Part 3

Alas! As I approached the camp on the occasion of my first visit after their return, the little lad saw me from a distance, and ran forward to take my hand. He looked well and happy, and we walked on gaily towards the tents. But suddenly the weight on my wrist increased, the child seemed to stumble, and looking down I saw that he was unconscious.

Misfortune dogged that unhappy family. Poor Zhawzha, enervated by constant solicitude, died at Mitcham, and was buried with ceremonies the barbaric extravagance of which was probably without parallel in this country. There followed unseemly bickerings about the possession of her property and the custody of the children, and Adam parted from the band to return to his own tribe. But it is comforting to know that, whatever may have happened during these days of grief, whatever sorrows the future may hold in store, that little afflicted boy will not be allowed to suffer unnecessarily. May his health be restored gradually as the years pass! But should fate decree that he must remain infirm during all the days of his life, it is certain that the tender care which was lavished on the sick Gypsy by his warm-hearted compatriots when he was a child will not be withdrawn when he becomes a grown man.

8. A GOOD WORK. {44}

I DO not think the old Drill Hall in Birkenhead has ever been a cheerful place: deserted by the military and transformed into a boxing booth, it is now positively dismal. But for two months during the summer of 1911 it was ablaze with Oriental colour. Kola, the Gypsy chieftain, with his tribe of coppersmiths, had taken possession of it, having left the English Romany camp at Tranmere to make room for his brothers, Yantshi and Yishwan, who had arrived from Marseilles with their wives, children and followers. The ruling family had established itself upon the high platform where once bruisers proved their mettle, and from it the royal tenant looked down a crooked lane bordered on either side by the tents of his subjects. From irregular skylights in the black roof dusty, mysterious sunbeams fell upon gay drapery and piles of eiderdown beds gaudily covered with scarlet and yellow stuff, on black-bearded men and strange groups of dark women in bright red dresses loaded with gold, on the little low round tables at which they sat cross-legged, and on the blue tendrils of smoke that rose from their brass samovars. In the yard outside was the din of many hammers beating cauldrons of copper, but it was almost drowned by a babel of shrill voices quarrelling in a strange and strongly aspirated tongue.

[Picture: Worsho. Photo. by F. A. Cooper]

For all was not well in Kola’s kingdom: disaffection was brewing, and a schism was imminent. And in the midst of all the trouble the wife of young Worsho Kokoiesko presented her husband with a little brown girl, his first child. No stranger ever knew what secret rites were practised in the distant corner of the great barn where Worsho, as a poor relation, lived humbly. Mother and child were screened carefully from observation, and the first token of the arrival of a new recruit was the healthy voice of a crying baby. There was no general rejoicing, no excitement; but Worsho slipped shyly to my side and, in his rich mellow voice which resembled singing rather than speaking, invited me to be godfather.

Thus it happened four days afterwards that I made a morning visit to the camp ready to add to the solemnity of the occasion such dignity as a frock-coat and top-hat could lend. Knowing the ancient and universal Gypsy fondness for baptism I had hoped that there would have been a tribal festival. It was therefore disappointing to find that the appearance of the hall was normal, and that Worsho himself was still in bed, although the time appointed for the ceremony was near at hand. After some exhortation he got up, stretched himself, breakfasted leisurely, and dressed in his ordinary clothes: but Saveta, daughter of Michael, who was to be godmother, kept me in countenance by putting on a white dress gaudy with floral patterns. At last the little procession set out for St. Werburgh’s Church—the strikingly handsome Worsho, his young widowed sister Luba, the two godparents, Saveta’s pretty little niece Liza, an assistant librarian from the Bodleian, and the indispensable baby.

We were shockingly late, and on our arrival found that the christening ceremony had already begun for the benefit of another infant. But the good priest left the font, came politely to the door to receive us, put us in our places, and recommenced the service. Although unprepared for the solemnity and thoroughness of my godchild’s reception into the Church, I played my unrehearsed part to the best of my ability, stumbling only once when, some ancient memory of a grammar school in the Midlands awaking suddenly at the command, “Say the Paternoster,” I said it bravely—in Latin! And indeed this fault causes my conscience less trouble than the problem of how to fulfil my godparental obligations when my wandering goddaughter may be anywhere at all in either hemisphere.

