Robert Browning.

And as it is with us, so it is with a nation, with a people.

In the dim, far-off times when our forefathers were wild, naked savages, they had no books.  Like ourselves, when we were tiny, they could neither read nor write.  But do you think that they had no stories?  Oh, yes!  We may be sure that when the day’s work was done, when the fight or the chase was over, they gathered round the wood fire and listened to the tales of the story-teller.

These stories were all of war.  They told of terrible combats with men or with fierce strange beasts, they told of passion, of revenge.  In them there was no beauty, no tenderness, no love.  For the life of man in those far-off days was wild and rough; it was one long struggle against foes, a struggle which left little room for what was beautiful or tender.

But as time went on, as life became more easy, in one way or another the savage learned to become less savage.  Then as he changed, the tales he listened to changed too.  They were no longer all of war, of revenge; they told of love also.  And later, when the story of Christ had come to soften men’s hearts and brighten men’s lives, the stories told of faith and purity and gentleness.

At last a time came when minstrels wandered from town to town, from castle to castle, singing their lays.  And the minstrel who had a good tale to tell was ever sure of a welcome, and for his pains he was rewarded with money, jewels, and even land.  That was the true listening time of the world.

It was no easy thing to be a minstrel, and a man often spent ten or twelve years in learning to be one.  There were certain tales which all minstrels had to know, and the best among them could tell three hundred and fifty.  Of these stories the minstrels used to learn only the outline, and each told the story in his own way, filling it in according to his own fancy.  So as time went on these well-known tales came to be told in many different ways, changing as the times changed.

At length, after many years had passed, men began to write down these tales, so that they might not be forgotten.  These first books we call Manuscripts, from the Latin words manus, a hand, and scribere, to write, for they were all written by hand.  Even after they were written down there were many changes made in the tales, for those who wrote or copied them would sometimes miss lines or alter others.  Yet they were less changed than they had been when told only by word of mouth.

These stories then form the beginnings of what is called our Literature.  Literature really means letters, for it comes from a Latin word littera, meaning a letter of the alphabet.  Words are made by letters of the alphabet being set together, and our literature again by words being set together; hence the name.

As on and on time went, every year more stories were told and sung and written down.  The first stories which our forefathers told in the days long, long ago, and which were never written down, are lost forever.  Even many of those stories which were written are lost too, but a few still remain, and from them we can learn much of the life and the history of the people who lived in our land ten and twelve hundred years ago, or more.