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The Romany Rye

G >> George Borrow >> The Romany Rye




"Thank you, brother, but your advice comes rather late; I accepted
the first offer that was made me five years ago."

"You married five years ago, Ursula! is it possible?"

"Quite possible, brother, I assure you."

"And how came I to know nothing about it?"

"How comes it that you don't know many thousand things about the
Romans, brother? Do you think they tell you all their affairs?"

"Married, Ursula, married! well, I declare!"

"You seem disappointed, brother."

"Disappointed! Oh! no, not at all; but Jasper, only a few weeks
ago, told me that you were not married; and, indeed, almost gave me
to understand that you would be very glad to get a husband."

"And you believed him? I'll tell you, brother, for your
instruction, that there is not in the whole world a greater liar
than Jasper Petulengro."

"I am sorry to hear it, Ursula; but with respect to him you
married--who might he be? A gorgio, or a Romany chal?"

"Gorgio, or Romany chal! Do you think I would ever condescend to a
gorgio! It was a Camomescro, brother, a Lovell, a distant relation
of my own."

"And where is he? and what became of him! Have you any family?"

"Don't think I am going to tell you all my history, brother; and,
to tell you the truth, I am tired of sitting under hedges with you,
talking nonsense. I shall go to my house."

"Do sit a little longer, sister Ursula. I most heartily
congratulate you on your marriage. But where is this same Lovell?
I have never seen him: I wish to congratulate him too. You are
quite as handsome as the Meridiana of Pulci, Ursula, ay, or the
Despina of Riciardetto. Riciardetto, Ursula, is a poem written by
one Fortiguerra, about ninety years ago, in imitation of the
Morgante of Pulci. It treats of the wars of Charlemagne and his
Paladins with various barbarous nations, who came to besiege Paris.
Despina was the daughter and heiress of Scricca, King of Cafria;
she was the beloved of Riciardetto, and was beautiful as an angel;
but I make no doubt you are quite as handsome as she."

"Brother," said Ursula--but the reply of Ursula I reserve for
another chapter, the present having attained to rather an uncommon
length, for which, however, the importance of the matter discussed
is a sufficient apology.



CHAPTER XI



Ursula's Tale--The Patteran--The Deep Water--Second Husband.


"Brother," said Ursula, plucking a dandelion which grew at her
feet, "I have always said that a more civil and pleasant-spoken
person than yourself can't be found. I have a great regard for you
and your learning, and am willing to do you any pleasure in the way
of words or conversation. Mine is not a very happy story, but as
you wish to hear it, it is quite at your service. Launcelot Lovell
made me an offer, as you call it, and we were married in Roman
fashion; that is, we gave each other our right hands, and promised
to be true to each other. We lived together two years, travelling
sometimes by ourselves, sometimes with our relations; I bore him
two children, both of which were still-born, partly, I believe,
from the fatigue I underwent in running about the country telling
dukkerin when I was not exactly in a state to do so, and partly
from the kicks and blows which my husband Launcelot was in the
habit of giving me every night, provided I came home with less than
five shillings, which it is sometimes impossible to make in the
country, provided no fair or merry-making is going on. At the end
of two years my husband, Launcelot, whistled a horse from a
farmer's field, and sold it for forty-pounds; and for that horse he
was taken, put in prison, tried, and condemned to be sent to the
other country for life. Two days before he was to be sent away, I
got leave to see him in the prison, and in the presence of the
turnkey I gave him a thin cake of gingerbread, in which there was a
dainty saw which could cut through iron. I then took on
wonderfully, turned my eyes inside out, fell down in a seeming fit,
and was carried out of the prison. That same night my husband
sawed his irons off, cut through the bars of his window, and
dropping down a height of fifty feet, lighted on his legs, and came
and joined me on a heath where I was camped alone. We were just
getting things ready to be off, when we heard people coming, and
sure enough they were runners after my husband, Launcelot Lovell;
for his escape had been discovered within a quarter of an hour
after he had got away. My husband, without bidding me farewell,
set off at full speed, and they after him, but they could not take
him, and so they came back and took me, and shook me, and
threatened me, and had me before the poknees, who shook his head at
me, and threatened me in order to make me discover where my husband
was, but I said I did not know, which was true enough; not that I
would have told him if I had. So at last the poknees and the
runners, not being able to make anything out of me, were obliged to
let me go, and I went in search of my husband. I wandered about
with my cart for several days in the direction in which I saw him
run off, with my eyes bent on the ground, but could see no marks of
him; at last, coming to four cross roads, I saw my husband's
patteran."

