Mr. Sharp went on to speak of his wonderful folk-lore
finds among the " lost " community of mountaineers in the United States—finds which so delighted those who were fortunate enough to take part in Mr. Sharp's courses of folk-dancing at Stratford-on-Avon last summer. This community has been almost isolated since the end of the eighteenth century, is of purely English stook, and is almost completely illiterate. It possesses, however, a fine traditional culture, and Mr. Sharp was able to trace here, in their original forms, both ballads and dances which had become hopelessly worn down and corrupt in England. It was indeed fortunate that such an expert recorder as Mr. Cecil Sharp should have reported upon the community before it was " discovered " by the profane. We shall now have the best record that could conceivably be made of this strangest of survivals.
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