Gipsy Life Part 12

"How many mercies will my life Before my view unfold!

What countless dangers will be past!

What tales of sorrow told!

"This scene will all my labours end, This road conduct on high; With comfort I'll review the past, And triumph though I die."

On the first Sunday in February this year I found myself surrounded by a black, thick London fog-almost as dense as the blackest midnight, and an overpowering sense of suffocation creeping over me-in the midst of an encampment of Gipsies at Canning Town, and, acting upon their kind invitation, I crept into one of their tents, and there found about a dozen Gipsy men of all sizes, ages, and complexions, squatting upon peg shavings. Some of their faces looked full of intelligence and worthy of a better vocation, and others seemed as if they had had the "cropper" at work round their ears; so short was their hair that any one attempting to "pull it up by the roots" would have a difficult task, unless he set to it with his teeth. They looked to me as if several of them had worn bright steel ornaments round their wrists and had danced at a county ball, and done more stepping upon the wheel of fortune than many people imagine; at any rate, they were quite happy in their way, and seemed prepared for another turn round when needful. Their first salutation was, "Well, governor, how are you? Sit you down and make yourself comfortable, and let's have a chat. Never mind if it is Sunday, send for some 'fourpenny' for us." I partly did as they bid me, but, owing to the darkness of the tent and the fog, I sat upon a seat that was partly covered with filth, consequently I had an addition to my trousers more than I bargained for. I told them my object was not to come to send for "fourpenny," but to get a law pa.s.sed to compel the Gipsy parents to send their children to school, and to have their tents registered and provided with a kind of school pa.s.s book; and, before I had well finished my remarks, one of the Gipsies, a good-looking fellow, said, "I say, Bill, that will be a capital thing, won't it?" "G.o.d bless you, man, for it,"

was the remark of another, and so the thing went the round among them.

By this time there were some score or more Gipsy women and children at the tent door, or, I should rather say, rag coverlet, who heard what had pa.s.sed, and they thoroughly fell in with the idea. The question next turned upon religion. They said they had heard that there were half-a-dozen different religions, and asked me if it was true. One said he was a Roman Catholic; but did not believe there was a h.e.l.l. Another said he was a Methodist, but could not agree with their singing and praying, and so it went round till they asked me what religion was. I told them in a way that seemed to satisfy them, and I also told them some of its results. I could not learn that any of these Gipsies had ever been in a place of worship.

I mentioned to them that I wanted to show, during my inquiries, both sides of the question, and should be glad if they would point out to me the name of a Gipsy whom they could look up to and consider as a good pattern for them to follow. Here they began to scratch their heads, and said I had put them "a nightcap on." "Upon my soul," said one, "I should not know where to begin to look for one," and then related to me the following story:-"The Devil sent word to some of his agents for them to send him the worst man they could find upon the face of the earth. So news went about among various societies everywhere, consultations and meetings were held, and it was decided that a Gipsy should be sent, as none of the societies or agents could find one bad enough. Accordingly a pa.s.sport was procured, and they started the Gipsy on his way. When he came to the door of h.e.l.l he knocked for admittance. The Devil shouted out, 'Who is there?' The Gipsy cried out, 'A Gipsy.' 'All right,' said the Devil; 'you are just the man I am wanting. I have been on the look-out for you some time. Come in. I have been told the Gipsies are the worst folks in all the world.' The Gipsy had not been long in h.e.l.l before the Devil perceived that he was too bad for his place, and the place began to swarm with young imps to such a degree that the Devil called the Gipsy to him one day, and said, 'Of all the people that have ever come to this place you are the worst. You are too bad for us. Here is your pa.s.sport. Be off back again!' The Devil opened the door, and said, as the Gipsy was going, 'Make yourself scarce.' So you see," said Lee to me, "we are too bad for the Devil. We'll go anywhere, fight anybody, or do anything. Now, lads, drink that 'fourpenny' up, and let's send for some more." This is Gipsy life in England on a Sunday afternoon within the sound of church bells.

