Book Description

Excerpt from Spanish Legendary Tales The mere fact that they exist in vast numbers, and that many of them bear upon the same subject, renders it necessary that, if they are to be remembered at all, they must be remembered with verbal accuracy; otherwise they would in a short time become hope lessly confused one with another. One of the most popular subjects of Spanish folk-lore is the Christ of the Vega. I have myself heard at least a dozen legends turning on this theme; and many more versions must certainly exist. It would be impossible to keep these various stories apart in the popular memory, unless they had become, so to speak, stereo typed. And this.is the case with the majority of Spanish prose legends. They have assumed, in the course of time, a fixed and traditional shape, in their words no less than in their subjects. It is a truism that the memory of those who cannot read or write is, on the average, stronger than that of 'those who have had a literary education. When once education is diffused among the masses of the Spanish people, those legends which have not been committed to writing will be gradually lost. The new interests which education brings with it will also weaken among the people those tastes to which tales of the marvellous appeal. But this time seems still to be distant in Spain.. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.