TAKEN FOR TRAMPS—AN EAST ANGLIAN FAMILY
DAY after day, in the woods around our village, the autumnal gales roared
and ravened with unabated fury, snapping brittle boughs, cracking
decrepit boles, and piling up drifts of brown leaves around grey roots
protruding like half-buried bones through the mossy woodland floor. Then
right in the midst of it all came a spell of calm weather, as if summer
had stolen back to her former haunts in sylvan glade and ferny lane.
Call it by what name you please, this brief season of sunny repose
following upon the heels of the tempestuous equinoctials is a time when
some of us are impelled, as by a primal instinct, to shake off the collar
of routine and take the road leading over the hill into what realm of
adventure beyond.
Fully a week the summer-like interlude had held sway in the land. Upon
the newly-turned furrows shimmered a golden light. A dreamy haze trailed
its filmy skirts over hill and dale. In narrow lanes invisible threads
of spiders’ silk stretched from hedge to hedge, and wayside tangles again
were silvered over with a fine dust suggestive of July. Amid the
lingering clover-flowers bees buzzed and blundered. Through the still
air, leaves of maple and chestnut, like red-winged insects, twirled down
to the grass, and the tall elms in the village churchyard littered their
yellow foliage upon the graves. Everywhere, serenitude, repose, peace,
save in restless hearts chafing at the humdrum of tasks grown monotonous
by reason of long-continued performance. For who with a soul fully awake
can resist the lure of the road at gossamer-time?
Thus it came to pass one afternoon that my wife and I, slipping out of
our drowsy village, took the upland way which after numerous windings
brought us into the Great North Road. Our plans were of the flimsiest.
It mattered little whether we went north or south, so long as we were
absent for a few days. On reaching the far-famed highway we stood under
the branching arms of a finger-post, and tossed pennies to determine the
course of our itinerary. “North” having won the toss, we footed it gaily
in that direction. To be sure, our semi-Gypsy garb, donned for this
jaunt, was not long in taking on a coating of road dust, and we were
about to shake off this clinging powder, when the rattle of wheels was
heard behind us, and almost immediately a dogcart slowed down by our
side, and the driver, a rubicund farmer, amicably invited us to take a
lift, an offer which was gladly accepted, and we climbed aboard the
conveyance.
“I’ve allus had a feeling for folks like you, and I offens give ’em a
lift as I’m passing back’ards and forrards on the ramper. Afore I pulled
up just now I says to myself, ‘They’ve seen better days, I’ll be bound.’
Maybe you’ve been in the army? Leastways, I thought you seemed to hold
yourself up pretty straight in your walk. I’ve done a bit of soldiering
myself. Once at a big do-ment in London, I was in the Queen’s Escort.
Yes, I’ve been about a bit in my time. I dessay you two’s got a goodish
way to go yet afore you come to your night’s lodgings.
“Ay, dear me,” he went on, “we offens has your sort calling at our
place—my farm’s a few miles farther along this way—and one day not long
since a poor chap knocked at our door and asked for work. He was a
parson’s son, so we gave him a lightish job and fed him well and bedded
him in the barn for three or four nights, till his sore feet got right
agen. Poor fellow, he worn’t much good at labouring work, but we liked
to listen to his tales; he could tell you summut now.”
Thus he rambled on after the manner of a garrulous Guardian of the Poor
who had acquired an interest in tramps.
“Yon’s my place among the trees, so I must leave you here.”
We thanked him for his kindly lift, and, rounding a bend in the highway,
were glad to relieve our pent-up feelings in laughter over the good man’s
misconception.
Now, as everyone knows, who has journeyed along it, the fine old turnpike
abounds in travellers of every shade and grade. Not once or twice on its
turfy wayside have I fraternized with “Weary Willies” boiling their tea
in discarded treacle-tins. Even now as we went along, two or three
tramps passed by, one of them coming up to beg a few matches, the others
scarcely giving us a glance.
