osites
on all occasions, and wonders that you do not promptly accept and
understand what his own people comprehend. This is not the case among
the Indians of North America, because oratory, involving the accurate use
of words, is among them the one great art; nor are the negroes, despite
their heedless ignorance, so deficient, since they are at least very fond
of elegant expressions and forcible preaching. I am positive and
confident that it would be ten times easier to learn a language from the
wildest Indian on the North American continent than from any real English
Gipsy, although the latter may be inclined with all his heart and soul to
teach, even to the extent of passing his leisure days in "skirmishing"
about among the tents picking up old Rommany words. Now the Gipsy has
passed his entire life in the busiest scenes of civilisation, and is
familiar with all its refined rascalities; yet notwithstanding this, I
have found by experience that the most untutored Kaw or Chippewa, as
ignorant of English as I was ignorant of his language, and with no means
of intelligence between us save signs, was a genius as regards ability to
teach language when compared to most Gipsies.

Everybody has heard of the Oriental _salaam_! In English Gipsy _shulam_
means a greeting. "Shulam to your kokero!" is another form of
_sarishan_! the common form of salutation. The Hindu _sar i sham_
signifies "early in the evening," from which I infer that the Dom or Rom
was a nocturnal character like the Night-Cavalier of Quevedo, and who
sang when night fell, "Arouse ye, then, my merry men!" or who said "Good-
evening!" just as we say (or used to say) "Good-day!" {127}

A very curious point of affinity between the Gipsies and Hindus may be
found in a custom which was described to me by a Rom in the following
words:--

"When a mush mullers, an' the juvas adree his ker can't _kair habben_
because they feel so naflo 'bout the rom being gone, or the chavi or
juvalo mush, or whoever it may be, then their friends for trin divvuses
kairs their habben an' bitchers it a lende. An' that's tacho Rommanis,
an' they wouldn't be dessen Rommany chuls that wouldn't kair dovo for
mushis in sig an' tukli."

"When a man dies, and the women in his house cannot prepare food
(literally, make food) as they feel so badly because the man is gone (or
the girl, or young man, or whoever it may be), then their friends for
three days prepare their food and send it t