[55] Mr. Hoyland makes some very judicious remarks upon the capacity of the Gipsies, when they first appeared in Europe. He says: “The first of this people who came into Europe must have been persons of discernment and discrimination, to have adapted their deceptions so exactly to the genius and habits of the different people they visited, as to ensure success in all countries. The stratagem to which they had recourse, on entering France, evinces consummate artifice of plan, and not a little adroitness and dexterity in the execution. The specious appearance of submission to Papal authority, in the penance of wandering seven years, without lying in a bed, contained three distinct objects. They could not have devised an expedient more likely to recommend them to the favour of the ecclesiastics, or better concerted for taking advantage of the superstitious credulity of the people, and, at the same time, for securing to themselves the gratification of their own nomadic propensities. So complete was the deception they practised, that we find they wandered up and down France, under the eye of the magistracy, not for seven years only, but for more than a hundred years, without molestation.”
Mr. Hoyland’s remarks cover only half of the question, for, being “pilgrims,” their chiefs must also assume very high titles, to give them consideration with the rulers of Europe—such as dukes, earls, lords, counts and knights. To carry out the character of pilgrims, the body would go very poorly clad; it would only be the chiefs who would be flashily accoutred. It is, therefore, by no means wonderful that the Gipsies should have succeeded so well, and so long, in obtaining an entrance, and a toleration, in every country of Europe.—Ed.
[56] Illustrissime, &c.—Anthonius Gawino, ex Parva Egypto comes, et cætera ejus comitatus, gens afflicta et miseranda, dum Christianam orbem peregrinationes studio. Apostolicæ sedis, (ut refert) jussu, suorum more peregrinans, fines nostri regni dudum advenerat, atque in sortis suæ, et miseriarum hujus populi, refugium, nos pro humanitate imploraverat ut nostros limites sibi impune adire, res cunctas, et quam habet societatem libere circumagere liceret. Impetrat facile quæ postulat miserorum hominum dura fortuna. Ita aliquot menses bene et catholice, (sic accepimus,) hic versatus, ad te, Rex et avuncule, in Daciam transitum paret. Sed oceanum transmissurus nostras literas exoravit; quibus celsitudinem tuam horum certiorum redderemus, simul et calamitatem ejus gentis Regiæ tuæ munificentiæ commendaremus. Ceterum errabundæ Egypti fata, moresque, et genus, eo tibe quam nobis credimus notiora, quo Egyptus tuo regno vicinior, et major hujusmodi hominum frequentia tuo diversatur imperio. Illustrissime, &c.
[57] I have taken the liberty of translating the various extracts from the Scottish acts of parliament, quoted in this chapter, as the original language is not very intelligible to English or even Scottish readers. For doing this, I may be denounced as a Vandal by the ultra Scotch, for so treating such “rich old Doric,” as the language of the period may be termed.—Ed.
[58] Ex. Registro Secreti Sigilli, Vol. XIV, fol. 59. Blackwood. Appendix to McLaurin’s Criminal Trials.
This document may well be termed the most curious and important record of the early history of the Gipsy race in Europe; and it is well worthy of consideration. The meaning of it is simply this: John Faw had evidently been importuned by the Scottish Court, (at which he appears to have been a man of no small consequence,) to bring his so-called “pilgrimage,” which he had undertaken “by command of the Pope,” to an end, so far, at least, as remaining in Scotland was concerned. Being pressed upon the point, he evidently, as a last resource, formed a plan with Sebastiane Lalow, and the other “rebels,” to leave him, and carry off, (as he said,) his property. To give the action an air of importance, and make it appear as a real rebellion, they brought the question into court. Then, John could turn round, and reply to the king: “May it please your majesty! I can’t return to my own country. My company and folk have conspired, rebelled, robbed, and left me. I can’t lay my hands upon them; I don’t even know where to find them. I must take them home with me, or a testimony of them that are dead, under the great peril of losing my heritage, at the hands of my lord, the Duke of Egypt. However, if your majesty will help me to catch them, I will not be long in taking leave of your kingdom, with all my company. In the meantime, your majesty will be pleased to issue your commands to all the shipowners and mariners in the kingdom, to be ready, when I gather together my folk(!) to further our passage to Egypt, for which I will pay them handsomely.” The whole business may be termed a piece of “thimble-rigging,” to prolong their stay—that is, enable them to remain permanently—in the country. Our author, I think, is quite in error in supposing this to have been a real quarrel among the Gipsies. If it had been a real quarrel, the Gipsies would soon have settled the question among themselves, by their own laws; it would have been the last thing, under all the circumstances of the case, they would have thought of, to have brought it before the Scottish court. The Gipsies, according to Grellmann, assigned the following reason for prolonging their stay in Europe: “They endeavoured to prolong the term (of their pilgrimage) by asserting that their return home was prevented by soldiers, stationed to intercept them; and by wishing to have it believed that new parties of pilgrims were to leave their country every year, otherwise their land would be rendered totally barren.”
The quarrel between the Faas and the Baillies, for the Gipsy crown, in after times, did not, in all probability, arise from this business, but most likely, as the English Gipsies believe, from some marriage between these families. The Scottish Gipsies, like the two Roses, have had, and for aught I know to the contrary, may have yet, two rival kings—Faa and Baillie, with their partisans—although the Faas, from the prominent position which they have always occupied in Scottish history, have been the only kings known to the Scottish public generally.
In perusing this work, the reader will be pleased to take the above mentioned document as the starting point of the history of the Gipsies in Scotland; and consider the Gipsies of that time as the progenitors of all those at present in Scotland, including the great encrease of the body, by the mixture of the white blood that has been brought within their community. He will also be pleased to divest himself of the childish prejudices, acquired in the nursery and in general literature, against the name of Gipsy; and consider that there are people in Scotland, occupying some of the highest positions in life, who are Gipsies; not indeed Gipsies in point of purity of blood, but people who have Gipsy blood in their veins, and who hold themselves to be Gipsies, in the manner which I have, to a certain extent, explained in the [Preface], and will more fully illustrate in my [Disquisition] on the Gipsies.—Ed.
[59] The Gipsies assert that, on this occasion, the king attempted to take liberties with one of their women: and that one of the male Gipsies “came crack over his head with a bottle.”—Ed.
[60] Small’s Roman Antiquities of Fife, pages 285 and 286. Small also records a song composed on James V dubbing a Tinker a knight.