Hearing the rumble of an approaching vehicle, we looked towards the bend
of the road, and round it came what looked like a carrier’s cart drawn by
a horse apparently old, for it proceeded slowly, and the cart creaked and
jolted as if it, too, were ancient. As it jogged nearer, I saw it
contained but a single occupant—a brown-faced little man who wore a faded
yellow kerchief—and, stepping into the roadway, I greeted him with _sâ
shan_ (how do?). Whereupon he pulled up. “I heard what you said just
now, but you’ve made a mistake. I’m no Romany—I’m a showman, an Aunt
Sally man, bound for Retford.”
Now a Gypsy will frequently deny his blood. Knowing that his kind live
under a ban, he has no desire to draw attention to himself. But, looking
at this Aunt Sally man, I saw that he had told the truth. His face was
freckled. No real Gypsy freckles. After all, as Groome says, “It is not
the caravan that makes the Gypsy, any more than my cat becomes a dog if
she takes to living in a kennel.”
Our road now became a gradual descent into a clean, flower-loving
village, where amid the trees we caught the gleam of a large canvas booth
in a field, and there were knockings of a mallet to be heard. Nor was it
long before we learned what was afoot. Within a tavern’s comfortable
parlour, a coloured playbill informed the world that Harrison’s
travelling theatre would that evening present a sensational drama—_Gypsy
Jack_—and in due time we found ourselves seated among the cottagers and
farm-hands, enjoying a highly entertaining, though garbled, version of
Mr. G. R. Sims’s _Romany Rye_. Opening with a Gypsy encampment in which
the gaily dressed Lees sat talking round a fire in a forest glade, we
were successively shown Joe Hackett’s shop, the race-course at Epsom, the
deck of the _Saratoga_, the cellar near Rotherhithe, and the Thames by
night. The play seemed a not inappropriate episode in our Gypsy jaunt.
Years afterwards, during one Derby week, I saw Mr. Sims’s _Romany Rye_
remarkably well played at a South London theatre. In connection with
this play an amusing story is told. The managers of the Princess’s
Theatre in London were anxious that the new drama should be announced in
the “Agony” column of _The Times_. Like many another one, the
advertisement clerk at _The Times_ office could make nothing whatever of
the mysterious words _Romany Rye_.
“What the deuce is this _Romany Rye_?” he asked the bearer of the strange
document.
“If you please, sir,” said the messenger, whom the manager of the theatre
had sworn to secrecy—“if you please, sir, I think it’s the name of a new
liver-pad.”
“Well,” remarked the official, “_The Times_ is a great paper and can do
without padding. Take it away.”
And the advertisement was declined.
* * * * *
From the door of the canvas theatre it was an easy walk to the little
town of Newark-on-Trent, at one of whose pleasant hostelries we spent the
night, our window overlooking the ruined castle by the waterside. It had
been in our minds to continue our walk next morning along the Great North
Road, but at breakfast a small paragraph in a newspaper brought about a
quick change in our plans. The item of news ran thus—
“_THE ROMANIES AGAIN_.
“Our friends, the gipsy Greys, are still with us in Grimsby, lamented
Mr. Councillor E— last evening, and he wanted to know whether
something could not be done to get them to clear out. The Town Clerk
had assisted them somewhat, and one or two had gone, but there were
still four families encamped at the back of T— Street, New Clee.
Inspector M— said he had visited the encampment and he must say that
the caravans were very clean. They could not be said to create a
nuisance. ‘It is not the tents that are a nuisance,’ replied the
lively representative of the H— Ward, ‘but the parties themselves,
who trespass in the backyards of the houses in that neighbourhood.
It is no uncommon thing on waking up in the morning to find a donkey
or a goat in your backyard or garden.’ The Inspector stated that
Eliza Grey, the owner of the vans, had informed him they would all be
going away in a few days.”
It was the sight of the Romany family name which altered our plans. The
East Anglian Grays are a good type of Gypsy not to be encountered every
day, hence we decided to lose no time in taking the train for Grimsby.
