the Chinese or the mystical _Swastika_ of the Buddhists,
embraces the long line of life, or of the infinite and the short, or
broken lines of the finite, and, therefore, as an ancient magical Eastern
sign, would be most appropriately inscribed as a _sikker-paskero
dromescro_--or hand post--to show the wandering Rommany how to proceed on
their way of life.

[Svastika: ill27.jpg]

That the ordinary Christian Cross should be called by the English Gipsies
a _trin bongo drum_--or the three cross roads--is not remarkable when we
consider that their only association with it is that of a "wayshower," as
Germans would call it. To you, reader, it may be that it points the way
of eternal life; to the benighted Rommany-English-Hindoo, it indicates
nothing more than the same old weary track of daily travel; of wayfare
and warfare with the world, seeking food and too often finding none;
living for petty joys and driven by dire need; lying down with poverty
and rising with hunger, ignorant in his very wretchedness of a thousand
things which he _ought_ to want, and not knowing enough to miss them.

Just as the reader a thousand, or perhaps only a hundred, years
hence--should a copy of this work be then extant--may pity the writer of
these lines for his ignorance of the charming comforts, as yet unborn,
which will render _his_ physical condition so delightful. To thee, oh,
future reader, I am what the Gipsy is to me! Wait, my dear boy of the
Future--wait--till _you_ get to heaven!

Which is a long way off from the Gipsies. Let us return. We had spoken
_of patteran_, or of crosses by the way-side, and this led naturally
enough to speaking of Him who died on the Cross, and of wandering. And I
must confess that it was with great interest I learned that the Gipsies,
from a very singular and Rommany point of view, respect, and even pay
him, in common with the peasantry in some parts of England, a peculiar
honour. For this reason I bade the Gipsy carefully repeat his words, and
wrote them down accurately. I give them in the original, with a
translation. Let me first state that my informant was not quite clear in
his mind as to whether the Boro Divvus, or Great Day, was Christmas or
New Year's, nor was he by any means certain on which Christ was born. But
he knew very well that when it came, the Gipsies took great pains to burn
an ash-wood fire.

"Avali--adusta cheirus I've had to jal dui or trin mees of a Boro Divvus
sig' in t