“To every man upon this earth death cometh soon or late,” and despite the postponement of the day of reckoning by living in the open air in a rational way, Romany life is not exempt from paying the debt to Nature, and sooner or later the sojourner in gypsy land must inevitably have some saddening experiences. One evening I was asked to sit up with friends whose father had just passed over to the majority. As I had known the old man in life very well and was desirous of showing my sympathy with the family in any way possible, I acceded to the request. The coffin was placed in a tent at a short distance from the rest of the camp, by its side stood a tiny clock recording the few hours remaining ere the body would be committed to the ground, the little chamber being lit by a lantern suspended from one of the tent rods. Two were keeping watch until midnight, when they would arouse two others to take their place until dawn. The autumn night was chilly, so a good fire was made and I sat until after ten o’clock with the watchers, until the moon, which was almost at the full, appeared well over the tree-tops, for we were in the depth of the forest; all around, and up to the little clearing in which the camp was situated, were large beeches and oaks whose foliage was quite still excepting when a slight puff of wind sent a shiver through the leaves. The whole scene was weird in the extreme,—the tent with its silent occupant, the watchers at a short distance by the fire whose lambent flames peopled the solitude with moving shadowy forms,—little imagination being needed for one to fancy them playing ghostly hide-and-seek among the trees,—and looking down upon it all was the harvest moon. I was present at the funeral next day, when the ceremony was most impressive, every one behaving with the utmost decorum. On this particular occasion there were none of the spectacular demonstrations of grief that at some gypsy funerals resemble the Eastern wailing. The personal belongings of the deceased were afterwards burned, as is customary, but I believe none of them were buried with him. These obsequies vary with different families, some of whom religiously carry out traditional rites, which others seem altogether to ignore. Many readers will doubtless recollect that, but a few years since, when a certain gypsy died, his van was burnt, crockery smashed, and metal pots and pans were battered so as to be useless. Occurrences of this kind appear, however, to be less frequent than in the past, when relatives of the departed gypsy sometimes reduced themselves to a condition of absolute poverty by faithfully carrying out this ceremony. In such cases, remonstrance, especially by a non-gypsy, would be quite useless, and no reply would be vouchsafed, except that “it is the way of the Romanies.”