III.—YOUNG GIPSIES.
"D
o we work at night! yes, I b'lieve yer; and afore daylight too, leastways, as soon as ever there's light enough to see by. Not always we don't, but when the old man comes back, an' says we must do a spell of peggin' there ain't no time hardly to get our vittles, except perhaps a tater, or a bit o' bread and bacon; but that's ever so much better than it used to be when poor mother was alive, and she and me and Aunt Ann and Ben used to work the dolls and windmills, an' the fly-ketchers, an' the flyin' birds."
She was a tall thin girl, with a flat dirty face, that would have been pale, if it had not been burnt to a yellowish brown with the sun, till it was only a shade lighter than the old battered straw hat that had let a wisp or two of yellow hair through a great slit in the back just above the brim. She wore a tattered cotton frock that had nearly all the pattern washed out, which must have been a long time before, because it was so stained and worn, so thin that it would bear no more washing.
The girl was trudging along in a pair of broken boots, two sizes too large for her, and trying to keep pace with a dark-haired sharp-eyed little woman, wrapped in a frayed shawl, and with a bonnet that looked as though it had been picked up from a dust-bin, as perhaps it had, and while the woman carried half a dozen long sticks, such as are used to prop up the lines upon which clothes are hung to dry, the girl held in one hand a bundle of the wooden pegs with which laundresses fastened the clothes to the lines, and in the other hand a coil of the line itself.
All these things together could not have been worth much, but it would be a hard day's work to cut the pegs, and a still harder day's work to the girl and the woman to sell them all. A good many miles of streets would have to be walked over, a good many area doors knocked at, a number of cross people, or people who were afraid of having something stolen, would shut those doors in their faces, and perhaps when they had trudged back again to Stratford, a long, long way on the other side of Whitechapel, they would only have earned a shilling or two, and would have eaten nothing but a bit of bread, unless somebody were kind enough to give them some food on purpose to get rid of them, when they stood whining and saying, "Buy a clothes-line, buy clothes-pegs, please to buy a clothes-prop," over and over again.
"They takes us for thieves, I s'pose," said the woman, "and I don't know that it's to be wondered at, for they reckon us all one with gipsies, and though our people ain't really gipsies, you know, they're not unlike 'em, and often we live much the same, and it can't be denied that there's them amongst us as would lay their hands on anything they see about; but none of my people would take what don't belong to 'em either from a passage or behind a door or a street stall—no, not if we was ever so badly off we wouldn't, would we, 'Liza?"
"I should think not, aunt," said the ragged girl. "Neither you nor poor mother nor father ever taught us that. It was hard enough, sometimes, as hard as it was yesterday, and is likely to be to-day, and there wasn't nothing to look forward to, except when I went out once or twice with father, or when he came home after a pretty good day, and we had something for supper, and then we often had to sit up at night to look over all the old clothes and the rags and bottles that he'd got in change for the dolls or the win'mills, and now we get more of the country in summer-time, and I ain't left off goin' to the Sunday-school, have I aunt?"
"No," said the woman, looking down and speaking in a low voice; "I shouldn't leave that off if I was you, and I often wish you could get to be in some place of service with a family, or do something better than live in this rough sort of a way. I a'most wish I'd never took you away after your mother died; but your father went away and little Ben was gone to sea, and I couldn't leave a little one like you to work night after night and day after day at the match-box-making along with other children, but with nobody to look after you." Here the poor woman held down her face, and I thought I saw a tear drop on to the back of the brown grimy hand that leaned upon the bundle of clothes-props. "But it's no good now," she said, rising from the bench where we were sitting. "What must be done to-day is to sell these props and pegs, and to-morrow, if Uncle Dick comes back, and has been pretty fortunate with the cart, we shall get our eggs and bacon, and our beef stew again, 'Liza, and most likely shall have a week or two in Epping Forest, with enough to eat, at all events."
"Stop a minute," said I; "perhaps I might find you a customer for your props and pegs, and I want to hear about the doll-making and the windmills."
The woman and the girl sat down again. It was on a bench upon an open space of ground known as Hackney Downs (a few miles out of London), a great bare-looking waste, where nearly all the grass has been worn off, and there's not much to look at; but where a fine air blows, and where there are a few benches for people to sit upon.
"Well, you see, sir, 'Liza had better tell you about the doll-making," said the woman, "becos she begun to speak of it: not that they was what you'd call dolls, but only a sort of rough flat shape, of a head an' body cut out of match-wood, with eyes and mouth painted for a face, and bits of cotton print, or more often wall-paper, pasted on for a dress, and another bit for a cap; they was for poor people's children, don't you see, as could only afford a ha'penny or a farthing."
"And what about the windmills and the birds?"
