Gipsy Life Part 1

Gipsy Life.

by George Smith.

I give my warmest thanks to W. H. OVEREND, Esq., for the block forming the Frontispiece, which he has kindly presented to me on the condition that the picture occupies the position it does in this book; and also to the proprietor of the _Ill.u.s.trated London News_ for the blocks to help forward my work, the pictures of which appeared in his journal in November and December of last year and January in the present year, as found herein on pages 42, 48, 66, 76, 96, 108, 118, 122, 174, 192, 236, 283.

I must at the same time express my heart-felt thanks to the manager and proprietors of the _Graphic_ for the blocks forming the ill.u.s.trations on pages 1, 132, 170, 222, 228, 248, 272, 277, and which appeared in their journal on March 13th in the present year, and which they have kindly presented to me to help forward my object, connected with which sketches, at the kind request of the Editor, I wrote the article.

W. H. OVEREND, Esq., was the artist for the sketches in the _Ill.u.s.trated London News_, and HERBERT JOHNSON, Esq., was the artist for the sketches in the _Graphic_.

I also tender my warmest thanks to the Press generally for the help rendered to me during the crusade so far, without which I should have done but little.

TO THE MOST HONOURABLE THE PEERS AND MEMBERS OF THE HIGH COURT OF PARLIAMENT.

I have taken the liberty of humbly dedicating this work to you, the object of which is not to tickle the critical ears of ethnologists and philologists, but to touch the hearts of my countrymen on behalf of the poor Gipsy women and children and other roadside Arabs flitting about in our midst, in such a way as to command attention to these neglected, dark, marshy spots of human life, whose seedlings have been running wild among us during the last three centuries, spreading their poisonous influence abroad, not only detrimental to the growth of Christianity and the spread of civilisation, but to the present and eternal welfare of the children; and, what I ask for is, that the hand of the Schoolmaster may be extended towards the children; and that the vans and other temporary and movable abodes in which they live may be brought under the eye and influence of the Sanitary Inspector.

Very respectfully yours, GEORGE SMITH, _Of Coalville_.

_April_ 30_th_, 1880.

Part I.-Rambles in Gipsydom.

The origin of the Gipsies, as to who they are; when they became regarded as a peculiar race of wandering, wastrel, ragam.u.f.fin vagabonds; the primary object they had in view in setting out upon their shuffling, skulking, sneaking, dark pilgrimage; whether they were driven at the point of the sword, or allured onwards by the love of gold, designing dark deeds of plunder, cruelty, and murder, or anxious to seek a haven of rest; the route by which they travelled, whether over hill and dale, by the side of the river and valley, skirting the edge of forest and dell, delighting in the jungle, or pitching their tent in the desert, following the sh.o.r.es of the ocean, or topping the mountains; whether they were Indians, Persians, Egyptians, Ishmaelites, Roumanians, Peruvians, Turks, Hungarians, Spaniards, or Bohemians; the end of their destination; their religious views-if any-their habits and modes of life have been during the last three or four centuries wrapped, surrounded, and encircled in mystery, according to some writers who have been studying the Gipsy character. They have been a theme upon which a "bookworm" could gloat, a chest of secret drawers into which the curious delight to pry, a difficult problem in Euclid for the mathematician to solve; and an unreadable book for the author. A conglomeration of languages for the scholar, a puzzle for the historian, and a subject for the novelist.

These are points which it is not the object of this book to attempt to clear up and settle; all it aims at, as in the case of my "Cry of the Children from the Brick-yards of England," and "Our Ca.n.a.l Population,"

is, to tell "A Dark Chapter in the Annals of the Poor," little wanderers, houseless, homeless, and friendless in our midst. At the same time it will be necessary to take a glimpse at some of the leading features of the historical part of their lives in order to get, to some extent, a knowledge of the "little ones" whose pitiable case I have ventured to take in hand.

Paint the words "mystery" and "secrecy" upon any man's house, and you at once make him a riddle for the cunning, envious, and crafty to try to solve; and this has been the case with the Gipsies for generations, and the consequence has been, they have trotted out kings, queens, princes, bishops, n.o.bles, ladies and gentlemen of all grades, wise men, fools, and fanatics, to fill their coffers, while they have been standing by laughing in their sleeves at the foolishness of the foolish.

In Spain they were banished by repeated edicts under the severest penalties. In Italy they were forbidden to remain more than two nights in the same place. In Germany they were shot down like wild beasts. In England during the reign of Elizabeth, it was felony, without the "benefit of the clergy," to be seen in their company. The State of Orleans decreed that they should be put to death with fire and sword-still they kept coming.