[Picture: A Fortune-telling Gipsy enjoying her pipe]

The proprietor of the _Weekly Times_ very readily granted permission for one of the princ.i.p.als of his staff to accompany me to one of the Gipsy encampments a Sunday or two ago on the outskirts of London. Those who know the writer would say the article is truthful, and not in the least overdrawn:-"The lane was full of decent-looking houses, tenanted by labourers in foundries and gas and waterworks; but there were s.p.a.ces between the rows of houses, forming yards for the deposit of garbage, and in these unsavoury spots the Gipsies had drawn up their caravans, and pitched their smoke-blackened tents. These yards were separated from each other by rows of cottages, and each yard contained families related near or distantly, or interested in each other's welfare by long a.s.sociations in the country during summer time, and in such places as we found them during the winter season. After spending several hours with these people in their tents and caravans, and pa.s.sing from yard to yard, asking the talkative ones questions, we came to the conclusion that, in the whole bounds of this great metropolis, it would have been impossible to have found any miscalling themselves Gipsies whose mode of living more urgently called for the remedial action of the law than the tenants of Lamb-lane. In the first place, there was not a true Gipsy amongst them; nor one man, woman, or child who could in any degree claim relationship with a Gipsy. They were, all of them, idle loafers, who had adopted the wandering life of the Gipsy because of the opportunities it afforded of combining a maximum of idle hours with a minimum of work. The men exhibited this in their countenances, in the att.i.tudes they took up, by the whining drawl with which they spoke; the women, by their dirtiness and inattention to dress; and the children, by their filthy condition.

The men and women had fled from the restraints of house life to escape the daily routine which a home involved; the men had no higher ambition than to obtain a small sum of money on the Sat.u.r.day to pay for a few days' food. There was not one man amongst them who could solder a broken kettle; a few, however, could mend a chair bottom, but there all industrial ability ended; and the others got their living by shaving skewers from Monday morning to Friday night, which were sold to butchers at 10d. or 1s. the stone. These men stayed at home, working over the brazier of burning c.o.ke during the week, while their wives hawked small wool mats or vases, but nothing of their own manufacture; and the grown-up lads, on market-days, added to the general industry by buying flowers in Covent-garden, and hawking them in the suburbs of the metropolis. We were a.s.sured by Mr. Smith that this cla.s.s of pseudo-Gipsy was largely on the increase, and to check their spread Mr. Smith suggests that the provisions of an Act of Parliament should be mainly directed.

Only one of all we saw and spoke to on Sunday was 'a scholar'-that is, could read at all-and this was a lad of about fourteen, who had spent a few hours occasionally at a Board school. With all the others the knowledge that comes of reading was an absolute blank. They knew nothing, except that the proceeds of the previous week had been below the average; social events of surpa.s.sing interest had not reached them, and the future was limited by 'to-morrow.' We questioned them upon their experiences of the past winter, and the preference they had for their tents over houses was emphatically marked. 'Brick houses,' said one woman, who was suckling a baby, 'are so full of draughts.' Night and day the brazier of burning c.o.ke was never allowed to go low, and under the tent the ground was always dry, however wet it might be outside, because of the heat from the brazier; besides, they lay upon well-trodden-down straw, six or eight inches deep, and covered themselves with their clothes, their wraps, their filthy rugs, and tattered rags, and were as warm as possible. The tents had many advantages over a brick house.

Besides having no draughts, there was no acc.u.mulation of snow upon the tops of the tents; and so these witless people were content to endure poverty, hunger, cold, and dirt for the sake of minimising their contribution to the general good of the whole commonwealth. The poorest working man in London who does an honest week's work is a hero compared with such men as these. It would be impossible to nurture sentiment in any tent in Lamb-lane. There was no face with a glimmer of honest self-reliance about it, no face bearing any trace of the strange beauty we had noticed in other encampments, and no form possessed of any distinguishing grace. The whole of the yards were redolent of dirt; and the people, each and all, inexcusably foul in person. In several yards little boys or girls sat on the ground in the open air, tending c.o.ke fires over which stood iron pots, and, as the water boiled and raised the lids, it was plain that the women were taking advantage of the quiet hours of the afternoon for a wash. Before we came away from the last yard, lines had been strung across all the yards, and the hastily-washed linen rags were fluttering in the air. One tent was closed to visitors.