"Well, don't you see, sir," says 'Liza—"the windmills was made of just the same bits of flat match-wood, that father brought home and cut into thin strips like. The windmills was like the spokes of a wheel joined together, with folded bits o' wall-paper, and fastened with a round French nail to the end of a stick, so as when the wind took 'em, they used to go round and round. The flying birds was this way—the wheel was a little sort of a hoop, with two wooden spokes to fasten it to the stick, and all the other spokes was made of strings with bits of feathers tied on to 'em, so that when the wind took it they looked like birds flying; as to the fly-ketchers, they was round and square bits o' coloured wall-papers and tissue—put together in strings till they looked like a sort of big Chinese lantern, to entice the flies to settle on 'em. You must have seen such things, sir; but then ours was common ones, of course, to sell for a penny, or a bottle or two, or some old rags."
"Oh, that was it, eh?"
"Yes. You see father'd bring home the wood, and Aunt Ann would cut it out to the shape—wouldn't you, aunt?—and poor mother'd cut out the paper or the cotton print for the dolls clothes, or the windmills, and I'd stick 'em on, or nail 'em on, and any of us 'ud paint the eyes an' mouth, even little Ben could do that. We used to live over beyond Bethnal Green, in a place called Twig Folly, and there was plenty of us children that used to work at lucifer match-box making about that part. When father took to the dolls and mills he bought his own wood and bits of wall-paper and that; but we worked night and day very often, so as to get a lot ready for him, when he used to go out with a barrow and all the dolls stuck up, and the mills going round, and the birds fluttering, and take 'em through the streets, for miles, selling them for ha'pennies, or givin' one for an old wine-bottle or a bundle o' rags, or old metal and such like. When he had money to spare, he'd buy old clothes, and then when he came home, we used to look through 'em to see which was to go with the rags, and which we could sell to the second-hand dealer. I don't work no harder now than I did then."
"What do you do now, then?"
"Well, you see, when poor mother died, and Ben was put aboard a ship to be taught the sea, father—he—he—went away and aunt went back where she'd been once before, to her brother-in-law's—which belongs to the gipsies,—not the real gipsies, that lives in tents, and goes about all over the country, but the London gipsies like, that lives down Stratford and Plaistow way. It's at Stratford that we lives, and there we cut these pegs out of the wood that Uncle Dick brings home; and he brings the props too, and buys the line. There's four of us gals, and when we ain't cuttin' the wood for the pegs we're basket-makin' or straw-plaitin'; but there's times when we go out a good bit, one or the other of us, I mean me and aunt and Uncle Dick's children, because he's got a share in a cart—one o' them big sort of carawans that's all hung round with baskets and mats, and cane-work and brooms and brushes and cradles—and it's a rare change too, to go along with it, though the walkin' makes your feet sore. But it's more change still when we go nearer to Epping Forest in summer-time, and live out there in the country in a covered wan and a tent or two, and learn to plait baskets out of osiers, and to cane chairs, and to make straw plait and all manner o' things, and only cut clothes-pegs at odd times. We don't work much at night then, but we're often up pretty early in the morning, I can tell you; but at Stratford—it's a close bad-smellin' sort of a little place is our lane, and we're pretty often hard at it by candle-light, or else lamplight, making up baskets and clothes-pegs and things ready for the trade in the summer. One thing is that when Uncle Dick makes a good week he don't stint us in food, and, as poor mother used to say, beggars mustn't be choosers, and I haven't got nobody to be good to me but Aunt Ann."
"There, don't take on that way," says the woman, rather roughly, though I can see another tear in her eye. "We've all got somebody to look after, and you was left to me, so up you get, 'Liza, and let's thank you kindly, sir, for—I don't like to take money for nothink, sir, and—perhaps, if you was livin' near here and had the washin' done at home, you'd like me to take home a prop or two, and half-a-dozen pegs, sir."
Thomas Archer.
A GAME FOR LONG EVENINGS.
Those who learn drawing will find the game of "Positions" a particularly pleasant pastime for the long evenings. Any number can play the game—the more the merrier. All the players seat themselves round the table, and each one must be supplied with small pieces of white paper, about two inches square, and a pencil—or, better still, a pen and ink. All the players, except one, then silently resolve on some position in life which it is possible for them to fill, and each makes some sign of their "Position" by sketching a little picture of some article connected with their proposed trade or business on one of the blank pieces of paper. The name of each sketcher should be written on his paper. Five minutes are allowed for the sketching, the time being kept by the player who has not selected a "Position." All the illustrated papers are then passed in order round the table, so that each may view the others' pictures; but no one is supposed to criticise them aloud. Lastly they are handed to the "Guesser" (who, up to this point, has taken no active part in the game, except to time the five minutes), and he ranges them in order before him according to the order in which the players are seated at the table. He looks at them attentively and then proceeds to guess from the pictures what are the intended "Positions" of each person. Supposing that there were three players, and each one drew a sketch, say of a house, a pear, and a crown respectively. The Guesser looking at them would have no difficulty in pronouncing (1) landlord, (2) greengrocer, (3) king. If she fail to guess any of the "Positions," the first person at whom he or she stopped is chosen Guesser for the next time; if there has been no failure, the player on the right hand of the Guesser takes the privilege. The principal object of this game is for each player to try who can make the best sketch in five minutes, and the next object is to puzzle the Guesser.