In the last century, however, a change has come over several of the European Governments. Maria Theresa in 1768, and Charles III. of Spain in 1783, took measures for the education of these poor outcasts in the habits of a civilised life with very encouraging results. The experiment is now being tried in Russia with signal success. The emanc.i.p.ation of the Wallachian Gipsies is a fact accomplished, and the best results are being achieved.

The Gipsies have various names a.s.signed to them in different countries.

The name of Bohemians was given to them by the French, probably on account of their coming to France from Bohemia. Some derive the word Bohemians from the old French word "Boem," signifying a sorcerer. The Germans gave them the name of "Ziegeuner," or wanderers. The Portuguese named them "Siganos." The Dutch called them "Heiden," or heathens. The Danes and Swedes, "Tartars." In Italy they are called "Zingari." In Turkey and the Levant, "Tschingenes." In Spain they are called "Gitanos." In Hungary and Transylvania, where they are very numerous, they are called "Pharaoh Nepek," or "Pharaoh's People." The notion of their being Egyptian is entirely erroneous-their appearance, manners, and language being totally different from those of either the Copts or Fellahs; there are many Gipsies now in Egypt, but they are looked upon as strangers.

Notwithstanding that edicts have been hurled against them, persecuted and hunted like vermin during the Middle Ages, still they kept coming. Later on, laws more merciful than in former times have taken a more humane view of them and been contented by cla.s.sing them as "vagrants and scoundrels"-still they came. Magistrates, ministers, doctors, and lawyers have spit their spite at them-still they came; frowning looks, sour faces, b.u.t.toned-up pockets, poverty and starvation staring them in the face-still they came. Doors slammed in their faces, dogs set upon their heels, and ignorant babblers hooting at them-still they came; and the worst of it is they are reducing our own "riff-raff" to their level.

The novelist has written about them; the preacher has preached against them; the drunkards have garbled them over in their mouths, and yelped out "Gipsy," and stuttered "scamp" in disgust; the swearer has sworn at them, and our "gutter-sc.u.m gentlemen" have told them to "stand off."

These "Jack-o'-th'-Lantern," "Will-o'-th'-Wisp," "Boo-peep," "Moons.h.i.+ne Vagrants," "Ditchbank Sculks," "Hedgerow Rodneys," of whom there are not a few, are black spots upon our horizon, and are ever and anon flitting before our eyes. A motley crowd of half-naked savages, carrion eaters, dressed in rags, tatters, and shreds, usually called men, women, and children, some running, walking, loitering, traipsing, shouting, gaping, and staring; the women with children on their backs, and in their arms; old men and women tottering along "leaning upon their staffs;" hordes of children following in the rear; hulking men with lurcher dogs at their heels, sauntering along in idleness, spotting out their prey; donkeys loaded with sacks, mules with tents and sticks, and their vans and waggons carrying ill-gotten gain and plunder; and the question arises in the mind of those who take an interest in this singularly unfortunate race of beings: From whence came they? How have they travelled? By what routes did they travel? What is their condition, past and present? How are they to be dealt with in any efforts put forth to improve their condition? These are questions I shall in my feeble way endeavour to solve; at any rate, the two latter questions; the first questions can be dealt better with by abler hands than mine.

I would say, in the first place, that it is my decided conviction that the Gipsies were neither more nor less, before they set out upon their pilgrimage, than a pell-mell gathering of many thousands of low-caste, good for nothing, idle Indians from Hindustan-not ashamed to beg, with some amount of sentiment in their nature, as exhibited in their musical tendencies and love of gaudy colours, and except in rare instances, without any true religious motives or influences. It may be worth while to notice that I have come to the conclusion that they were originally from India by observing them entirely in the light given to me years ago of the different characters of human beings both in Asia, Europe, and Africa. Their habits, manners, and customs, to me, is a sufficient test, without calling in the aid of the philologist to decide the point of their originality. I may here remark that in order to get at the real condition of the Gipsies as they are at the present day in this country, and not to have my mind warped or bia.s.sed in any way, I purposely kept myself in ignorance upon the subject as to what various authors have said either for or against them until I had made my inquiries and the movement had been afloat for several months. The first work touching the Gipsy question I ever handled was presented to me by one of the authors-Mr.

