His vocabulary, however, has been
always accepted as the speech of the English Gypsies, whereas it is
at most entitled to be considered as the peculiar speech of the
thieves and vagabonds of his time. The cant of the present day,
which, though it differs in some respects from the vocabulary
already mentioned, is radically the same, is used not only by the
thieves in town and country, but by the jockeys of the racecourse
and the pugilists of the 'ring.' As a specimen of the cant of
England, we shall take the liberty of quoting the epithalamium to
which we have above alluded:-
'Bing out, bien morts, and tour and tour
Bing out, bien morts and tour;
For all your duds are bing'd awast,
The bien cove hath the loure. (78)
'I met a dell, I viewed her well,
She was benship to my watch:
So she and I did stall and cloy
Whatever we could catch.
'This doxy dell can cut ben whids,
And wap well for a win,
And prig and cloy so benshiply,
All daisy-ville within.
'The hoyle was up, we had good luck,
In frost for and in snow;
Men they did seek, then we did creep
And plant the roughman's low.'
It is scarcely necessary to say anything more upon the Germania in
general or in particular; we believe that we have achieved the task
which we marked out for ourselves, and have conveyed to our readers
a clear and distinct idea of what it is.
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