The Gitános of Estremadura call themselves in general Chai or Chabos, and say that their original country was Chal or Egypt. I frequently asked them what reason they could assign for calling themselves Egyptians, and whether they could remember the names of any places in their supposed fatherland; but I soon found that, like their brethren in other parts of the world, they were unable to give any rational account of themselves, and preserved no recollection of the places where their forefathers had wandered; their language, however, to a considerable extent, solved the riddle, the bulk of which being Hindui, pointed out India as the birthplace of their race, whilst the number of Persian, Sclavonian, and modern Greek words with which it is checkered, spoke plainly as to the countries through which these singular people had wandered before they arrived in Spain.
They said that they believed themselves to be Egyptians, because their fathers before them believed so, who must know much better than themselves. They were fond of talking of Egypt and its former greatness, though it was evident that they knew nothing farther of the country and its history than what they derived from spurious biblical legends current amongst the Spaniards; only from such materials could they have composed the following account of the manner of their expulsion from their native land.
‘There was a great king in Egypt, and his name was Pharaoh. He had numerous armies, with which he made war on all countries, and conquered them all. And when he had conquered the entire world, he became sad and sorrowful; for as he delighted in war, he no longer knew on what to employ himself. At last he bethought him on making war on God; so he sent a defiance to God, daring him to descend from the sky with his angels, and contend with Pharaoh and his armies; but God said, I will not measure my strength with that of a man. But God was incensed against Pharaoh, and resolved to punish him; and he opened a hole in the side of an enormous mountain, and he raised a raging wind, and drove before it Pharaoh and his armies to that hole, and the abyss received them, and the mountain closed upon them; but whosoever goes to that mountain on the night of St. John can hear Pharaoh and his armies singing and yelling therein. And it came to pass, that when Pharaoh and his armies had disappeared, all the kings and the nations which had become subject to Egypt revolted against Egypt, which, having lost her king and her armies, was left utterly without defence; and they made war against her, and prevailed against her, and took her people and drove them forth, dispersing them over all the world.’
So that now, say the Chai, ‘Our horses drink the water of the Guadiana’—(Apilyela gras Chai la panee Lucalee).
‘THE STEEDS OF THE EGYPTIANS DRINK THE WATERS OF THE GUADIANA
‘The region of Chal was our dear native soil,
Where in fulness of pleasure we lived without toil;
Till dispersed through all lands, ’twas our fortune to be—
Our steeds, Guadiana, must now drink of thee.‘Once kings came from far to kneel down at our gate,
And princes rejoic’d on our meanest to wait;
But now who so mean but would scorn our degree—
Our steeds, Guadiana, must now drink of thee.‘For the Undebel saw, from his throne in the cloud,
That our deeds they were foolish, our hearts they were proud;
And in anger he bade us his presence to flee—
Our steeds, Guadiana, must now drink of thee.‘Our horses should drink of no river but one;
It sparkles through Chal, ’neath the smile of the sun,
But they taste of all streams save that only, and see—
Apilyela gras Chai la panee Lucalee.’
CHAPTER II
In Madrid the Gitános chiefly reside in the neighbourhood of the ‘mercado,’ or the place where horses and other animals are sold,—in two narrow and dirty lanes, called the Calle de la Comadre and the Callejon de Lavapies. It is said that at the beginning of last century Madrid abounded with these people, who, by their lawless behaviour and dissolute lives, gave occasion to great scandal; if such were the case, their numbers must have considerably diminished since that period, as it would be difficult at any time to collect fifty throughout Madrid. These Gitános seem, for the most part, to be either Valencians or of Valencian origin, as they in general either speak or understand the dialect of Valencia; and whilst speaking their own peculiar jargon, the Rommany, are in the habit of making use of many Valencian words and terms.
The manner of life of the Gitános of Madrid differs in no material respect from that of their brethren in other places. The men, every market-day, are to be seen on the skirts of the mercado, generally with some miserable animal—for example, a foundered mule or galled borrico, by means of which they seldom fail to gain a dollar or two, either by sale or exchange. It must not, however, be supposed that they content themselves with such paltry earnings. Provided they have any valuable animal, which is not unfrequently the case, they invariably keep such at home snug in the stall, conducting thither the chapman, should they find any, and concluding the bargain with the greatest secrecy. Their general reason for this conduct is an unwillingness to exhibit anything calculated to excite the jealousy of the chalans, or jockeys of Spanish blood, who on the slightest umbrage are in the habit of ejecting them from the fair by force of palos or cudgels, in which violence the chalans are to a certain extent countenanced by law; for though by the edict of Carlos the Third the Gitános were in other respects placed upon an equality with the rest of the Spaniards, they were still forbidden to obtain their livelihood by the traffic of markets and fairs.