oys better than the black-eyed
Gipsy girl has done among "fast-goers," swells, and fops. In ninety-nine
cases out of a hundred she has trotted them out to perfection and then
left them in the lurch, and those, when they have come to their senses,
and had their eyes opened to the stern facts of a Gipsy's life, have said
to themselves, "What fools we have been, to be sure," and they would have
given any amount to have undone the past. The praise, flattery, and
looks bestowed upon the "bewitching deceivers," when they have been
labouring under the sense of infatuation and fascination instead of
reason, has made them in the presence of friends hang down their heads
like a willow, and to escape, if possible, the company of their "old
chums" by all sorts of manoeuvres. Hubert Petalengro--a gentleman, and a
rich member of a long family--conceived the idea, after falling madly in
love with a dark-eyed beauty, so-called, of turning Gipsy and tasting for
himself--not in fiction and romance--the charms of tent life, as he
thought, in reality passing through the "first," "second," and "third
degrees." At first, it was ideal and fascinating enough in all
conscience; it was a pity Brother Petalengro did not have a foretaste of
it by spending a month in a Gipsy's tent in the depth of winter, with no
balance at his banker's, and compelled to wear Gipsy clothing, and make
pegs and skewers for his Sunday broth; gather sticks for the fire, and
sleep on damp straw in the midst of slush and snow, and peeping through
the ragged tent roof at the moon as he lay on his back, surrounded by
Gipsies of both sexes, of all ages and sizes, cursing each other under
the maddening influence of brandy and disappointment. To make himself
and his damsel comfortable on a Gipsy tour he fills his pocket with gold,
flask with brandy, buys a quantity of rugs upon which are a number of
foxes' heads--and I suppose tails too--waterproof covering for the tent,
and waterproof sheets and a number of blankets to lay on the damp grass
to prevent their tender bodies being overtaken with rheumatics, and he
also lays in a stock of potted meats and other dainties; makes all
"square" with Esmeralda and her two brothers and the donkeys; takes first
and second-class tickets for the whole of them to Hull--the Balaams
excepted (it is not on record that they spoke to him on his journey);
provides Esmeralda with dresses and petticoats--not too long to hide her
pretty ankles, r