The
English, who are accustomed to them from childhood, and often suffer
from their petty depredations, consider them as mere nuisances; but I
have been very much struck with their peculiarities. I like to behold
their clear olive complexions, their romantic black eyes, their raven
locks, their lithe, slender figures; and hear them in low silver tones
dealing forth magnificent promises of honours and estates, of world's
wealth, and ladies' love.
Their mode of life, too, has something in it very fanciful and
picturesque. They are the free denizens of nature, and maintain a
primitive independence, in spite of law and gospel; of county gaols
and country magistrates. It is curious to see this obstinate adherence
to the wild, unsettled habits of savage life transmitted from
generation to generation, and preserved in the midst of one of the
most cultivated, populous, and systematic countries in the world. They
are totally distinct from the busy, thrifty people about them. They
seem to be, like the Indians of America, either above or below the
ordinary cares and anxieties of mankind. Heedless of power, of
honours, of wealth; and indifferent to the fluctuations of times; the
rise or fall of grain, or stock, or empires, they seem to laugh at the
tolling, fretting world around them, and to live according to the
philosophy of the old song:
"Who would ambition shun,
And loves to lie i' the sun,
Seeking the food he eats,
And pleased with what he gets,
Come hither, come hither, come hither;
Here shall he see
No enemy,
But winter and rough weather.
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