Crofton-at the close of my Social Science Congress paper read at Manchester last October, ent.i.tled "The Dialect of the English Gipsies,"

which work, without any disrespect to the authors-and I know they will overlook this want of respect-remained uncut for nearly two months. With further reference to their Indian origin, the following is an extract from "Hoyland's Historical Survey," in which the author says:-"The Gipsies have no writing peculiar to themselves in which to give a specimen of the construction of their dialect. Music is the only science in which the Gipsies partic.i.p.ate in any considerable degree; they likewise compose, but it is after the manner of the Eastern people, extempore." Grellmann a.s.serts that the Hindustan language has the greatest affinity with that of the Gipsies. He also infers from the following consideration that Gipsies are of the lowest cla.s.s of Indians, namely, Parias, or, as they are called in Hindustan, Suders, and goes on to say that the whole great nation of Indians is known to be divided into four ranks, or stocks, which are called by a Portuguese name, Castes, each of which has its own particular sub-division. Of these castes, the Brahmins is the first; the second contains the Tschechterias, or Setreas; the third consists of the Beis, or Wazziers; the fourth is the caste of the above-mentioned Suders, who, upon the peninsula of Malabar, where their condition is the same as in Hindustan, are called Parias and Pariers. The first were appointed by Brahma to seek after knowledge, to give instruction, and to take care of religion. The second were to serve in war. The third were, as the Brahmins, to cultivate science, but particularly to attend to the breeding of cattle. The caste of the Suders was to be subservient to the Brahmins, the Tschechterias, and the Beis. These Suders, he goes on to say, are held in disdain, and they are considered infamous and unclean from their occupation, and they are abhorred because they eat flesh; the three other castes living entirely on vegetables. Baldeus says the Parias or Suders are a filthy people and wicked crew. It is related in the "Danish Mission Intelligencer," n.o.body can deny that the Parias are the dregs and refuse of all the Indians; they are thievish, and have wicked dispositions. Neuhof a.s.sures us, "the Parias are full of every kind of dishonesty; they do not consider lying and cheating to be sinful." The Gipsy's solicitude to conceal his language is also a striking Indian trait. Professor Pallas says of the Indians round Astracan, custom has rendered them to the greatest degree suspicious about their language. Salmon says that the nearest relations cohabit with each other; and as to education, their children grow up in the most shameful neglect, without either discipline or instruction. The missionary journal before quoted says with respect to matrimony among the Suders or Gipsies, "they act like beasts, and their children are brought up without restraint or information." "The Suders are fond of horses, so are the Gipsies." Grellmann goes on to say "that the Gipsies hunt after cattle which have died of distempers in order to feed on them, and when they can procure more of the flesh than is sufficient for one day's consumption, they dry it in the sun. Such is the constant custom with the Suders in India." "That the Gipsies and natives of Hindustan resemble each other in complexion and shape is undeniable. And what is a.s.serted of the young Gipsy girls rambling about with their fathers, who are musicians, dancing with lascivious and indecent gesture to divert any person who is willing to give them a small gratuity for so acting, is likewise perfectly Indian." Sonneratt confirms this in the account he gives of the dancing girls of Surat. Fortune-telling is practised all over the East, but the peculiar kind professed by the Gipsies, viz., chiromancy, constantly referring to whether the parties shall be rich or poor, happy or unhappy in marriage, &c., is nowhere met with but in India. Sonneratt says:-"The Indian smith carries his tools, his shop, and his forge about with him, and works in any place where he can find employment. He has a stone instead of an anvil, and his whole apparatus is a pair of tongs, a hammer, a beetle, and a file. This is very much like Gipsy tinkers," &c. It is usual for Parias, or Suders, in India to have their huts outside the villages of other castes. This is one of the leading features of the Gipsies of this country. A visit to the outskirts of London, where the Gipsies encamp, will satisfy any one upon this point, viz., that our Gipsies are Indians. In isolated cases a strong religious feeling has manifested itself in certain persons of the Bunyan type of character and countenance-a strong frame, with large, square, ma.s.sive forehead, such as Bunyan possessed; for it should be noted that John Bunyan was a Gipsy tinker, with not an improbable mixture of the blood of an Englishman in his veins, and, as a rule, persons of this mixture become powerful for good or evil. A case in point, viz., Mrs. Simpson and her family, has come under my own observation lately, which forcibly ill.u.s.trates my meaning, both as regards the evil Mrs.