"You saw your husband's patteran?"

"Yes, brother. Do you know what patteran means?"

"Of course, Ursula; the gypsy trail, the handful of grass which the
gypsies strew in the roads as they travel, to give information to
any of their companions who may be behind, as to the route they
have taken. The gypsy patteran has always had a strange interest
for me, Ursula."

"Like enough, brother; but what does patteran mean?"

"Why, the gypsy trail, formed as I told you before."

"And you know nothing more about patteran, brother?"

"Nothing at all, Ursula; do you?"

"What's the name for the leaf of a tree, brother?"

"I don't know," said I; "it's odd enough that I have asked that
question of a dozen Romany chals and chies, and they always told me
that they did not know."

"No more they did, brother; there's only one person in England that
knows, and that's myself--the name for a leaf is patteran. Now
there are two that knows it--the other is yourself."

"Dear me, Ursula, how very strange! I am much obliged to you. I
think I never saw you look so pretty as you do now; but who told
you?"

"My mother, Mrs. Herne, told it me one day, brother, when she was
in a good humour, which she very seldom was, as no one has a better
right to know than yourself, as she hated you mortally: it was one
day when you had been asking our company what was the word for a
leaf, and nobody could tell you, that she took me aside and told
me, for she was in a good humour, and triumphed in seeing you
balked. She told me the word for leaf was patteran, which our
people use now for trail, having forgotten the true meaning. She
said that the trail was called patteran, because the gypsies of old
were in the habit of making the marks with the leaves and branches
of trees, placed in a certain manner. She said that nobody knew it
but herself, who was one of the old sort, and begged me never to
tell the word to any one but him I should marry; and to be
particularly cautious never to let you know it, whom she hated.
Well, brother, perhaps I have done wrong to tell you; but, as I
said before, I likes you, and am always ready to do your pleasure
in words and conversation; my mother, moreover, is dead and gone,
and, poor thing, will never know anything about the matter. So,
when I married, I told my husband about the patteran, and we were
in the habit of making our private trails with leaves and branches
of trees, which none of the other gypsy people did; so, when I saw
my husband's patteran, I knew it at once, and I followed it upwards
of two hundred miles towards the north; and then I came to a deep,
awful-looking water, with an overhanging bank, and on the bank I
found the patteran, which directed me to proceed along the bank
towards the east, and I followed my husband's patteran towards the
east; and before I had gone half a mile, I came to a place where I
saw the bank had given way, and fallen into the deep water.
Without paying much heed, I passed on, and presently came to a
public-house, not far from the water, and I entered the public-
house to get a little beer, and perhaps to tell a dukkerin, for I
saw a great many people about the door; and, when I entered, I
found there was what they calls an inquest being held upon a body
in that house, and the jury had just risen to go and look at the
body; and being a woman, and having a curiosity, I thought I would
go with them, and so I did; and no sooner did I see the body, than
I knew it to be my husband's; it was much swelled and altered, but
I knew it partly by the clothes, and partly by a mark on the
forehead, and I cried out, 'It is my husband's body,' and I fell
down in a fit, and the fit that time, brother, was not a seeming
one."

"Dear me," said I, "how terrible! but tell me, Ursula, how did your
husband come by his death?"

"The bank, overhanging the deep water, gave way under him, brother,
and he was drowned; for, like most of our people, he could not
swim, or only a little. The body, after it had been in the water a
long time, came up of itself, and was found floating. Well,
brother, when the people of the neighbourhood found that I was the
wife of the drowned man, they were very kind to me, and made a
subscription for me, with which, after having seen my husband
buried, I returned the way I had come, till I met Jasper and his
people, and with them I have travelled ever since: I was very
melancholy for a long time, I assure you, brother; for the death of
my husband preyed very much upon my mind."