It was then four o'clock, and a woman told us confidentially her friend was washing a blanket, which she would have to dry that same afternoon, as it would be 'wanted' at night; but 'the friend' professed her readiness to take charge of anything we had to spare for the washerwoman-a mouthful of baccy, a 'sucker' for the baby, or 'three ha'pence for a cup of tea.' Boys were there of fourteen and sixteen, with great rents in the knees of their corduroys, who only went out to hawk one day in the week-Sat.u.r.day. They started with a light truck for Covent-garden at four in the morning, and would have from 4s. to 6s. to lay out in flowers. When questioned as to what flowers they had bought on the previous day, one lad said they were 'tulips, hyacinths, and cyclaments,' but n.o.body could give us an intelligible description of the last-named flowers. Two lads generally took charge of the flower truck, and the result of the day's hawking was usually a profit of half-a-crown to three shillings. These lads also a.s.sisted during the week in shaving skewers, and accompanied their fathers to market when they had a load to sell. In one tent we found a dandy-hen sitting; she had been so occupied one week, and the presence of the children and adults, who shared her straw bed, in no way discomposed her. We found that baccy and 'suckers'

were the most negotiable exchanges with these people. The women, young and old, small boys and the men, all smoked, and the day became historic with them because, of the extra smokes they were able to have. The 'suckers' were the largest specimen of 'bulls' eyes' we could find-not those dainty specimens sold at the West-end or in the Strand, but real whoppers, almost the size of pigeons' eggs; and yet there was no baby whose mouth was not found equal to the reception and the hiding of the largest; and we noticed as a strange psychological fact that no baby would consent, though earnestly entreated by its mother, to suffer the 'sucker' to leave its mouth for the mother to look at. The babies knew better, shaking their wary little heads at their mothers. Instinct was stronger than obedience. We were not sorry to get away from Lamb-lane, with its filthy habitations, blanket washings, ragged boys and girls, lazy men and women. For the genuine Gipsy tribe, and their mysterious promptings to live apart from their fellows in the lanes and fields of the country, we have a sentimental pity; but with such as these Lamb-lane people, off-scourings of the lowest form of society, we have no manner of sympathy; and we hope that a gracious Act of Parliament may soon rid English social life of such a plague, and teach such people their duty to their children and to society at large-things they are too ignorant and too idle to learn for themselves."

My son sends me the following account of a visit he made to a Gipsy encampment near London:-I visited the camp at Barking Road this afternoon. Possibly you thought I might not go if you gave me a correct description of the route, for I certainly went through more muddy streets and over lock-bridges than your instructions mentioned. Presuming I was near the camp, I inquired of a policeman, and was surprised with the reply that there used to be one, but he had not heard anything of it for a long while. His mind was evidently wandering, or else he meant it as a joke, for we were then standing within three hundred yards of the largest encampment I have yet seen. It is situated at the back of Barking Road, in what may be termed a field, but it certainly is not a green one, for the only horse and donkey that I saw were standing against boxes eating-perhaps corn.

I am surprised that the Gipsies should choose such an exposed, damp place for camping-ground, as it is always partly under water, and the only shelter afforded being a few houses at the back and one side; the rest faces, and is consequently exposed to, the bleak winds blowing over the marsh and the river.

At the entrance I was met by a poor woman taking a child to the doctor, her chief dread being that if she did not the law would be down upon her.

She had put the journey off to the last minute, for the poor thing looked nearly dead then.

Once in the camp one could not but notice the miserable appearance of the place. Women and children, not one of whom could read and write, with scarcely any clothing, the latter without shoes or stockings. Twenty to twenty-five old, ragged, and dirty tents-not canvas, but old, worn-out blankets-separated by the remains of old broken vans, buckets, and rubbish that must have taken years to acc.u.mulate. Everything betokened age and poverty. Evidently this field has been a camping-ground for some years. Three old vans were all the place could boast of, and one of those was made out of a two-wheeled cart.

