They know that chastity is a jewel of high price, and that
conjugal fidelity is capable of occasionally flinging a sunshine
even over the dreary hours of a life passed in the contempt of
almost all laws, whether human or divine.
There is a word in the Gypsy language to which those who speak it
attach ideas of peculiar reverence, far superior to that connected
with the name of the Supreme Being, the creator of themselves and
the universe. This word is LACHA, which with them is the corporeal
chastity of the females; we say corporeal chastity, for no other do
they hold in the slightest esteem; it is lawful amongst them, nay
praiseworthy, to be obscene in look, gesture, and discourse, to be
accessories to vice, and to stand by and laugh at the worst
abominations of the Busne, provided their LACHA YE TRUPOS, or
corporeal chastity, remains unblemished. The Gypsy child, from her
earliest years, is told by her strange mother, that a good Calli
need only dread one thing in this world, and that is the loss of
Lacha, in comparison with which that of life is of little
consequence, as in such an event she will be provided for, but what
provision is there for a Gypsy who has lost her Lacha? 'Bear this
in mind, my child,' she will say, 'and now eat this bread, and go
forth and see what you can steal.
Pages:
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320
321