FREDERICK S. ARNOLD. • 109 



In describing Amelia Wells' tent I have described the 

 handsome, white tent of the well-to-do Romany. But 

 some go even further. Richard Stanley was a Icdto 

 Ramani (black Gypsy), who camped in the city of 

 Brooklyn, in a vacant lot, on the Eastern^Park way. 

 Stanley was a stout, handsome, jolly Romany of the 

 pure blood, very dark, very black haired. He could 

 read and write, and was one of the finest and deepest 

 Gypsies I ever met. A friend of mine, also a Ramani 

 rai, took me out to see him. 



Stanley had three large, handsome tents. One, the 

 parlor tent, if we may so express ourselves, was pecu- 

 liarly handsome and clean, carpet on floor, two couches 

 with bedding neatly put away on them, several skamins 

 (chairs), and some chromos and photographs of friends 

 hung to the canvas. It was characteristically Gypsyish 

 that, while Mrs. Stanley took us into this tent and 

 placed chairs for us, she herself squatted, oriental 

 fashion, on the floor. Stanley owned a house and lot in 

 Albany, which he rented. Owned a house and lived in 

 tents ! Had chairs, and sat on the floor ! Dark, strange 

 and inscrutable are thy ways, oh, roving Romany ! 



The second tent was the one they sat around in and 

 used most. It was a fair size and had boards on the 

 floor and a carpet thrown over them, and was divided 

 unequally in two by a curtain. The part curtained ofif 

 would, perhaps, have been a sleeping room for any one 

 who had been up all night and wanted a snooze in the 

 day time. The third tent was the kitchen. It had no 

 floor, was the largest of all three, and the stove and 

 boxes and cases of food stood in it. There I sat down 

 to a good lunch and one of the best beefsteaks I ever 

 tasted. The Gypsy always asks you to eat with him, 

 even if you will only drink a little mutamengri or tea. 



After the wardo and the tdn^ the only property of the 

 Gypsies of importance is their horses. The American 



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