I was for the first ten minutes fully occupied in trying to keep a respectable distance from a number of dogs of all sizes and breeds, which had the usual appet.i.te for fresh meat and tweed trowsering, and, at the same time, endeavouring in vain to find solid ground upon which to stand, for the place at the entrance and all round the tents was one regular ma.s.s of deep "slush." It soon became known that my pockets were plentifully supplied with half-ounces of tobacco and sweets. These I soon disposed off, especially the latter, for there seemed no end to the little bare-footed children that could walk, and those that couldn't were brought in turn by their sisters or brothers. I was invited to visit all the tents, but I could gain but little information beyond an account of the severe winter, bad state of trade, your visit in one of the black, dense fogs, &c.

[Picture: Inside a Christian Gipsy's Van-Mrs. Simpson's]

The men followed the occupation of either tinkers or peg-makers, and all the young women will pull out their pipe and ask for tobacco as readily as the old ones.

The camp is one of the Lees. The majority of the men, women, and children are of light complexion, and, as for a dark-eyed beauty, one was not to be found. I stayed most of the time under the "blanket" of the old man, Thomas Lee, who is a jolly old fellow about sixty, and the father of eleven young children. He was evidently the life of the camp, for they all flock round his tent to hear his interesting s.n.a.t.c.hes of song and story.

He had heard that Her Majesty had sent 50 to a.s.sist you in getting the children educated, and just before I left I was pleased to hear him give vent to his feelings with the rough but patriotic speech that "She was a rare good woman, and a Queen of the right sort."

It must not be inferred from what I have said, or shall say, that there are no good Gipsies among them. Here and there are females to be found ready at all hours and on all occasions to do good both to the souls and bodies of Gipsies and house-dwellers as they travel with their basket from door to door hawking their wares; and to ill.u.s.trate the truth of this I cannot do better than refer to the case of the good and kind-hearted Mrs. Simpson, who is generally located with her husband and some grand-children in her van in the neighbourhood near Notting Hill, on the outskirts of London. Mrs. Simpson tells me that she is not a thorough Gipsy, only a half one. Her father was one of the rare old Gipsy family of Lees, of Norfolk, and her mother was a Gorgio or Gentile, who preferred following the "witching eye" and "black locks" to the rag and stick hovel-or, to be more aristocratic, "the tent"-whose roof and sides consisted of sticks and canvas, with an opening in the roof to serve as a chimney, through which the smoke arising from the hearth-stick fire could pa.s.s, excepting that which settled on the hands and face.

Gra.s.s, green, decayed, or otherwise, to serve as a carpet, the brown trampled turf taking the place of mosaic and encaustic tile pavements, straw instead of a feather-bed, and a soap-box, tea-chest, and like things doing duty as drawing-room furniture. Mrs. Simpson, when quite a child, was always reckoned most clever in the art of deception, telling lies and fortunes out of a small black Testament, of which she could not read a sentence or tell a letter; sometimes reading the planets of silly geese, simpletons, and fools out of it when it was upside down, and when detected she was always ready with a plausible excuse, which they, with open mouths, always swallowed as Gospel; and for more than twenty-five years she kept herself and family in this way with sufficient money to keep them in luxury, loose living, and idleness, till the year of 1859, when, by some unaccountable means, her conscience, which, up to this time, had been insensible, dull, and without feeling, became awakened, sharp, and alive. Probably this quickening took place in consequence of her hearing a good Methodist minister in a mission-room in the neighbourhood. The result was that the money she took by telling fortunes began to burn her fingers, and to make it sit upon her conscience as easy as possible she had a large pocket made in her dress so that she could drop it in without much handling. It was no easy thing to give up such an easy way of getting a living to face the realities of an honest pedlar's life, in the midst of "slamming of doors,"