Simpson did in the former part of her life, and for the last twenty years in her efforts to do good among persons of her cla.s.s, and also among others, as she has travelled about the country. The exodus of the Gipsies from India may be set down, first, to famine, of which India, as we all know, suffers so much periodically; second, to the insatiable love of gold and plunder bound up in the nature of the Gipsies-the West, from an Indian point of view, is always looked upon as a land of gold, flowing with milk and honey; third, the hatred the Gipsies have for wars, and as in the years of 1408 and 1409, and many years previous to these dates, India experienced some terrible b.l.o.o.d.y conflicts, when hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children were butchered by the cruel monster Timur Beg in cold blood, and during the tenth and eleventh centuries by Mahmood the Demon, on purpose to make proselytes to the Mohammedan faith, it is only natural to suppose that under those circ.u.mstances the Gipsies would leave the country to escape the consequences following those calamities, over-populated as it was, numbering close upon 200,000,000 of human beings. {8} I am inclined to think that it would be hunger and starvation upon their heels that would be the propelling power to send them forward in quest of food. From Attock, Peshawur, Cabul, and Herat, they would tramp through Persia by Teheran, and enter the Euphrates Valley at Bagdad. From Calcutta, Madras, Seringapatam, Bangalore, Goa, Poonah, Hydrabad, Aurungabad, Nagpoor, Jabbulpoor, Benares, Allahabad, Surat, Simla, Delhi, Lah.o.r.e, they would wander along to the mouth of the river Indus, and commence their journey at Hydrabad, and travelling by the sh.o.r.es of the Indian Ocean, stragglers coming in from Bunpore, Gombaroon, the commencement of the Persian Gulf, when they would travel by Bus.h.i.+no to Ba.s.sora. At this place they would begin to scatter themselves over some parts of Arabia, making their headquarters near Molah, Mecca, and other parts of the country, crossing over Suez, and getting into Egypt in large numbers. Others would take the Euphrates Valley route, which, by the way, is the route of the proposed railway to India. Tribes branching off at Kurnah, some to Bagdad, following the course of the river Tigris to Mosul and Diarbeker, and others would go to Jerusalem, Damuscus, and Antioch, till they arrived at Allepo and Alexandretta. Here may be considered the starting-point from which they spread over Asiatic Turkey in large numbers, till they arrived before Constantinople at the commencement of the fourteenth century.

Straggling Gipsies no doubt found their way westward prior to the wars of Timur Beg, and in this view I am supported by the fact that two of our own countrymen-Fitz-Simeon and Hugh the Illuminator, holy friars-on their pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1322, called at Crete, and there found some Gipsies-I am inclined to think only a few sent out as a kind of advance-guard or feeler, adopting the plan they have done subsequently in peopling Europe and England during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.

Brand, in his observations in "Popular Antiquities," is of opinion also that the Gipsies fled from Hindustan when Timur Beg ravaged India with a view of making Mohammedans of the heathens, and it is calculated that during his deeds of blood he butchered 500,000 Indians. Some writers suppose that the Gipsies, in order to escape the sword of this human monster, came into Europe through Egypt, and on this account were called English Gipsies.

In a paper read by Colonel Herriot before the Royal Asiatic Society, he says that the Gipsies, or Indians-called by some Suders, by others Naths or Benia, the first signifying rogue, the second dancer or tumbler-are to be met in large numbers in that part of Hindustan which is watered by the Ganges, as well as the Malwa, Gujerat, and the Deccan.

The religious crusades to the Holy Land commenced in the year 1095 and lasted to 1270. It was during the latter part of the time of the Crusades, and prior to the commencement of the wars by Timur Beg, that the Gipsies flocked by hundreds of thousands to Asiatic Turkey. While the rich merchants and princes were trying to outvie each other in their costly equipages, grandeur, and display of gold in their pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and the tremendous death-struggles between Christianity, Idolatry, and Mohammedism, the Gipsies were busily engaged in singing songs and plundering, and in this work they were encouraged by the Persians as they pa.s.sed through their territory. The Persians have always been friendly to these wandering, loafing Indians, for we find that during the wars of India by Timur Beg, and other monsters previous, they were harbouring 20,000 of these poor low-caste and outcast Indians; and, in fact, the same thing may be said of the other countries they pa.s.sed through on their way westward, for we do not read of their being persecuted in these countries to anything like the extent they have been in Europe. This, no doubt, arises from the affinity there is between the Indian, Persian, and Gipsy races, and the dislike the Europeans have towards idlers, loafers, liars, and thieves; and especially is this so in England. Gipsy life may find favour in the East, but in the West the system cannot thrive. A real Englishman hates the man who will not work, scorns the man who would tell him a lie, and would give the thief who puts his hands into his pocket the cat-o'-nine-tails most unmercifully.

