whose life is believed, in some cases, to date back at least a thousand years. These great popular stories form a kind of sacred
inheritance bequeathed by one generation to another as a possession of the memory, and are almost entirely unrelated to the written literature of the country. Miss Hapgood tells a very interesting story of a government official, stationed on the western shore of Lake Onega, who became so absorbed in the search for this
literature of the people that he followed singers and reciters from place to place, eager to learn from their lips the most widely known of these folk tales. On such an expedition of discovery he found himself, one stormy night, on an island in the lake. The hut of refuge was already full of stormbound peasants when he entered. Having made himself some tea, and spread his blanket in a vacant place, he fell asleep. He was presently awakened by a murmur of recurring sounds. Sitting up, he found the group of peasants hanging on the words of an old man, of kindly face, expressive eyes, and melodious voice, from whose lips flowed a marvellous song; grave and gay by turns, monotonous and passionate in succession; but wonderfully fresh, picturesque, and fascinating. The listener soon became aware that he was hearing, for the first time, the famous story of "Sadko, the Merchant of Novgorod." It was like being present at the birth of a piece of literature!
The fact that unwritten songs and stories still exist in great numbers among remote country-folk of our own time, and that additions are still made to them, help us to understand the probable origin