theft of a considerable sum of money at a Dalkeith market. The proof seemed to the judge fully sufficient, but the jury being of a different opinion, brought in the verdict Not Proven, on which occasion, the presiding judge, when he dismissed the prisoner from the bar, informed him, in his own characteristic language, "That he had rubbit shouthers wi' the gallows that morning;" and warned him not again to appear there with a similar body of proof against him, as it seemed scarce possible he should meet with another jury who would construe it as favourably. Upon the same occasion, the prisoner's counsel, a gentleman now deceased, thought it proper also to say something to his client on the risk he had run, and the necessity of future propriety of conduct; to which the gypsey replied, to the great entertainment of all around, "That he was proven an innocent man, and that naebody had ony right to use siccan language to him."

We have much satisfaction in being enabled to relate the following characteristic anecdotes, in the words of another correspondent of the highest respectability:

"A gang, of the name of Winters, long inhabited the wastes of Northumberland, and committed many crimes; among others, a murder upon a poor woman, with singular atrocity, for which one of them was hung in chains, near Tone-pitt, in Reedsdale. His mortal reliques having decayed, the lord of the manor has replaced them by a wooden effigy, and still maintains the gibbet. The remnant of this gang came to Scotland about fifteen years ago, and assumed the Roxburghshire name of Winterip, as they found their own something odious. They settled at a cottage within about four miles of Earlston, and became great plagues to the country, until they were secured, after a tight battle, tried before the circuit court at Jedburgh, and banished back to their native country of England. The dalesmen of Reedwater shewed great reluctance to receive these returned emigrants. After the Sunday service at a little chapel near Otterbourne, one of the squires rose, and, addressing the congregation, told them they would be accounted no longer Reedsdale men, but Reedsdale women, if they permitted this marked and atrocious family to enter their district. The people answered, that they would not permit them to come that

way; and the proscribed family, hearing of the unanimous resolution to oppose their passage, went more southerly by the heads of Tyne, and I never heard more of them, but have little doubt they are all hanged.

"Will Allan, mentioned by the Reedwater Minstrel,* I did not know, but was well acquainted with his son, Jamie, a most excellent piper, and at one time in the household of the Northumberland family; but being an utterly unprincipled vagabond, he wearied the benevolence of all his protectors, who were numerous and powerful, and saved him from the gallows more than once. Upon one occasion, being closely pursued, when surprised in some villany, he dropped from the top of a very high wall, not without receiving a severe cut upon the fingers with a hanger from one of his pursu ers, who came up at the moment he hung suspended for descent. Allan exclaimed, with minstrel pride, Ye hae spoiled the best pipe hand in Britain. Latterly, he became an absolute mendicant, and I saw him refu→ sed quarters at the house of my uncle,

"A stalwart Tinkler wight was he,
An' weel could mend a pot or pan,
An' deftly Wull could thraw a flee,
An' neatly weave the willow wan';
"An' sweetly wild were Allan's strains,
An' mony a jig an' reel he blew,
Wi' merry lilts he charm'd the swains,
Wi' barbed spear the otter slew," &c.
Lay of the Reedwater Minstrel
Newcastle, 1809.

In a note upon a preceding passage of the same poem, the author (whose name was George Rokesby) says—

"Here was the rendezvous of the va

grant train of Faas, tinklers, &c. The celebrated Wull Allan frequently sojourned here, in the progress of his fishing and otter-hunting expeditions; and here often resounded the drones of his no less celebrated son, Jamie Allan, the Northumberland piper."

Lochside, near Yetholm, she had care fully abstained from committing any depredations on the farmer's property. But her sons (nine in number) had not, it seems, the same delicacy, and stole a brood-sow from their kind entertainer. Jean was so much mortified at this ungrateful conduct, and so much ashamed at it, that she absented herself from Lochside for several years. At length, in consequence of some temporary pecuniary necessity, the Goodman of Lochside was obliged to go to Newcastle to get some money to pay his rent. Returning through the mountains of Cheviot, he was benight ed, and lost his way. A light, glimmering through the window of a large waste barn, which had survived the farm-house to which it had once belonged, guided him to a place of shelter; and when he knocked at the door, it was opened by Jean Gordon. Her very remarkable figure, for she was nearly six feet high, and her equally remarkable features and dress, render ed it impossible to mistake her for a moment; and to meet with such a character in so solitary a place, and probably at no great distance from her clan, was a terrible surprise to the poor man, whose rent (to lose which would have been ruin to him) was about his person. Jean set up a loud shout of joyful recognition Eh, sirs! the winsome gudeman of Lochside! Light down, light down; for ye manna gang farther the night, and a friend's house sae near.' The farm er was obliged to dismount, and accept of the gypsey's offer of supper and a bed. There was plenty of meat in the barn, however it might be come by, and preparations were going on for a plentiful supper, which the farmer, to the great increase of his anxiety, observed, was calculated for ten or twelve guests, of the same description no doubt with his landlady. Jean left him in no doubt on the subject. She brought up the story of the stolen sow, and noticed how much pain and vexation it had given her. Like other philosophers, she remarked that the world grows worse daily; and, like other parents, that the bairns got out of her guiding, and neglected the old gypsey regulations, which commanded them to respect, in their depredations, the property of their benefactors. The end of all this was, an inquiry what money the farmer had about him,