The persecutions of the Gipsies in this country from time to time has been brought about, to a great extent, by themselves. John Bull dislikes keeping the idle, b.a.s.t.a.r.d children of other nations. He readily protects all those who tread upon English soil, but in return for this kindness he expects them, like bees, to be all workers. Drones, ragam.u.f.fins, and rodneys cannot grumble if they get kicked out of the hive. If 20,000 Englishmen were to tramp all over India, Turkey, Persia, Hungary, Spain, America, Egypt, Greece, Cyprus, South Africa, Germany, or France, in bands of from, say two to fifty men, women, and children, in a most wretched; miserable condition, doing little else but fiddling upon the national conscience and sympathies, blood-sucking the hardworking population, and frittering their time away in idleness, pilfering, and filth, I expect, and justly so, the inhabitants would begin to "kick,"

and the place would no doubt get rather warm for Mr. John Bull and his motley flock. If the Gipsies, and others of the same cla.s.s in this country, will begin to "buckle-to," and set themselves out for real hard work, instead of cadging from door to door, they will find, notwithstanding they are called Gipsies, John Bull extending to them the hand of brotherhood and sympathy, and the days of persecution pa.s.sed.

One thing is remarkable concerning the Gipsies-we never hear of their being actually engaged in warfare. They left India for Asiatic Turkey before the great and terrible wars broke out during the fourteenth century, and before the great religious wars concerning the Mohammedan faith in Turkey, during the fourteenth century, they fled to Western Europe. Thus it will be seen that they "would sooner run a mile than fight a minute." The idea of cold steel in open day frightens them out of their wits. Whenever a war is about to take place in the country in which they are located they will begin to make themselves scarce; and, on the other hand, they will not visit a country where war is going on till after it is over, and then, vulture-like, they swoop down upon the prey.

This feature is one of their leading characteristics; with some honourable exceptions, they are always looked upon as long-sighted, dark, deep, designing specimens of fallen humanity. For a number of years prior to the capture of Constantinople by Mohammed II. in 1453 the Gipsies had commenced to wend their way to various parts of Europe. The 200,000 Gipsies who had emigrated to Wallachia and Moldavia, their favourite spot and stronghold, saw what was brewing, and had begun to divide themselves into small bands. A band of 300 of these wanderers, calling themselves Secani, appeared in 1417 at Luneburg, and in 1418 at Basil and Bern in Switzerland. Some were seen at Augsberg on November 1, 1418. Near to Paris there were to be seen numbers of Gipsies in 1424, 1426, and 1427; but it is not likely they remained long in Paris. Later on we find them at Arnheim in 1429, and at Metz in 1430, Erfurt in 1432, and in Bavaria in 1433. The reason they appeared at these places at those particular times, was, no doubt, owing to the internal troubles of France; for it was during 1429 that Joan of Arc raised the siege of Orleans. The Gipsies appearing in small bands in various parts of the Continent at this particular time were, no doubt, as Mr. Groom says in his article in the "Encyclopaedia Britannica," sent forward by the main body of Gipsies left behind in Asiatic and European Turkey, to spy out the land whither they were anxious to bend their ways; for it was in the year 1438, fifteen years before the terrible struggle by the Mohammedans for Constantinople, that the great exodus of Gipsies from Wallachia, Roumania, and Moldavia, for the golden cities of the West commenced.

From the period of 1427 to 1514, a s.p.a.ce of about eighty-seven years-except spies-they were content to remain on the Continent without visiting our sh.o.r.es; probably from two causes-first, their dislike to crossing the water; second, the unsettled state of our own country during this period. For it should be remembered that the Wars of the Roses commenced in 1455, Richard III. was killed at the Battle of Bosworth Field, and in 1513 the Battle of Flodden took place in Scotland, in which the Scots were defeated. The first appearance of the Gipsies in large numbers in Great Britain was in Scotland in 1514, the year after the Battle of Flodden. Another remarkable coincidence connected with their appearance in this country came out during my inquiries; but whether there is any foundation for it further than it is an idea floating in my brain I have not yet been able to ascertain, as nothing is mentioned of it in any of the writings I have perused. It seems reasonable to suppose that the Gipsies, would retain and hand down some of their pleasant, as well as some of the bitter, recollections of India, which, no doubt, would at this time be mentioned to persons high in position-it should be noted that the Gipsies at this time were favourably received at certain head-quarters amongst merchants and princes-for we find that within fourteen years after the landing of the Indians upon our sh.o.r.es attempts were made to reach India by the North-east and North-west pa.s.sages, which proved a disastrous affair. Then, again, in 1579 Sir F. Drake's expedition set out for India. In 1589 the Levant Company made a land expedition, and in all probability followed the track by which the Gipsies travelled from India to the Holy Land in the fourteenth century, by the Euphrates valley and Persian Gulf.

