The Gypsies Part 14

The gypsies of Wales are to those of England what the Welsh themselves are to the English; more antique and quaint, therefore to a collector of human bric-a-brac more curious. The Welsh Rom is specially grateful for kindness or courtesy; he is deeper as to language, and preserves many of the picturesque traits of his race which are now so rapidly vanis.h.i.+ng.

But then he has such excellent opportunity for gypsying. In Wales there are yet thousands of acres of wild land, deep ravines, rocky corners, and roadside nooks, where he can boil the kettle and _hatch the tan_, or pitch his tent, undisturbed by the rural policeman. For it is a charming country, where no one need weary in summer, when the days are long, or in early autumn,--

"When the barley is ripe, And the frog doth pipe, In golden stripe And green all dressed; When the red apples Roll in the chest."

Then it is pleasant walking in Wales, and there too at times, between hedge-rows, you may meet with the Romany.

I was at Aberystwith by the sea, and one afternoon we went, a party of three gentlemen and three ladies, in a char-a-banc, or wagonette, to drive. It was a pleasant afternoon, and we had many a fine view of distant mountains, on whose sides were mines of lead with silver, and of which there were legends from the time of Queen Elizabeth. The hills looked leaden and blue in the distance, while the glancing sea far beyond recalled silver,--for the alchemy of imagery, at least, is never wanting to supply ideal metals, though the real may show a sad _deficit_ in the returns.

As we drove we suddenly overtook a singular party, the first of whom was the leader, who had lagged behind. He was a handsome, slender, very dark young man, carrying a violin. Before him went a little open cart, in which lay an old woman, and by her a harp. With it walked a good-looking gypsy girl, and another young man, not a gypsy. He was by far the handsomest young fellow, in form and features, whom I ever met among the agricultural cla.s.s in England; we called him a peasant Apollo. It became evident that the pa.s.sional affinity which had drawn this rustic to the gypsy girl, and to the roads, was according to the law of natural selection, for they were wonderfully well matched. The young man had the grace inseparable from a fine figure and a handsome face, while the girl was tall, lithe, and pantherine, with the diavolesque charm which, though often attributed by fast-fas.h.i.+onable novelists to their heroines, is really never found except among the lowborn beauties of nature. It is the beauty of the Imp and of the Serpent; it fades with letters; it dies in the drawing-room or on the stage. You are mistaken when you think you see it coming out of the synagogue, unless it be a very vulgar one. Your Lahova has it not, despite her black eyes, for she is too clever and too conscious; the devil-beauty never knows how to read, she is unstudied and no actress. Rachel and the Bernhardt have it not, any more than Saint Agnes or Miss Blanche Lapin. It is not of good or of evil, or of culture, which is both; it is all and only of nature, and it does not know itself.

As the wagonette stopped I greeted the young man at first in English, then in Romany. When he heard the gypsy tongue he started, his countenance expressing the utmost surprise and delight. As if he could hardly believe in such a phenomenon he inquired, "_Romany_?" and as I nodded a.s.sent, he clasped my hand, the tears coming into his eyes. Such manifestations are not common among gypsies, but I can remember how one, the wife of black Ben Lee, was thus surprised and affected. How well I recall the time and scene,--by the Thames, in the late twilight, when every tree and twig was violet black against the amber sky, where the birds were chirp-chattering themselves to roost and rest, and the river rippled and murmured a duet with the evening breeze. I was walking homeward to Oatlands when I met the tawny Sinaminta, bearing her little stock of baskets to the tent and van which I had just quitted, and where Ben and his beautiful little boy were lighting the _al fresco_ fire. "I have prayed to see this day!" exclaimed the gypsy woman. "I have so wanted to see the Romany rye of the Coopers. And I laid by a little _delaben_, a small present, for you when we should meet. It's a photograph of Ben and me and our child." I might have forgotten the evening and the amber sky, rippling river and dark-green hedge-rows, but for this strange meeting and greeting of an unknown friend, but a few kind words fixed them all for life. That must be indeed a wonderful landscape which humanity does not make more impressive.

I spoke but a few words to the gypsy with the violin, and we drove on to a little wayside inn, where we alighted and rested. After a while the gypsies came along.

"And now, if you will, let us have a real frolic," I said to my friends.

