[153] I published the greater part of the Gipsy method of cooking, in the Fife Herald, of the 18th April, 1833.
[154] Ponqueville considers the Gipsies contemporary of the first societies. Paris, 1830.
[155] According to Grellmann, working in iron is the most usual occupation of the Gipsies. In Hungary it is so common, as to have given rise to the proverb, “So many Gipsies, so many smiths.” The same may be said of those in Transylvania, Wallachia, and Moldavia, and all Turkey in Europe; at least, Gipsies following that occupation are very numerous in those countries.
This occupation seems to have been a favourite one with them, from the most distant period. Uladislaus, King of Hungary, in the year 1496, ordered: “That every officer and subject, of whatever rank or condition, do allow Thomas Polgar, leader of twenty-five tents of wandering Gipsies, free residence everywhere, and on no account to molest either him or his people, because they prepared musket balls and other military stores, for the Bishop Sigismund, at Fünf-kirchen.” In the year 1565, when Mustapa, Turkish Regent of Bosnia, besieged Crupa, the Turks having expended their powder and cannon balls, the Gipsies were employed to make the latter, part of iron, the rest of stone, cased with lead.
Observe the Gipsies at whatever employment you may, there always appear sparks of genius. We cannot, indeed, help wondering, when we consider the skill they display in preparing and bringing their work to perfection, from the scarcity of proper tools and materials.—Grellmann on the Hungarian Gipsies.—Ed.
CHAPTER VII.
BORDER GIPSIES.
It would be an unpardonable omission were I to overlook the descendants of John Faw, “Lord and Earl of Little Egypt,” in this history of the Gipsies in Scotland. But to enter into details relative to many of the members of this ancient clan, would be merely a repetition of actions, similar in character to those already related of some of the other bands in Scotland.