The Gypsies | Page 2

be known
to the reviewer in question, has at least never been set before the public
by anybody but myself, and that it deserves further investigation. No
account of the tribes of the East mentions the Rom or Trablus, and yet I
have personally met with and thoroughly examined one of them. In like
manner, the "Shelta Thari" has remained till the present day entirely
unknown to all writers on either the languages or the nomadic people of
Great Britain. If we are so ignorant of the wanderers among us, and at
our very doors, it is not remarkable that we should be ignorant of those
of India.

INTRODUCTION.
I have frequently been asked, "Why do you take an interest in gypsies?"
And it is not so easy to answer. Why, indeed? In Spain one who has
been fascinated by them is called one of the aficion, or affection, or
"fancy;" he is an aficionado, or affected unto them, and people there
know perfectly what it means, for every Spaniard is at heart a
Bohemian. He feels what a charm there is in a wandering life, in
camping in lonely places, under old chestnut-trees, near towering cliffs,
al pasar del arroyo, by the rivulets among the rocks. He thinks of the
wine skin and wheaten cake when one was hungry on the road, of the
mules and tinkling bells, the fire by night, and the cigarito, smoked till
he fell asleep. Then he remembers the gypsies who came to the camp,
and the black-eyed girl who told him his fortune, and all that followed
in the rosy dawn and ever onward into starry night.
"Y se alegre el alma llena De la luz de esos luceros."
And his heart is filled with rapture At the light of those lights above.
This man understands it. So, too, does many an Englishman. But I
cannot tell you why. Why do I love to wander on the roads to hear the
birds; to see old church towers afar, rising over fringes of forest, a river

and a bridge in the foreground, and an ancient castle beyond, with a
modern village springing up about it, just as at the foot of the burg
there lies the falling trunk of an old tree, around which weeds and
flowers are springing up, nourished by its decay? Why love these better
than pictures, and with a more than fine-art feeling? Because on the
roads, among such scenes, between the hedge-rows and by the river, I
find the wanderers who properly inhabit not the houses but the scene,
not a part but the whole. These are the gypsies, who live like the birds
and hares, not of the house-born or the town-bred, but free and at home
only with nature.
I am at some pleasant watering-place, no matter where. Let it be
Torquay, or Ilfracombe, or Aberystwith, or Bath, or Bournemouth, or
Hastings. I find out what old churches, castles, towns, towers, manors,
lakes, forests, fairy-wells, or other charms of England lie within twenty
miles. Then I take my staff and sketch-book, and set out on my day's
pilgrimage. In the distance lie the lines of the shining sea, with ships
sailing to unknown lands. Those who live in them are the Bohemians of
the sea, homing while roaming, sleeping as they go, even as gypsies
dwell on wheels. And if you look wistfully at these ships far off and out
at sea with the sun upon their sails, and wonder what quaint mysteries
of life they hide, verily you are not far from being affected or elected
unto the Romany. And if, when you see the wild birds on the wing,
wending their way to the South, and wish that you could fly with
them,--anywhere, anywhere over the world and into adventure,--then
you are not far in spirit from the kingdom of Bohemia and its seven
castles, in the deep windows of which AEolian wind-harps sing
forever.
Now, as you wander along, it may be that in the wood and by some
grassy nook you will hear voices, and see the gleam of a red garment,
and then find a man of the roads, with dusky wife and child. You speak
one word, "Sarishan!" and you are introduced. These people are like
birds and bees, they belong to out-of-doors and nature. If you can chirp
or buzz a little in their language and know their ways, you will find out,
as you sit in the forest, why he who loves green bushes and mossy
rocks is glad to fly from cities, and likes to be free of the joyous

citizenship of the roads, and everywhere at home in such boon
company.
When I have been a stranger in a strange town, I have never gone out
for a