A word was enough. A quart of ale, and the fiddle was set going, and I sang in Romany, and the rustic landlord and his household wondered what sort of guests we could be. That they had never before entertained such a mixed party I can well believe. Here, on one hand, were indubitable swells, above their usual range; there, on the other, were the dusky vagabonds of the road; and it could be no common condescending patronage, for I was speaking neither Welsh nor English, and our friendly fraternity was evident. Yes, many a time, in England, have I seen the civil landlady or the neat-handed Phillis awed with bewilderment, as I have introduced Plato Buckland, or the most disreputable-looking but oily--yea, glycerine-politeful--old Windsor Frog, into the parlor, and conversed with him in mystic words. Such an event is a rare joy to the gypsy. For he loves to be lifted up among men; he will tell you with pride of the times when he was pointed at, and people said, "_He's_ the man!" and how a real gentleman once invited him into his house and gave him a gla.s.s of wine. But to enter the best room of the familiar tavern, to order, in politest but imperative tones, "beer"--sixpenny beer--for himself and "the other gentleman," is indeed bliss. Then, in addition to the honor of moving in distinguished society, before the very eyes and in the high places of those who have hitherto always considered him as a lowly cuss, the Romany realizes far more than the common peasant the contrast-contradiction, or the humor of the drama, its bit of mystification, and especially the mystification of the house-folk. This is unto him the high hour of the soul, and it is not forgotten. It pa.s.ses unto the golden legends of the heart, and you are tenderly enshrined in it.

Once, when I was wandering afoot with old Cooper, we stopped at an inn, and in a room by ourselves ordered luncheon. The gypsy might have had poultry of the best; he preferred cold pork. While the attendant was in the room, he sat with exemplary dignity at the table; but as the girl left, he followed her step sounds with his ears, like a dog, moved his head, glanced at me with a nod, turned sideways from the table, and, putting his plate on his knees, proceeded to eat without a fork.

"For it isn't proper for me to eat at the table with you, or _as_ you do."

The Welsh gypsy played well, and his sister touched the harp and sang, the ale circulated, and the villagers, a.s.sembling, gazed in a crowd into the hall. Then the girl danced solo, just as I have seen her sisters do in Egypt and in Russia, to her brother's fiddling. Even so of old, Syrian and Egyptian girls haunted gardens and taverns, and danced _pas seul_ all over the Roman empire, even unto Spain, behaving so gypsily that wise men have conjectured that they were gypsies in very truth. And who shall say they were not? For it is possible that prehistorically, and beyond all records of Persian Luri and Syrian Ballerine and Egyptian Almeh, there was all over the East an outflowing of these children of art from one common primeval Indian stock. From one fraternity, in Italy, at the present day, those itinerant pests, the hand-organ players, proceed to the ends of the earth and to the gold-diggings thereof, and time will yet show that before all time, or in its early dawn, there were root-born Romany itinerants singing, piping, and dancing unto all the known world; yea, and into the unknown darkness beyond, _in partibus infidelium_.

A gentleman who was in our party had been long in the East. I had known him in Alexandria during the carnival, and he had lived long time _outre mer_, in India. Hearing me use the gypsy numerals--_yeck_, _dui_, _trin_, _shtor_, _panj_,--he proceeded to count in Hindustani or Persian, in which the same words from one to ten are almost identical with Romany.

All of this was carefully noted by the old gypsy mother,--as, also, that my friend is of dark complexion, with sparkling black eyes. Reduced in dress, or diluted down to worn corduroy and a red tie, he might easily pa.s.s muster, among the Sons of the Road, as one of them.

And now the ladies must, of course, have their fortunes told, and this, I could observe, greatly astonished the gypsies in their secret souls, though they put a cool face on it. That we, ourselves, were some kind of a mysterious high-caste Romany they had already concluded, and what faith could we put in _dukkerin_? But as it would indubitably bring forth s.h.i.+llings to their benefit, they wisely raised no questions, but calmly took this windfall, which had fallen as it were, from the skies, even as they had accepted the beer, which had come, like a providential rain, unto them, in the thirst of a dry journey.

