er as a "slang" word or as indicative of colour, since one
of its early Sanskrit meanings is _light_ or _radiance_. This identity
of the so regarded vulgar and the refined, continually confronts us in
studying Rommany.

"To make a MULL of anything," meaning thereby to spoil or confuse it, if
it be derived, as is said, from the Gipsy, must have come from _Mullo_
meaning _dead_, and the Sanskrit _Mara_. There is, however, no such
Gipsy word as mull, in the sense of entangling or spoiling.

PROSS is a theatrical slang word, meaning to instruct and train a tyro.
As there are several stage words of manifest Gipsy origin, I am inclined
to derive this from the old Gipsy _Priss_, to read. In English Gipsy
_Prasser_ or _Pross_ means to ridicule or scorn. Something of this is
implied in the slang word _Pross_, since it also means "to sponge upon a
comrade," &c., "for drink."

TOSHERS are in English low language, "men who steal copper from ship's
bottoms." I cannot form any direct connection between this word and any
in English Gipsy, but it is curious that in Turkish Gipsy _Tasi_ is a
cup, and in Turkish Persian it means, according to Paspati, a copper
basin used in the baths. It is as characteristic of English Gipsy as of
any of its cognate dialects, that we often find lurking in it the most
remarkable Oriental fragments, which cannot be directly traced through
the regular line of transmission.

UP TO TRAP means, in common slang, intelligent. It is worth observing,
that in Gipsy, _drab_ or _trap_ (which words were pronounced alike by the
first Gipsies who came from Germany to England), is used for medicine or
poison, and the employment of the latter is regarded, even at the
present, as the greatest Rommany secret. Indeed, it is only a few days
since a Gipsy said to me, "If you know _drab_, you're up to everything;
for there's nothing goes above that." With _drab_ the Gipsy secures
game, fish, pigs, and poultry; he quiets kicking horses until they can be
sold; and last, not least, kills or catches rats and mice. As with the
Indians of North America, _medicine_--whether to kill or cure--is to the
Gipsy the art of arts, and those who affect a knowledge of it are always
regarded as the most intelligent. It is, however, remarkable, that the
Gipsy, though he lives in fields and woods, is, all the world over, far
inferior to the American Indian as regards a knowledge of the properties
of herbs or minerals. One may pick t