Towards the end of the year 1417, in the Hanseatic towns on the Baltic coast and at the mouth of the Elbe, there appeared before the gates of Luneburg, and later on at Hamburg, Lubeck, Wirmar, Rostock, and Stralsuna, a herd of swarthy and strange specimens of humanity, uncouth in form, hideous in complexion, and their whole exterior shadowed forth the lowest depths of poverty and degradation. A cloak made of the fragments of oriental finery was generally used to disguise the filth and tattered garments of their slight remaining apparel. The women and young children travelled in rude carts drawn by a.s.ses or mules; the men trudged alongside, casting fierce and suspicious glances on those they met, thief-like, from underneath their low, projecting foreheads and eyebrows; the elder children, unkempt and half-clad, swarmed in every direction, calling with shrill cries and monkey-like faces and grimaces to the pa.s.sers-by to their feats of jugglery, craft, and deception. Forsaking the Baltic provinces the dusky band then sought a more friendly refuge in central Germany-and it was quite time they had begun to make a move, for their deeds of darkness had oozed out, and a number of them paid the penalty upon the gallows, and the rest scampered off to Meissen, Leipsic, and Herse. At these places they were not long in letting the inhabitants know, by their depredations, witchcraft, devilry, and other abominations, the cla.s.s of people they had in their midst, and the result was their speedy banishment from Germany; and in 1418, after wandering about for a few months only, they turned their steps towards Switzerland, reaching Zurich on August 1st, and encamped during six days before the town, exciting much sympathy by their pious tale and sorrowful appearance. In Switzerland the inhabitants were more gullible, and the soft parts of their nature were easily getatable, and the consequence was the Gipsies made a good thing of it for the s.p.a.ce of four years. Soon after leaving Zurich, according to Dr. Mikliosch, the wanderers divided their forces.

One detachment crossed the Botzberg and created quite a panic amongst the peaceable inhabitants of Sisteron, who, fearing and imagining all sorts of evils from these satanic-looking people, fed them with a hundred loaves, and induced them, for the good of their health, to make themselves miserably less. We next hear of them in Italy, in 1422.

After leaving Asiatic Turkey, and in their wanderings through Russia and Germany, the Asiatic, sanctimonious, religious halo, borrowed from their idolatrous form and notions of the wors.h.i.+p of G.o.d in the East, had suffered much from exposure to the civilising and Christianising influences of the West; and the result was their leaders decided to make a pilgrimage to Rome to regain, under the cloak of religion, some of the self-imagined lost prestige; and in this they were, at any rate, for a time, successful. On the 11th day of July, 1422, a leader of the Gipsies, named Duke Andrew, arrived at Bologna, with men, women and children, fully one hundred persons, carrying with them, as they alleged, a decree signed by the King of Hungary, permitting them, owing to their return to the Christian faith-stating at the same time that 4,000 had been re-baptised-to rob without penalty or hindrance wherever they travelled during seven years. Here these long-faced, pious hypocrites were in clover, as a reward for their professed re-embracing Christianity. After the expiration of this term they told the open-mouthed inhabitants, as a kind of sweetener, that they were to present themselves to the Pope, and then return to India-aye, with the spoils of their lying campaign, gained by robbing and plundering all they came in contact with. The result of their deceitful, lying expedition to Rome was all they could wish, and they received a fresh pa.s.sport from .

the Pope, asking for alms from his faithful flock on behalf of these wretches, who have been figuring before western nations of the world-sometimes as kings, counts, martyrs, prophets, witches, thieves, liars, and murderers; sometimes laying their misfortunes at the door of the King of Egypt, the Sultan of Turkey, religious persecution in India, the King of Hungary, and a thousand other Gorgios since them. Sometimes they would appear as renegade Christians, converted heathens, Roman Catholics, in fact, they have been everything to everybody; and, so long as the "grist was coming to the mill," it did not matter how or by whom it came.

By an ordinance of the State of Orleans in the year 1560 it was enjoined that all those impostors and vagabonds who go tramping about under the name of Bohemians and Egyptians should quit the kingdom, on penalty of the galleys. Upon this they dispersed into lesser companies, and spread themselves over Europe. They were expelled from Spain in 1591. The first time we hear of them in England in the public records was in the year 1530, when they were described by the statute 22 Hen. VIII., cap.

10, as "an outlandish people calling themselves Egyptians. Using no craft nor seat of merchandise, who have come into this realm and gone from s.h.i.+re to s.h.i.+re, and place to place, in great company, and used great subtile, crafty means to deceive the people, bearing them in hand, that they by palmistry could tell men's and women's fortunes, and so many times by craft and subtilty have deceived the people of their money, and also have committed many heinous felonies and robberies. Wherefore they are directed to avoid the realm, and not to return under pain of imprisonment and forfeiture of their goods and chattels; and upon their trials for any felony which they may have committed they shall not be ent.i.tled to a jury _de medietate linguae_." As if the above enactment was not sufficiently strong to prevent these wretched people multiplying in our midst and carrying on their abominable practices, it was afterwards enacted by statutes 1 and 2 Ph., and in c. 4 and 5 Eliz., cap. 20, "that if any such person shall be imported into this kingdom, the importer shall forfeit 40. And if the Egyptians themselves remain one month in this kingdom, or if any person being fourteen years old (whether natural-born subject or stranger), which hath been seen or found in the fellows.h.i.+p of such Egyptians, or which hath disguised him or herself like them, shall remain in the same one month, or if several times it is felony, without the benefit of the clergy."