It is customary for all gypsy sorceresses to take those who are to be fortune-told aside, and, if possible, into a room by themselves. This is done partly to enhance the mystery of the proceeding, and partly to avoid the presence of witnesses to what is really an illegal act. And as the old sorceress led a lady into the little parlor, the gypsy man, whose name was Mat, glanced up at me, with a droll, puzzled expression, and said, "Patchessa _tu_ adovo?" (Do _you_ believe in that?) With a wink, I answered, "Why not? I, too, tell fortunes myself." _Anch io sono pittore_. It seemed to satisfy him, for he replied, with a nod-wink, and proceeded to pour forth the balance of his thoughts, if he had any, into the music of his violin.

When the ladies had all been instructed as to their future, my friend, who had been in the East, must needs have his destiny made known unto him. He did not believe in this sort of thing, you know,--of course not.

But he had lived a long time among Orientals, and he just happened to wish to know how certain speculations would fall out, and he loves, above all things, a lark, or anything out of the common. So he went in. And when alone with the sybil, she began to talk to him in Romany.

"Oh, I say, now, old lady, stow that!" he exclaimed. "I don't understand you."

"You don't understand me!" exclaimed the fortune-teller. "Perhaps you didn't understand your own mother when she talked Romany to you. What's the use of your tryin' to make yourself out a Gorgio to _me_? Don't I know our people? Didn't your friend there talk Romanes? Isn't he all Romaneskas? And didn't I hear you with my own ears count up to ten in Romany? And now, after that, you would deny your own blood and people!

Yes, you've dwelt in Gorgines so long that you think your eyes are blue and your hair is yellow, my son, and you have been far over the sea; but wherever you went you knew Romanes, if you don't know your own color.

But you shall hear your fortune. There is lead in the mines and silver in the lead, and wealth for him who is to win it, and that will be a dark man who has been nine times over the sea, and eaten his bread under the black tents, and been three times near death, once from a horse, and once from a man, and once through a woman. And you will know something you don't know now before a month is over, and something will be found that is now hidden, and has been hidden since the world was made. And there's a good fortune coming to the man it was made for, before the oldest tree that's a-growing was a seed, and that's a man as knows how to count Romanes up to ten, and many a more thing beside that, that he's learned beyond the great water."

And so we went our ways, the harp and violin sounds growing fainter as we receded, till they were like the buzzing of bees in drying clover, and the twilight grew rosier brown. I never met Mat Woods again, though I often heard of his fame as a fiddler. Whether my Anglo-Indian friend found the fortune so vaguely predicted is to me as yet unknown. But I believe that the prediction encouraged him. That there are evils in palmistry, and sin in card-drawing, and iniquity in coffee-grounding, and vice in all the planets, is established by statute, and yet withal I incline to believe that the art of prediction cheers up many a despondent soul, and does some little good, even as good ale, despite the wickedness of drinking, makes some hearts merry and others stronger. If there are foolish maids who have had their heads turned by being told of coming n.o.blemen and prospective swells, who loved the ground they trod on, and were waiting to woo and win and wed, and if the same maidens herein described have thereby, in the manner set forth, been led by the aforesaid devices unto their great injury, as written in the above indictment, it may also _per contra_ and on the other hand be pleaded that divers girls, to wit, those who believe in prediction, have, by encouragement and hope to them held out of legally marrying sundry young men of good estate, been induced to behave better than they would otherwise have done, and led by this hope have acted more morally than was their wont, and thereby lifted themselves above the lowly state of vulgarity, and even of vice, in which they would otherwise have groveled, hoveled, or cottaged. And there have been men who, cheris.h.i.+ng in their hearts a prediction, or, what amounts to the same thing, a conviction, or a set fancy, have persevered in hope until the hope was realized. You, O Christian, who believe in a millennium, you, O Jew, who expect a Messiah, and await the fulfillment of your _dukkerin_, are both in the right, for both will come true when you _make_ them do so.