All Gypsies have two names, one for public, the other for private use; and it may be that the baptismal name is the one they value least. At all events the duty of choosing it devolved, in this instance, on me, and the parents gave no indication as to what were their wishes. Unable on the spur of the moment to remember anything really monumental, I called the child Saveta after her godmother, and thus she was registered in the great book when our picturesque little party withdrew to the sacristy. The mother’s name, Anastasi Fiodorana Shodoro, was also placed on record, the last element being probably that of the child’s maternal grandfather. But when I began to dictate W-O-R-S-H-O, Worsho excitedly plucked my sleeve and protested. I had never heard him called by any other name, and was amazed; but he produced documents and passports to prove that he was, officially, Garaz son of Fanaz, the son of Zigano, and as “Garaz Fanaz Zigano” he was written down. The absence of a surname caused no difficulties with our sympathetic Irish priest; but it was quite otherwise when we paid a necessary visit to an ignorant registrar. He declared, “The man must have a surname,” and regarded the want of so necessary a distinction as little less serious than the want of a head or heart. There was a column for surnames in his register, and it would have been a scandal to leave it empty. We filled it.

Of all the pleasant recollections associated with this adventure, one lingers in my memory as especially bright and comforting. When we left the church the kindly and venerable Father, who had shepherded us so lovingly through the ceremony, conducted us courteously to the door, held up his hands in benediction and exclaimed in a voice that quivered with sincerity, “You have done a good work this day.”

9. THE REVELATION.

ALMOST a year after the arrival of the coppersmiths, old Grantsha, his sons Fardi, Yantshi and Yishwan, and his son-in-law Yono, with their wives and children reappeared in Liverpool, meaning to take ship and follow Kola, who had already gone to Monte Video. But no boat could be found to convey them, and after waiting a week in an emigrants’ lodging-house in Duke Street, they were obliged to go by rail to Dover and embark there. It was a gloomy, undecorated dwelling in which they stayed, a warren of scantily-furnished rooms, in each of which one family camped like bears in an overcrowded menagerie. Since there was nothing else to do, their idle misery found expression in begging. At home and abroad, in season and out of season, whenever there was anybody to beg from, they begged immoderately—all except Fardi. He and his family were exceptional, cultivating little courtly airs and holding themselves somewhat aloof from the rest of the tribe; and in the matter of respectability the chief himself could hardly hold a candle to his brother, though they had this in common, that neither ever begged.

I spent the afternoon of the day of their departure with the coppersmiths. It was a naturally dispiriting afternoon of steady, drizzling rain, and the conduct of the Gypsies made it almost insufferably unpleasant. Throughout a long wet promenade Milanko begged dismally for a silk scarf. A smaller boy, inspired by a well-founded conviction that I would give him a cap, accompanied me and a friend when we went home for afternoon tea. He begged in the streets and at table as continuously and mechanically as a Chinese praying wheel, refused food and drink in order that his mouth might be free to exercise its main function, and afterwards, drenched but undaunted, droned petitions during half our walk to the station. Yono enticed me into an apartment on the first floor where he and his family lived, in order that we might debate at tiresome length a proposed supplementary payment for tinning the cauldron. Even Fardi’s wife and daughter forgot their manners. He himself was out, but his women locked the door and removed the key in order that I might not escape from their room at the top of the house until Lotka had made a last desperate effort to become possessor of my carpet. They were interrupted by a loud knock, and hope rose within me that Fardi had returned and would exercise parental authority to stop the persecution. But it was only patient Yono wishing to resume the discussion about the cauldron. As he came in I went out—against resistance, precipitately. Downstairs Grantsha and burly Yishwan sat in a larger room surrounded by children, while a group of women stitched industriously at the opposite end. Every one of them begged. The lads demanded watches, cigarette-holders and silver match-boxes; even the dotard Grantsha asked for money; Yishwan’s smallest request was for the coat from off my back; and the girls pleaded singly and in chorus: “Brother, why have you given me nothing?” The attack was irresistible: I was outnumbered, and the only alternative to surrender was flight. So I rose to take my leave, assisted to my feet by two impish boys who, with apparent politeness, seized my hands and unnoticed by me cleverly stole my silver Zodiac ring.

