Leland on the Gypsies

BY a connection of sympathies not difficult to understand, Mr. Leland has made himself as well known to a smaller audience in the character of a gypsologist as to the general public by his Hans Breitmann’s Ballads. In his new work ¹ there are elements which ought to appeal to both branches of his constituency. In these chapters about the gypsies of Russia, England, America, Wales, and India, one finds material for the general reader no less than for the ethnologist. Indeed, the volume is one especially well adapted to those who wish to loiter along pleasant by-ways rather than to climb the steep path of systematic investigation. And yet it is precisely because the author knows his subject so well that he is able to present it so easily, and with such charming glimpses of landscape and adventure and personal reminiscence ; as, for instance, his mention of Oatlands Park (in which readers of Mrs. Kemble’s Autobiography already feel at home), his account of Cobham Fair, or of The Pious Washerwoman, or the Philadelphia crocus — pitcher — street-quack — and the gypsies in a New Jersey camp. Americans are inclined to regard the Romany as a creature remote from the sphere of their exceedingly practical interests, and hence are sometimes skeptical as to his active existence in their midst. Many will therefore be surprised at Mr. Leland’s statement that “ America is a far better place in which to study the [gypsy] language than England.” His own collection of AngloRomany words (still unpublished) embraces four thousand terms, while George Borrow limited the vocabulary to fourteen hundred. Not less surprising in its way is the belief — which by its naïveté escapes blasphemy — entertained among gypsy wanderers that Christ himself was of their tribe, because he was poor and went about upon a donkey. Surprise, however, becomes, if we may say so, an established state of mind in looking through the pages of Mr. Leland, which abound, like his subject, in quaintnesses and the unexpected.

The section devoted to Russian gypsies is very properly given the place of honor, since it is the most elaborate of the studies here presented, and contains perhaps the greatest share of novelty. The music of the Zigani, as heard in St. Petersburg and Moscow, is described with an enthusiasm that can hardly fail to communicate itself. “ These artists,” it is said, “ with wonderful tact and untaught skill, have succeeded, in all their songs, in combining the true, wild Eastern music with that of regular and simple melody, intelligible to every Western ear. . . . There is no self-consciousness, no vanity, — all is real. The listener feels as if he were a performer ; the performer is an enraptured listener.” Among these interesting folk Mr. Leland had the curious experience of telling their fortunes to professional chiromancers, and also of being asked by them what kind of people they really were and whence they came. This gave him an opportunity to set forth a theory, which he likewise elaborates in a special chapter on the Origin of the Gypsies. The hypothesis that they came from India is not especially new, having been advanced by Rüdiger in 1782. Still, it is here developed in accord with the latest and fullest research. The Jats, who were driven from India by Mahmoud in the eleventh century, are accepted as the main stock, supplemented by the Doms, — still extant in India, — who are simply Roms (the D and R being interchangeable in Hindustani and English Romany). There are other wandering Indian tribes that resemble the gypsies : the Nuts, as well as some not mentioned by Mr. Leland, such as the Thuba-raja and Chandala outcasts, and the Tchingani robbers at the mouth of the Indus; these last presenting a coincidence of name which is worth noticing. The author of The Gypsies, however, supplies a valuable link of evidence in his account of a Hindû, seen by him in London, who in youth had lived with a roving tribe in his native country, known as Trablus (Syrians), but “calling themselves and their language Rom. ” They were not really of Syrian blood, but were Hindûs, and gypsy, as their language proved. This is certainly a very important contribution, and goes a good deal farther than Bishop Heber’s statement that he met with a camp of gypsies on the banks of the Ganges, who spoke Hindustani as their mother tongue.

Concerning Mr. Leland’s explanation of the meaning and origin of the term Zingan or Tchenkan, we feel less confidence, although it is doubtless plausible. He derives it from two words, — chen, the moon, and gan or kan, the sun, — thus making this all but universal appellation of the roving folk signify the moon-sun people. Indirect evidence in favor of such a derivation is afforded by a legend current among Roumanian gypsies about the marriage of the sun and moon, which were regarded as brother and sister. The gypsies of Turkey have the same story, which with them becomes a tradition concerning the early history of their people: Chen having been a gypsy chief, who wedded his sister Guin, soon after the departure of the tribe from its home country (presumably India). It was this unholy union that gave their nation a name, and also drew down upon it a curse, dooming them to perpetual migration. We could wish that Mr. Leland had here discussed the fact to which Francis Hinde Groom refers, namely, that when Sultan Selim conquered Egypt, in the sixteenth century, many of the inhabitants refused to submit to him, revolted under a chief named Zinganeus, and on being subdued agreed to disperse in small bodies through various countries. Mr. Leland’s ingenious derivation leads back to a period so much earlier than the date of Selim’s conquest that he is disinclined to consider any other theory ; and perhaps he would account for the appellation Zinganeus as merely a type name. Another distinct addition to our knowledge of obscure dialects is made by the author in his discovery, entirely new to literature, of the Minklers Thari, or Shelta Thari, — the language of tinkers. How he came to make this discovery is narrated in picturesque and attractive fashion ; and an interesting though brief vocabulary is given, one end of which was picked up in Wales, and the other in Philadelphia. The Shelta Thari appears to be Celtic, though quite independent of Old Irish, Welsh, or Gaelic. “ I have always supposed,” says Mr. Leland, “ that the tinkers’ language spoken of by Shakespeare was Romany ; but I now incline to think it may have been Shelta.” Indeed, it seems likely enough that we have here a new proof of Shakespeare’s wide-reaching observation, in his allusion to a kind of speech which for two hundred and fifty years since his death has remained unnoticed and unknown.

It is to be regretted that in the translation of the gypsy letter given on page 275 so much that does not appear in the original should have been interjected, since this gives to the whole the air of a fancy-piece. Much more satisfactory are the gypsy stories in Romany and English, which form one part of this diversified collection of curious matter. New and useful, also, is the list of gypsy names, with appended notes on the characteristics of families bearing them, and a classification of those that are represented in America. Mr. Leland’s style is not in all respects to be commended. “ A sufficient cause for wits calling it Lindsay - Wolsey ” (page 98), while embodying a clever witticism, is an example of certain inelegant forms that occur. There are passages of rhyme printed as prose; and nearly the whole paragraph on page 129 (which is, by the way, a totally irrelevant one) turns out to be blank verse. The author’s predilection for coining eccentric words, like “ carnivalers and carnivalentines,” “ womanity,” and “ traveler - esque,” amounts to a failing. These peculiarities, taken with a tendency to the grotesque and a species of cumbrous playfulness, give the reader occasionally a sense that he, and possibly the subject, is being trifled with. Yet Mr. Leland has so much of that genuine humor, which is rather a pervasive atmosphere than the definite electric flash of a jest, that we may easily forgive the minor blemishes of a book so exceptional in merit, so full of erudition and originality, as this one. It contains probably more information, more variety of fact, about gypsies than any other single volume devoted to them; and it presents this with all the charm of an autobiography tinged by romance. The mood in which the theme is approached abounds in warm human interest and a fresh out-of-door feeling that verges upon the poetic. The author regards gypsies as the types of a simple, direct, mute love of nature, and as possessing “ an unexpressed mythology,” the sentiment of which he tries to preserve. He succeeds so well that the book acquires added importance as an indirect protest against the pseudo-artistic and intensely artificial way, now in vogue, of regarding the things of nature. Being healthy in that regard, it is of a sort to lend strength to current literature, at the same time that it enlarges its resources for entertainment.