These prophecies are repeated, particularly by Ezekiel, many times almost in the same words in different chapters (see particularly the whole of the 30th and 32nd), as if he were desirous in an especial manner to enforce them. These denunciations and prophecies, then, seem clearly to establish three distinct important events to the Egyptians—first, their complete conquest and dispersion; secondly, their remaining dispersed, without idols, among all nations and countries, in the open fields, during forty years; and, finally, their being again brought to the land of their habitation, where they shall be taught to know the Lord.

The Gipsies.72 By Samuel Roberts.

OUR GUIDE—TO THE MOUNTAINS—MYSTIC LIGHT—THE PHOTOGRAPHS—THE CLAYMORE YACHT—NORWEGIAN GIPSIES—SINGULAR RACE—OCCUPATIONS—GIPSY BURIALS—ROMANTIC LOVE—PREDESTINATION—THE BONDEGAARD—THE HIGH DEMAND—ESMERALDA’S SOUVENIR.

A note was soon after placed in our hands, by a broad-shouldered thickset muscular man, rather under middle height, with a thick sandy almost red beard; his small quick eye betokened alertness, and self-possession, his countenance expressed good temper, fidelity, and rectitude. It was not necessary to look again, as we took the note. He was a broad-chested, sturdy reindeer hunter, of the Fjeld; the note was an introduction given by Mr. L. the bearer was Ole Halvorsen, or as he is usually called Ole RÖdsheim, from the name of his station and land in Boeverdal. A certificate of strong recommendation by two English gentlemen, for whom he had recently acted as guide, and had lately parted from, was also given us. Captain C.‘s name was also used with his permission. We at once liked Ole RÖdsheim; his quiet manner, and appearance, was so different from many of the “Tolks,” and guides, who are often more trouble, and expense than use; most of them would sneeze for an hour, at the idea of sleeping on some damp heath, under a rock during a windy wet night, near the exhilarating influence of a cold snow field; such were not the men for our expedition, and Ole RÖdsheim was. After a careful inspection of our maps, we soon arranged in our minds, the course for our future expedition after we left Veblungsnoes. The summit of the Galdhoepiggen, the MÖrkfos, and the valders, with a long route through many Mountain and Lake scenes, we proposed to accomplish. Ole RÖdsheim spoke good English, and the following arrangement was soon concluded; he was to join us near Molmen, and guide our party over the mountains, to Skeaker, Lom, and RÖdsheim, and ascend with us the GaldhÖpiggen, for the sum of three dollars and a half, finding himself board and lodging; his services afterwards, if required, to be 4 marks a day, including everything. Deciding to make a forced march, and travel in two days what we had before travelled in four, we agreed to be at the BÖver Moen (Beaver stream) between Stueflaaten and Molmen on the following Wednesday morning.

With what pleasure we looked forward to fresh scenes of travel and adventure in even wilder scenes of nature than those we had yet traversed. Those we had seen were very beautiful; each camp seemed to eclipse the last, in the beauty of its scenery. On those still clear Norwegian nights, full of mystic light, lovely in their starlight stillness, the mind seemed enthralled, in a thousand pleasing fancies; the music of the waterfall; the voices on the breeze. The melody of nature, produced impressions we can never forget.

Norway is not the country for the sybarite, fainÉant, and the flÂneur; it is the home of the hardy mountaineer, the angler, the reindeer hunter, and nomad wanderer, the lover of nature and nature’s works in her wildest and most beautiful forms.

Plants, mosses of every hue, trees, rocks, glaciers, torrents, lakes, fjords, waterfalls, mountains, woods, and glens, are, in their perfection, met at every step, in Norway’s free romantic land.

When Mr. L. came to our camp in the evening with Herr Solberg, we arranged for our photographs, and paid for them. The views of Romsdalshorn, Veblungsnoes, and Troldtinderne, from which the engravings in this book are taken, had yet to be completed specially for us. They were afterwards forwarded; Herr Solberg was allowed the privilege of disposing of the stereoscopic view of our gipsy camp, and the carte de visite of Esmeralda. The specimens he brought to show us, were presented to Esmeralda.

Our last walk with Mr. L. is taken by the Isfjord. As a parting souvenir we gave him an illustrated copy of Her Majesty the Queen of England’s Journal, with which he was much interested; Mr. L. added much to the pleasure of our visit to the quaint old town of Veblungsnoes. When shall we meet again? So it is in this world; we meet and we part, but fortunately the memory retains friendship’s recollection not so easily effaced.