It was a crawling “ordinary” by which we travelled, and at a little
wayside station a few miles out of Newark, a lithe, dark fellow carrying
a pedlar’s basket stepped into our compartment, and at once I recognized
in him my old friend Snakey Petulengro. How his face lit up on seeing
me, for we had not met for years. I was so much struck by his altered
bearing that I could scarcely believe my eyes. He seemed now as gentle
in his manner as once he had been wild. The sight of him brought back
Gypsy Court and all its associations. He said he had left the old home,
his father and mother having passed away. On my inquiring about his
sister Sibby, he said she had married a Gypsy and, tiring of Old England,
had gone to ’Merikay. As Snakey quitted the carriage at Lincoln, an
observant passenger remarked—
“There goes one of Nature’s gentlemen.”
By mid-afternoon the slender hydraulic tower glowed rosily in the
sunlight above Grimsby Docks; and since the fishing-port had no
particular charm for us, we proceeded to Cleethorpes, preferring the more
airy shore and being eager to see the Gypsies. As might be expected, the
summer-like day had brought a goodly number of late holiday-makers to the
sands, and as we moved in and out among the groups near the pier foot, I
heard a donkey-boy address someone not far away—
“Would the lady like a ride?” The lad’s features, bearing, and tone of
voice were distinctly Gypsy, and, seeing he was within hail, I looked
towards him and said—
“_Dova sî kushto maila odoi_” (That’s a good donkey there).
His face beamed with delight, and from his lips sprang the question—
“_Romano Rai_?” (Gypsy gentleman?)
“_Âwa_; _kai shan tîro foki hatsh_in?” (Yes; where are your people
camping?)
In gratitude for the explicit directions he gave, I placed a sixpence in
his hand, and his remark was “_Dova_’s too _kisi_, _raia_” (That’s too
much, sir). “A _hora_ (penny) would have been _dosta_ (enough) for
_mandi_” (me). This boy was one of the Grays, and, following his
instructions, we had no difficulty in locating the Romany camp.
It was early evening when we strolled forth upon an expanse of grass
parcelled into building plots, where in a corner between the hedgerows
were drawn up, with the doorways facing south, several substantial _vâdê_
(caravans) near which some large tents had been erected. The Grays, who
were silently moving to and fro, revealed by their interested
side-glances that they had already heard of somebody’s inquiries
concerning themselves, and when we advanced to offer our civil and
friendly greetings to two women who were washing pots before an outside
fire, every politeness was shown to us. They rose and spread a horse-rug
for us upon the ground. “_Dai ta tshai_” (mother and daughter), thought
I; nor was I wrong. The older woman, diminutive, lean, and somewhat bent
with age, informed me that she was Eliza Gray, and the younger was her
daughter Lena. As we talked by the fire, a goat appeared and rubbed its
nose affectionately against Eliza’s knee. Said she: “This is an old pet
of ours. We’s had it for years. I picked it up in Scotland.”
In late September the sun goes down early, and a chilly wind now set in
from the North Sea. In the baulk of the old lady’s tent a coke brazier
was glowing invitingly, so we all moved under cover, and, seated on a
dais of clean straw covered with rugs, listened to tales and talk, the
brazier’s crimson gleam being our only light. After some discussion of
mutual acquaintances, the conversation drifted towards _duker_in
(fortune-telling), a subject never very far from the thoughts of a Gypsy
woman.
“How I’ve _sal_’d” (laughed), said Eliza, “at those _dinelê gawjê_
(foolish gentiles) what come to our tent to be _duker_’d. One time I put
a crystal on a little table covered with oilcloth, and I ax’d the young
lady if she couldn’t see her sweetheart in it. ‘Yes, I can,’ she says,
‘and it’s just like his face, but oh, lor, in this glass ball he’s got a
tail.’ I nearly laughed straight out, for I’d sort of accidentally put
the crystal on top of a monkey picture. The oilcloth was covered with
all sorts of beastses, don’t you see?”
