Part 12 (1/2)

He killed both of us A sarcastic expression

_I dicked their stadees an langis sherros_

I saw their hats on their heads Apropos of a

_When you've tatti panni and rikker tutes kokero pash rai_

When you have brandy (spirits), and keep yourself half drunk, you can go through the winter like a horse

CHAPTER VIII INDICATIONS OF THE INDIAN ORIGIN OF THE GIPSIES

Boro Duvel, or ”Great God,” an Old Gipsy term for Water--Bishnoo or Vishnu, the Rain-God--The Rain, called God's Blood by Gipsies--The Snow, ”Angel's Feathers”--Mahadeva--Buddha--The Siari and niggering--The Nile--Nats and Nautches, Naubat and nobbet--A Puncher--Pitch, Piller and Pivlibeebee--Quod--Kishro--Sarserin--Shali or Rice--The Shaster in England--The Evil Eye--Sikhs--Stan, Hindostan, Iranistan--The true origin of Slang--Tat, the Essence of Being--Bahar and Bar--The Origin of the Words Rom and Romni--Dom and Domni--The Hindi tem--Gipsy and Hindustani points of the Compass--Salaa on objects--Horseflesh--English and Foreign Gipsies--Bohealnitschan--has said of Ro to be able to study a Hindu dialect in the heart of Europe He is quite right; but as ards its relations to poetry, how land--traces of the treo in India And though these traces be faint, it is still apparent enough that they really exist

One day an old Gipsy, who is said to be more than usually ”deep” in Ro such knowledge from Gipsies older and deeper than himself, sent word to me, to know if ”the rye” are that Boro Duvel, or the Great God, was an old Roular e to come from a tent at Battersea, and asked my special Gipsy _factotum_, why God should be called water, or water, God? And he replied in the folloords:

”Panni is the Boro Duvel, and it is Bishnoo or Vishnoo, because it pells alay from the Boro Duvel '_Vishnu is the Boro Duvel then_?'--Avali

There can't be no stretch adoi--can there, rya? Duvel is Duvel all the world over--but by the right _formation_, Vishnoo is the Duvel's ratt

I've shuned adovo but dusta cheiruses An' the snow is poris, that jals frouses And what I penned, that Bishnoo is the Duvel's ratt, is puro Rommanis, and jinned by saw our foki” {110}

Now in India, Vishnu and Indra are the Gods of the rain

The learned, who insist that as there ought to be, so there noring the fact that a dozen causes may aid in its formation, will at once declare that, as Bishnoo or Vishnoo is derived from the old Gipsy Brishni or Brschindo, and this from the Hindu Barish, and the Sanscrit Varish or Prish, there can be ”no rational ground” for connecting the English Gipsy ith the Hindu God But who can tell what secret undercurrents of diue association may have come down to the present day from the olden time That rain should be often called God's blood, and water bearing the naarded as a specially curious bit of Gipsy lore, is at any rate reh

As for the Gipsies in question ever having heard of Vishnu and other Gods (as a friend suggests to me), save in this dim tradition, I can only say, that I doubt whether either of them ever heard even of the apostles; and I satisfied ht the secret had never heard of Joseph, was pitiably ignorant of Potiphar's wife, and only knew of ”Mozhus” or Moses, that he ”once heerd he was on the bulrushes”

Mahadeva, or Mahadev, exists apparently in the lish Gipsy in the phrase ”Maduveleste!” or, God bless you This word Maduvel is often changed to Mi--duvel, and is generally supposed to mean ”My God;” but I was once assured, that the _old_ and correct forreat in connection with Duvel

A curious illustration of a lost word returning by chance to its original source was given one day, when I asked a Gipsy if he knew such a word as Buddha? He promptly replied, ”Yes; that a booderi or boodha e of Buddha, said: ”That is a Boohda” He ed person, but the coincidence was at least renifies an oldon the chiriffin--a hideous little goblin ings--informed me that the Gipsy name for it was a Seemor or Seemorus, and further declared that the sas,” I remarked

”Oh, hasn't it?” rejoined the Gipsy; ”its _fins_ are its wings, if it hadn't wings it could not be a Seeh or Griffin of Persian fable {112} I could learn nothing arded a dolphin as reseed monster, which he called a Seelish Gipsies still retain this primaeval word, but apply it only to the blind-wor, or blind-worm, is, in the opinion of the Rommany, the moster it like a swagler's toov,” ”When a blind-worm dies it is as hard as a stick, and you can break it like a pipe-steifted, so far as his will goes, with incredible nity, and say of him--

”If he could dick sirai jal an the drum”

”If he could see as well as he can hear, he would not allow o on the road”

The Hindi alphabet Deva Nagari, ”the writing of the Gods,” is co is ”niggering”

”He niggered sar he could pooker adree a chinaer_ may, it is true, be merely accidental, but the reader, ill ascertain by examination of the vocabulary the proportion of Rommany words unquestionably Indian, will adin

Froarded as a descent ”fro at least to find a passable parallel for this siutter Nala is in Hindustani a brook; nali, a kennel: and it has been conjectured that the Indian word indicates that of the great river of Egypt

All of irls, the so-called _bayaderes_ or dancing-girls of India; but very few, I suppose, are aware that their generic nalish Gipsy words Nachna in Hindustani means to dance, while the Nats, who are a kind of Gipsies, are generally jugglers, dancers, and lish Gipsy _nautering_about with music Other attractions may be added, but, as I have heard a Gipsy say, ”it always takes o _a-nauterin_' or _nobbin_'”