You Have No
Traditions." The Phrase Was At First A Puzzling One.
We Americans are
apt to think we have traditions, - a rather clearly marked line of
precedents.
And it is hard to see how a people should be happier without
them. It is not anywhere considered a misfortune to have had a
grandfather, I believe, and some very good folks take an innocent pride
in that very natural fact. It was not easy to conceive why the
possession of a glorious history of many centuries should be regarded as
a drawback. But a closer observation of Spanish life and thought reveals
the curious and hurtful effect of tradition upon every phase of
existence.
In the commonest events of every day you will find the flavor of past
ages lingering in petty annoyances. The insecurity of the middle ages
has left as a legacy to our times a complicated system of obstacles to a
man getting into his own house at night. I lived in a pleasant house on
the Prado, with a minute garden in front, and an iron gate and railing.
This gate was shut and locked by the night watchman of the quarter at
midnight, - so conscientiously that he usually had everything snug by
half past eleven. As the same man had charge of a dozen or more houses,
it was scarcely reasonable to expect him to be always at your own gate
when you arrived. But by a singular fatality I think no man ever found
him in sight at any hour.
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