nd Poachers.--A Gipsy Camp.--The Ancient
Henry.--I am mistaken for a Magistrate or Policeman.--Gipsies of Three
Grades.--The Slangs.--Jim and the Twigs.--Beer rained from
Heaven.--Fortune-telling.--A golden Opportunity to live at my
Ease.--Petulamengro.--I hear of a New York Friend.--The Professor's
Legend of the Olive-leaf and the Dove, "A wery tidy little Story."--The
Story of Samson as given by a Gipsy.--The great Prize-fighter who was
hocussed by a Fancy Girl.--The Judgment Day.--Passing away in Sleep or
Dream to God.--A Gipsy on Ghosts.--Dogs which can kill Ghosts.--Twisted-
legged Stealing.--How to keep Dogs away from a Place.--Gipsies avoid
Unions.--A Gipsy Advertisement in the "Times."--A Gipsy Poetess and a
Rommany Song.

It would be a difficult matter to decide whether the superstitions and
odd fancies entertained by the Gipsies in England are derived from the
English peasantry, were brought from India, or picked up on the way. This
must be left for ethnologists more industrious and better informed than
myself to decide. In any case, the possible common Aryan source will
tend to obscure the truth, just as it often does the derivation of
Rommany words. But nothing can detract from the inexpressibly quaint
spirit of Gipsy originality in which these odd _credos_ are expressed, or
surpass the strangeness of the reasons given for them. If the spirit of
the goblin and elfin lingers anywhere on earth, it is among the Rommany.

One day I questioned a Gipsy as to cats, and what his opinion was of
black ones, correctly surmising that he would have some peculiar ideas on
the subject, and he replied--

"Rommanys never lel kaulo matchers adree the ker, 'cause they're mullos,
and beng is covvas; and the puro beng, you jin, is kaulo, an' has shtor
herros an' dui mushis--an' a sherro. But pauno matchers san kushto, for
they're sim to pauno ghosts of ranis."

Which means in English, "Gipsies never have black cats in the house,
because they are unearthly creatures, and things of the devil; and the
old devil, you know, is black, and has four legs and two arms--and a
head. But white cats are good, for they are like the white ghosts of
ladies."

It is in the extraordinary reason given for liking white cats that the
subtle Gipsyism of this cat-commentary consists. Most people would
consider a resemblance to a white ghost rather repulsive. But the Gipsy
lives by night a strange life, and the reader who peruses carefully