The word remained fairly common during the seventeenth century. Mary Rich, Countess of Warwick, in her Diary (1667) speaks of herself as suffering from “a fit of the spleen and mother together.”
[{290}] Stranger men.
[{291}] Ursula is evidently intended by Borrow to typify the gypsy chi. And the key to the type is supplied in the Gypsies in Spain (see especially chap. vii.). The gypsies, says Borrow, arc almost entirely ignorant of the grand points of morality; but on one point they are in general wiser than those who have had far better opportunities than such unfortunate outcasts of regulating their steps and distinguishing good from evil. They know that chastity is a jewel of high price, and that conjugal fidelity is capable of occasionally flinging a sunshine even over the dreary hours of a life passed in the contempt of almost all laws, whether human or divine. There is a word in the gypsy language to which those who speak it attach ideas of peculiar reverence, far superior to that connected with the name of the Supreme Being, the creator of themselves and the universe. This word is Lácha, which with them is the corporeal chastity of the females; we say corporeal chastity, for no other do they hold in the slightest esteem; it is lawful among them, nay praiseworthy, to be obscene in look, gesture and discourse, to be accessories to vice, and to stand by and laugh at the worst abominations of the Busné (gorgios, or gentiles) provided their Lácha ye trupos, or corporeal chastity, remains unblemished. The gypsy child, from her earliest years, is told by her strange mother that a good Calli need only dread one thing in this world, and that is the loss of her Lácha, in comparison with which that of life is of little consequence, as in such an event she will be provided for, but what provision is there for a gypsy who has lost her Lácha. “Bear this in mind, my child,” she will say, “and now eat this bread and go forth and see what you can steal.” The Romany, in a word, is the sect of the Husbands (and Wives) and their first precept is this: Be faithful to the Roms (husbands) and take not up with the gorgios, whether they be raior (gentlemen) or baior (fellows).
[{293}] Godly book.
[{295a}] Chore, to steal.
[{295b}] Hokkawar, to cheat.
[{295c}] Lubbeny, the whore.
[{296}] God.
[{298}] Choomer, a kiss.
[{299a}] Uncle.