The men,
every market-day, are to be seen on the skirts of the mercado,
generally with some miserable animal - for example, a foundered
mule or galled borrico, by means of which they seldom fail to gain
a dollar or two, either by sale or exchange. It must not, however,
be supposed that they content themselves with such paltry earnings.
Provided they have any valuable animal, which is not unfrequently
the case, they invariably keep such at home snug in the stall,
conducting thither the chapman, should they find any, and
concluding the bargain with the greatest secrecy. Their general
reason for this conduct is an unwillingness to exhibit anything
calculated to excite the jealousy of the chalans, or jockeys of
Spanish blood, who on the slightest umbrage are in the habit of
ejecting them from the fair by force of palos or cudgels, in which
violence the chalans are to a certain extent countenanced by law;
for though by the edict of Carlos the Third the Gitanos were in
other respects placed upon an equality with the rest of the
Spaniards, they were still forbidden to obtain their livelihood by
the traffic of markets and fairs.
They have occasionally however another excellent reason for not
exposing the animal in the public mercado - having obtained him by
dishonest means.
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