II. THE PIOUS WASHERWOMAN.

There is not much in life pleasanter than a long ramble on the road in leaf-green, sun-gold summer. Then it is Nature's merry-time, when fowls in woods them maken blithe, and the crow preaches from the fence to his friends afield, and the honeysuckle winketh to the wild rose in the hedge when she is wooed by the little buzzy bee. In such times it is good for the heart to wander over the hills and far away, into haunts known of old, where perhaps some semi-Saxon church nestles in a hollow behind a hill, where gra.s.s o'ergrows each mouldering tomb, and the brook, as it ripples by in a darksome aldered hollow, speaks in a language which man knows no more, but which is answered in the same forgotten tongue by the thousand-year yew as it rustles in the breeze. And when there are Runic stones in this garden of G.o.d, where He raises souls, I often fancy that this old dialect is written in their rhythmic lines. The yew-trees were planted by law, lang-syne, to yield bows to the realm, and now archery is dead and Martini-Henry has taken its place, but the yews still live, and the Runic fine art of the twisted lines on the tombs, after a thousand years' sleep, is beginning to revive. Every thing at such a time speaks of joy and resurrection--tree and tomb and bird and flower and bee.

These are all memories of a walk from the town of Aberystwith, in Wales, which walk leads by an ancient church, in the soul garden of which are two Runic cross tombstones. One day I went farther afield to a more ancient shrine, on the top of a high mountain. This was to the summit of Cader Idris, sixteen miles off. On this summit there is a Druidical circle, of which the stones, themselves to ruin grown, are strange and death-like old. Legend says that this is the burial-place of Taliesin, the first of Welsh bards, the primeval poet of Celtic time. Whoever sleeps on the grave will awake either a madman or a poet, or is at any rate unsafe to become one or the other. I went, with two friends, afoot on this little pilgrimage. Both were professors at one of the great universities. The elder is a gentleman of great benevolence, learning, and gentleness; the other, a younger man, has been well polished and sharpened by travel in many lands. It is rumored that he has preached Islam in a mosque unto the Moslem even unto taking up a collection, which is the final test of the faith which reaches forth into a bright eternity. That he can be, as I have elsewhere noted, a Persian unto Persians, and a Romany among Roms, and a professional among the hanky-pankorites, is likewise on the cards, as surely as that he knows the roads and all the devices and little games of them that dwell thereon. Though elegant enough in his court dress and rapier when he kisses the hand of our sovereign lady the queen, he appears such an abandoned rough when he goes a-fis.h.i.+ng that the innocent and guileless gypsies, little suspecting that a _rye_ lies _perdu_ in his wrap-rascal, will then confide in him as if he and in-doors had never been acquainted.

We had taken with us a sparing lunch of thin sandwiches and a frugal flask of modest, blus.h.i.+ng brandy, which we diluted at a stingy little fountain spring which dropped economically through a rift in the rock, as if its nymph were conscious that such a delicious drink should not be wasted. As it was, it refreshed us, and we were resting in a blessed repose under the green leaves, when we heard footsteps, and an old woman came walking by.

She was the ideal of decent and extreme poverty. I never saw anybody who was at once so poor and so clean. In her face and in her thin garments was marked the mute, resolute struggle between need and self-respect, which, to him who understands it, is as brave as any battle between life and death. She walked on as if she would have gone past without a word, but when we greeted her she paused, and spoke respectfully. Without forwardness she told her sad and simple story: how she belonged to the Wesleyan confession, how her daughter was dying in the hospital at Caernarvon; how she had walked sixty miles to see her, and hoped to get there in time to close her eyes. In reply to a question as to her means, she admitted that they were exhausted, but that she could get through without money; she did not beg. And then came naturally enough the rest of the little artless narrative, as it generally happens among the simple annals of the poor: how she had been for forty years a washerwoman, and had a letter from her clergyman.

There was a tear in the eye of the elder professor, and his hand was in his pocket. The younger smoked in silence. I was greatly moved myself,--perhaps bewildered would be the better word,--when, all at once, as the old woman turned in the sunlight, I caught the expression _of the corner of an eye_!

My friend Salaman, who boasts that he is of the last of the Sadducees,--that strange, ancient, and secret sect, who disguise themselves as the _Neu Reformirte_,--declares that the Sephardim may be distinguished from the Ashken.a.z.im as readily as from the confounded Goyim, by the corners of their eyes. This he ill.u.s.trated by pointing out to me, as they walked by in the cool of the evening, the difference between the eyes of Fraulein Eleonora Kohn and Senorita Linda Abarbanel and divers and sundry other young ladies,--the result being that I received in return thirty-six distinct _oeillades_, several of which expressed indignation, and in all of which there was evidently an entire misconception of my object in looking at them. Now the eyes of the Sephardesses are unquestionably fascinating; and here it may be recalled that, in the Middle Ages, witches were also recognized by having exactly the same corners, or peaks, to the eye. This is an ancient mystery of darksome lore, that the enchantress always has the bird-peaked eye, which betokens danger to somebody, be she of the Sephardim, or an ordinary witch or enchantress, or a gypsy.

