[CRUIKSHANK] PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS 9 



Sir George Prévost in Winchester cathedral are singularly at variance 

 with the estimates generally accepted by the historian. 



The chief and, indeed, almost the only sources of material for 

 the history of modern times consist of written or printed documents. 

 Written documents may be broadly divided into three classes: those 

 that are official, those that are semi-official, and those that are non- 

 official or private. Each class has its peculiar limitations as to 

 credibility and trustworthiness. Official documents are usually 

 marked by a certain restraint, which is found to a less degree in the 

 semi-official, and still less in private correspondence, which is fre- 

 quently coloured by the personal bias or passions of the writer. 



In another way, they may be classified into those that are con- 

 temporary with the events they purport to relate, and those of a later 

 date. Considering them from still another point of view, it is most 

 important to know whether they contain the statements of an actual 

 eye-witness or of some other person. In other words, is the evidence 

 direct or hearsay? "One eyewitness," says W. E. Henley, "however 

 dull and unprejudiced, is worth a wilderness of sentimental historians." 

 But it must be remembered that eyewitnesses are seldom unprejudiced 

 and that their statements are often much impaired by personal bias, 

 by the nervous excitement of the moment, or by a limited range of 

 observation. Then a subsequent narrative or report is often pieced 

 together by some person, who was in a very limited sense, or quite 

 possibly in no sense at all, an eyewitness, from the statements of 

 several participants. So much inevitably depends on the personal 

 point of view and individual facilities for seeing, hearing, and appreci- 

 ating what actually took place. A curious example of this is reported 

 to have occurred at the Congress of Psychologists held at Goettingen, 

 shortly before the war. At an evening session, when all present, who 

 were mostly lawyers, physicians or men of science, were in complete 

 ignorance of the test to be made, a violent scene was enacted by two 

 persons, supposed to have come into the hall from a neighbouring 

 ball. It was very brief, lasting only for twenty seconds. Under a 

 pretext that a judicial investigation might be held, the president 

 requested each of the spectators to draw up an independent account 

 of this little drama. Among fort}^ reports that were handed in, only 

 one contained less than twenty per cent, of errors, fourteen contained 

 between twenty and forty per cent., twelve contained between forty 

 and fifty per cent., and thirteen contained more than fifty per cent. 

 In thirty-four reports, between ten and fifteen per cent, of the details 

 were absolutely imaginary. 



