ys my sister. 'Who, indeed, but
my son Jasper,' I answers. And here should I be a greater fool to sit
still and suffer it; which I will not do. I do not like the look of him;
he looks over-gorgious. An ill day to the Romans when he masters
Rommany; and when I says that, I pens a true dukkerin."

"What do you call God, Jasper?"

"You had better be jawing," said the woman, raising her voice to a
terrible scream; "you had better be moving off, my Gorgio; hang you for a
keen one, sitting there by the fire, and stealing my language before my
face. Do you know whom you have to deal with? Do you know that I am
dangerous? My name is Herne, and I comes of the hairy ones!"

And a hairy one she looked! She wore her hair clubbed upon her head,
fastened with many strings and ligatures; but now, tearing these off, her
locks, originally jet black, but now partially grizzled with age, fell
down on every side of her, covering her face and back as far down as her
knees. No she-bear of Lapland ever looked more fierce and hairy than did
that woman, as, standing in the open part of the tent, with her head bent
down, and her shoulders drawn up, seemingly about to precipitate herself
upon me, she repeated, again and again,--

"My name is Herne, and I comes of the hairy ones!--"

"I call God Duvel, brother."

"It sounds very like Devil."

"It doth, brother, it doth."

"And what do you call divine, I mean godly?"

"Oh! I call that duvelskoe."

"I am thinking of something, Jasper."

"What are you thinking of, brother?"

"Would it not be a rum thing if divine and devilish were originally one
and the same word?"

"It would, brother, it would--"

* * * * *

From this time I had frequent interviews with Jasper, sometimes in his
tent, sometimes on the heath, about which we would roam for hours,
discoursing on various matters. Sometimes mounted on one of his horses,
of which he had several, I would accompany him to various fairs and
markets in the neighbourhood, to which he went on his own affairs, or
those of his tribe. I soon found that I had become acquainted with a
most singular people, whose habits and pursuits awakened within me the
highest interest. Of all connected with them, however, their language
was doubtless that which exercised the greatest influence over my
imagination. I had at first some suspicion that it would prove a mere
made-up gibberish. But I was soon undeceived. Broken, corrupted, and
half in