John Bunyan and the Gipsies

by James Simson

COPYRIGHT, 1882, BY
JAMES SIMSON

PREFACE.

Although what is contained in the following pages should explain itself, a few prefatory remarks may not be out of place. In the Scottish Churches and the Gipsies I said that, “in regard to the belief about the destiny of the Gipsies,” “almost all have joined in it, as something established”—that “the Gipsies ‘cease to be Gipsies’ by conforming, in a great measure, with the dress and habits of others, and keeping silence as to their being members of the race;” and that “in bringing forward this subject for discussion and action I thus find the way barred in every direction.” Although I have said that the belief about the disappearance, or rather the extinction, of the race has been tacitly if not formally maintained by almost everyone, “no one seems inclined to give a reason for this belief in regard to the destiny of the Gipsies, nor an intelligible definition of the word Gipsy.”

This is the position in which the Gipsy problem stands to-day. The latest work on the subject which I have seen is that of The Gipsies (New York, 1882), by Mr. Leland, so fully reviewed in the following pages. He leaves the question, in its most important meaning, just where he found it; and confesses that it has “puzzled and muddled” him. In 1874 I wrote in Contributions to Natural History, etc., as follows:—

“What becomes of the Gipsies is a question that cannot be settled by reference to any of Mr. Borrow’s writings, although these contain a few incidental remarks that throw some light on it when information of a positive and circumstantial nature is added” (p. 120).

In offering to a London journal the double-article on Mr. Leland on the Gipsies I said, on the 30th May, 1882:—

“I admit that it is a very difficult and delicate matter for a journal to ‘go back on’ a position once taken up on any question; but I think that if you admit the intended article the point will be gained, without any responsibility on the part of the journal or editor;” and that the insertion of it would put the journal “in its proper position before the world, without recanting anything.” I further wrote that “Purely literary journals must necessarily labour under great disadvantages when called on to notice a book on a very special subject, unless they can find a writer who can do it for them.”

If all that has been written on the Gipsies “ceasing to be Gipsies,” under any circumstances, “be allowed to go uncontradicted, it will become rooted in the public mind, and gather credit as time goes by, making it daily more difficult to set it aside, and allow truth to take its place”—as I wrote in reply to two fulsome eulogies on Charles Waterton.

There are various phenomena connected with the subject of the Gipsies; not the least striking one being the popular impression about the extinction of the race by its changing its habits, which has been arrived at without investigation and evidence, and against all analogy and the “nature of things.” So fully has this idea taken possession of the public mind that a hearing on the true position of the question can scarcely be had. One purpose this has served, that it has saved the public almost every serious thought or care in regard to its duty towards the race, and relieved it of every ultimate responsibility connected with it. But that is not a becoming position for any people to occupy—that of getting rid of its obligations by ignoring them. In 1871 I wrote thus:—

“The subject of the Gipsies, so far as it is understood . . . presents little interest to the world if it means only a certain style of life that may cease at any moment; in which case it would be deserving of little notice.”