From the Isfjord, near Veblungsnoes, the farm was pointed out to us where Colonel Sinclair, who perished at the Kringelen, landed with his forces.

The church of Veblungsnoes is represented in the engraving of the town. There was nothing remarkable about this church to note. A newly dug grave was prepared in the churchyard for the deceased Bondegaard, who had resided near. If it happens that the clergyman cannot attend when the corpse is buried no delay occurs; the service is read over by the clergyman at some future time, when he attends for church service. The yacht Claymore added a charm to our evening contemplation of the Isfjord. Noah said he had seen one of the gentlemen of the yacht on shore, who had that day ascended the mountain above our camp.

Our stay was now nearly ended. Hitherto our travels had through every difficulty, been most successful; we had scarcely lost anything; the two hats, musketo veil, and kettle prop we could manage without. Mr. L. told us that two young Norwegian friends who had made an excursion, came to him with scarcely anything left; they had forgotten some article at nearly every place they went to. With some trouble the things were again recovered. When the travellers departed, they again contrived to leave behind them an umbrella and a pair of galoshes.

Some of the Norwegian gipsies usually attend the October fair at Veblungsnoes. The women are very handsome, and some of the men. When they attend the fair, the women drink even more than the men. They are very fond of music, and at the fairs, when they have drunk to excess, are very quarrelsome and passionate. Under the Norwegian law any person who arrives at a certain age without being able to read or write, and who has not been confirmed, is liable to be committed to gaol. There they remain until they can read, write, and are properly instructed in religious knowledge. Many of the gipsies when examined by clergymen, have been found so ignorant, and without instruction, that they have from time to time been committed to prison, and detained there, till they came up to the standard of required proficiency. Proesten Eilert Sundt had therefore good opportunities of seeing them, and conversing with them. The vocabulary of Romany words, as spoken by the Norwegian gipsies, which he has collected, with other information, is very valuable.73 His mission seems to have been performed with much energy. The short rÉsumÉ of his works, given in the appendix to this book, we had specially made for our English readers; it gives some idea of the state in which he found this wandering and singular people in Norway. The Storthing granted a large sum for the amelioration of their condition. We were told that some gipsies who had money given them, and were settled in farms on the shore of the Isfjord opposite Veblungsnoes, did not remain long, and, selling their farms, disappeared with the money. Many of the gipsies who attend the Veblungsnoes fair, when asked where they came from, say the Valders. This was one reason why we decided to return with our gipsies through that part of Norway. Notwithstanding, Proesten Sundt’s account of their mode of life, and predilections, and the very unenviable notoriety they seem to have attained in Norway, we were certainly anxious to fall in with a band of these wanderers, so that our people might hold converse with them. We were told that some of the gipsies had land in the Valders! but it is very possible that the statement that they came from that part of Norway was an evasive reply. It is very seldom gipsies will give even their right names to curious questioners; as in other countries where they are found, and in very few they are not, they deal in horses and work in metals. The Norwegian gipsies are skilful workers in brass; we were told that they live in houses in the winter, the cold being too intense for them to travel with their tents.

The circumstance of the non-burial of the gipsy dead in the Norwegian churchyards, as stated by the Proesten Sundt, is not confined exclusively to the gipsies of Norway. Baudrimont in his “Langue des BohÉmiens,” as spoken by those living in the Basque provinces, says at page 27, “We know not what becomes of the gipsies who die; not the slightest trace of them is ever met with. This has given rise to the idea, that they turn the course of rivulets, and, digging a pit, place the body in the torrent’s bed, and again let the water resume its course.”

Francisque-Michel in his work, “Le Pays Basque,”74 at page 143, says:—“‘I have noticed in many localities,’ said Monsieur le Vicomte de Belsunce, who was for a considerable period the mayor of a district, ‘that gipsy men and women of great age, long known to the present generation as old people, disappear suddenly, and never return. It is a common occurrence, and yet no labourer in the fields, or traveller on the roads, or shepherd, or hunter in the mountains, ever sees the trace of a grave.’”

And the same author says:—“Was Grellman75 right, or was it true, as many assert, that these people turned the course of some brook whilst they made the grave, and turned the stream over it immediately afterwards? Such a burial would not leave any trace, and it was so they buried Attila, who followed, when he came into Europe, the same route as the gipsies.”

