He was the one disturbing influence in the tribe, and when the illness seized him, always suddenly and unexpectedly, frantic crises of shrill emotion broke the tranquillity of the camp. From all sides gesticulating women would rush screaming wildly, and the men would leave their work to return soon after in gloomy silence bending their heads to an inevitable fate, while the poor little figure in all the ridiculous bravery of his gaudy clothes and pale blue plush hat would be carried under shelter and nursed tenderly. The distracted mother, meanwhile, would pace the ground, her face distorted with agony, clutching convulsively at her hair and singing a wild lament; and even the queenly Tinka would sink to the ashes where she stood, raise her kindly face to heaven and weep aloud. Such scenes were frequent and very painful. Even more painful was one’s sense of impotence afterwards, when Zhawzha offered all she had, even the gold coins from her hair, in exchange for her boy’s health. Time alone could give what she demanded; but she scorned patience and would not wait. No cure which anybody recommended was left untried, it mattered not what it was nor how much it cost. And so the child wore amulets, and to the tent-pole mysterious bunches of thorn-twigs were tied. But the malady was stubborn, and recourse was had to quacks who poisoned the little fellow with excessive doses so that he ceased even to speak, and wandered aimlessly in a comatose condition. And then, most wonderfully—for which of us in our own land could find, at need, a sorceress?—they discovered that there was a witch-doctor in Bradford. Letters were dictated, symptoms described, medicine bought at exorbitant prices, and Harley Street fees paid. A lock of hair was cut and sent, untouched by human hands, for some kind of sympathetic magic. But this, like everything else, failed to effect the instantaneous cure the mother demanded, and she and her lad, with his father, a very black and rather stupid little Gypsy named Adam Kirpatsh, journeyed to Bradford for a personal interview.