Gypsy people

“ In the old time, indeed, the Gypsy law was so strong against the debtor, that provided he could not repay his brother husband, he was delivered over to him as his slave for a year and a day, and compelled to serve him as a hewer of wood, a drawer of water, or a beast of burden; but those times are past, the Gypsies are no longer the independent people they were of yore,—dark, mysterious, and dreaded wanderers, living apart in the deserts and heaths with which England at one time abounded. Gypsy law has given place to common law ”

“ And so some day, when all the rest of the family are in the fields, the gypsy--man or woman--comes, and entering into a conversation, leads it to the subject of the house, remarking that it is a belief among his people that in it a treasure lies buried. ”

“ By the first section the Rom or Gypsy is enjoined to live with his brethren, the husbands, and not with the gorgios [28] or gentiles; he is to live in a tent, as is befitting a Rom and a wanderer, and not in a house, which ties him to one spot; in a word, he is in every respect to conform to the ways of his own people, and to eschew those of gorgios, with whom he is not to mix, save to tell them hoquepenes (lies) , and to chore them. ”

“ There is a force abroad which is doomed to destroy it, a force which never sleepeth either by day or night, and which will not allow the Roman people rest for the soles of their feet. That force is the Rural Police, which, had it been established at the commencement instead of towards the middle of the present century, would have put down Gypsyism long ago. But, recent as its establishment has been, observe what it has produced. Walk from London to Carlisle, but neither by the road’s side, nor on heath or common, will you see a single Gypsy tent. ”

“ Yet it is a truth that, amidst all these seeming disadvantages, they not only exist there, but in no part of the world is their life more in accordance with the general idea that the Gypsy is like Cain, a wanderer of the earth; for in England the covered cart and the little tent are the houses of the Gypsy, and he seldom remains more than three days in the same place.
At present they are considered in some degree as a privileged people; for, though their way of life is unlawful, it is connived at ”

“ You knows the sort, but us Gypsies has a different way. When did you ever know any p. 87of us to meddle with anythink in these here parts? Don’t your farmers buy ponies off us? Ain’t we highly respected by the gentle-folk for miles round? Why, there was a squire up in Yorkshire, a prize-poultry fancier, as know’d my people wery well. We often camped on his land and never meddled with nothink. He trusted us so much that he comes down to our tents one day and says to my daddy—
“‘I want to beg a favour of you, Tâno. ”

“ A passionate folk are the Gypsies, a provoking word being at any time sufficient to call forth a blow. Even as I write these words, visions of gory fists and faces obtrude themselves through the mists of past days.
However, the Gypsies were never reported to be otherwise than polite towards the outsider who ventured into the alley. Diplomats rather than hooligans were they. “Let’s ’eave ’alf a brick at ’im,” is not the Gypsy’s way with a stranger who happens to stroll into the camp. ”

“ Pure Gypsies draw a marked line between dirty, low-class van-dwellers and themselves; but unfortunately the world at large makes no such distinction, immensely to the detriment of the true Romanitshel.
East Yorkshire is a favourite country with the Herons and Youngs. Both Josh and Nettie love it well, as did also some of their forelders. It was at Robin Hood’s Bay that Nettie’s Aunt Whipney died long years ago. I well remember a little tale about this old Gypsy. Tinker Ned, her husband, had “found” a kani (hen) for the pot. ”

“ Her face I could not see, but she wore a tattered shawl about her shoulders, and her black hair was done up in small plaits like a horse’s mane at fair-time. “Gypsy,” said I to myself, and, hastening alongside, I greeted her in the Romany tongue. The words had a magical effect. Instantly she wheeled round and scanned me up and down with a puzzled air. There before her, wearing an orthodox collar and black coat, stood a parson who nevertheless talked like a Gypsy. Now in common with some ladies of high degree, nearly all Gypsy women enjoy a whiff of tobacco smoke. ”

“ Forth to the winding road under the open sky, the Gypsies are calling you. Scorning our hurrying mode of life, these folk are content to loiter beneath the green beeches, or in the shadow of some old inn on the fringe of a windy common. Like Nature herself, these wildlings of hers overflow with the play-spirit and therefore remain ever youthful. ”

