Beggars in Greece.
'There nro no brsKirs In Greece or tli# toliuids Ft the Archipelago, the iMlwl : al I others would think :t =haine to live by alms, with their blue and sunny •sky atoove them, and then- frrtilp poll be.neafh their feet. But the blind are a ! privileged class: ihey po from house to jlihouse. jreceivlng a ready welcome nt . !;sach, for ttiey are wandering minstrels, *an<J have been so ever rlnce Homer's . time. Some of them have learnt by h«nrt \ an Immense number of songs ; and they • all know a large collection. Their 1 memory Is their stock-in-trade—their means of llvtagr. Tliey never stay long one pla<ce, but traverse Greece from to end." and have a ■wonderful knack ■ln adapting their choice of songs to the ( character <.tf the' inhabitants of the j place where .they chant them. These {•minstrels are' divided Into two sots—- ( those who merely remember what they nave learnt from others, and those who . ;ompose baßads of' their own. in addl- •' den to stores erf memory. In fnct. ! these blind beggars are the novelists and , the historians of modern Greece.— ' M Atalanta
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/MIC18990915.2.28
Bibliographic details
Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume 30, Issue 9182, 15 September 1899, Page 5
Word Count
188Beggars in Greece. Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume 30, Issue 9182, 15 September 1899, Page 5
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