[Picture: Children. Photo, by Newspaper Illustrations, Ltd.]

The Gypsies had told me that they would go to Lime Street Station at seven o’clock, and that their train would leave at half-past eight. Twice before under similar circumstances they had tried to hoodwink me, and it seemed that they had tricked me again, for when at half-past seven I reached Lime Street there was never a gay red skirt to be seen, nor even a braided coat. Moreover, on inquiry, I learned that no train for Dover left that or any other Liverpool Station at eight-thirty. Almost glad to escape a renewal of the afternoon’s hostilities I began to retrace my steps. I had not walked a couple of hundred yards when, from afar, I spied a flash of colour so brilliant that it could have been nothing except a Gypsy girl’s dress. She was standing outside the Central Station, where the tribe had assembled to wait two hours, for their train was scheduled to start at half-past nine. A microcosm within, yet untouched by, the greater world, these outlandish people sat perfectly self-possessed and completely isolated amid a throng of inquisitive strangers whose presence imported to them as little as the presence of the vulgar sparrows. They were adventuring on a journey longer than that which their ancestors undertook centuries ago when they emigrated from India, yet they exhibited no greater emotion than if they were changing parishes. On the platform they had grouped themselves by families, and behind each group was a hillock of trunks, utensils, bedding, carpets and tents; but before I reached them Vasili and another lad met me and, postponing my farewell interview with the elders, I turned back with the boys to buy them cigarettes. In the street we found Fardi, and he accompanied us to a tobacconist.

To my surprise Fardi encouraged the boys not only to choose the most expensive Russian cigarettes, but also to demand meerschaum holders. That very afternoon, to distinguish him above his brethren and mark my approval of the admirable Fardi who never begged, I had given him as parting present a splendid guinea pipe; and now he must needs demonstrate that he had gulled me, that though he had played a long and cunning game of respectability he was no whit less a Gypsy than the others, and could, when he chose, beg with the best. My paragon produced three leather purses which, he said most falsely, contained all the money he possessed. Two were empty, and in the third a half-sovereign lurked among some coppers. He begged for a loan, and, when I refused to entertain the idea, entreated me to buy a dress for his wife. In the window of a shop which was preparing to close he saw a gloriously green silk underskirt marked “six and eleven” which was exactly what she would like; and I was the more ready to surrender to his unexpected attack because I had given Lotka nothing. But when we entered the shop he saw and preferred a long silk scarf which was attractively festooned upon a rail. I bought it, congratulating myself secretly that Fardi, being illiterate, would not notice that its cost was two shillings less than that of the petticoat. But Fardi’s sharp eyes discerned the price I paid, and immediately he claimed the dress as well, becoming almost abusive, and telling me plainly that I ought to be ashamed to refuse so small a favour. It was the revelation of a new and unsuspected Fardi—a much less comfortable character than the Fardi who never begged.

He begged desperately and without a moment’s pause until the train left Liverpool, ably abetted by every member of his family. Had I yielded Fardi would have won a barren victory, because the shop was closed and the dress beyond our reach: but higher principles were at stake—it was a trial of strength, and the respect in which the Gypsies held me was threatened. There were flank attacks by Yishwan, who wanted my watch, and rear attacks from battalions of boys, whose demands a universal provider would have been hard pushed to satisfy: but Lotka’s skirt was the main objective, and, meeting all arguments, talking with marvellous if ungrammatical fluency, and shouting as loudly as anybody, I held my position without budging a hair’s-breadth.

Even when, with their samovars and eiderdown beds, the whole party had been packed in the carriages, Fardi stood at a door and mischievously continued his persecution. But he and the others bade me a warm farewell, wishing me brilliantly overwhelming blessings, all except Yono, who angrily rejected my proffered hand; and as the train steamed out of the station an impudent little boy waved from a window a grubby fist, on one finger of which shone my stolen silver ring.