“ WITH THE YORKSHIRE GYPSIES
As I have said, Gypsies settled in houses now greatly outnumber their roving brethren. Hence it has come to pass that nearly every town in the land possesses a Bohemian quarter where you are met by dark faces and sidelong glances speaking of Gypsy blood. Nor can the student of Gypsy life and manners afford to neglect these haunts despite their dinginess, for as often as not they contain aged Gypsies whose memories are well worth ransacking for lore and legend, and in “working” these queer alleys, one has often picked up choice reminiscences of bygone Gypsy life. ”

“ From a hillock by the hedge I have watched her seize a skittish pony by the mane and, leaping astride its back, gallop madly along a lane, to return a few moments later, breathless and dishevelled. This was her frolicsome mood.
Never very far below the surface of the Gypsy nature lurks a feeling of disdain, waxing fierce at times towards everything and everybody outside the Romany world. To this mood the Gypsy life appears to be the only life worth living, and the Gypsy is the only real man in the world. All other ways and all alien folk are suspect. ”

“ I soon found that these Gypsies did not hold with folks writing books about their race and telling the mumpli gawjê (nasty gentiles) about their ways.
No one loves a little fun more than the Gypsy, p. 92and generally he means no harm by his playful romancing. After all, he is but a grown-up child, and loves to make-believe. The Gypsy’s world is a haphazard one, in which luck plays a large part. He knows nothing of the orderly cosmos of providence or science. ”

“ I have always known that Gypsies readily help one another when in trouble. This man, before going off with his telegram, told me a pleasing thing. It appears that an aged Gypsy, whose horse had died suddenly, had no money to buy another with, but a pal of his, going round with a cap among the Gypsy dealers at the fair, had quickly taken ten pounds, which were handed up to the old man who was now able to buy himself an animal. ”

“ Gypsies dislike to be addressed by their peculiar “fore” or Christian names in the presence of gawjê; hence to the postman, Ènos become Amos, Fèmi—Amy, and Poley—George, and so on. As a rule, you find a Gypsy is unwilling to impart his true name to a stranger. May not this reluctance be due to a lingering subconscious belief that the possession of one’s true name would enable a stranger to work harmful spells upon the owner? ”

“ But the difficulty vanishes if one may suppose that the Gypsies, starting from the Balkan Peninsula at a date when churches were familiar objects, which a pursuer would naturally pass, carried with them the modern version of the story to Russia, Spain, and the other countries in which it is told to-day. Similarly, in Gypsy stories, and in stories current in countries wide apart, one finds such incidents as the hero falling in love through a portrait, the hero playing cards with the devil, the hero carrying a Bellerophon letter, the hero looking through an all-seeing telescope. ”

“ It seems that among Gypsies “wishing a wish” sometimes means a curse. It was at Peterborough Fair in 1872 that Groome saw a blind Gypsy child—made blind, he was told, through the father wishing a wish. Akin to this is the belief in the evil eye. A Battersea Gypsy mother would not let her baby be seen by its half-witted uncle, for fear his looking at it should turn its black hair red.
After leaving Wythen, I sauntered along, making mental notes of Gypsies all around, among whom were local Brinkleys, the far-travelled Greens, some Loveridges, and other Midland Gypsies. ”

“ How in the world did Gypsy “grow up?” For that was before toboggans and telephones, before bicycles and electric cars, before bangs and puffed sleeves, before girls studied Greek, and golf-capes came in. ”

“ That is all, or practically all, we know of the coming of the Gypsies to North America, where, at New York, there were house-dwelling Gypsies as far back as 1850, and where to-day there must be hundreds or thousands of the race from England, Scotland, Hungary, Spain, one knows not whence else besides. ”

“ Dark men, wild-looking, witch-like women, and yellow-faced children are at the doors of the caravans, or wending their way through the narrow spaces left for transit between the vehicles. You have now arrived at the second grand Gypsyry of London—you are amongst the Romany Chals of the Potteries, called in Gypsy the Koromengreskoe Tan, or the place of the fellows who make pots; in which place certain Gypsies have settled, not with the view of making pots, an employment which they utterly eschew, but simply because it is convenient to them, and suits their fancy. ”

