466 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2od S. N» 102., Dec. 12. '67. 



*.That may be so,' was the reply I got. Then 

 Slingsby was very careful to mention to Lavengro 

 that his wife was white ; * a thing not necessarily 

 true, because he asserted it, but it implied that he 

 was different. These are but instances of all our 

 English tinkers. 



"The prejudice against the name of Gipsy was 

 apparently as great in Bunyan's time as it is now ; 

 and there was evidently as great delicacy on the 

 part of mixed fair-haired Gipsies to own the blood 

 then as now ; and actual danger ; for then it was 

 hangable to be a Gipsy. When the name of Gipsy 

 was by law proscribed, what other name would 

 they all go under but tinkers — their own proper 

 occupation? Those only would be called by 

 the public ' Gipsies,' whose appearance indi- 

 cated the pure, or nearly pure Gipsy. However 

 much, in conversation, Bunyan^might have hid his 

 blood, he virtually acknowledged it when he said : 

 ' For my descent, it was, as is well known to many, 

 of a low and inconsiderate generation ; my father's 

 house being of that rank that is meanest and most 

 despised of all the families of the land.' Of whom 

 does Bunyan speak here if not of the Gipsies ? 

 He says of all the families of the land. (The 

 Italics are my own.) Well might Southey re- 

 mark : ' Wherefore this (tinkering) should have 

 been so mean and despised a calling, is not how- 

 ever apparent, when it was not followed as a 

 vagabond employment ; but, as in this case, ex- 

 ercised by one who had a settled habitation ; and 

 who, mean as his condition was, was nevertheless 

 able to put his son to school, in an age when very 

 few of the poor were taught to read and write.' 

 The fact is, that Bunyan's father had a town beat, 

 which would give him a settled residence, prevent 

 him using a tent, and lead him to conform with 

 the ways of the ordinary Inhabitants ; but doubt- 

 less he had his pass from the chief of the Gipsies 

 for the district. The same may be said of John 

 Bunyan himself. 



" Bunyan's very appearance indicated him to be 

 a mixed Gipsy ; for according to Scott, he was 'tall 

 and broad set, though not corpulent ; he had a 

 ruddy complexion, with sparkling eyes and hair in- 

 clining to red't — and likewise the way in which 



" * Slingsbv said : ' My wife is a Christian woman, and 

 though she follows the roads,' Sfc. (like mixed Gipsies). 

 laopel Berners (whom I claim to have been another 

 mixed Gipsy) said : ' I am none of your chi^s (female 

 Gipsies) ; I am of Christian blood and parents' These 

 are specimens of the equivocating language of mixed 

 Gipsies. 



" ■]• This is a description in every respect applicable to 

 many mixed British Gipsies. The race seems to have 

 had a predeliction for fair or red hair in such children as 

 have been brought up and incorporated with the body. 

 Should a fair-haired native marry a full-blood Gipsj', the 

 issue would show some children like the one parent and 

 some like the other. Should a second crossing take place 

 with a native, the issue' will show still less of the Gipsy. 

 Such crossing continued, soon crosses the Gipsy out to 



he married ; for, according to Southey, it is said 

 that he and his wife ' came together as poor as poor 

 might be, not having so much household stuff as 

 a dish or a spoon between them.' His boyhood 

 likewise indicated the Gipsy ; for he seems to have 

 been at the bottom of much of the devilment 

 practised by the youth of his native village. See, 

 then, when he was confined to Bedford jail, how 

 naturally he took on to making tagged laces to 

 enable him to support his wife and family. But 

 the greatest possible weight attaches to the ques- 

 tion which he put to his father, if he was of Israel- 

 itish blood ; a question which I have heard put hy 

 Gipsy lads to their parent (« iiery much mixed 

 Gipsy), which was answered thus : ' We must 

 have been among the Jews, for some of our cere- 

 monies are like theirs.' 



" How little does a late writer in the Dublin 

 University Magazine know of the feelings of a 

 mixed Gipsy like Bunyan, wlien he says : ' Did 

 he belong to the Gipsies, we have little doubt 

 that he would ,have dwelt on it with a sort of 

 spiritual exultation ; and that of his having been 

 called out of Egypt would have been to him one 

 of the proofs of Divine favour. We cannot ima- 

 gine him suppressing the fact or disguising it.' It 

 is very apparent that this writer never conversed 

 with a Gispy, at least a mixed one ; or at all 

 events never directed his attention to the question 

 of his feelings in owning himself to the public to be 

 a Gipsy. Where is the point in this reviewer's 

 remarks? His remarks have no point. What 

 occasion had Bunyan to mention he was a Gipsy? 

 What pairpose would it have served ? How would 

 it have advanced his mission as a minister? Con- 

 sidering the prejudice that has always existed 

 against that unfortunate word Gipsy, it would 

 have created a pretty sensation among all parties if 

 Bunyan had said that he was a Gipsy. ' What?' 

 the people would have asked, ' a Gipsy turned 

 priest ? We'll have the devil turning priest 

 next ! ' Considering the many enemies which the 

 tinker-bishop had to contend with, many of whom 

 even sought his life, he would have given them a 

 pretty ocf'asion of revenging themselves upon him 

 had he said he was a Gipsy. They would soon 

 have put the law in force, and stretched his neck 

 for him.* 



appearance; still not altogether so; for the Gipsy will 

 come up, but in a modified form. Mr. Borrow describes 

 a half-blood, but a thorough Gipsy, in the person of a 

 half-pay captain in the service of Donna Isabel, as fol- 

 lows : ' He had flaxen hair, his eyes small, and, like fer- 

 rets', red and fiery ; his complexion like a brick or dull 

 red, chequered with spots of purple.' 



" * Justice Keeling threatened him with this fate even 

 for preaching the Gospel; for, said he : ' If j'ou do not sub- 

 mit to go to hear divine service and leave 3'our preaching, 

 you must be banished the realm : and if, after such a day 

 as shall be appointed you to be gone, you shall be found 

 in this realm, or be found to come over again without 



