Saint Mary's beacon. [volume] (Leonard Town, Md.) 1867-1983, 1878-08-15

TIE gypsies SET great store By their
Dialect, and Slll nSf ssIflingly iEahart K
TO Ehe GOrgios lGcntiles or strangefsy
Utiless when drunkenness or long iati-
fsGacy relaxes their caution. Thiseomes
partly from notioa among the more -
noraFst that Il is q penal offence 20 talk
Rouf:hany, and partly from the ?snity
which leads them to think Il ( high hon-
or to have a secret mode of. 6cAmmuni-
cation with each other. Il Is said that
the thousands Of gypsies who have come
to this country d1FfHg and since the CO.
l0nial TINES. and, ABANDONING the tent
iifs and beeoming house. dW ellefs. have
melted into the stream Of population
teach the language to their children.
aud keep the secret with a more than
Masonic jealousy. dOtbt the stOrsi
They guard the secret Of their origin
with great care, from an absurd notion
that the gypsy blood, OF which they arc
really proud. would lead TO reproaeh
from their neighbors. But few OF them.
] fancy, keep Up their knowledge 81 The
laEguage, Rh,ch is lost in the second
generation, aid bat for the tramps of tho
tent and wsgon wot,ld fade out aItogeth:
er. And Sti, the lafigdage is . very
important factor in solving the problem:
who are gyPsies, and from whence dit
they spring. They are Of the white
species cf the. genus homo; their anat-
omy and physiology shtw u; but ttet
are as distinct a variety as the Jew OF
white Tartar. From their former claim
Of an Egyptian ancestry, Biblical stu
dents assigned them 10 the mixed mff-
titude" that came out Of Egypt wllk the
Hebrews. But their language IDS M
affinity with Hebrew or Chaldaie. IL
is filled with words identical with low
and base Industani. The borO or b0'0r6
of Rommany has the same meaiii1g ~
Lura in low Indnstani, and in the sand
way, iR tls fNo dialects, Gallo and kako,
praD and PfdiG, pfawI and Praicl, rgs
and riak, rgja and rGje, bGhrG and 6tfk;
TG, ehi6 and jibh, jGirda and jairliG, sccf
and scgE Skers and Skoirs, ckori and
chosrri, hOod and do0dh, blaW and BLAIR,
fafria and tIetTiR, ehOv and ehoT, .ja's
roee and jUUG, pidagTia and fnFri1s
kiisfie aud kiiste, LOOdnie and E6onie,
and so en-, have nearly or quite The
same sound and entirely the same mean.
ing. Then there are words in ROM
mahy expressing q different shade Of
meaning from the originals fact east
ly explained. In different countries,
as We have said. the Romifiany varies
in its pronunciation, but there Is enough
Ieil to show IFS similarity withitseEf and
It's Eastern source. Take the numer-
ais, for instance. Yek (oRe) in how I1s
dustani becomes with tEe English gyP-
sizes veek, with the Scotch yak, with
the German ick or Ell, with the Magyar
jeg (yeg) or jak (yakJ, and with the
Spanish yegas. So paaRch (fvel in In
dustanif (6dntAG in Sanskrit) becomes
successfully Payi, punch, PGHfseh.
raaneh Of pansch, Paneh and PGTsche'
The sypsIgs seem to have been dtiseH
from India BY or at the time Of The IN
vasion Of Timoor, and 10 have made
their way to European Turkey and
Transylvania, from whence portions %
them spread, during the fourteenth shd
fifteenth centuries, 10 other parts Of
Europe. A few Persian words in theh
iargoh betray the route they took. Tur+
key and Hungary are their central abode
even now. They are there numbered
as n distinc. fsee, and, though thousands
have melted into other races, their NUM-
bers, as ascertained BY the most rectte
census, amount 20 a quarter OF mil;
lion In Turkey and about one hundred
and eighty thousand In Hungary. They
are a fecund face, marrying at an early,
age, and wefe il not fot Their habit Of
drotpiHg of Tito civilized habits, where
their identity is soon lost. would have
increased enormously. II we take those
who are ckurredo (half-bloOd) into ac-
count, the gypsy race 10 the aggregate
counts its millions. and, pT5ttsbfy, out
numbers the Jews through The world,
not as much as Il does In Turkey, where
it has four TO one, but appTeciably. Tie
European advent was by way of Ger
many and ftaiy-.N Y. Sun.