untry from time to time has
been brought about, to a great extent, by themselves. John Bull dislikes
keeping the idle, bastard children of other nations. He readily protects
all those who tread upon English soil, but in return for this kindness he
expects them, like bees, to be all workers. Drones, ragamuffins, and
rodneys cannot grumble if they get kicked out of the hive. If 20,000
Englishmen were to tramp all over India, Turkey, Persia, Hungary, Spain,
America, Egypt, Greece, Cyprus, South Africa, Germany, or France, in
bands of from, say two to fifty men, women, and children, in a most
wretched; miserable condition, doing little else but fiddling upon the
national conscience and sympathies, blood-sucking the hardworking
population, and frittering their time away in idleness, pilfering, and
filth, I expect, and justly so, the inhabitants would begin to "kick,"
and the place would no doubt get rather warm for Mr. John Bull and his
motley flock. If the Gipsies, and others of the same class in this
country, will begin to "buckle-to," and set themselves out for real hard
work, instead of cadging from door to door, they will find,
notwithstanding they are called Gipsies, John Bull extending to them the
hand of brotherhood and sympathy, and the days of persecution passed.

One thing is remarkable concerning the Gipsies--we never hear of their
being actually engaged in warfare. They left India for Asiatic Turkey
before the great and terrible wars broke out during the fourteenth
century, and before the great religious wars concerning the Mohammedan
faith in Turkey, during the fourteenth century, they fled to Western
Europe. Thus it will be seen that they "would sooner run a mile than
fight a minute." The idea of cold steel in open day frightens them out
of their wits. Whenever a war is about to take place in the country in
which they are located they will begin to make themselves scarce; and, on
the other hand, they will not visit a country where war is going on till
after it is over, and then, vulture-like, they swoop down upon the prey.
This feature is one of their leading characteristics; with some
honourable exceptions, they are always looked upon as long-sighted, dark,
deep, designing specimens of fallen humanity. For a number of years
prior to the capture of Constantinople by Mohammed II. in 1453 the
Gipsies had commenced to wend their way to various parts of Europe. The
200,000 Gipsies who had emigrated to Wa