e glance and word
there was a concentrated anathema.

The stern-eyed Gipsy conversed well, entertaining his guests with ease.
After he had spoken of the excellent behaviour and morals of his
tribe--and I believe that they have a very high character in these
respects--I put him a question.

"Can you tell me if there is really such a thing as a Gipsy language? one
hears such differing accounts, you know."

With the amiable smile of one who pitied my credulity, but who was
himself superior to all petty deception or vulgar mystery, he replied--

"That is another of the absurd tales which people have invented about
Gipsies. As if we could have kept such a thing a secret!"

"It does, indeed, seem to me," I replied, "that if you _had_, some people
who were not Gipsies _must_ have learned it."

"Of course," resumed the Gipsy, philosophically, "all people who keep
together get to using a few peculiar terms. Tailors and shoemakers have
their own words. And there are common vagabonds who go up and down
talking thieves' slang, and imposing it on people for Gipsy. But as for
any Gipsy tongue, I ought to know it" ("So I should think," I mentally
ejaculated, as I contemplated his brazen calmness); "and I don't know
three words of it."

And we, the Gorgios, all smiled approval. At least that humbug was
settled; and the Rommany tongue was done for--dead and buried--if,
indeed, it ever existed. Indeed, as I looked in the Gipsy's face, I
began to realise that a man might be talked out of a belief in his own
name, and felt a rudimentary sensation to the effect that the language of
the Black Wanderers was all a dream, and Pott's Zigeuner the mere
tinkling of a pot of brass, Paspati a jingling Turkish symbol, and all
Rommany a _praeterea nihil_ without the _vox_. To dissipate the
delusion, I inquired of the Gipsy--

"You have been in America. Did you ever hunt game in the west?"

"Yes; many a time. On the plains."

"Of course--buffalo--antelope--jack rabbits. And once" (I said this as
if forgetfully)--"I once ate a hedgehog--no, I don't mean a hedgehog, but
a porcupine."

A meaning glance shot from the Gipsy's eye. I uttered a first-class
password, and if he had any doubt before as to who the Rommany rye might
be, there was none now. But with a courteous smile he replied--

"It's quite the same, sir--porcupine or hedgehog. I know perfectly well
what you mean."

"Porcupines," I resumed, "are very common in America