gradually doing away with much of the parade and
renown of the Common-Riding. But 'Tyr-ibus ye Tyr ye
Odin' retains all its local power to fire the lieges,
and the accredited method of arousing the burghers to
any political or civil struggle is still to send round
the drums and fifes, 'to play Tyribus' through the
town, a summons analogous to that of the Fiery Cross
in olden times. Apart from the words of the slogan,
the air itself bears in its wild fire all the tokens
of a remote origin."[147]

We could not get better evidence than this of the survival of tribal
custom, custom that is distinctly connected with tribes rather than
with places or individuals, with groups of people who, now bound
together by local considerations and influences, have only recently
passed away from the far more ancient influences of the tribe. Alike
in the forms of historical codes and in traditional local remains, we
have found evidence of the use of rhyme for the preservation of
unwritten rules and forms; and this use restores to tradition an
important branch of its material.

We have thus ascertained that there is direct and acknowledged
indebtedness of history to tradition. Its extent covers a wide area of
culture progress, and of unbroken continuity from tribal to historic
times. The legal codes of the barbaric tribes of Western Europe are
the direct successors of the traditional originals; and because these
legal codes, equally with their unwritten predecessors, cannot be
dispensed with by the historian, they find their place unquestioned
among genuine historical material. They are no more, and no less,
historical than other traditional material. They are part of the life
of the people rescued from prehistoric days, and they tell us of these
days by the same sanction and the same methods as the rest of the
traditional material which has been so strangely and so persistently
neglected by the historian. The whole of tradition, and not selected
parts of it, must be brought into use if we would follow scientific
method, and I claim this for the study of folklore on the strength of
the results which have now been brought together.

[Illustration: ONE OF FIVE STONE CIRCLES IN THE FIELDS OPPOSITE THE
GLEBE OF NYMPHSFIELD]

[Illustration: CARN-AN-CHLUITHE
TO COMMEMORATE THE DEFEAT AND DEATH OF THE YOUTHS OF THE DANANNS]

[Illustration: THE CAIRN OF BALLYMAGIBBON NEAR THE ROAD PASSIN