A superstitious family, the Grays have a characteristic way of recounting
their own traditions. Here is one of Eliza’s tales—
“Once we were stopping by a woodside. The back of our tent was nigh
agen a dry ditch full of dead leaves, and one night we lay abed
listening to sounds, a thing I can’t abide. Well, there was rummy
folk about in them days, so when we hears a footstep in the wood just
t’other side of that there ditch, I ups wi’ the kettle-prop and peeps
outen the tent, and listens, but no, never a sound could I catch; all
was still as the grave. Till long and by last there comes a rustling
in the leaves, and the bushes parts like something trying to make a
way through. Then I lifts up the kettle-prop, and I says to myself,
if blows are to be struck, Liza had better be the first to strike,
when there, straight afore me, stands a woman waving her poor thin
arms about, but saying nothing. At that I drops the kettle-prop and
screams, and my man Perun jumps straight up. ‘They’re killing my
Liza, they are.’ But by that the _muli_ (ghost) had gone like a
flash of lightning. Next morning we ax’d at the keeper’s house down
the lane, and the missis tell’d us as how a _rawni_ (lady) was once
_maw_’d (murdered) in that wood, so it would be her _muli_ as I saw
that night. Oh, yes, I believe in _mulê_, I do.”
During the telling of this tale two of Eliza’s sons, Yoben and Poley,
sauntered up and stood listening behind their sister Lena. It was Yoben
who now added his contribution of ghost-lore.
“Why, yes, of course, mother, there’s _mulê_ (ghosts). Don’t you
remember after Dolferus died, his voice used to speak in the tent to
Delaia? She says it really was his voice as nat’ral as life, and it
made her shiver to hear it. One day she went to a parson for advice.
He told her the next time it spoke, to say: ‘I promise you nothing.
Begone!’ Well, sure enough, the voice came again, and she remembered
to say what the parson had told her, and she never heard the voice no
more. My Uncle Ike asked Delaia one day—
“‘I say, my gal, did you really hear Dolferus’s voice?’
“‘Yes; it was his and no one else’s.’
“‘Is that the _tatshipen_ (truth), my gal?’ Ike seemed anxious to
know the truth of the matter.”
* * * * *
“Dreams is funny things,” put in Poley, “and I’ve had some wery queer
’uns in my time. Once I dreamt I was walking along a narrow shelf of
rock, and on one side of me was a stony wall like a cliff, and on the
other side the edge of the path hung over a terrible steep place.
Right away below was a river of fiery red stuff pouring along. You
could smell it. I thought this rocky road was the path to heaven,
and I was trying to get there, but, ’pon my word, it was no easy
matter. Now I see’d a tiger chained to the rocky wall on my left
hand, and a bit furder on a big lion was tied up. These here
critturs was hard to get past. I had to go wery near the dangerous
edge what looked down on to the burning river. What a fright I was
in; it made the sweat run off me. Sometimes I had to crawl on my
hands and knees to get round a big rock in the middle of the path. I
felt as if I never should get where I wanted to. Well, after a lot
of scrambling and slithering, for my feet gave way sometimes—I had
naily boots on—I got to the top of the path, and in the dazzling
light, like the sun itself on a summer day, there sat a grey-haired,
doubled-up man, a wery aged man, with his chin resting on his hand.
It was the _Duvel_ (God), and when he see’d me coming, he sat up and
held up his hand, forbidding me to go any furder. He didn’t speak a
word, but I knew that his uplifted hand meant ‘Go back.’ And just
then I woke. That’s my dream of trying to get to heaven.”