"His death was certainly a very shocking one, Ursula; but, really,
if he had died a natural one, you could scarcely have regretted it,
for he appears to have treated you barbarously."

"Women must bear, brother; and, barring that he kicked and beat me,
and drove me out to tell dukkerin when I could scarcely stand, he
was not a bad husband. A man, by gypsy law, brother, is allowed to
kick and beat his wife, and to bury her alive, if he thinks proper.
I am a gypsy, and have nothing to say against the law."

"But what has Mikailia Chikno to say about it?"

"She is a cripple, brother, the only cripple amongst the Roman
people: so she is allowed to do and say as she pleases. Moreover,
her husband does not think fit to kick or beat her, though it is my
opinion she would like him all the better if he were occasionally
to do so, and threaten to bury her alive; at any rate, she would
treat him better, and respect him more."

"Your sister does not seem to stand much in awe of Jasper
Petulengro, Ursula."

"Let the matters of my sister and Jasper Petulengro alone, brother;
you must travel in their company some time before you can
understand them; they are a strange two, up to all kind of
chaffing: but two more regular Romans don't breathe, and I'll tell
you, for your instruction, that there isn't a better mare-breaker
in England than Jasper Petulengro, if you can manage Miss Isopel
Berners as well as--"

"Isopel Berners," said I, "how came you to think of her?"

"How should I but think of her, brother, living as she does with
you in Mumper's dingle, and travelling about with you; you will
have, brother, more difficulty to manage her, than Jasper has to
manage my sister Pakomovna. I should have mentioned her before,
only I wanted to know what you had to say to me; and when we got
into discourse, I forgot her. I say, brother, let me tell you your
dukkerin, with respect to her, you will never--"

"I want to hear no dukkerin, Ursula."

"Do let me tell you your dukkerin, brother, you will never manage--
"

"I want to hear no dukkerin, Ursula, in connection with Isopel
Berners. Moreover, it is Sunday, we will change the subject; it is
surprising to me that, after all you have undergone, you should
look so beautiful. I suppose you do not think of marrying again,
Ursula?"

"No, brother, one husband at a time is quite enough for any
reasonable mort; especially such a good husband as I have got."

"Such a good husband! why, I thought you told me your husband was
drowned?"

"Yes, brother, my first husband was."

"And have you a second?"

"To be sure, brother."

"And who is he? in the name of wonder."

"Who is he? why Sylvester, to be sure."

"I do assure you, Ursula, that I feel disposed to be angry with
you; such a handsome young woman as yourself to take up with such a
nasty pepper-faced good for nothing--"

"I won't hear my husband abused, brother; so you had better say no
more."

"Why, is he not the Lazarus of the gypsies? has he a penny of his
own, Ursula?"

"Then the more his want, brother, of a clever chi like me to take
care of him and his childer. I tell you what, brother, I will
chore, if necessary, and tell dukkerin for Sylvester, if even so
heavy as scarcely to be able to stand. You call him lazy; you
would not think him lazy if you were in a ring with him: he is a
proper man with his hands; Jasper is going to back him for twenty
pounds against Slammocks of the Chong gav, the brother of Roarer
and Bell-metal, he says he has no doubt that he will win."

"Well, if you like him, I, of course, can have no objection. Have
you been long married?"

"About a fortnight, brother; that dinner, the other day, when I
sang the song, was given in celebration of the wedding."

"Were you married in a church, Ursula?"

"We were not, brother; none but gorgios, cripples, and lubbenys are
ever married in a church: we took each other's words. Brother, I
have been with you near three hours beneath this hedge. I will go
to my husband."

"Does he know that you are here?"

"He does, brother."

"And is he satisfied?"

"Satisfied! of course. Lor', you gorgies! Brother, I go to my
husband and my house." And, thereupon, Ursula rose and departed.