“ At last he is passing through a Gypsy quarter,36 when he hears a boy singing: ‘his voice was beautiful as any nightingale’s.’ He looks through a door, and sees a boy, who is every whit as handsome as the prince, so he purchases this boy, and the boy plays a leading part in the story. The abject contempt in which Gypsies are held throughout the whole of south-eastern Europe renders it probable that none but a Gypsy would thus have described a member of the race. ”

“ The Russian version as a whole is fuller and more perfect; yet neither from it, nor, seemingly, from any of its variants, can the Gypsy tale be derived. The opening of the latter comes much closer to that of Hahn’s story from Syra (ii. 267) , a variant of the Turkish-Gypsy story of ‘The Dead Man’s Gratitude’ (No. 1) , and surely itself of Gypsy origin. Here a king has an only son, and puts him to school; and the vizier, sent in quest of another lad, buys a beautiful Gypsy boy with a voice like a nightingale’s. He, too, is put to school, and proves the better scholar of the two. ”

“ Now Gypsy Sam ignites his tobacco by scooping up a red ember with the bowl of his pipe. His wife does the same, and I follow suit.
“A prettier place is this,” quoth Lottie, “than when you see’d us under that ugly railway bank at Hull.”
Verily the Gypsies are possessed of an æsthetic sense, and their roving eyes grow wistful as they take in the beauty of the distant hills and the sun-gleams lighting up grassy knolls and spindly fir-trees rising from patches of sand.
“You remember that pawno grai (white horse) of ours?” says Sam. ”

“ The Gypsy looks through the iron-grated door, and beholds, seated near the fountain, a richly dressed dame and two lovely delicate maidens; they are busied at their morning’s occupation, intertwining with their sharp needles the gold and silk on the tambour; several female attendants are seated behind. The Gypsy pulls the bell, when is heard the soft cry of ‘Quien es’; the door, unlocked by means of a string, recedes upon its hinges, when in walks the Gitana, the witch-wife of Multan, with a look such as the tiger-cat casts when she stealeth from her jungle into the plain. ”

“ But that Big Jim looked to be tough enough, when we saw him down at Pleasant Cove, to belong in prison for life. Remember him, Aggie?”
“The children did not say anything about a Gypsy man,” observed his friend. “There were two Gypsy women.”
She went on to tell June Wildwood all about the basket purchase and the finding of the silver bracelet. The older girl shook her head solemnly as she said:
“I don’t understand it at all. Gypsies are always shrewd bargainers. They never sell things for less than they cost.” ”

“ When talking of breezy commons, green woodsides, rabbits, pheasants, and the like, I have seen the eyes of a house-dwelling Gypsy grow wistful as he sighed at the visions and memories arising within him.
p. 157The sedentary Gypsies are now largely in the preponderance. Not that the tendency to settle is entirely a thing of our times. Fifty years ago, the Gypsy colony hard by my childhood’s home told of a movement not then by any means new. ”

“ From the Indus to Gibraltar, the contrast of obscenity in language and in songs with corporal chastity has ever been a distinctive characteristic.... Gypsy marriages, like those of the high caste Hindus, entail ruinous expense; the revelry lasts three days, the 'Gentile' is freely invited, and the profusion of meats and drinks often makes the bridgegroom a debtor for life. The Spanish Gypsies are remarkable for beauty in early youth ”

“ In Great Britain the Gypsies are at present exposed to a petty persecution, inflicted ostensibly for their good by illogical persons, who pretend to believe that they live unnatural lives and should be driven into town slums for the benefit of their health and morals. ”

“ And once the king came that way,... and as he went to pluck an apple, “Stay,” said the Gypsy, “don’t seize it so, but shake the tree, and then they will all turn into doves.” The king shook the tree, and all the apples then turned into doves. Up they flew, and the poor son’s father arose.’ The Gypsy then goes in quest of the Otter King (Vídrisko Kírāli) . A king gives him a filly that can speak. On the way he is fed by a swineherd (one pail of wine and a whole swine) and a neatherd (an ox and two pails) ; he then meets a shepherd, overcomes a wether, and stabs the shepherd at his own request. ”