* * * * *
“There’s a lot about heaven and hell in God’s Book, isn’t there,
_rashai_?” said Old Eliza. “A _rawni_ (lady) used to read all about
them places to us on a Sunday, but that were years ago, and I used to
like to hear her talk about the blessed Saviour riding on a _maila_
(donkey) into the big town. She said they nailed him to a cross on
Good Friday, and when we was young I remember we all used to fast on
that day. We ate no flesh—nothing with blood in it—it would be a sin
to do that. If we took anything to stay our hunger it was nothing
but dry bread, and our drink was water. We didn’t _tuv_ (smoke), and
we didn’t _tov_ our _kokerê_ (wash ourselves) on that day. I don’t
know whether there be such places as heaven and hell. I reckons we
makes our own destiny. Heaven and hell’s inside us; that’s what I
think.”
Lena, however, had her own ideas. “This life is everything there is, I
reckons, and when we’re dead, that’s the end of us. Life is sweet, mind
you, and we’s a right to be as happy as we can. Mother’s getting old,
you see, and has had her fling. I mean to have a good time. Why, last
Sunday me and Poley was going off to get some nuts in the woods, but
mother stopped us—
“It’s _Beng_’s work getting nuts on the dear Lord’s day.”
“Yes,” says Yoben; “I’ve heard our old daddy say that the _Beng_ likes
nuts, and I’d sartinly scorn to go getting them onlucky things on a
Sunday; I wouldn’t like to put myself in the _Beng_’s power, like poor
Zuba Lovell.”
“What about Zuba?” asked my wife.
Then Yoben told a weird tale.
[Picture: A Maid of the Tents]
“A handsome lass was Zuba, but bad luck dogged her like her own
shadow. One night she came back to the camp, for she lived with her
old people, and, throwing down a few coppers she had in her hand, she
said—
“‘There, mother, what do you think of that for a hard day’s work?’
She had done wery badly, you see. Luck never seemed to come her way
at all. And after supper she wandered out a little way from the
camp. The moon and stars was shining as she walked round and round
an old tree, a blasted old stump, black as a gallows-post. As she
kept on walking round it, she said aloud, ‘This game won’t do for me.
It’s money I want and money I’ll have. I’d sell my blood to the
_Beng_ to have plenty of money in my pocket always.’ The words was
hardly out of her mouth when a black thing, like the shadow of the
tree, rose up from the ground, and, lor, there was the wery _Beng_
hisself, and after he’d promised her what she had wished for, he
wanished. And after that no more grumbling from Zuba; no more
complaints about her bad luck. She always had plenty of money now,
and she bought herself trinkets and fine clothes till everybody was
’mazed at her, and of course she had kept it to herself what took
place that night by the old tree. Days and weeks went by, till one
night Zuba was missing from the camp. Her old folks sat up by the
fire waiting for her, but no Zuba came. At last her daddy set out to
look for her, and there by the foot of the tree lay Zuba’s frock and
shawl, and when he took ’em back to his wife’s tent, the poor woman
screamed and fainted right away, and old man Lovell walked up and
down all night, saying, ‘Oh, my Zuba, my blessed gal, we shall never
see you no more,’ and they never did. The _Beng_ had fetched her.
That’s the end of Zuba Lovell.”
While listening to these tales in the tent, the flight of the hours
passed unobserved, till a distant clock boomed out the hour of ten.
“You’ll _wel apopli_ (come again), my dears?” said Eliza, as we retired
amid the smiles and bows of the Gypsy family.
Next morning found us again in the camp. Already the Gypsies had
breakfasted, and were making preparations for “_tov_in-_divus_”
(washing-day). Sun and wind promised an ideal day for such a purpose.
It was a thing to be noticed that the articles about to be dealt with lay
in two heaps on the grass.
Among the Gypsies there is a ceremonial rule which holds it to be
_mokadi_ (unclean) to wash together in the same vessel “what you eat off
with what you wear.” This was the meaning of the separated articles, and
then I observed two zinc vessels lying ready on the ground. Said Old
Eliza to Lena, “I’ll take this lot, and you take that lot.” To begin
with, they both cleansed their hands and arms in hot water, and as they
did this I remarked how brown were Lena’s arms, whereupon she replied
with a laugh—
“_Âwa_, _raia_ (Yes, sir), monkey soap won’t fetch that off”—a modern
rendering, I take it, of Ferdousi’s saying, “No washing will turn a Gypsy
white.”
