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THE GYPSIES
THE GYPSIES
BY CHARLES G. LELAND author of “THE ENGLISH GYPSIES AND THEIR LANGUAGE,” “ANGLO-ROMANY BALLADS,” “HANS BREITMANN’S BALLADS,” etc. BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY The Riverside Press, Cambridge Copyright, 1882, By CHARLES G. LELAND. All rights reserved ....
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PREFACE.
PREFACE.
The reader will find in this book sketches of experiences among gypsies of different nations by one who speaks their language and is conversant with their ways. These embrace descriptions of the justly famed musical gypsies of St. Petersburg and Moscow, by whom the writer was received literally as a brother; of the Austrian gypsies, especially those composing the first Romany orchestra of that country, selected by Liszt, and who played for their friend as they declared they had never played bef
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INTRODUCTION.
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
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ST. PETERSBURG.
ST. PETERSBURG.
There are gypsies and gypsies in the world, for there are the wanderers on the roads and the secret dwellers in towns; but even among the aficionados , or Romany ryes, by whom I mean those scholars who are fond of studying life and language from the people themselves, very few have dreamed that there exist communities of gentlemanly and lady-like gypsies of art, like the Bohemians of Murger and George Sand, but differing from them in being real “Bohemians” by race. I confess that it had never o
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THE TROIKA.
THE TROIKA.
Vot y’dit troika udalaiya . Hear ye the troika-bell a-ringing, And see the peasant driver there? Hear ye the mournful song he’s singing, Like distant tolling through the air? “O eyes, blue eyes, to me so lonely, O eyes—alas!—ye give me pain; O eyes, that once looked at me only, I ne’er shall see your like again. “Farewell, my darling, now in heaven, And still the heaven of my soul; Farewell, thou father town, O Moscow, Where I have left my life, my all!” And ever at the rein still st
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MOSCOW.
MOSCOW.
I had no friends in Moscow to direct me where to find gypsies en famille , and the inquiries which I made of chance acquaintances simply convinced me that the world at large was as ignorant of their ways as it was prejudiced against them. At last the good-natured old porter of our hotel told me, in his rough Baltic German, how to meet these mysterious minstrels to advantage. “You must take a sleigh,” he said, “and go out to Petrovka. That is a place in the country, where there are grand cafés
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I.
I.
In June, 1878, I went to Paris, during the great Exhibition. I had been invited by Monsieur Edmond About to attend as a delegate the Congrès Internationale Littéraire, which was about to be held in the great city. How we assembled, how M. About distinguished himself as one of the most practical and common-sensible of men of genius, and how we were all finally harangued by M. Victor Hugo with the most extraordinary display of oratorical sky-rockets, Catherine-wheels, blue-lights, fire-crackers,
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II. AUSTRIAN GYPSIES IN PHILADELPHIA.
II. AUSTRIAN GYPSIES IN PHILADELPHIA.
It was a sunny Sunday afternoon, and I was walking down Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, when I met with three very dark men. Dark men are not rarities in my native city. There is, for instance, Eugene, who has the invaluable faculty of being able to turn his hand to an infinite helpfulness in the small arts. These men were darker than Eugene, but they differed from him in this, that while he is a man of color, they were not. For in America the man of Aryan blood, however dark he may be, is alw
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I. OATLANDS PARK.
I. OATLANDS PARK.
Oatlands Park (between Weybridge and Walton-upon-Thames) was once the property of the Duke of York, but now the lordly manor-house is a hotel. The grounds about it are well preserved and very picturesque. They should look well, for they cover a vast and wasted fortune. There is, for instance, a grotto which cost forty thousand pounds. It is one of those wretched and tasteless masses of silly rock-rococo work which were so much admired at the beginning of the present century, when sham ruins
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II. WALKING AND VISITING.
II. WALKING AND VISITING.
I never shall forget the sparkling splendor of that frosty morning in December when I went with a younger friend from Oatlands Park for a day’s walk. I may have seen at other times, but I do not remember, such winter lace-work as then adorned the hedges. The gossamer spider has within her an inward monitor which tells if the weather will be fine; but it says nothing about sudden changes to keen cold, and the artistic result was that the hedges were hung with thousands of Honiton lamp-mats, ins
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III. COBHAM FAIR.
III. COBHAM FAIR.
The walk from Oatlands Park Hotel to Cobham is beautiful with memorials of Older England. Even on the grounds there is a quaint brick gateway, which is the only relic of a palace which preceded the present pile. The grandfather was indeed a stately edifice, built by Henry VIII., improved and magnified, according to his lights, by Inigo Jones, and then destroyed during the civil war. The river is here very beautiful, and the view was once painted by Turner. It abounds in “short windings and r
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IV. THE MIXED FORTUNES.