and an urgent request, that he would make her his purse-keeper, as the bairns, so she called her sons, would be soon home. The poor farmer made a virtue of necessity, told his story, and surrendered his gold into Jane's custody. She made him put a few shillings in his pocket, observing it would excite suspicion should he be found travelling altogether pennyless. This arrangement being made, the farmer lay down on a sort of shakedown, as the Scotch call it, upon some straw, but, as will easily be believed, slept not. About midnight the gang returned with various articles of plunder, and talked over their exploits in language which made the farmer tremble. They were not long in discovering their guest, and demanded of Jane whom she had got there? "E'en the winsome gudeman of Lochside, poor body," replied Jane: "he's been at Newcastle seeking for siller to pay his rent, honest man, but deil-be-licket he's been able to gather in, and sae he's gaun e'en hame wi' a toom purse and a sair heart." "That may be, Jane," replied one of the banditti ; maun ripe his pouches a bit, and see if it be true or no." Jean set up her throat in exclamations against this breach of hospitality, but without producing any change of their determi nation. The farmer soon heard their stifled whispers and light steps by his bedside, and understood they were rummaging his clothes. When they found the money which the providence of Jean Gordon had made him retain, they held a consultation if they should take it or no, but the smallness of the booty, and the vehemence of Jean's remonstrances, determined them in the negative. They caroused and went to rest. So soon as day dawned, Jean roused her guest, produced his horse, which she had accommodated behind the hallan, and guided him for some miles till he was on the high road to Lochside. She then restored his whole property, nor could his earnest intreaties prevail on her to accept so much as a single guinea.

"but we

I have heard the old people at Jedburgh say, that all Jean's son's were condemned to die there on the same day. It is said the jury were equally divided; but that a friend to justice, who had slept during the whole discussion, waked suddenly, and gave his vote for condemnation, in the emphat

peculiar fashion, and a long staff nearly as tall as herself. I remember her well; every week she paid my father a visit for her almous, when I was a little boy, and I looked upon Madge with no common degree of awe and terror. When she spoke vehemently (for she had many complaints) she used to strike her staff upon the floor, and throw herself into an attitude which it was impossible to regard with indifference. She used to say that she could bring from the remotest parts of the island, friends to revenge her quarrel, while she sat motionless in her cottage; and she frequently boasted that there was a time when she was of considerable importance, for there were at her wedding fifty saddled asses, and unsaddled asses without number. If Jean Gordon was the prototype of the character of Meg Merrilies, I imagine Madge must have sat to the unknown author as the representative of her person.

"I have ever understood," says the same correspondent, speaking of the Yetholm gypsies," that they are extremely superstitious-carefully noticing the formation of the clouds, the flight of particular birds, and the soughing of the winds, before attempting any enterprise. They have been known for several successive days to turn back with their loaded carts, asses, and children, upon meeting with persons whom they considered of unlucky aspect; nor do they ever proceed upon their summer peregrinations without some propitious omen of their fortunate return. They also burn the clothes of their dead, not so much from any apprehension of infection being communicated by them, as the conviction that the very circumstance of wearing them would shorten the days of the living. They likewise carefully watch the corpse by night and day till the time of interment, and conceive that the deil tinkles at the lykewake' of those who felt in their dead thraw the agonies and terrors of remorse.-I am rather uncertain about the nature of their separate language. They certainly do frequently converse in such a way as completely to conceal their meaning from other people; but it seems doubtful whether the jargon they use, on such occasions, be not a mere slang invented for very obvious purposes. I recollect of having heard them conversing in VOL, I.

this manner-and whether it was an imaginary resemblance I know notbut the first time I listened to Hindhustanee spoken fluently, it reminded me of the colloquies of the Yetholm gypsies."

