The tinkler-gypsies . sh Tinklers and Tinkler-Gypsies to the wave of Gypsies which enteredIreland or Great Britain either towards theend of the fifteenth or the beginning of thesixteenth century. Our attitude towards the Tinklers renders itsomewhat difficult to obtain information fromthem. When we chance upon a gang of Tinklers—such as that depicted in Mr Malcolm excellent sketch of a Tinklers encamp-ment, showing Will Marshall, the ProtestantTinkler, a descendant of our hero Billy Marshall,busy making tin cans—what are our feelings ?Do we not admire the picturesque scene, and thenn
The tinkler-gypsies . sh Tinklers and Tinkler-Gypsies to the wave of Gypsies which enteredIreland or Great Britain either towards theend of the fifteenth or the beginning of thesixteenth century. Our attitude towards the Tinklers renders itsomewhat difficult to obtain information fromthem. When we chance upon a gang of Tinklers—such as that depicted in Mr Malcolm excellent sketch of a Tinklers encamp-ment, showing Will Marshall, the ProtestantTinkler, a descendant of our hero Billy Marshall,busy making tin cans—what are our feelings ?Do we not admire the picturesque scene, and thennoting the Tinklers themselves and the primitiveconditions under which they exist, does not some-thing akin to contempt take possession of us ?These same feelings are the direct descendantsof the feelings which have alw^s drawn out,in self-defence, the worst characteristics of theGypsies. Their physical beauty, graced by apretty style of dress and ornamentation, charmedour forefathers, who, nevertheless, persecuted. z^ 5 -2 o II 4 The Tnikler-Gxpsies. and even hanged many of them merely becausethey were habit and repute Egyptians. Needwe wonder, then, that in self-defence theyretaliated ? and so is it now. Our attitude ofcontempt towards the poor Tinklers is oursurest way to perpetuate their worst characteris-tics. Why should we treat them so ? There ismuch in their ancestry and history to be justlyproud of. They possess a strong strain ofPictish(?) and Gypsy blood. It is the strengthof that strain that has caused them to clinglonger than their neighbours to the manners andcustoms of their ancestors. Their individualityhas been too strongly marked to allow them tochange with changing polities. Dont let uspass them by merely as objects of idle are a most intensely interesting class, andif we would only break down that barrier ofreserve which we, by our attitude of contemptfor these poor strugglers with their ownindividuality, have created in them, w^e woulddraw
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