128 



MR. BORROW ON THE GIPSIES. 



the mixed Gipsies, following various oc- 

 cupations ; for a large part of the Gip- 

 sy blood in England has, as it were, 

 been spread over a large surface of the 

 White. In Scotland it is almost alto- 

 gether so (Ed., p. 395). I may, indeed, 

 venture to assert that there is not a full- 

 blooded Gipsy in Scotland ; and most 

 positively that, in England, where the 

 race is held to be so pure, all that can be 

 said of s-ome families is that they have 

 not been crossed, as far as is known ; 

 but that, with these exceptions, the body 

 is much mixed ; " dreadfully mixed " 

 is the Gipsies' description, as in many 

 instances my own eyes have witnessed 

 (Ed., p. 374). 



Among the English Gipsies, fair- 

 haired ones are looked upon by the 

 purer sort, or even by those taking after 

 the Gipsy, as " small potatoes." The 

 consequence is, they have to make up 

 for their want of blood, by smartness, 

 knowledge of the language, or some- 

 thing that will go to balance the defici- 

 ency of blood. They generally lay claim 

 to the intellect, while they yield the 

 blood to the others. A full or nearly 

 full-blood young English Gipsy looks 

 upon herself with all the pride of a lit- 

 tle duchess, while in the company of 

 young male mixed Gipsies. A mixed 

 Gipsy may reasonably be assumed to 

 be more intelligent than one of the old 

 stock, were it only for this reason, that 

 the mixture softens down the natural 

 conceit and bigotry of the Gipsy ; while, 

 as regards his personal appearance, it 

 puts him in a more improvable position.* 

 Still, a full-blood Gipsy looks up to a 



* We naturally ask, what effect has 

 this difference in appearance upon two 

 such members of one family the one with 

 European, the other with Gipsy features 

 and colour? and the answer is this : The 

 first will hide the fact of his being a Gip- 

 sy from strangers ; indeed, he is ashamed 

 to let it be known that he is a Gipsy ; and 

 he is afraid that people, not knowing how 

 it came about, would laugh at him. 

 " What ! " they would ask, "you a Gipsy ? 

 The idea is absurd." Besides, it facili- 

 tates his getting on in the world, to pre- 

 vent its being known that he is a Gipsy. 

 The other member cannot den)'- that he 

 is a Gipsy, because anyone can see it. 

 Such are the Gipsies who are more apt 

 to cling to the tent, or the more original 

 ways of the old stock. They are very 

 proud of their appearance ; but it is a 

 pride accompanied with disadvantages 

 and even pain. For, after all, the beauty 



mixed Gipsy, if he is anything of 

 a superior man, and freely acknow- 

 ledges the blood. Indeed, the two 

 kinds will readily marry, if circumstan- 

 ces bring them together. To a couple 

 of such Gipsies I said : " What differ- 

 ence does it make, if the person has the 

 blood, and has his heart in the right 

 place?" "That's the idea; that's ex- 

 actly the idea," they both replied (Ed., 

 p. 382). 



Various of the characters mentioned 

 in Mr. Borrow's Lavengro and Romany 

 Rye are, beyond doubt, Gipsies. Old 

 Fulcher is termed, in a derisive man- 

 ner, by Ursula, " a gorgio and basket- 

 maker." She is one of the Hernes ; 

 a family which gorgio and basket-maker 

 Gipsies describe as "an ignorant and 

 conceited set, who think nothing of 

 other Gipsies, owing to the quality and 

 quantity of their own blood." This is 

 the manner in which the more original 

 and pure and the other kind of English 

 Gipsies frequently talk of each other. 

 The latter will deny that they are Gip- 

 sies, at least hide it from the world ; 

 and, like the same kind of Scottish Gip- 

 sies, speak of the others, exclusively, as 

 Gipsies. I am acquainted with a fair- 

 haired English Gipsy, whose wife, now 

 dead, was a half-breed. " But I am 

 not a Gipsy," said he to me, very ab- 

 ruptly, before I had said anything that 

 could have induced him to think that I 

 took him for one. He spoke Gipsy, 

 like the others. I soon caught him trip- 

 ping ; for, in speaking of the size of 

 Gipsy families, he slipped his foot, and 

 said, " For example, there is our family ; 



and pleasure in being a Gipsy is to have 

 the other cast of features and colour ; he 

 has as much of the blood and language 

 as the other, while he can go into any 

 kind of company a sort of Jack-the- 

 Giant-Killer in his invisible coat. The 

 nearer the Gipsy comes to the original 

 colour of his race, the less chance is there 

 of improving him. He knows what he is 

 like ; and well does he know the feeling 

 that people entertain for him. In fact, he 

 feels that there is no use in being any- 

 thing but what people call a Gipsy. But 

 it is different with those of European 

 countenance and colour, or when these 

 have been modified or diluted by a mix- 

 ture of white blood. They can, then, en- 

 ter upon any sphere of employment to 

 which they have a mind, and their per- 

 sonal advantages and outward circum- 

 stances will admit of (Ed., p. 3^2). 



