Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by Google Books (Princeton University Library) Transcriber's Notes: 1. Page scan source: http://books.google.com/books?id=nqMuAAAAYAAJ 2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe]. THE GIPSY; A TALE. BY THE AUTHOR OF "RICHELIEU," "MARY OF BURGUNDY," &c. "Ah! what a tangled web we weave, When first we venture to deceive." Sir Walter Scott. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. NEW YORK HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE. 1855. THE GIPSY. CHAPTER I. At that time in the world's history when watches, in their decline from the fat comeliness of the turnip to the scanty meagerness of the half-crown, had arrived at the intermediate form of a biffin--when the last remnant of a chivalrous spirit instigated men to wear swords every day, and to take purses on horseback--when quadrupeds were preferred to steam, and sails were necessary to a ship--when Chatham and Blackstone appeared in the senate and at the bar, and Goldsmith, Johnson, and Burke, Cowper, Reynolds, Robertson Hume, and Smollett, were just beginning to cumber the highways of arts and sciences--at that period of the dark ages, the events which are about to be related undoubtedly took place, in a county which shall be nameless. It may be that the reader would rather have the situation more precisely defined, in order, as he goes along, to fix each particular incident that this book may hereafter contain to the precise spot and person for which it was intended. Nevertheless, such disclosures must not be; in the first place, because the story, being totally and entirely a domestic one, depends little upon locality; and, in the next place, because greater liberties can be taken with people and things when their identity is left in doubt, than when it is clearly ascertained; for, although-- "When caps into a crowd are thrown, What each man fits he calls his own," yet no one likes to have his name written upon his fool's cap, and handed down for the benefit of posterity, attached to such an ornament.