10. AN UNWRITTEN TONGUE.

PLUMBERS, and even politicians, think meanly of Gypsies. The _Oxford English Dictionary_, apparently regarding them as a species of vermin rather than a nation, denies them the barren honour which it awards to Gallovidians, and spells their name with a little _g_. As an old witch complained to Lavengro, some very respectable persons go so far as to “grudge the poor people the speech they talk among themselves,” and, like the magistrate, brand it “no language at all, merely a made-up gibberish.” Mrs. Herne very properly retorted, with an ironical curtsey: “Oh, bless your wisdom, you can tell us what our language is without understanding it”; for to learn to understand Romani is a far easier task than to trace it to its sources.

The central mystery of a mysterious race, it is their greatest treasure, whether, with Borrow, we regard it as a means “to enable habitual breakers of the law to carry on their consultations with more secrecy,” or share the enthusiasm of scholars who have found in it the most fascinating, yet most baffling, problem of linguistics. On the language of the Gypsies one of the greatest philologists wrote two volumes, containing more than a thousand closely-printed pages, although he confessed he had never heard it spoken; another devoted eight years to the gradual publication of a huge quarto which, when completed, weighed nearly a hundred ounces; and countless humbler contributors have added their stones to the cairn of learning under which Romani lies buried. All believed that in this unwritten tongue, the conversational currency of “the most unfortunate and degraded of beings,” lay hid answers to riddles which have perplexed the learned for five hundred years: Where was the original home of the Gypsies? When did they leave it? By what route did they reach Europe? But the hopes of scholars have been grievously disappointed, and at the end of a century of diligent gleaning and scientific analysis the mystery of Gypsy origin is as deep as it was at the beginning!

Far from being gibberish, Romani is an inflected language possessing more cases for its noun than did Latin; and it is Indian, although the Gypsies, true to their reputation, have begged words with which to supplement their vocabulary from Persians, Greeks, Slavs and other peoples among whom they have dwelt. It has been said that “the Arabic of the Bedouin in this century is incomparably more nearly identical with that of the tribes through whose borders the children of Israel were led by Moses than is any one of our contemporary European tongues with its ancestor of the same remote period.” A similar cause has enabled the Gypsies, ever wandering, separating and reuniting, to resist more successfully than a sedentary race could have resisted the gradual changes which ultimately part a language into mutually incomprehensible dialects. Their speech is an echo which has reverberated through the centuries, for in it may be heard ancient Indian forms that have been lost in India itself, and dearest of all to the philologist, though most perplexing, a number of words which are almost pure Sanskrit. But if you ask the linguistic student of the _Roma_ whence they come, you will receive no reply more definite than a reference to north-west Hindustan and the inhospitable mountains thereabouts; while for the date of the Gypsy exodus you may choose at will any period between 300 B.C. and 1300 A.D. and find high philological authority for your choice.

To satisfy, or, better still, to stimulate curiosity about the language of the “Brahmins of the roads,” a short nursery story in the dialect of the coppersmiths is here reprinted from the pages of the _Journal of the Gypsy Lore Society_, by the kind permission of Mr. E. O. Winstedt, to whom it was dictated by one of Kola’s sons-in-law. Most of the consonants may, without serious error, be pronounced as in English, _r_ being rolled as in “rural,” _g_ hard as in “gas,” and s unvoiced as in “sago.” The symbol _zh_ represents the French _j_ or the _z_ in English “azure,” while _sh_ is the corresponding unvoiced sound in “ash”: with _t_ prefixed the latter becomes _tsh_, the double sound heard twice in “church,” which would be written _tshə_(_r_)_tsh_. In Romani the letter _h_ is often found after _p_, _t_ and _k_, where, except in the mouths of Irish speakers, it is not used in English. Thus _ph_ and _th_ have not the values they have in “philosophy” and “theology,” nor _kh_ (as in Oriental languages) that of the _ch_ in Scottish “loch,” but the _h_ must be sounded after the other consonant: _p+h_, _t+h_, and _k+h_. The vowels may be pronounced as in Italian, the additional vowel _ə_ representing the vowels in English “but” and “cur,” and the diphthongs _ai_ and _au_ being similar to the sounds in “aisle” and “ounce.” The vowel in English “law” is written _aw_. For examples the following words may be taken:—

_but_ (much) as “boot.”

_hai_ (and) as “high.”

_háide_! (come!) as “high-day.”