After waiting a little time I also arose; it was now dark, and I
thought I could do no better than betake myself to the dingle; at
the entrance of it I found Mr. Petulengro. "Well, brother," said
he, "what kind of conversation have you and Ursula had beneath the
hedge?"

"If you wished to hear what we were talking about, you should have
come and sat down beside us; you knew where we were."

"Well, brother, I did much the same, for I went and sat down behind
you."

"Behind the hedge, Jasper?"

"Behind the hedge, brother."

"And heard all our conversation."

"Every word, brother; and a rum conversation it was."

"'Tis an old saying, Jasper, that listeners never hear any good of
themselves; perhaps you heard the epithet that Ursula bestowed upon
you."

"If, by epitaph, you mean that she called me a liar, I did,
brother, and she was not much wrong, for I certainly do not always
stick exactly to truth; you, however, have not much to complain of
me."

"You deceived me about Ursula, giving me to understand she was not
married."

"She was not married when I told you so, brother; that is, not to
Sylvester; nor was I aware that she was going to marry him. I once
thought you had a kind of regard for her, and I am sure she had as
much for you as a Romany chi can have for a gorgio. I half
expected to have heard you make love to her behind the hedge, but I
begin to think you care for nothing in this world but old words and
strange stories. Lor' to take a young woman under a hedge, and
talk to her as you did to Ursula; and yet you got everything out of
her that you wanted, with your gammon about old Fulcher and
Meridiana. You are a cunning one, brother."

"There you are mistaken, Jasper. I am not cunning. If people
think I am, it is because, being made up of art themselves,
simplicity of character is a puzzle to them. Your women are
certainly extraordinary creatures, Jasper."

"Didn't I say they were rum animals? Brother, we Romans shall
always stick together as long as they stick fast to us."

"Do you think they always will, Jasper?"

"Can't say, brother; nothing lasts for ever. Romany chies are
Romany chies still, though not exactly what they were sixty years
ago. My wife, though a rum one, is not Mrs. Herne, brother. I
think she is rather fond of Frenchmen and French discourse. I tell
you what, brother, if ever gypsyism breaks up, it will be owing to
our chies having been bitten by that mad puppy they calls
gentility."



CHAPTER XII



The Dingle at Night--The Two Sides of the Question--Roman Females--
Filling the Kettle--The Dream--The Tall Figure.


I descended to the bottom of the dingle. It was nearly involved in
obscurity. To dissipate the feeling of melancholy which came over
my mind, I resolved to kindle a fire; and having heaped dry sticks
upon my hearth, and added a billet or two, I struck a light, and
soon produced a blaze. Sitting down, I fixed my eyes upon the
blaze, and soon fell into a deep meditation. I thought of the
events of the day, the scene at church, and what I had heard at
church, the danger of losing one's soul, the doubts of Jasper
Petulengro as to whether one had a soul. I thought over the
various arguments which I had either heard, or which had come
spontaneously to my mind, for or against the probability of a state
of future existence. They appeared to me to be tolerably evenly
balanced. I then thought that it was at all events taking the
safest part to conclude that there was a soul. It would be a
terrible thing, after having passed one's life in the disbelief of
the existence of a soul, to wake up after death a soul, and to find
one's self a lost soul. Yes, methought I would come to the
conclusion that one has a soul. Choosing the safe side, however,
appeared to me to be playing a rather dastardly part. I had never
been an admirer of people who chose the safe side in everything;
indeed I had always entertained a thorough contempt for them.
Surely it would be showing more manhood to adopt the dangerous
side, that of disbelief; I almost resolved to do so--but yet in a
question of so much importance, I ought not to be guided by vanity.
The question was not which was the safe, but the true side? yet how
was I to know which was the true side? Then I thought of the
Bible--which I had been reading in the morning--that spoke of the
soul and a future state; but was the Bible true? I had heard
learned and moral men say that it was true, but I had also heard
learned and moral men say that it was not: how was I to decide?
Still that balance of probabilities! If I could but see the way of
truth, I would follow it, if necessary, upon hands and knees; on
that I was determined; but I could not see it. Feeling my brain
begin to turn round, I resolved to think of something else; and
forthwith began to think of what had passed between Ursula and
myself in our discourse beneath the hedge.