IV. THE MIXED FORTUNES.
“Thus spoke the king to the great Master: ‘Thou didst bless and ban the people; thou didst give benison and curse, luck and sorrow, to the evil or the good.’ “And the Master said, ‘It may be so.’ “And the king continued, ‘There came two men, and one was good and the other bad. And one thou didst bless, thinking he was good; but he was wicked. And the other thou didst curse, and thought him bad; but he was good.’ “The Master said, ‘And what came of it?’ “The king answered, ‘All evil came upon t
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V. HAMPTON RACES.
V. HAMPTON RACES.
On a summer day, when waking dreams softly wave before the fancy, it is pleasant to walk in the noon-stillness along the Thames, for then we pass a series of pictures forming a gallery which I would not exchange for that of the Louvre, could I impress them as indelibly upon the eye-memory as its works are fixed on canvas. There exists in all of us a spiritual photographic apparatus, by means of which we might retain accurately all we have ever seen, and bring out, at will, the pictures from the
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VI. STREET SKETCHES.
VI. STREET SKETCHES.
London, during hot weather, after the close of the wise season, suggests to the upper ten thousand, and to the lower twenty thousand who reflect their ways, and to the lowest millions who minister to them all, a scene of doleful dullness. I call the time which has passed wise, because that which succeeds is universally known as the silly season. Then the editors in town have recourse to the American newspapers for amusing murders, while their rural brethren invent great gooseberries. Then the
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VII. OF CERTAIN GENTLEMEN AND GYPSIES.
VII. OF CERTAIN GENTLEMEN AND GYPSIES.
One morning I was walking with Mr. Thomas Carlyle and Mr. Froude. We went across Hyde Park, and paused to rest on the bridge. This is a remarkable place, since there, in the very heart of London, one sees a view which is perfectly rural. The old oaks rise above each other like green waves, the houses in the distance are country-like, while over the trees, and far away, a village-looking spire completes the picture. I think that it was Mr. Froude who called my attention to the beauty of the v
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I. MAT WOODS THE FIDDLER.
I. MAT WOODS THE FIDDLER.
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 vanishing. But then he has such excellent opportunity for gypsying. In Wales there are yet thousands of acres of wild land, deep ravines, rocky corn
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II. THE PIOUS WASHERWOMAN.
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 behin
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III. THE GYPSIES AT ABERYSTWITH.
III. THE GYPSIES AT ABERYSTWITH.
Aberystwith is a little fishing-village, which has of late years first bloomed as a railway-station, and then fruited into prosperity as a bathing-place. Like many parvenus , it makes a great display of its Norman ancestor, the old castle, saying little about the long centuries of plebeian obscurity in which it was once buried. This castle, after being woefully neglected during the days when nobody cared for its early respectability, has been suddenly remembered, now that better times have com
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I. GYPSIES IN PHILADELPHIA.
I. GYPSIES IN PHILADELPHIA.
It is true that the American gypsy has grown more vigorous in this country, and, like many plants, has thriven better for being trans—I was about to write incautiously ported , but, on second thought, say planted . Strangely enough, he is more Romany than ever. I have had many opportunities of studying both the elders from England and the younger gypsies, born of English parents, and I have found that there is unquestionably a great improvement in the race here, even from a gypsy stand-point.
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II. THE CROCUS-PITCHER. [241] (PHILADELPHIA.)
II. THE CROCUS-PITCHER. [241] (PHILADELPHIA.)
It was a fine spring noon, and the corner of Fourth and Library streets in Philadelphia was like a rock in the turn of a rapid river, so great was the crowd of busy business men which flowed past. Just out of the current a man paused, put down a parcel which he carried, turned it into a table, placed on it several vials, produced a bundle of hand-bills, and began, in the language of his tribe, to cant —that is, cantare , to sing—the virtues of a medicine which was certainly patent in being spre
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III. GYPSIES IN CAMP. (NEW JERSEY.)
