I had at first some suspicion that it would prove a mere made-up gibberish; but I was soon undeceived.

Broken, corrupted, and half in ruins as it was, it was not long before I found that it was an original speech, far more so, indeed, than one or two others of high name and celebrity, which, up to that time, I had been in the habit of regarding with respect and veneration.

Indeed many obscure points connected with the vocabulary of these languages, and to which neither classic nor modern lore afforded any clue, I thought I could now clear up by means of this strange broken tongue, spoken by people who dwelt amongst thickets and furze bushes, in tents as tawny as their faces, and whom the generality of mankind designated, and with much semblance of justice, as thieves and vagabonds.

But where did this speech come from, and who were they who spoke it?
These were questions which I could not solve, and which Jasper himself, when pressed, confessed his inability to answer.

'But, whoever we be, brother,' said he, 'we are an old people, and not what folks in general imagine, broken gorgios; and, if we are not Egyptians, we are at any rate Rommany Chals!' {picture:'My name is Herne, and I comes of the hairy ones!': page122.jpg} 'Rommany Chals! I should not wonder after all,' said I, 'that these people had something to do with the founding of Rome.