“Mistaken mortals, did you know Where joy, heart’s ease, and comforts grow!”
[Picture: An English gipsy king—“krális”—lying in wait in his palace, králisko-kair]
In May, 1880, I visited one of the largest towns in the midland counties, with the object of ascertaining the probable number of shows, vans, and other movable abodes there were in and round the outskirts of the town, and found close about thirty. These, together with others in various parts of the country, would in all probability bring the number to nearly forty-five. No doubt other counties would furnish similar results. In showing the number of those who live in these vans I will quote the following seven cases as a specimen. The numbers were given to me by a man and his wife, who own and live in one of the vans about the size of a carrier’s dray, following the profession of “knock-’em-down.” B—, man, wife, and eleven children of all ages and sizes; S—, man, wife, and four children; J—, man, wife, and five children; P—, man, wife, and seven children; B—, man, wife, and four children; E—, man, wife, and seven children; N—, man, wife, and five children. By these figures it will be seen that there are forty-three children and fourteen men and women, with four-fifths at least of English blood in their veins, living in these seven vans. Few of these persons can read or write. I should think scarcely half a dozen could write their own names. In the case of the man B—, two children could just put three letters together, and two could just write their own names, and this was the extent of their education. Some of the “popgun” owners I have known personally for some years. One of the sons worked for me, and would by this time have been earning his £1 per week; but instead of this the whole family of twelve have taken to this libertine kind of wandering existence, with a prospect that does not look very encouraging, and many others are doing the same thing. These cases are given to show what is going on all over the country. In some instances the parents would send their children to school, but they say they cannot afford to pay for a week’s schooling when the children can only attend a day or two. It seems hardly fair to make those who of all others should have their education encouraged to pay three times as much as town residents, which is the case when the children attend three different schools in one week. These ramblers are on the increase, and it is high time they were taken in hand. James, a man well known, and who travels with a “ginger-bread stall,” said, when I told him my object and what the results would be, as he filled my hand full of his best “Grantham ginger-bread,” “God bless you, man, for it, and I wish with all my heart it would come to pass to morrow. Will it be three months first?” I told him that I thought it would be a much longer time than that, at which he shook his head, and said it was a “bad job.”