III. GYPSIES IN CAMP. (NEW JERSEY.)
The Weather had put on his very worst clothes, and was never so hard at work for the agricultural interests, or so little inclined to see visitors, as on the Sunday afternoon when I started gypsying. The rain and the wind were fighting one with another, and both with the mud, even as the Jews in Jerusalem fought with themselves, and both with the Romans,—which was the time when the Shaket , or butcher, killed the ox who drank the water which quenched the fire which the reader has often heard al
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IV. HOUSE GYPSIES IN PHILADELPHIA
IV. HOUSE GYPSIES IN PHILADELPHIA
This chapter was written by my niece through marriage, Miss Elizabeth Robins. It is a part of an article which was published in “The Century,” and it sets forth certain wanderings in seeking old houses in the city of Philadelphia. All along the lower part of Race Street, saith the lady, are wholesale stores and warehouses of every description. Some carts belonging to one of them had just been unloaded. The stevedores who do this—all negroes—were resting while they waited for the next load. T
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V. A GYPSY LETTER.
V. A GYPSY LETTER.
All the gypsies in the country are not upon the roads. Many of them live in houses, and that very respectably, nay, even aristocratically. Yea, and it may be, O reader, that thou hast met them and knowest them not, any more than thou knowest many other deep secrets of the hearts and lives of those who live around thee. Dark are the ways of the Romany, strange his paths, even when reclaimed from the tent and the van. It is, however, intelligible enough that the Rom converted to the true faith
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GYPSIES IN THE EAST.
GYPSIES IN THE EAST.
Noon in Cairo. A silent old court-yard, half sun and half shadow in which quaintly graceful, strangely curving columns seem to have taken from long companionship with trees something of their inner life, while the palms, their neighbors, from long in-door existence, look as if they had in turn acquired household or animal instincts, if not human sympathies. And as the younger the race the more it seeks for poets and orators to express in thought what it only feels, so these dumb pillars and pla
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CHARACTERISTICS. [307b]
CHARACTERISTICS. [307b]
Of these gypsies the Bailies are fair. The Birds are in Norfolk and Suffolk. The Blacks are dark, stout, and strong. The Bosvilles are rather short, fair, stout, and heavy. The Broadways are fair, of medium height and good figures. The Bucklands are thin, dark, and tallish. The Bunces travel in the South of England. The Burtons are short, dark, and very active. The Chapmans are fair. The Clarkes are fair and well-sized men. The Coopers are short, dark, and very active. The Dightons are very dark
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MASCULINE NAMES.
MASCULINE NAMES.
Opi Boswell. Wanselo, or Anselo. I was once of the opinion that this name was originally Lancelot, but as Mr. Borrow has found Wentzlow, i.e. , Wenceslas, in England, the latter is probably the original. I have found it changed to Onslow, as the name painted on a Romany van in Aberystwith, but it was pronounced Anselo. Pastor-rumis. Spico. Jineral, i.e. , General Cooper. Horferus and Horfer. Either Arthur or Orpheus. His name was then changed to Wacker-doll, and finally settled into Wacker.
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FEMININE NAMES.
FEMININE NAMES.
Selinda, Slinda, Linda, Slindi. Delilah. Mia. Prudence. Mizelia, Mizelli, Mizela. Providence. Lina. Eve. Pendivella. Athaliah. Jewránum, i.e. , Geranium. Gentilla, Gentie. Virginia. Synfie. Probably Cynthia. Suby, Azuba. Sybie. Probably from Sibyl. Isaia. Richenda. Canairis. Kiomi. Fenella. Liberina. Floure, Flower, Flora. Malindi. Kisaiya. Otchamé. Orlenda. Renée. Reyora, Regina. Sinaminta. Syeira. Probably Cyra. Y-yra or Yeira. Truffeni. Delīra, Deleera. Ocean Solis. Marili
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MERLINOS TE TRINALI.
MERLINOS TE TRINALI.
“Miro koko, pen mandy a rinkeno gudlo?” Avali miri chavi. Me ’tvel pen tute dui te shyan trin, vonka tute ’atches sār pūkeno. Shūn amengi. Yeckorus adré o Làvines tem sos a boro chovihan, navdo Merlinos. Gusvero mush sos Merlinos, būti seeri covva yuv asti kair. Jindás yuv ta pūr yeck jivnipen adré o waver, saster adré o rūpp, te o rūpp adré sonakai. Finō covva sos adovo te sos miro. Te longoduro fon leste jivdes a bori chovihani, Trinali sos lākis nav. Boridiri chovihani sos Trinali, bū
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MERLIN AND TRINALI.
MERLIN AND TRINALI.
“My uncle, tell me a pretty story!” Yes, my child. I will tell you two, and perhaps three, if you keep very quiet. Listen to me. Once in Wales there was a great wizard named Merlin. Many magic things he could do. He knew how to change one living being into another, iron into silver, and silver into gold. A fine thing that would be if it were mine. And afar from him lived a great witch. Trinali was her name. A great witch was Trinali. Many men did she enchant, many gentlemen did she cha
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O PŪV-SŪVER.