Sir Matthew Hale informs us that at the Suffolk a.s.sizes no less than thirteen Gipsies were executed upon these statutes a few years before the Restoration. But to the honour of our national humanity-which at the time of these executions could only have been in name and not in reality, for those were the days of bull-fighting, bear-baiting, and like sports, the practice of which in those dark ages was thought to be the highest pitch of culture and refinement-no more instances of this kind were thrown into the balance, for the public conscience had become somewhat awakened; the days of enlightenment had begun to dawn, for by statute 23, George III., cap. 51, it was enacted that the Act of Eliz., cap. 20, is repealed; and the statute 17 George II., cap. 5, regards them under the denomination of "rogues and vagabonds;" and such is the t.i.tle given to them at the present day by the law of the land-"Rogues and Vagabonds."

Borrow, in page 10 of his "Bible in Spain," says: "Shortly after their first arrival in England, which is upwards of three centuries since, a dreadful persecution was raised against them, the aim of which was their utter extermination-the being a Gipsy was esteemed a crime worthy of death, and the gibbets of England groaned and creaked beneath the weight of Gipsy carcases, and the miserable survivors were literally obliged to creep into the earth in order to preserve their lives. But these days pa.s.sed by; their persecutors became weary of persecuting them; they showed their heads from the caves where they had hidden themselves; they ventured forth increased in numbers, and each tribe or family choosing a particular circuit, they fairly divided the land amongst them.

"In England the male Gipsies are all dealers in horses [this is not exactly the case with the Gipsies of the present day], and sometimes employ their time in mending the tin and copper utensils of the peasantry; the females tell fortunes. They generally pitch their tents in the vicinity of a village or small town, by the roadside, under the shelter of the hedges and trees. The climate of England is well known to be favourable to beauty, and in no part of the world is the appearance of the Gipsies so prepossessing as in that country. Their complexion is dark, but not disagreeably so; their faces are oval, their features regular, their foreheads rather low, and their hands and feet small.

"The crimes of which these people were originally accused were various, but the princ.i.p.al were theft, sorcery, and causing disease among the cattle; and there is every reason for supposing that in none of these points they were altogether guiltless.

"With respect to sorcery, a thing in itself impossible, not only the English Gipsies, but the whole race, have ever professed it; therefore, whatever misery they may have suffered on that account they may be considered as having called it down upon their own heads.

"Dabbling in sorcery is in some degree the province of the female Gipsy.

She affects to tell the future, and to prepare philters by means of which love can be awakened in any individual towards any particular object; and such is the credulity of the human race, even in the more enlightened countries, that the profits arising from their practices are great. The following is a case in point:-Two females, neighbours and friends, were tried some years since in England for the murder of their husbands. It appeared that they were in love with the same individual, and had conjointly, at various times, paid sums of money to a Gipsy woman to work charms to captivate his affection. Whatever little effect the charm might produce, they were successful in their princ.i.p.al object, for the person in question carried on for some time a criminal intercourse with both. The matter came to the knowledge of the husbands, who, taking means to break off this connection, were respectively poisoned by their wives. Till the moment of conviction these wretched females betrayed neither emotion nor fear; but then their consternation was indescribable, when they afterwards confessed that the Gipsy who had visited them in prison had promised to s.h.i.+eld them from conviction by means of her art.

"Poisoning cattle is exercised by them in two ways: by one, they merely cause disease in the animals, with the view of receiving money for curing them upon offering their services. The poison is generally administered by powders cast at night into the mangers of the animals. This way is only practised upon the larger cattle, such as horses and cows. By the other, which they practise chiefly on swine, speedy death is almost invariably produced, the drug administered being of a highly intoxicating nature, and affecting the brain. Then they apply at the house or farm where the disaster has occurred for the carcase of the animal, which is generally given them without suspicion, and then they feast on the flesh, which is not injured by the poison, it only affecting the head."

