rja tiro pen,

BRITANNIA LEE.

TRANSLATION.

_February_ 1_st_.

MY DEAR FRIEND,--You will be glad to learn that I, within the week,
found a real Romany family (place) here in this town. Charming it
was to find our folk again; pleasant it was to listen to our tongue.
The Lord be on me! but I was half sick of Gentiles and their ways
till this occurred. The other day, as I was returning from a highly
aristocratic breakfast, where we had winter strawberries with the
_creme de la creme_, I saw two gypsy women sitting on a bench in ---
Square. Black eyes, black hair, red kerchiefs on their heads, their
baskets on the ground before their feet. Dear Lord! but I was half
wild with delight at seeing them. Aye, I made the coachman stop the
horses, and cried aloud, "Come here!" They thought I was a lady to
fortune-tell, and came quickly. But I laughed, and said in Romany,
"How are you, my dears? You don't know that I am a gypsy." They
could not trust their very ears or eyes! At length one said, "My
God! what _is_ your name?" "My name's Britannia Lee," and, at a
glance, they saw that I was to be trusted, and a Romany. Their
names, they said, were M. and D. It was hard (far) for them to
understand how a Romany lady _could_ live among Gentiles, and look so
Gorgious, and yet be a true gypsy withal, and proud of her dark
blood. Much they talked about our people; much news I heard,--much
as to who was married and born and buried, who was come from the old
country, and much more. Oh, _never_ was such news so sweet to me!
M. said, "I don't know how you _can_ live among the Gentiles." I
answered, "I don't live; I _die_, living in their houses with them."
They begged me then to come and see them in their home, upon the
hill, where they are wintering. M. said, "Come, my sister, and eat a
little with us. You know that the women are only at home at night
and on Sunday."

Sunday morning, sister and I went there, and found the house. It was
a little place, but, as they said, after the life in wagons it seemed
large. M. was there, and her husband's mother, a nice old woman;
also A., with four children. M. was cooking as we entered. The old
mother was glad to see us; she wis