70 Remarks on the Gypsies. 



retain the Soudras and Parias. They are such vagabonds that 

 travellws have met with them in Abyssinia, in Arabia, at 

 T^ouakem in the Persian Gulf, at Penang, at Singapore, at 

 Malacca, at Manilla, at Celebes, at Anyer, and even in China. 



Is it not natural to believe that the Tzengaris, who are so ac- 

 customed to a camp life, and excluded from Hindoo communion, 

 should practise, or feign to practise, religion which offered them 

 so many advantages, that they should act as spies and purveyoi's 

 to the Mongul armies, and that a portion of them should ac- 

 company Timur in his long traverse through Kandahar, Persia 

 and Bukahra ; and after passing through the Caspian and Cau- 

 casian regions, and leaving behind them a train of detached 

 families, they should have come to a stand, some in Russia, 

 others in Asia Minor ; that a second column should have passed 

 from Kandahar into Mekran and Irak- Arabia; and a third 

 strayed into Syria, Palestine, and Arabia-Petrea, and should 

 have reached Egypt by the Isthmus of Suez, and thence should 

 have passed into Mauritania. 



It is not improbable that these rude travellers landed from the 

 Black Sea and Asia Minor in Europe, by the intervention of 

 the Turks during their wars with the Greek empire ; and it is 

 equally probable that the first of them who came to Europe, 

 scgourned in European Turkey, as Aventine informs us, and 

 proceeded thence to Wallachia and Moldavia. In 1417, they 

 were found in Hungary, and at the conclusion of that year 

 they were seen in Germany and Bohemia ; the next year in 

 Switzerland, and in 14^2 in Italy. Pasquier carries their ori- 

 gin in France to 1417, and says that they styled themselves 

 Christians from Lower Egypt, expelled thence by the Saracens, 

 but that in reality they came from Bohemia. From France 

 they passed into Spain and Portugal, and afterwards under 

 llenry VIII. into England. Their hordes commonly consist of 

 two or three hundred persons of both sexes. 



Although it is difficult to explain how they acquired the name 

 of Gypsies or Egyptians, it is certain they neither have an Egyp- 

 tian origin, nor came from Egypt to Europe, as Crantz and Mun- 

 ster have proved. 



Countries in which the Tzengaris or Gypsies are now found. 

 — These people constitute part of the population of all the 

 countries of Europe and of a large portion of Asia. In Africa 