On the subject of the gypsey language, our readers will remark a curious coincidence between the observation just quoted, and the first of the following anecdotes, which we are enabled to state upon the authority and in the words of Mr Walter Scott-a gentleman to whose distinguished assistance and advice we have been on the present occasion very peculiarly indebted, and who has not only furnished us with many interesting particulars himself, but has also obligingly directed us to other sources of curious information :

"Whether the Yetholm gypsies have a separate language or not, I imagine might be ascertained, though those vagrants always reckon this among their arcana majora. A lady who had been in India addressed some gypsies in the Hindhustanee language, from the received opinion that it is similar to their own. They did not apparently understand her, but were extremely incensed at what they conceived a mockery; so it is probable the sound of the language had an affinity to that of their own.

"Of the Highland gypsies I had the following account from a person of observation, and highly worthy of credit. There are many settled in Kintyre, who travel through the highlands and lowlands annually. They frequently take their route through the passes of Loch Katrine, where they are often to be met with. They certainly speak among themselves a language totally distinct from either Gaelic or Lowland Scotch. A family having settled near my informer for a few days, he wormed some of the words out of a boy of about twelve years old, who communicate.l them with the utmost reluctance, saying, his grandfather would kill him if he knew of his teaching any one their speech. One of the sentences my informer remembered-it sounded like no language I ever heard, and I am certain it has no affinity with any branch of the Gothic or Celtic dialects. I omitted to write the words down, but they signified, 'I will stick my knife into you, you black son of a devil' a gypsey-like exclamation. My

H

"The Scottish lowland gypsies have not in general so atrocious a character, but are always poachers, robbers of hen-roosts, black-fishers, stealers of wood, &c. and in that respect inconvenient neighbours. A gang of them, Faas and Baillies, lately fought a skirmish with the Duke of Buccleuch's people and some officers of mine, in which a fish-spear was driven into the thigh of one of the game keepers.

"A lady of rank, who has resided some time in India, lately informed me, that the gypsies are to be found there in the same way as in England, and practise the same arts of posture-making and tumbling, fortune-telling, stealing, and so forth. The Indian gypsies are called Nuts, or Bazeegurs, and are believed by many to be the remains of an original race, prior even to the Hindhus, and who have never adopted the worship of Bramah. They are entirely different from the Parias, who are Hindhus that have lost caste, and so become degraded.

There is a very curious essay concerning the Nuts in the seventh volume of the Asiatic Researches, which contains some interesting observations on the origin and language of the European gypsies. But we have been tempted to extend this article already far beyond the limits we propose usually to allot to any subject in the course of a single Number; and though we have still many curious particulars to detail, we find these must necessarily be delayed till our next appearance. We cannot, however, quit this subject for the present without noticing with particular approbation a little work lately published by Mr Hoyland of Sheffield, entitled, "A Historical Survey of the Customs, Habits, and present State of the Gypsies; designed to develope the origin of this singular people, and to promote the amelioration of their condition." The author has industriously collected the substance of what previous historians or

travellers have related of them, from their first appearance in Europe down to our own times. He has also taken great pains to procure information respecting their present state in Britain

by sending circular queries to the chief provincial magistrates, and by personally visiting several of their encampments for the purpose of setting on foot some plan for their improvement and civilization. Mr Hoyland, we understand, is a member of the respectable society of Friends or Quakers

whose disinterested and unwearied exertions in the cause of injured hu manity are above all praise. It is enough to say of the present object, that it is not unworthy of that Christian philanthropy which accomplished the abolition of the slave trade. We shall account ourselves peculiarly happy, should our humble endeavours in any degree tend to promote Mr H.'s benevolent purpose, by attracting public attention to this degraded race of outcasts-the Parias of Europethousands of whom still exist in Britain, in a state of barbarism and wretchedness scarcely equalled by that of their brethren in India. From such of our readers as may have had opportunities of observing the manners, or investigating the origin and peculiar dialect of this singular people, we respectfully invite communications. Even solitary or seemingly trivial notices on such a subject ought not to be neglected: though singly unimportant, they may lead collec tively to valuable results. But we need not multiply observations on this point

since our idea is already so well expressed in the following extract from the same valuable communication which we last quoted.—" "I have always considered," says Mr Scott, as a very curious phenomenon in Society, the existence of those wandering tribes, having nearly the same manners and habits in all the nations of Europe, and mingling everywhere with civil society without ever becoming amalgamated with it. It has been hitherto found difficult to trace their origin, perhaps because there is not a sufficient number of facts to go upon. I have not spared you such as I have heard or observed, though many are trivial: if others who have better opportunities would do the same, some general conclusions might result from the whole."

(To be continued.)