For the information of those who have no experience of the pleasure that may be derived from picking hops, I may say that beyond alertness, and nimbleness of fingers, no special aptitude for the work is demanded, but the class of person whose fingers are “all thumbs” will not be likely to get much pleasure out of the occupation and had better stay at home, or, at least, keep out of the way, for they will not be wanted during “hopping.” A quick child has often been known to pick cleaner and in greater quantity than many an adult, and, as with strawberries, so with hops, the gypsies are almost invariably the cleanest and most rapid pickers. Naturally alert and quick, the Romanichal must not be likened to the average rural worker or farm hand, who will perhaps do fairly well the class of work he is required to do, but is altogether lacking in the adaptability and quick-wittedness of the true gypsy. For instance, the normal rustic usually finds it a tough job to acquire sufficient English, of a kind, to enable him to hold communication with his fellow-man and to help him in gaining a livelihood, while the Romanichal, who usually does not attend even a village school, speaks English fluently, with fewer grammatical errors and far less dialect than the labourer, and for his own particular uses has the well-beloved and musical Romany. Thus—speaking in terms of comparison—we may say that the true gypsy exemplifies the grace and skill of the Oriental, while the average rustic appears to be a welding of Teutonic clumsiness and Saxon stupidity. I soon discovered that my companion was, in intelligence, quite up to the average chi, and that she brought a good deal of philosophy to bear upon her view of life. During our talk she asked— “Rye, do you care what people say about you?” “No,” I replied; “why should I?” “I’m glad to hear that,” she said, and went on— “I think if everybody got an honest living they wouldn’t care what people thought about them. If there’s one thing I don’t like it’s pride; it makes such fools of people, and rich folks are generally the proudest, but you know as well as I do it’s the people who work the hardest that have the most right to be proud, but they’re too sensible. “I know a man who had a lot of money, and when his hair got a little grey he dyed it, but that didn’t help him to be honest, did it? “Ah well! our basket’s full, perhaps you’ll give a hand to empty it into this bag.” Having accomplished this we resumed the pulling and picking; eventually a whistle sounded and all the pickers called out at once, making a good deal of noise for a few seconds,—the day’s work was finished after we had picked those we had down. After the hops had been “booked” and collected by the carts preparatory to taking them to the kiln for drying, we “knocked off” and turned our faces homeward.