A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, & Present State of the Gypsies Part 11

QUESTIONS.

1. From whence is it said the Gypsies first came?

2. How many is it supposed there are in England?

3. What is your circuit in summer?

4. How many Gypsey families are supposed to be in it?

5. What are the names of them?

6. Have they any meetings with those of other circuits?

7. And for what purpose?

8. What number of Gypsies are there computed to be in the county?

9. What proportion of their number follow business, and what kind?

10. What do they bring their children up to?

11. What do the women employ themselves in?

12. From how many generations can they trace their descent?

13. Have they kept to one part of the country, or removed to distant parts?

14. How long have they lived in this part?

15. Have they any speech of their own, different to that used by other people?

16. What do they call it? Can any one write it?

17. Is there any writing of it to be seen any where?

18. Have they any rules of conduct which are general to their community?

19. What religion do they mostly profess?

20. Do they marry, and in what manner?

21. How do they teach their children religion?

22. Do any of them learn to read?

23. Who teaches them?

24. Have they any houses to go to in winter?

25. What proportion of them, is it supposed, live out of doors in winter, as in summer?

5_th_ _Month_, 16_th_, 1815.

THE REPORTS

_Received from the Counties of England_, _are comprised in the following general Answers to the Queries of the Circular_.

1. All Gypsies suppose the first of them came from Egypt.

2. They cannot form any idea of the number in England.

3. The Gypsies of Bedfords.h.i.+re, Hertfords.h.i.+re, parts of Buckinghams.h.i.+re, Cambridge, and Huntingdons.h.i.+re, are continually making revolutions within the range of those counties.

4. They are either ignorant of the number of Gypsies in the counties through which they travel, or unwilling to disclose their knowledge.

5. The most common names are Smith, Cooper, Draper, Taylor, Bosswel, Lee, Lovell, Loversedge, Allen, Mansfield, Glover, Williams, Carew, Martin, Stanley, Buckley, Plunkett, Corrie.

6 & 7. The gangs in different towns have not any regular connection, or organization; but those who take up their winter quarters in the same city or town, appear to have some knowledge of the different routes each horde will pursue; probably with a design to prevent interference.

8. In the county of Herts, it is computed there may be sixty families, having many children. Whether they are quite so numerous in Buckinghams.h.i.+re, Bedfords.h.i.+re, and Northamptons.h.i.+re, the answers are not sufficiently definite to determine. In Cambridges.h.i.+re, Oxfords.h.i.+re, Warwicks.h.i.+re, Wilts.h.i.+re, and Dorsets.h.i.+re, greater numbers are calculated upon. In various counties, the attention has not been competent to procuring data for any estimate of families, or individuals.

9. More than half their number follow no business; others are dealers in horses and a.s.ses; farriers, smiths, tinkers, braziers, grinders of cutlery, basket-makers, chair-bottomers, and musicians.

10. Children are brought up in the habits of their parents, particularly to music and dancing, and are of dissolute conduct.

11. The women mostly carry baskets with trinkets and small wares; and tell fortunes.

12. Too indolent to have acquired accounts of genealogy, and perhaps indisposed to it by the irregularity of their habits.

13. In most counties there are particular situations to which they are partial. In Berks.h.i.+re is a marsh, near Newbury, much frequented by them; and Dr. Clarke states, that in Cambridges.h.i.+re, their princ.i.p.al rendezvous is near the western villages.

14. It cannot be ascertained, whether from their first coming into the nation, attachment to particular places has prevailed.

15, 16, & 17. When among strangers, they elude inquiries respecting their peculiar language, calling it gibberish. Don't know of any person that can write it, or of any written specimen of it.

18. Their habits and customs in all places are peculiar.

19. Those who profess any religion, represent it to be that of the country in which they reside: but their description of it, seldom goes beyond repeating the Lord's prayer; and only a few of them are capable of that. Instances of their attending any place for wars.h.i.+p are very rare.

20. They marry for the most part by pledging to each other, without any ceremony. A few exceptions have occurred when money was plentiful.

21. They do not teach their children religion.

22 & 23. Not _one_ in a _thousand_ can read.