By-and-by some one proposed a dance. Would Captain Antonio oblige us by a bolero or fandango? Most readily, he answered, but he must have a partner; of course,—so we went down into the kitchen, and, after much pressing, up came the daughters of the house, Pepita and little Pepita, Maria, and a friend as young and pretty and playful as themselves. The brother, our little waiter, threw aside his napkin and took up the gipsy’s guitar as naturally as if he had been a musician by profession; one of the young ladies, after a little coyness, consented to become Captain Antonio’s partner, and the dance commenced,—that musical, monotonous dance, so popular among the pleasure-loving Andalusians. But to gain a thorough idea of a gipsy dance, you must get up what is called a funcion,—rather a costly affair; that is to say, you must invite a troop of gipsies, who will not come to dance and sing and play to you without being well paid. Captain Antonio every one should hear and see; he is quite a genius, and if enticed to London or Paris, would create a sensation. We said to him,—
“You should purchase a better guitar, Señor Antonio, and go to London. You would come home a rich man.”
He smiled, showing his glittering white teeth and shook his head:—
“I have a wife and five children, Señora,” he replied; “London is too far off.”
And he did not like the disparagement of his guitar, I think, for he took it up and tuned it in a caressing sort of way, as if it were a living pet we had been slighting.
There is nothing of romance left to the gipsies in Spain now but their costume, even that fast disappearing, and their music. When Borrow wrote of them more than sixty years ago, he speaks of the happy effects of Charles the Third’s edicts, which, by admitting the gipsies into the pale of civilised society, has done more than the fierce persecutions of his predecessors to assimilate this savage race with others. Ferdinand and Isabella and the Philips, did their utmost to put down what they called the Egyptians, publishing edict after edict against them, but in vain. Whilst they were a proscribed caste, whilst the very privilege of sanctuary was denied them, whilst they were hunted down and persecuted by fire and sword, the Egyptians, or Gitanos, flourished and had their palmy days; murdering, stealing, cheating, telling fortunes, hating the Busnees, and all who were not Romanys, to their heart’s content. Gitanisimo—that is to say, quoting Borrow, gipsy villany of every description, flourished till Gitanisimo was declared to be no more. Charles the Third, in 1733, published a humane edict in which he declared the gipsies capable of following any career of arts and sciences, and altogether ignored that they were a separate people, amenable to separate laws. What was the consequence? The law of Carlos Tercero has superseded gipsy law, say the gipsies a little regretfully. Gitanisimo, or gipsydom, if not wholly transformed, has been modified. The gipsies no longer wander about living by murder and theft. The women still tell fortunes, and the men, as dealers in horses and mules, are not to be trusted, but they are everywhere spoken of as a poor and harmless set of people; and though the instinct of caste is just as strong as ever among themselves, they are no longer feared or hated. At the time Borrow wrote the gipsies in Spain numbered 40,000 souls; at the commencement of the present century they numbered only 20,000, so that the race here, as elsewhere, seems dying out, or, at any rate, greatly decreasing. Indeed, nothing else could have been expected of them. Wild animals from African deserts are not more out of place, caged in English gardens, than these kings and queens of savagedom compelled to sleep under a roof, and to consider killing as murder. But their dancing and music are worthy of a less lawless and terrible race, and are cosas de España, not to be missed by any travellers.
In the afternoon we drove to the Albaycin, or old town, in search of pottery. The views from this part of Granada are very fine, but the inhabitants are so unused to the sight of travellers, and are such strange, half-civilised beings, that you are hardly able to see anything. We alighted in one place to walk a few yards, and in a moment, as wasps gather round a fallen peach, we were surrounded by a youthful rabble who looked at us suspiciously, and not content with that, caught hold of our clothes, begged from us, laughed at us—all but tore us to pieces. We had left our coachman behind, as we had come by a way not carrossable, in order to see a view, and our poor old guide was wholly inefficient to keep off the tribe of persecutors. Two or three big gipsyish girls of twelve or thirteen, caught hold of his coat, and I expected to see his pockets attacked every moment. The noise and noisomeness of this dirty, unkempt mob of juveniles no words can describe. Bensaken’s mild reproof, “Are not these señoras like other señoras? why do you behave so rudely to them?” had no effect. We lost temper, shook our umbrellas threateningly, scolded, and pushed on, never waiting to see the view, and only too glad to close the carriage-door on the merciless, miserable little rabble. Any Englishwoman venturing alone in the streets of the Albaycin would have reason to regret such a piece of audacity as long as she lived. I believe she would be pelted with mud and stones. Nothing is too bad to expect from those awful children. What are the priests after, that they are left in such a state of savagedom?
But the Albaycin has pleasanter aspects. Bensaken now took us to a little spot far away from the scene of our persecution, and we soon found ourselves in a scene so peaceful, so poetic, and so lovely, that the ugly dream faded away from our memories. It was the potter’s house we had come to see. The outer walls were whitewashed and bare, after the fashion of Moorish houses, but no sooner was the threshold passed than all was life and colour.
Picture to yourselves a sunny little court with a fountain in the midst, pots of flowers here and there, dogs basking in the sun, pigeons fluttering over head, and rows of lustrous pottery, blue, green, yellow, and brown, placed against the walls, or heaped up in the corners. We entered a little sitting-room and were made welcome by the whole family. There was a grandmother, an aunt, a cousin, and I do not know how many more, but I am only concerned with the young potter and his mother. The first was a lad of nineteen, with quite an artist’s face, sensitive, refined, full of happy expression; the second was a handsome, portly creature, a regular type of the Andalusian matron, and as ready to sing or dance a bolero, as the youngest of her daughters.
We were enchanted with the pottery, which is often rude in shape and colouring, but never without a certain childish grace and feeling for art. Some of the designs are wonderfully good, bold, simple, and unique, whilst the coloured patterns often testify a richness of fancy and comprehension of decorative art, quite astonishing in artists so untaught. The prevailing colour is dark rich blue, reminding one of old Wedgwood, and there is always a liberality of imagination both in shape and ornament; no vases or dishes are alike either in the one respect or the other. But, alas! cheap as this quaint pottery is, and plentiful as it would be if appreciated, the manufactures of France and England are taking its place, and by-and-by travellers will have to look far and wide for specimens of it.