“Por-engro,” said I.
“All right,” was the reply, “good night to you.”
In ascending a little hill on my way I halted for a second and looked back. In the dim distance lights glimmered here and there and I reflected that in a few minutes all the occupants would be slumbering, perhaps not even expecting outsiders,—the beasts of burden, and the betie juggals tuley the wardoes, those cute little mongrel dogs under the vans, which one never finds asleep.
Again I turned my face towards home, feeling physically very tired, while mentally I was actively engaged in turning over the events of the day, and reviewing, to the credit of my gypsy acquaintances, the self-sacrifices I had witnessed and the little kindnesses I had seen them perform one to the other, sometimes even under the cloak of rough behaviour and sharp words, but one could make no mistake as to the love they have for the children. This has always impressed me as one of the good traits in the gypsies’ somewhat complex character, and one that may well efface a multitude of sins. One of their women once said to me:
“I couldn’t see ’em want. Folks say it’s wrong to take chickens and rabbits, but if I knew I should get six months for it and I could keep the kiddies from starvin’, I’d get ’em the grub and take my six months.”
Speaking of food brings to mind domestic utensils and appliances, and a short description of those commonly in use among the tent-dwelling gypsies will not be out of place here. It will be obvious that as these people are true nomads, such goods and chattels as they carry about with them must be easily portable as well as indispensable.
SINGLE TENT. SUMMER.
The possessor of a van is, of course, able to carry more, and is often a person of some means, but the tent-dweller’s means of transport—if indeed he possess any but the sinews of his family—consists of a horse and cart, or sometimes only of a vehicle scarcely worthy of the name of cart, and a dilapidated donkey whose coat reminds one of a badly moth-eaten hearth-rug; we refrain, however, from comparing the Romany “moke” with its well-fed and sleek relatives of the seaside.