Now, as the old Wesleyan washerwoman turned around in the suns.h.i.+ne, I saw the witch-pointed eye and the glint of the Romany. And then I glanced at her hands, and saw that they had not been long familiar with wash-tubs; for, though clean, they were brown, and had never been blanched with an age of soap-suds. And I spoke suddenly, and said,--

"_Can tute rakker Romanes_, _miri dye_?" (Can you speak Romany, my mother?) And she answered, as if bewildered,--

"The Lord forbid, sir, that I should talk any of them wicked languages."

The younger professor's eyes expressed dawning delight. I followed my shot with,--

"_Tute needn't be attrash to rakker_. _Mandy's been apre the drom mi-kokero_." (You needn't be afraid to speak. I have been upon the road myself.)

And, still more confused, she answered in English,--

"Why, sir, you be upon the road now!"

"It seems to me, old lady," remarked the younger professor, "that you understand Romany very well for one who has been for forty years in the Methodist communion."

It may be observed that he here confounded was.h.i.+ng with wors.h.i.+ping.

The face of the true believer was at this point a fine study. All her confidence had deserted her. Whether she thought we were of her kind in disguise, or that, in the unknown higher world of respectability, there might be gypsies of corresponding rank, even as there might be gypsy angels among the celestial hierarchies, I cannot with confidence a.s.sert.

About a week ago a philologist and purist told me that there is no exact synonym in English for the word _flabbergasted_, as it expresses a peculiar state of bewilderment as yet unnamed by scholars, and it exactly sets forth the condition in which our virtuous poverty appeared. She was, indeed, flabbergasted. _Cornix scorpum rapuit_,--the owl had come down on the rabbits, and lo! they had fangs. I resumed,--

"Now, old lady, here is a penny. You are a very poor person, and I pity you so much that I give you this penny for your poverty. But there is a pocketful where this came from, and you shall have the lot if you'll _rakker_,"--that is, talk gypsy.

And at that touch of the Ithuriel spear the old toad flashed up into the Romany devil, as with gleaming eyes and a witch-like grin she cried in a mixture of gypsy and tinker languages,--

"Gents, I'll have tute jin when you tharis mandy you rakker a reg'lar fly old bewer." Which means, "Gentlemen, I'll have you know, when you talk to me, you talk to a reg'lar shrewd old female thief."

The face of the elder professor was a study of astonishment for Lavater.

His fingers relaxed their grasp of the s.h.i.+lling, his hand was drawn from his pocket, and his glance, like Bill Nye's, remarked: "_Can_ this be?"

He tells the story to this day, and always adds, "I _never_ was so astonished in my life." But the venerable washerwoman was also changed, and, the mask once thrown aside, she became as festive as a witch on the Brocken. Truly, it is a great comfort to cease playing a part, particularly a pious one, and be at home and at ease among your like; and better still if they be swells. This was the delight of Anderson's ugly duck when it got among the swans, "and, blest sensation, felt genteel."

And to show her grat.i.tude, the sorceress, who really seemed to have grown several shades darker, insisted on telling our fortunes. I think it was to give vent to her feelings in defiance of the law that she did this; certain it was that just then, under the circ.u.mstances, it was the only way available in which the law could be broken. And as it was, indeed, by heath and hill that the priestess of the hidden spell bade the Palmer from over the sea hold out his palm. And she began in the usual sing-song tone, mocking the style of gypsy fortune-tellers, and satirizing herself. And thus she spoke,--

"You're born under a lucky star, my good gentleman, and you're a married man; but there's a black-eyed young lady that's in love with you."

"Oh, mother of all the thieves!" I cried, "you've put the _dukkerin_ on the wrong man. I'm the one that the dark girls go after."

"Yes, my good gentleman. She's in love with you both."

"And now tell my fortune!" I exclaimed, and with a grim expression, casting up my palm, I said,--