Now as our friends were about to become much occupied, we proposed to
stroll round the camp and pay calls on the other Gypsies in the same
field. “Stop a bit,” said Eliza, and, slipping into the tent, she came
out with a black bottle. “You’ll take a drop of my elderberry wine and a
bite o’ cake,” pouring out the claret-coloured liquid into two glasses
fished out from an inner recess. While enjoying this snack on the grass,
I took out from a breast pocket a white unused handkerchief which I
spread on my knee. Presently Old Eliza slyly took it by the corner and
twitched it away, giving me in place thereof a neatly folded napkin
brought from the tent, and I saw that I had broken a Gypsy custom in
converting a handkerchief into a crumbcloth. Said the old mother, “That
_mol_ (wine) is old, and should be _kushto_ (good). It’s some we buried
in a place till we came round again.”
In another corner of the field were encamped Fennix Boswell and his
stepson Shanny, and, going forward, we found the pair seated at their
tent door handling fishing-rods. On seeing us they rose and invited us
into the tent, where we sat down. Shanny showed us some of his pencil
drawings.
“I’ve got one of a parrot somewhere; I must find it,” said he.
“_Âwali_, _muk man dik o roker_in-_tshiriklo_” (Yes, let me see the
talking-bird), I replied, and in a minute or two he handed me a really
clever sketch.
These two Gypsies had just come down from Scotland, where they had been
travelling during the summer months, and we got talking about Kirk
Yetholm. The Blythes, related to old King Charley Faa, were
acquaintances of theirs. It appears that one of the King’s sons named
Robert, a rollicking fellow, was fond, as Gypsies are, of practical
jokes, and some of his escapades are still remembered in the Border
Country. One of Fennix’s tales about this fun-loving Faa may well find a
place here.
* * * * *
One spring morning Bobbie started off on a foray with some of his pals.
The air was clear, and a soft wind was blowing over the Lammer-moors on
whose slopes the lambs were gambolling. The Gypsies had walked a few
miles, and the mountain air had sharpened the edge of their appetites.
Looking round for a farmhouse or a cottage where they might ask for a
kettle of boiling water to brew their tea in the can—such as few of the
Faas would ever travel without—Bobbie was the first to espy some
outbuildings, at the back of which stood a shepherd’s cottage, and,
taking upon himself to be spokesman, he bravely started off for the
cottage, the men resting meanwhile at the foot of the hill. As he
approached the door, a fine savoury smell greeted Bobbie, making him feel
ten times more hungry than before. He knocked gently at the door, which
stood ajar, but no one came, and all was quiet within. He repeated his
knock, and, taking a step forward, found the kitchen empty. Before the
fire stood a tempting shepherds-pie of a most extraordinary size, and its
appetizing steam quite overcame any scruples which otherwise might have
lurked in the heart of Bobbie Faa. Not for one moment did he hesitate,
but, nipping up the dish, he speedily ran down the hill with the pie
under his arm. Not knowing how he had come by it, his mates could
scarcely believe their eyes when he laid the pie on the grass, and they
praised the gude-wife who had so kindly given them such a feast. When
the dish was empty, he gave it to a pal, telling him to take it back to
the gude woman and say how much they had enjoyed the pie. It happened to
be a sheep-shearing day, and the shepherd’s wife had gone to call her
husband and his fellows to their dinner. She had just returned to the
kitchen when the Gypsy lad arrived with the empty dish, and on handing it
back to her with smiles and thanks, a torrent of abuse was poured forth
on the poor boy’s head, as the woman now grasped the situation and became
aware of the fate of her pie. Just then her husband and the other
shearers appeared round the corner, and, hearing what had befallen their
dinner, the infuriated men seized the lad and gave him a sound drubbing.