I mused deeply on what she had told me as to the virtue of the
females of her race. How singular that virtue must be which was
kept pure and immaculate by the possessor, whilst indulging in
habits of falsehood and dishonesty! I had always thought the gypsy
females extraordinary beings. I had often wondered at them, their
dress, their manner of speaking, and, not least, at their names;
but, until the present day, I had been unacquainted with the most
extraordinary point connected with them. How came they possessed
of this extraordinary virtue? was it because they were thievish? I
remembered that an ancient thief-taker, who had retired from his
useful calling, and who frequently visited the office of my master
at law, the respectable S---, who had the management of his
property--I remembered to have heard this worthy, with whom I
occasionally held discourse, philosophic and profound, when he and
I chanced to be alone together in the office, say that all first-
rate thieves were sober, and of well-regulated morals, their bodily
passions being kept in abeyance by their love of gain; but this
axiom could scarcely hold good with respect to these women--however
thievish they might be, they did care for something besides gain:
they cared for their husbands. If they did thieve, they merely
thieved for their husbands; and though, perhaps, some of them were
vain, they merely prized their beauty because it gave them favour
in the eyes of their husbands. Whatever the husbands were--and
Jasper had almost insinuated that the males occasionally allowed
themselves some latitude--they appeared to be as faithful to their
husbands as the ancient Roman matrons were to theirs. Roman
matrons! and, after all, might not these be in reality Roman
matrons? They called themselves Romans; might not they be the
descendants of the old Roman matrons? Might not they be of the
same blood as Lucretia? And were not many of their strange names--
Lucretia amongst the rest--handed down to them from old Rome? It
is true their language was not that of old Rome; it was not,
however, altogether different from it. After all, the ancient
Romans might be a tribe of these people, who settled down and
founded a village with the tilts of carts, which, by degrees, and
the influx of other people, became the grand city of the world. I
liked the idea of the grand city of the world owing its origin to a
people who had been in the habit of carrying their houses in their
carts. Why, after all, should not the Romans of history be a
branch of these Romans? There were several points of similarity
between them; if Roman matrons were chaste, both men and women were
thieves. Old Rome was the thief of the world; yet still there were
difficulties to be removed before I could persuade myself that the
old Romans and my Romans were identical; and in trying to remove
these difficulties, I felt my brain once more beginning to turn,
and in haste took up another subject of meditation, and that was
the patteran, and what Ursula had told me about it.

I had always entertained a strange interest for that sign by which
in their wanderings the Romanese gave to those of their people who
came behind intimation as to the direction which they took; but it
now inspired me with greater interest than ever,--now that I had
learnt that the proper meaning of it was the leaves of trees. I
had, as I had said in my dialogue with Ursula, been very eager to
learn the word for leaf in the Romanian language, but had never
learnt it till this day; so patteran signified leaf of a tree; and
no one at present knew that but myself and Ursula, who had learnt
it from Mrs. Herne, the last, it was said, of the old stock; and
then I thought what strange people the gypsies must have been in
the old time. They were sufficiently strange at present, but they
must have been far stranger of old; they must have been a more
peculiar people--their language must have been more perfect--and
they must have had a greater stock of strange secrets. I almost
wished that I had lived some two or three hundred years ago, that I
might have observed these people when they were yet stranger than
at present. I wondered whether I could have introduced myself to
their company at that period, whether I should have been so
fortunate as to meet such a strange, half-malicious, half good-
humoured being as Jasper, who would have instructed me in the
language, then more deserving of note than at present. What might
I not have done with that language, had I known it in its purity?
Why, I might have written books in it; yet those who spoke it would
hardly have admitted me to their society at that period, when they
kept more to themselves. Yet I thought that I might possibly have
gained their confidence, and have wandered about with them, and
learnt their language, and all their strange ways, and then--and
then--and a sigh rose from the depth of my breast; for I began to
think, "Supposing I had accomplished all this, what would have been
the profit of it; and in what would all this wild gypsy dream have
terminated?"

