Quarrels do not
often take place among them, but when they do, they are dreadful. The
laws of the country in which they sojourn have so far banished the use
of knives from among them that they only grind them, otherwise these
conflicts would always be fatal. They fight like tigers with tooth and
nail, and knee and toe, and seem animated only with the spirit of
daemonism. Luckily the worst weapon they use is a stick, and, if the
devil tempts, a hedge-stake.
We have been put in mind to say something of the gipsies by having
witnessed the consequences of one of these affrays, which has brought
us still better acquainted with these singular people. A quarrel
originating in jealousy had produced results of the most serious
nature. A blow on the head with a tent-pole had evidently produced
concussion of the brain if not fracture, and the victim was lying on
his straw bed in a state of profound coma. The tent was tripartite,
being formed of three main tops meeting in a centre: one was sacred to
the women--the gynekeion of the Greeks, the anderoon of the Persians:
in the others were collected the whole faction of the dying man. Nine
or ten swarthy but handsome countenances were anxiously watching the
struggling breath of their unhappy comrade--some sobbing, some
grief-stricken, some sombre, none savage. An old crone was
administering ineffectual milk, perhaps the very woman who had found
the same fluid so nutritious some thirty years ago.
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