_kothé_ (there) as “coat-hay.”

_le_ (take) as “lay.”

_meklé_ (they allowed) as “make-lay.”

_per_ (belly) as “pair.”

_ye_ (even) as “yea.”

The acute accents indicate the stressed syllables and do not alter the quality of the vowels. They were not marked in the original, and are added here merely to assist readers and not as an accurate record of the coppersmiths’ method of accentuation.

O DÍLO HAI LÉSKE DÚI PHRALÁ.

SAS trin phral; dúi sa godiáver, thai yek dílo. Thai muló léngo dad. Thai phendiá léngo dad: “Zha per talé.” Káno vo meréla, te avél sáko phral kothé léste. Hai phendiá o phral o báro: “Zha tu, phrála dilíya, k’ amáro dad.” Liá o phral o dílo yek kash (bórta), hai thodéla po dúmo, hai geló ka pésko dad. Hai ushtiló lésko dad, hai diá les yek bal kálo. Káno vo tshinól les, ənklél ándo kódo bal yek gras kálo.

Hai phendiá o əmperáto, kon khodéla ka léski rákli ándo kher, ənkəsto, kodoléske déla. Thai phendiá o phral o báro: “Háide! phrála, te dikás kon khutéla ka i rákli.” Thai phendiás o dílo: “Meg me, phrále, te dikáu ye me kothé.” Hai mardé lə lésko phral; tshi meklé les. Thai liné le dúi phral le grastén, hai gelé-tar. Hai liás o phral o dílo o bal, hai kerdiló léske yek gras ándo bal, hai geló-tar. Aresliá péske do phralén, aresló palál; hai pushlé les: “Kon tu san, manushá?” Vo si mánush depel-méshti (vityáz). Hai mardé le zoralés péske phralén; hai geló-tar ka i rákli. Hai hukló ándo kher ka i rákli. Hai liás la rakliá péske; hai tshumidá les lésko sókro, le dilés.

Hai tradéla léskro sókro péske dúi zhamutrén (godiáver zhamutré) te mudarén tshirikliá. Hai aviló-tar o dílo ka pésko sókro əmperáto, thai phendiá o dílo te del les púshka te mudarél ye vo tshirikliá. Hai la o dílo phagliás e púshka, hai geló-tar péske dúye shogorénsa. Vo sas o tríto. Hai pirdé léske shogoré so (? kai) rodiás, hai tshi mudardé kántshi tshirikliá. Hai o dílo mudardiás le kashtésa but tshirikliá bi-pushkáko. Hai avilé léske shogoré, hai diklé le tshiriklián; hai den pe dúma: “O dílo mudardiás but tshirikliá, hai amé tshi mudardiám kantsh.” Hai mangén le tshiriklián kátar o dílo, te del le lénge. Hai phendiá o dílo: “Kána la te shináv tumáro práshhau (per) le shuriása, atúntshi dav túme le tshirikliá, hai phenáu k’ o əmperáto ke túme mudardián le tshirikliá.” Hai kána shindiá o práshau léngo, hai del lénge i tshirikliá, hai gelé-tar kheré.

Hai dikliás əmperáto le but tshiriklé, hai lovodíl pésko do zhamutrén. Hai pushél le dilés: “Tu tshi mu(da)rdán kantsh?” Hai phenél o dílo le əmperatóske: “Me kudalá tshirikliá me mudardém le. Tu man tshi patshiás? Me shindém le shuriása léngo práshau, tha dem lénge le tshirikliá.” Hai vasdás əmperáto léngo gad, hai dikliá léngo práshau. E tshiriklí si but láshi. Hai phendiás əmperáto ke léske zhamutré: “Díle mánush! sóste von meklé te shindiás léngro práshau?

Thai ma nai kantsh.

THE FOOL AND HIS TWO BROTHERS.

THERE were three brothers; two were wise, and one a fool. And their father died. Now their father said: “I am going to take to my bed.” When he dies, each brother is to come there to him. And the big brother said: “Do you go, foolish brother, to our father.” The foolish brother took a stick and put it on his shoulder, and went to his father. And his father got up, and gave him a black hair. Whenever he cuts it, there will come out of that hair a black horse.