Morning journal and courier., 1889-09-07
LIFE AMONG THE GYPsIEs.

amount of book knowledge he had somehow acquired, made him a sort of seer among his race. I always approached him with real veneratien, and when ore day I asked him why gipsies were wanderers he instantly an- swered in Romany:
 "Because they are Gods chosen people!"
 am pretty sure the old rascal did not be- lieve what he said, because there was mer- ry, half-wicked twinkle in his eyes; and be- sides we were at that very moment occupied in dressing some plump chickens, over whose manner of getting into camp thought best to throw the mantle of silent charity. But he gravely proceeded to draw host of si- those of the ancient patriarchs, laying great emphasis upon the statement that gipsies were the true descendants of the house of Rechabites, so loved of the Lord for its peo- ples' faithful observance of divine oom- mands. Then he glibly quoted from Jere- miah: "Neither shall ye build houses, nor SOW seed, nor plant vineyard, nor have any; but all your days ye shall dwell in tents; that ye may live many days in the land where ye be strangers"
 If gipsies may be said to possess ethical or religious principles whatever, they will all be found underlying and sustaining their own as against all other modes of life. h. numerable times have made the direct in- quiry of my gipsy companions and friends regarding this matter, and on every occasion
 have been met with similar answer. The
 gipsies mind is an utter blank on all matters
 which the Christian world regard as sacred.
 Revealed religion is to him as extraordinary
 tissue of chioanery as are bis black arts to
 us. He will quote you yards of Bible to prove his pilgriming life the only correct one. But he does that merely to confuse you; not because he himself respects the au- thority to which he has recourse. Unquss- l.. I,aJ{o 1s is the only right way of living. Whatever you and nay believe about that, have had too many and indubitable proofs of his integrity of conviction to doubt it. And so what is his belief, what his heredity of sa- cred legend, what the principles and inoen- tives upon which his life and effort are planted and what his hope for, and faith in, i the future state, have been for twenty-five years my most earnest and interesting, and must confess most futile and barren, sub. i ieots of study among these tawny wanderers of the tent and road.
 It is @ noteworthy fact that the Romany (gipsy) language contains no exact equivalent | for God. Indeed, 1t is almost barren of words designating the Creator. The nearest | expression that my most studious and per- sistent researches and inquiries have been able to discover is that of Baurie Rom, or Great Head; and yet this literally means a powerful man, chief potentste, and does ! not mean spiritual being with somniscient powers. Nor is this term applied to a su | preme being save In one instance. That one | is in a singularly universal and always SC. ! cret sacred legend of the gipsies; their sols lore pertaining to the infinite mysteries
 This story, tradition or legend relates in picturesque, brief and almost poetic manner the contest of the Great Good Spirit and the ! Great Bad Spirit as follows:
 One day the Baurie Rom (Great Head), ! whose shining tent was the sky, went ont to ! seek wild boar for dinner. As no good being will steal from an open tent, the Bau- ! rie Rom drew not the curtain about the door ! Literally, mouth.) Soon along came the Baurie Bing (chief evil spirit, the great dev- ! ill, who saw the deserted tent and cried out ! with great glee:
 "Now the Baurie Rom is gone. will de- | stroy his beautiful habitation and leave him | desolatel"
 Then the Baurie Bing drank up the rivers, | ate all the pomegranates between the rims of | the sky, and licked up all the earth's honey. ! After feasting he blew flame on the world ! and split the mountains with his fiery tail. ! Then he arose to go, but had sxelled so ! broad and high that he could not get out oi | the tent door, and his horns got fast in the | woolly tent curve Cover, the sky.) The Bau- ! rie Bing struggled and believed, and ten black devils (dasa kala bing) came to help the Baurie Bing away. Just then the Baurie Rom came back. The ten black devils ran
 away, when the Baurie Rom took the Baurie Bing In his hand as though light as dust and
 hurled him beyond the edge of the sky, into place where he ever burns but there never is light. From that day the Baurie Rom placed great chief to guard his tent door
 In passing it is interesting to find in tn, three words dasa kala ping (tsn black devils
 remarkable proof of the extreme antiquity
 of the gipsy race. They are respectively | Sanscrit, Hindostanee and Romany; and
 their preservation by these people, indepen'
 dent of any written or printed language seems almost beyond belief.
 But in the tale of the Baurie Rom and thu
 Baurie Bing are found many symbols O gipsy thought and feeling. It is thousand
 of years older than the Bible, and 1t is a GU rious example of the earliest formulativ I thought as to supreme being. He is typi
 in just wrath. The devil, too, as the typ | of greed, envy and malicious destructive ! ness, WAS not bad notion for three or fou
 thousand years ago; while many of the me ! terial instincts of these strange folk-th | sky ss semblance of the tent; the huntin
 of the wild boar for dinner, once e perfst
 ton of attainment among gipsies; tho feast ing and gorging of the intruder; his hns discomforture and almost Miltonio castin out into an eternal dark, which gipsies drea in color, symbol, and in all places at nigh , when they say they "feel 1t hurt;" stand eu
 | clearly in these tropes and similes.
 But the most singular feature of the mat ter is that this notion of @ supreme bein | and an antithesis, the temptation, the fal D ! the expulsion from state of privilege, tt | endless punishment for rebellion and sil l and the final sentineling of the Baurie Rom |, dwelling by Ca great ohief," like our lat ! poetic station for St. Peter, crystalized
 the minds of pilgrims by the Narbudda ar
 Tapstee rivers from four to six thousar | years ago, remain intact in the brain al thought of every one of their gipsy desce '- dents that live; that is, the bare story, t 1t ! myth of 6 substance. the wrath of sor = Great Head is nothing to the gipsy hea k From wherever sprang in the night of t le ages this bit of lore, while it is clung to as l. life, 1t has no influence on the life.
 ,. "Hits our way O thinkin'." "Hits go 10 enough for gipsies." 'tHus folk 'as no mi le vexin' about wat nobody doesn't know E. "Yous all goes crazy many time an' oft D. w'ats hidden" "Ef there's any one migl f. fer, Baurie Rom's jess as like the right c v as yours;" and the like; they ever retort a ig with imperturbable good humor. They [ sd willing to admit, to please you, that tn v. may be such being as God, but they
 ways leave you vanquished by the most
 nign and suave proposition that if there ,, 50 great power will take care of everythi 'n wisely; and, "snyhow, gipsies is too trif G. fur anybody's minain', let alone seoh migl in folks!" remember of one instance amc he many where in positive desperation in an :. tempt to give group of friendly gips some faint idea of God as we conee 'w him, and, indeed, of discerning if there '
 a the faintest idea in any one of their mil dv of God of their own mental creation, I my patience and cried out in vexation "t 'o you vagabonds such people deserve 'ce God"
 ms "That's jess hit. That's jess hit;;" aeve sa- replied instantly, and with exasperatt or Faint like for bus sech things be-" { ny whether the rascals said it with I fe. knowledge of hopeless outlawry, with o- spondent consciousness of impossibility
 knowing what we regard as of the sui snt nest importance to know, or to close snt argument concerning a matter no huI ves has yet made clear or acceptable to
 Romany, to me there was pathetic ii m" ity in their renunoiation could never wi lon ly dispel.
 nee It is not fair to say these folk are blasr