In looking at the subject from a plain, practical, common-sense point of view-divested of "opinions," "surmises," "technicalities,"

"similarities," certain ethnological false shadows and philological mystifications, the little glow-worm in the hedge-bottom on a dark night, which our great minds have been running after for generations, and "natural consequences," "objects sought," and "certain results"-we shall find that the same thing has happened to the Gipsies, or Indians, centuries ago, that has happened to all nations at one time or other.

There can be no doubt but that terrible internal struggles took place, and hundreds of thousands of the inhabitants were butchered in cold blood, in India, during the tenth, eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries; there can be no question, also, that the 200,000,000 inhabitants, in this over-populated country, would suffer, in various forms, the direst consequences of war, famine, and bloodshed; and, it is more than probable, that hundreds of thousands of the idle, low-caste Indians, too lazy to work, too cowardly to fight in open day, with no honourable ambition or true religious instincts in their nature, other than to aspire to the position similar to bands of Nihilists, Communists, Socialists, or Fenians of the present day, would emigrate to Wallachia, Roumania, or Moldavia, which countries, at that day, were looked upon as England is at the present time. The Gipsies, many centuries ago, as now, did not believe in yokes being placed round their necks. The fact of 200,000 of these emigrants, about whom, after all, there is not much mystery, emigrating to Wallachia in such large numbers, proves to my mind that there was a greater power behind them and before them than is usually supposed to be the case, and than that attending wandering minstrels, impelling them forward. Mohammedism, soldiers, and death would not be looked upon by the Gipsies as pleasant companions. By fleeing for their lives they escaped death, and Wallachia was to the Gipsies, for some time, what America has been to the Fenians-an ark of safety and the land of Nod. Many of the Gipsies themselves imagine that they are the descendants of Ishmael, from the simple fact that it was decreed by G.o.d, they say, that his descendants should wander about in tents, and they were to be against everybody, and everybody against them.

This erroneous impression wants removing, or the Gipsies will never rise in position.

In no country in the world is there so much caste feeling, devilish jealousy, and diabolical revenge manifested as in India. These are true types and traits of Indian character, especially of the lower orders and those who have lost caste; the Turks, Arabs, Egyptians, Roumanians, Hungarians, and Spaniards sink into insignificance when compared with the Afghans, Hindus, and other inhabitants of some of the worst parts of India. Any one observing the Gipsies closely, as I have been trying to do for some time, outside their mystery boxes, with their thin, flimsy veil of romance and superst.i.tious turn of their faces, will soon discover their Indian character. Of course their intermixture with Circa.s.sians and other nations, in the course of their travels from India, during five or six centuries, till the time they arrived at our doors, has brought, and is still bringing, to the surface the blighted flowers of humanity, whose ancestral tree derived its nourishment from the soil of Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, Greece, Roumania, Wallachia, Moldavia, Spain, Hungary, Norway, Italy, Germany, France, Switzerland, England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, as the muddy stream of Gipsyism has been winding its way for ages through various parts of the world; and, I am sorry to say, this little dark stream has been casting forth an unpleasant odour and a horrible stench in our midst, which has so long been fed and augmented by the dregs of English society from Sunday-schools and the hearthstones of pious parents. The different nationalities to be seen among the Gipsies, in their camps and tents, may be looked upon as so many b.a.s.t.a.r.d off-shoots from the main trunk of the trees that have been met with in their wanderings.

In no part of the globe, owing princ.i.p.ally to our isolation, is the old Gipsy character losing itself among the street-gutter rabble as in our own; notwithstanding this mixture of blood and races, the diabolical Indian elements are easily recognisable in their wigwams. Then, again, their Indian origin can be traced in many of their social habits; among others, they squat upon the ground differently to the Turk, Arab, and other nationalities, who are pointed to by some writers as being the ancestors of the Gipsies. Their tramping over the hills and plains of India, and exposure to all the changes of the climate, has no doubt fitted them, physically, for the kind of life they are leading in various parts of the world. To-day Gipsies are to be found in almost every part of the civilised countries, between the frozen regions of Siberia and the burning sands of Africa, squatting about in their tents. The treatment of the women and children by the men corresponds exactly with the treatment the women and children are receiving at the hands of the low-caste Indians. The Arabian women, the Turkish women, and Egyptian women, may be said to be queens when set up in comparison with the poor Gipsy woman in this country. In Turkey, Arabia, Egypt, and some other Eastern nations, the women are kept in the background; but among the low-caste Indians and Gipsies the women are brought to the front divested of the modesty of those nations who claim to be the primogenitors of the Gipsy tribes and races. Among the lower orders of Indians, from whom the Gipsies are the outcome, most extraordinary types of characters and countenances are to be seen. Any one visiting the Gipsy wigwams of the present day will soon discover the relations.h.i.+p.