 | English-gipsy songs |  |
199
THE SHAH.
“Yes, my master, I've seen the Shah,”
Said old Dame Petulengro to me.
“And I says to my son, ‘You needn't talk,
For I know he's a bit of a Rommany.’
Said old Dame Petulengro to me.
“And I says to my son, ‘You needn't talk,
For I know he's a bit of a Rommany.’
“I've seen all sorts of Gipsy folk,
Our own and them from beyond the sea;
I knows the eye, and I knows the walk:
I tell you he's somehow a Rommany.
Our own and them from beyond the sea;
I knows the eye, and I knows the walk:
I tell you he's somehow a Rommany.
“Other folks' eyes may be werry good eyes,
I won't say never how that may be;
But this I say, that that Persian rye's
Have got the shine of the Rommany.”
I won't say never how that may be;
But this I say, that that Persian rye's
Have got the shine of the Rommany.”
And as she talked in her Gipsy tongue,
With just one Persian word in three,
It seemed as if she couldn't be wrong,
And the Shah were a bit of a Rommany.
Persian words in these lines, and it chances that the proportion of them is rather less here than usually occurs. The following, however, belong to that language: Avali, Persian bali; rye, Pers. ray; rākker, Pers. rakídan; kush-ti, Pers. khush; shuned, Pers. shun-ídan; puri, Pers. pír; Mā (prohibitative), Pers. ma; Gorgiko (from Gorgio), Pers. kh'ája, pronounced khorja.
With just one Persian word in three,
It seemed as if she couldn't be wrong,
And the Shah were a bit of a Rommany.
The incident here described is true, every expression having been accurately retained. No effort has been made to introduce
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