Then rose another sigh, yet more profound, for I began to think,
"What was likely to be the profit of my present way of life; the
living in dingles, making pony and donkey shoes, conversing with
gypsy-women under hedges, and extracting from them their odd
secrets?" What was likely to be the profit of such a kind of life,
even should it continue for a length of time?--a supposition not
very probable, for I was earning nothing to support me, and the
funds with which I had entered upon this life were gradually
disappearing. I was living, it is true, not unpleasantly, enjoying
the healthy air of heaven; but, upon the whole, was I not sadly
misspending my time? Surely I was; and, as I looked back, it
appeared to me that I had always been doing so. What had been the
profit of the tongues which I had learnt? had they ever assisted me
in the day of hunger? No, no! it appeared to me that I had always
misspent my time, save in one instance, when by a desperate effort
I had collected all the powers of my imagination, and written the
"Life of Joseph Sell;" but even when I wrote the Life of Sell, was
I not in a false position? Provided I had not misspent my time,
would it have been necessary to make that effort, which, after all,
had only enabled me to leave London, and wander about the country
for a time? But could I, taking all circumstances into
consideration, have done better than I had? With my peculiar
temperament and ideas, could I have pursued with advantage the
profession to which my respectable parents had endeavoured to bring
me up? It appeared to me that I could not, and that the hand of
necessity had guided me from my earliest years, until the present
night, in which I found myself seated in the dingle, staring on the
brands of the fire. But ceasing to think of the past which, as
irrecoverably gone, it was useless to regret, even were there cause
to regret it, what should I do in future? Should I write another
book like the Life of Joseph Sell; take it to London, and offer it
to a publisher? But when I reflected on the grisly sufferings
which I had undergone whilst engaged in writing the Life of Sell, I
shrank from the idea of a similar attempt; moreover, I doubted
whether I possessed the power to write a similar work--whether the
materials for the life of another Sell lurked within the recesses
of my brain? Had I not better become in reality what I had
hitherto been merely playing at--a tinker or a gypsy? But I soon
saw that I was not fitted to become either in reality. It was much
more agreeable to play the gypsy or the tinker than to become
either in reality. I had seen enough of gypsying and tinkering to
be convinced of that. All of a sudden the idea of tilling the soil
came into my head; tilling the soil was a healthful and noble
pursuit! but my idea of tilling the soil had no connection with
Britain; for I could only expect to till the soil in Britain as a
serf. I thought of tilling it in America, in which it was said
there was plenty of wild, unclaimed land, of which any one, who
chose to clear it of its trees, might take possession. I figured
myself in America, in an immense forest, clearing the land
destined, by my exertions, to become a fruitful and smiling plain.
Methought I heard the crash of the huge trees as they fell beneath
my axe; and then I bethought me that a man was intended to marry--I
ought to marry; and if I married, where was I likely to be more
happy as a husband and a father than in America, engaged in tilling
the ground? I fancied myself in America, engaged in tilling the
ground, assisted by an enormous progeny. Well, why not marry, and
go and till the ground in America? I was young, and youth was the
time to marry in, and to labour in. I had the use of all my
faculties; my eyes, it is true, were rather dull from early study,
and from writing the Life of Joseph Sell; but I could see tolerably
well with them, and they were not bleared. I felt my arms, and
thighs, and teeth--they were strong and sound enough; so now was
the time to labour, to marry, eat strong flesh, and beget strong
children--the power of doing all this would pass away with youth,
which was terribly transitory. I bethought me that a time would
come when my eyes would be bleared, and, perhaps, sightless; my
arms and thighs strengthless and sapless; when my teeth would shake
in my jaws, even supposing they did not drop out. No going a
wooing then--no labouring--no eating strong flesh, and begetting
lusty children then; and I bethought me how, when all this should
be, I should bewail the days of my youth as misspent, provided I
had not in them founded for myself a home, and begotten strong
children to take care of me in the days when I could not take care
of myself; and thinking of these things, I became sadder and
sadder, and stared vacantly upon the fire till my eyes closed in a
doze.

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