One fact has always struck us with particular force in the history of these people, namely, that Gitanismo—which means Gypsy villainy of every description—flourished and knew nothing of decay so long as the laws recommended and enjoined measures the most harsh and severe for the suppression of the Gypsy sect; the palmy days of Gitanismo were those in which the caste was proscribed, and its members, in the event of renouncing their Gypsy habits, had nothing farther to expect than the occupation of tilling the earth, a dull hopeless toil; then it was that the Gitános paid tribute to the inferior ministers of justice, and were engaged in illicit connection with those of higher station, and by such means baffled the law, whose vengeance rarely fell upon their heads; and then it was that they bid it open defiance, retiring to the deserts and mountains, and living in wild independence by rapine and shedding of blood; for as the law then stood they would lose all by resigning their Gitanismo, whereas by clinging to it they lived either in the independence so dear to them, or beneath the protection of their confederates. It would appear that in proportion as the law was harsh and severe, so was the Gitáno bold and secure. The fiercest of these laws was the one of Philip the Fifth, passed in the year 1745, which commands that the refractory Gitános be hunted down with fire and sword; that it was quite inefficient is satisfactorily proved by its being twice reiterated, once in the year ‘46, and again in ‘49, which would scarcely have been deemed necessary had it quelled the Gitános. This law, with some unimportant modifications, continued in force till the year ‘83, when the famous edict of Carlos Tercero superseded it. Will any feel disposed to doubt that the preceding laws had served to foster what they were intended to suppress, when we state the remarkable fact, that since the enactment of that law, as humane as the others were unjust, _we have heard nothing more of the Gitános from official quarters_; _they have ceased to play a distinct part in the history of Spain_; _and the law no longer speaks of them as a distinct people_? The caste of the Gitáno still exists, but it is neither so extensive nor so formidable as a century ago, when the law in denouncing Gitanismo proposed to the Gitános the alternatives of death for persisting in their profession, or slavery for abandoning it.