Some importance ought to be attached to the opinion of the
Gitanos themselves on this point. 'El Crallis ha nicobado la liri
de los Cales,' is a proverbial saying among them. By Crallis, or
King, they mean Carlos Tercero, so that the saying, the proverbial
saying, may be thus translated: THE LAW OF CARLOS TERCERO HAS
SUPERSEDED GYPSY LAW.
By the law the schools are open to them, and there is no art or
science which they may not pursue, if they are willing. Have they
availed themselves of the rights which the law has conferred upon
them?
Up to the present period but little - they still continue jockeys
and blacksmiths; but some of these Gypsy chalans, these bronzed
smiths, these wild-looking esquiladors, can read or write in the
proportion of one man in three or four; what more can be expected?
Would you have the Gypsy bantling, born in filth and misery, 'midst
mules and borricos, amidst the mud of a choza or the sand of a
barranco, grasp with its swarthy hands the crayon and easel, the
compass, or the microscope, or the tube which renders more distinct
the heavenly orbs, and essay to become a Murillo, or a Feijoo, or a
Lorenzo de Hervas, as soon as the legal disabilities are removed
which doomed him to be a thievish jockey or a sullen husbandman?
Much will have been accomplished, if, after the lapse of a hundred
years, one hundred human beings shall have been evolved from the
Gypsy stock, who shall prove sober, honest, and useful members of
society, - that stock so degraded, so inveterate in wickedness and
evil customs, and so hardened by brutalising laws.
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