O PŪV-SŪVER.
Yeckorus sims būti kedivvus, sos rakli, te yoi sos kushti partanengrī, te yoi astis kair a rinkeno plāchta, yeck sār dívvus. Te covakai chi kamdas rye butidiro, awer yeck dívvus lākis pīreno sos stardo adré staruben. Te vonka yoi shundas lis, yoi hushtiedas apré te jas keti krallis te mangerdas leste choruknes ta mūkk lākis pīreno jā pīro. Te krallis patserdas lāki tevel yoi kairdas leste a rinkeno plāchta, yeck sār divvus pā kūrikus, hafta plāchta pā hafta dívvus, yuv tvel ferdel leste, te d
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THE SPIDER.
THE SPIDER.
Once there was a girl, as there are many to-day, and she was a good needle-worker, and could make a beautiful cloak in one day. And that [there] girl loved a gentleman very much; but one day her sweetheart was shut up in prison, and when she heard it she hastened and went to the king, and begged him humbly to let her love go free. And the king promised her if she would make him a fine cloak,—one every day for a week, seven cloaks for seven days,—he would forgive him, and give him leave to go f
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GORGIO, KALO-MANUSH, TE ROM.
GORGIO, KALO-MANUSH, TE ROM.
Yeckorus pā ankairoben, kon i manūshia nanei lavia, o boro Dúvel jas pirián. Sā sī asar? Shūn miri chavi, me givellis tute:— Būti beshia kedivrus kennā Adré o tem ankairoben, O boro Dúvel jās ’vrī ajā, Ta dikk i mushia miraben. Sa yuv pirridas, dikkdas trin mūshia pāsh o dromescro rikk, hatchin keti chomano mūsh te vel dé lendis navia, te len putcherde o boro Dúvel ta navver lende. Dordi, o yeckto mush sos pāno, te o boro Dúvel pūkkerdas kavodoi, “Gorgio.” Te yuv sikkerdas leste kokero k
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GORGIO, [319a] BLACK MAN, AND GYPSY.
GORGIO, [319a] BLACK MAN, AND GYPSY.
Once in the creation, when men had no names, the Lord went walking. How was that? Listen, my child, I will sing it to you:— Many a year has passed away Since the world was first begun, That the great Lord went out one day To see how men’s lives went on. As he walked along he saw three men by the roadside, waiting till some man would give them names; and they asked the Lord to name them. See! the first man was white, and the Lord called him Gorgio. Then he adapted himself to that name, an
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YAG-BAR TE SASTER. SĀ O KAM SOS ANKERDO.
YAG-BAR TE SASTER. SĀ O KAM SOS ANKERDO.
“Pen mandy a waver gudlo trustal o ankairoben!” Né shomas adoi, awer shūndom būti apā lis fon miro bābus. Foki pende mengy sā o chollo-tem [320] sos kérdo fon o kam, awer i Romany chalia savo keren sār chingernes, pen o kam sos kérdo fon o boro tem. Wafedo gry se adovo te nestis ja sigan te anpāli o kūshto drom. Yeckorus ’dré o pūro chirus, te kennā, sos a bori pūreni chovihāni te kérdas sīrīni covvas, te jivdas sār akonyo adré o heb adré o rātti. Yeck dívvus yoi latchedas yag-bar adré o puv
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FLINT AND STEEL. OR HOW THE SUN WAS CREATED.
FLINT AND STEEL. OR HOW THE SUN WAS CREATED.
“Tell me another story about the creation!” I was not there at the time, but I heard a great deal about it from my grandfather. All he did there was to turn the wheel. People tell me that the world was made from the sun, but gypsies, who do everything all contrary, say that the sun was made from the earth. A bad horse is that which will not travel either way on a road. Once in the old time, as [there may be] now, was a great old witch, who made enchantments, and lived all alone in the sky in
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O MANŪSH KON JIVDAS ADRÉ O CHONE (SHONE).
O MANŪSH KON JIVDAS ADRÉ O CHONE (SHONE).
“Pen mandy a wāver gudlo apā o chone?” Avail miri deari. Adré o pūro chirus būtidosta manushia jivvede kūshti-bākeno ’dré o chone, sār chichi ta kair awer ta rikker āp o yāg so kérela o dūd. Awer, amen i foki jivdas būti wafodo mūleno manush, kon dusherdas te lias witchaben atūt sār i waveri deari manushia, te yuv kairedas lis sā’s ta shikker lende sār adrom, te chivdas len avrī o chone. Te kennā o sig o i foki shan jillo, yuv pendas: “Kennā akovi dinneli juckalis shan jillo, me te vel jiv ma
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THE MAN WHO LIVED IN THE MOON.