"cold-shoulders," "scowls," "frowns," and insults; and a woman with less determination of character would never have attempted it-or, at least, if attempted, it would soon have been given up on account of the insurmountable difficulties surrounding it. Many times she has sat by the wayside with her basket, after walking and toiling all day, and not having taken a penny with which to provide the Sunday's dinner, when at the last extremity Providence has opened her way and friends have appeared upon the scene, and she has been enabled to "go on her way rejoicing," and for the last twenty years she has been trying to do all the good she can, and to day she is not one penny the loser, but, on the other hand, a gainer, by following such a course. Personally, I have received much encouragement and valuable information at her hands to help me in my work to do the Gipsy children good in one form or other. I have frequently called to see the grand old Gipsy woman, sometimes unexpectedly, and when I have done so I have either found her reading the Bible or else it has been close to her elbow. Its stains and soils betoken much wear and constant use. Very different to the old woman who put her spectacles into her Bible as she set it upon the clock, and lost them for more than seven years. She is a firm believer in prayer; in fact, it seems the very essence of her life, and she can relate numbers of instances when and where G.o.d has answered her pet.i.tions. On her bed-quilt are the following texts of scripture, poetry, &c., which, as she says, these, with other portions of G.o.d's word, she "has learnt to read without any other aid except His Holy Spirit:"-"For G.o.d so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life." "Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and a house divided against a house falleth." "But whoso hath this world's goods and seeth his brother have need and shutteth up his bowels of compa.s.sion from him, how dwelleth the love of G.o.d in him?" "All things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer believing ye shall receive." "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, He leadeth me beside the still waters." "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me, Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me." "I am the door; by Me if any man enter in he shall be saved, and shall go in and out and find pasture." "Let nothing be done through strife, but in lowliness of mind; let each esteem others better than themselves." "Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others." "Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man."

"Wives submit yourselves unto your husbands, as it is fit in the Lord."

"Husbands love your own wives and be not bitter against them." "Children obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing unto the Lord." "Fathers provoke not your children to anger lest they be discouraged." "Servants obey in all things your masters according to the flesh, not with eye service as man pleases, but in singleness of heart fearing G.o.d." "The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness," &c. "The wages of sin is death." "Let us run the race with patience." "Judge not, that ye be not judged."

"Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you do ye even so to them."

"He that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast out." "Come unto Me all ye that labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest." "I am the way, the truth, and the life." "Whatsoever ye find to do, do it with all your might." "And G.o.d shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are pa.s.sed away." "He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his G.o.d and he shall be My son." "And they shall see His face and His name shall be in their foreheads." "And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun, for the Lord G.o.d giveth them light, and they shall reign for ever and ever."

"Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in Thee; Let the water and the blood, From Thy riven side which flowed, Be of sin the double cure, Save me from its guilt and power.

"While I draw this fleeting breath, When mine eyes shall close in death, When I soar to worlds unknown, See Thee on Thy judgment throne; Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in Thee."

"Just as I am, without one plea, But that Thy blood was shed for me, And that Thou bidd'st me come to Thee, O Lamb of G.o.d, I come, I come!

"Just as I am-Thy love unknown Has broken every barrier down; Now to be Thine, yea, Thine alone, O Lamb of G.o.d, I come, I come!"

"Abide with me: fast falls the eventide; The darkness deepens; Lord, with me abide; When other helpers fail, and comforts flee, Help of the helpless, oh, abide with me.

"Swift to its close ebbs out life's little day; Earth's joys grow dim, its glories pa.s.s away!

Change and decay in all around I see; O Thou who changest not, abide with me.

"I need Thy presence every pa.s.sing hour; What but Thy grace can foil the tempter's power?

Who like Thyself my guide and stay can be?

Through cloud and sunshine, oh, abide with me."

Upon these promises of help, comfort, warning, encouragement, and consolation, she has many times rested her wearied body after returning from her day's trudging and toil, and under these she has slept peacefully as in the arms of death, ready to answer the Master's summons, and to meet with her dear little boy who has crossed the river, when He shall say, "It is enough; come up hither," and "sit on My throne."