The more the gipsy element becomes mingled with other house-dwelling races the less strongly will they cling to their tents. We who have tried it must confess to a strange fascination in tent life. To our own knowledge we have known instances of gipsies who have married house-dwelling gorgios. One singular instance of romantic love was once narrated to me of a young gentleman of birth, who became so infatuated as to leave all for a handsome gipsy girl he met with. She left the neighbourhood of his home, but he could not rest, and, with a few things, followed and found her, and at last submitted for her sake to be her husband and adopt tent life. His end was sad. He was making some pegs for her to sell, but being unpractised in the art, and clumsy with his knife, it slipped and entered his thigh, probably severed the femoral artery, for he died soon after.

As long as much of the gipsy element remains, it is not probable that they can be bent to the steady pursuits of a stationary house-dwelling population. As well try to turn the falcon into a barn-door fowl; but Christian charity should lead us, if we cannot alter their nature, to aid in placing them in such course of life, as may best improve and raise their moral condition, without requiring them to sacrifice entirely, those strong and restless feelings, which seem inherent in their being, and the necessity of some mysterious law or predestination.

We sat out late by our tents, writing our notes; the long evenings of clear light, enabled us often to snatch those hours which in England, would be quite dark. The gipsies, before we retired to rest, had their dose of brimstone and treacle, and with many anticipations, we were soon buried in repose.

All was stir and bustle. Up, Noah!—up, Zachariah!—vand! All were moving before six. Eggs, bread, butter, and tea for breakfast. Esmeralda had been unwell all night. Our gipsies had been living well, and without their usual exercise. Esmeralda was evidently bilious. She had behaved very well, and was now deep in the mysteries of cooking and housekeeping.

The old farmer hovered near as if he was looking out for his quarry. We had scarcely seen him about before. We were uncertain when Mr. L. would come, and therefore mentioned to the farmer that we wished to pay him for our accommodation.

He led the way into his house, and we found ourselves in a little parlour, comfortably furnished, but without any ventilation: a picture of the death-bed of King Oscar in 1859, two prints of the Emperor Napoleon III. and the Empress, and a German coloured print called Elise, and Our Saviour, were placed on the walls.

His daughter brought in a bottle of some wine or cordial, and a wine-glass, but we asked for a cup of coffee in preference. In answer to my request, the old man, who sat on the other side of the table, counted slowly on his fingers five marks—“Een thaler,” said he. It was what we expected, and proceeding to pay him, we pulled out three dollar notes. Not wishing to pay more of our silver away than we could help, we thought it a good opportunity to pay one of our dollar notes. Directly the old man saw the notes he suddenly counted three on his fingers, and raised his demand to “drei thalers.” It was of little consequence, and we paid him his demand, disgusted with his cupidity—three dollars, or 13s. 6d. English money, which in Norway was equivalent to the rent of a cottage and ground for one year for a Huusmand. What different hospitality the wanderers met with from many not half so wealthy, who brought to our camp fladbrÖd for our acceptance. This, and the one at Lillehammer, were the only two instances we met with of any over-exaction in Norway. We were told afterwards that one dollar was amply sufficient.

We had almost loaded our donkeys when Mr. L. came; and at our wish a boatman brought up two very fine sea trout, for which we paid three marks and twelve skillings, and took them with us.

The militia were to commence their training at Veblungsnoes that morning. One of our former acquaintances, a Norwegian captain—a fine specimen of a thorough-going military man, erect and handsome, with his grey moustache—had come to see us off. Esmeralda stepped forward, and pinned some beautiful flowers, selected from the Aak bouquet, in Mr. L.’s coat. A copy of our song was left for Monsieur le Capitaine’s son; another for Frue Landmark, of Aak; and one for Herr Solberg; and two copies for Mr. L. to do what he liked with. The Chevalier had sent a very nice return telegram to us. Mr. L. and the Captain were astonished at the weight our donkeys carried. We wished the farmer’s wife and daughter and son good-by. The old man was absent, probably gloating over his sudden acquisition of wealth. His son and daughter were very quiet, respectable young people. The farm people collected on the ground, and, saluting each other with our hats, we left the camp, and passed up the wide lane leading to the main route. As we were disappearing over the edge of the ascent, we saw the Capitaine and his son still looking after us; they waved their hats as we vanished with a farewell signal in return.