e
had to content himself with a journey to Novgorod and Moscow. As he had
visited the Jews at Hamburg so he did the Gypsies at Moscow. This
adventure moved him to his first characteristic piece of prose, in a
letter to the Society. This letter, which was afterwards printed in the
"Athenaeum," {132} and incorporated in "The Zincali," mentions the
Gypsies who have become successful singers and married noblemen, but
continues:

"It is not, however, to be supposed that all the female Gypsies are of
this high, talented and respectable order: amongst them are many low and
profligate females, who sing at taverns or at the various gardens in the
neighbourhood, and whose husbands and male connexions subsist by horse
jobbing and like kinds of traffic. The principal place of resort of this
class is Marina Rotche, lying about two versts from Moscow, and thither I
drove, attended by a _valet de place_. Upon my arriving there, the
Gypsies swarmed out from their tents, and from the little tradeer, or
tavern, and surrounded me; standing on the seat of the caleche, I
addressed them in a loud voice in the dialect of the English Gypsies,
with which I have some slight acquaintance. A scream of wonder instantly
arose, and welcomes and greetings were poured forth in torrents of
musical Rommany, amongst which, however, the most prominent air was, 'Ah
kak mi toute karmama,' 'Oh, how we love you'; for at first they supposed
me to be one of their brothers, who they said, were wandering about in
Turkey, China, and other parts, and that I had come over the great
pawnee, or water, to visit them. . . . I visited this place several times
during my sojourn at Moscow, and spoke to them upon their sinful manner
of living, upon the advent and suffering of Christ Jesus, and expressed,
upon my taking leave of them, a hope that they would be in a short period
furnished with the word of eternal life in their own language, which they
seemed to value and esteem much higher than the Russian."

The tone of this letter suggests that it was meant for the Bible
Society--and a copy was addressed to them--but at this date it is
possible to see in it an outline of the Gypsy gentleman, very much the
gentleman, the "colossal clergyman" of later days.

Borrow liked the Russians, and for some reasons was sorry to leave them
and Hasfeldt in September, 1835. But for other reasons he was glad. He
would see his mother and comfort her for the loss of her elder son in