Although she is a big, powerful woman, and has been more so in years that are past, when any one begins to talk about Heaven and the happiness and joy in reserve for those who have a hope of meeting with loved ones again, when the cares and anxieties of life are ended, it is not long before they see big, scalding, briny tears rolling down her dark, Gipsy-coloured face, and she will frequently edge in words during the conversation about her "Dear Saviour" and "Blessed Lord and Master." I may mention the names of other warm-hearted Gipsies who are trying to improve the condition of some of the adult portion of their brethren and sisters-dwellers upon the turf, and clod scratchers, who feed many of their poor women and children upon cabbage broth and turnip sauce, and "bed them down," after kicks, blows, and ill-usage, upon rotten straw strewn upon the damp ground. Mrs. Carey, Mr. and Mrs. Eastwood, Mrs.

Hedges, and the three Gipsy brothers Smith, Mrs. Lee, and a few others, have not laboured without some success, at the same time they are powerless to improve the condition of the future generations of Gipsy women and children, young mongrels and hut-dwelling Gorgios, by applying the civilising influences of education and sanitary measures to banish heathenism worse than that of Africa, idleness, immorality, thieving, lying, and deception of the deepest dye from our midst, as exhibited in the dwellings of the rag and stick hovels to be seen flitting about the outskirts, fringe, and sc.u.m of our own neglected ragam.u.f.fin population, roaming about under the cognition that the name of a Gipsy is nauseous and disgusting in most people's mouths on account of the d.a.m.ning evil practices they have followed and carried out for centuries upon the honest and industrious artisans, tradesmen, and others they have been brought in contact with. A raw-boned Gipsy, with low, slanting forehead, deep-set eyes, large eyebrows, thick lips, wide mouth, skulkingly slow gait, slouched hat, and a large grizzly-coloured dog at his heels, in a dark, narrow lane, on a starlight night, is not a pleasant state of things for a timid and nervous man to grapple with; nevertheless this is one side of a Gipsy's life as he goes prowling about in quest of his prey, and as such it is seen by those who know something of Gipsy life.

"And they return at evening: they growl like a dog and compa.s.s the city; They-they prowl about for food.

If (or since) they are not satisfied they spend the night (in the search)."

"Sunday at Home."

Even my friends, the ca.n.a.l-boatmen, look upon Gipsies as the lowest of the low, and lower down the social scale than any boatman to be met with.

Some of them have gone so far as to try to shake my nerves by telling me that, now I had taken the Gipsy women and children in hand, they would not give sixpence for my life. I could only reply with a smile, and tell them that I was in safe keeping till the work was done, as in the case of the ca.n.a.l movement. Frowns, dogs, sticks, stones, and oaths did not frighten me. The time had arrived when the vagabondish life of a Gipsy-so called-should be unmasked and the plain truth made known; and for this the Gipsies will thank me, if they take into consideration the object I have in view and the end I am seeking. My object is to elevate them, through the instrumentality of sanitary officer and schoolmaster being at work among the children, into respectable citizens of society, earning an honest livelihood by honourable and legitimate means; far better to do this than to go sneaking about the country, begging, cadging, lying, and stealing all they can lay their hands upon, and training their children to put up with the scoffs, sneers, and insults of the Gorgios or Gentiles for the sake of pocketing a penny at the cost of losing their manhood. A thousand times better live a life such as would enable them to look everybody straight in the face than burrowing and scratching their way into the ground, making skewers at one shilling per stone, and being considered as outlaws, having the mark of Cain upon their forehead, with their hands against everybody and everybody against them. There is no honour in a scamp's life, credit in being a thief, glory surrounding a rogue, and halo over the life of a vagabond and a tramp. To see a half-naked, full grown-man and his wife, with six or eight children, sitting on the damp ground in rag huts large enough only for a litter of pigs, scratching roasted potatoes out of the dying embers of a c.o.ke fire, as thousands are doing to-day, is enough to freeze the blood in one's veins, make one utter a shriek of horror and despair, and to bring down the wrath of G.o.d upon the country that allows such a state of things in her midst.