THE MAN WHO LIVED IN THE MOON.
“Tell me another story about the moon.” Yes, my dear. In the old time many men lived happily in the moon, with nothing to do but keep up the fire which makes the light. But among the folk lived a very wicked, obstinate man, who troubled and hated all the other nice [dear] people, and he managed it so as to drive them all away, and put them out of the moon. And when the mass of the folk were gone, he said, “Now those stupid dogs have gone, I will live comfortably and well, all alone.” But aft
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ROMANY TACHIPEN.
ROMANY TACHIPEN.
Taken down accurately from an old gypsy. Common dialect, or “half-and-half” language. “Rya, tute kāms mandy to pukker tute the tachopen—āwo? Se’s a boro or a kūsi covva, mandy’ll rakker tacho, s’up mi-duvel, apré mi meriben, bengis adré man’nys see if mandy pens a bitto huckaben! An’ sā se adduvvel? Did mandy ever chore a kāni adré mi jiv? and what do the Romany chals kair o’ the poris, ’cause kekker ever dikked chīchī pāsh of a Romany tan? Kek rya,—mandy never chored a kāni an’ adré sixty
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GYPSY TRUTH.
GYPSY TRUTH.
“Master, you want me to tell you all the truth,—yes? If it’s a big or a little thing, I’ll tell the truth, so help me God, upon my life! The devil be in my soul if I tell the least lie! And what is it? Did I ever in all my life steal a chicken? and what do the gypsies do with the feathers, because nobody ever saw any near a gypsy tent? Never, sir,—I never stole a chicken; and in all the sixty years that I’ve been on the roads, in all that time I never saw or heard or knew of a gypsy’s steal
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CHOVIHANIPEN.
CHOVIHANIPEN.
“Miri diri bībī, me kamāva butidiro tevel chovihani. Kāmāva ta dukker geeris te ta jin kūnjerni cola. Tu sosti sikker mengi sārakovi.” “Oh miri kamli! vonka tu vissa te vel chovihani, te i Gorgie jinena lis, tu lesa buti tugnus. Sār i chavi tevel shellavrī, te kair a gudli te wūsser baria kánna dikena tute, te shyan i bori foki mérena tute. Awer kūshti se ta jin garini covva, kushti se vonka chori churkni jūva te sār i sweti chungen’ apré, jinela sā ta kair lende wafodopen ta pessur sār leng
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WITCHCRAFT. [327]
WITCHCRAFT. [327]
“My dear aunt, I wish very much to be a witch. I would like to enchant people and to know secret things. You can teach me all that.” “Oh, my darling! if you come to be a witch, and the Gentiles know it, you will have much trouble. All the children will cry aloud, and make a noise and throw stones at you when they see you, and perhaps the grown-up people will kill you. But it is nice to know secret things; pleasant for a poor old humble woman whom all the world spits upon to know how to do th
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THE SUN AND THE MOON.
THE SUN AND THE MOON.
Brother, one day the Sun resolved to marry. During nine years, drawn by nine fiery horses, he had rolled by heaven and earth as fast as the wind or a flying arrow. But it was in vain that he fatigued his horses. Nowhere could he find a love worthy of him. Nowhere in the universe was one who equaled in beauty his sister Helen, the beautiful Helen with silver tresses. The Sun went to meet her, and thus addressed her: “My dear little sister Helen, Helen of the silver tresses, let us be betrothed
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A GYPSY MAGIC SPELL.
A GYPSY MAGIC SPELL.
There is a meaningless rhyme, very common among children. It is repeated while counting off those who are taking part in a game, and allotting to each a place. It is as follows:— “Ekkeri akkery u-kery an Fillisi’, follasy, Nicolas John Queebee-quābee—Irishman. Stingle ’em—stangle ’em—buck!” With a very little alteration in sounds, and not more than children make of these verses in different places, this may be read as follows:— “’Ekkeri, akai-ri, you kair—án. Filissin follasy. Nakelas jā’n. K
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SHELTA, THE TINKERS’ TALK.
SHELTA, THE TINKERS’ TALK.
“So good a proficient in one quarter of an hour that I can drink with any tinker in his own language during my life.”— King Henry the Fourth . One summer day, in the year 1876, I was returning from a long walk in the beautiful country which lies around Bath, when, on the road near the town, I met with a man who had evidently grown up from childhood into middle age as a beggar and a tramp. I have learned by long experience that there is not a so-called “traveler” of England or of the world, be h
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