"How dark yon dwelling by the solemn grove!"

Part V.

The sad Condition of the Gipsies, with Suggestions for their Improvement.

One thing that strikes me in going through the writings of those authors in this country who have endeavoured to deal with the Gipsy question is, their hesitation to tackle the Gipsy difficulty at home. On the surface of the books they have written there appears a disposition to mince the subject, at all events, that amount of courage has not been put into their works that characterised Grellmann's work upon the Gipsies of his own country. If an account similar to Grellmann's had appeared concerning our English Gipsies a century ago, and energetic action had been taken by our law-makers, instead of publishing an account of the Hungarian and other Continental Gipsies, it is impossible to calculate the beneficent results that would have accrued long before this, both to the Gipsies themselves and the country at large.

[Picture: Inside a Gipsy Fortune-teller's van near Latimer Road]

One writer deals princ.i.p.ally with the Scotch Gipsies, another with the Spanish Gipsies, another is trying to prove the Egyptian origin of the Gipsies, another is tracing their language, another treats upon our English Gipsies in a kind of "milk-and-watery" fashion that will neither do them good nor harm-he pleases his readers, but leaves the Gipsies where he found them, viz., in the ditch. Another went to work on the principle of praying and believing for them; but, I am sorry to say, in his circ.u.mscribed sphere his faith and works fell flat, on account, no doubt, of this dear, good man and his friends undertaking to do a work which should in that day have been undertaken by the State, at least, that part of it relating to the education of the Gipsy children.

The Gipsy race is supposed to be the most beautiful in the world, and amongst the Russian Gipsies are to be found countenances, which, to do justice to, would require an abler pen than mine; but exposure to the rays of the sun, the biting of the frost, and the pelting of the pitiless sleet and snow destroys the beauty at a very early age, and if in infancy their personal advantages are remarkable, their ugliness at an advanced age is no less so, for then it is loathsome and appalling:-"He wanted but the dark and kingly crown to have represented the monster who opposed the progress of Lucifer whilst careering in burning arms and infernal glory to the outlet of his h.e.l.lish prison." In our own country a number of Gipsies sit as models, for which they get one shilling per hour. They are not in demand as perfect specimens of the human figure from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot; but few of them, owing to their low, debasing habits, have arrived at that state of perfection. I know one real, fine, old Gipsy woman who sits to artists for the back of her head only, on account of her black, frizzy, raven locks. One will sit for her eyes, another for the nose, another for the hands and feet, another for the colour only. Alfred Smith sits for his feet, and there are others who sit for their legs and arms. No cla.s.s of people, owing to their mixture with other cla.s.ses, tribes, and nations, presents a greater variety of models for the artist than the Gipsy. If an artist wants to paint a thief he can find a model among the Gipsies. If he wants to paint a dark highwayman lurking behind a hedge after his prey he goes to the Gipsy. If he wants to paint Ajax he goes to the Gipsy. If he wants to paint a Grecian, Roman, or Spaniard he goes to the Gipsy. Of course there are exceptions, but if an artist wants to paint a large, fine, intellectual-looking figure, with an open countenance, he keeps away from the Gipsies and seeks his models elsewhere. Dregs among the Gipsies have produced queens for the artists.

Gipsies with a mixture of English blood in their veins have produced men with pluck, courage, and stamina, strongly built, with plenty of muscle and bone. Two "bruisers" of the Gipsy vagabond cla.s.s have worn the champion's belt of the world; and, on the other hand, this mixture of English and Gipsy blood has produced some fine delicate Grecian forms of female beauty, dove-like, soft in eye, hand, and heart-the flashy fire in the eye of a Gipsy has been reduced to the modesty and innocence and simplicity of a child. Our present race of Gipsies, under the influence of education, refinement, and religion, will, if properly and wisely taken in hand and dealt with according to the light of reason and truth, produce a cla.s.s of men and women well qualified to take their share, for weal or for woe, in the struggle of life.