The reader, whilst perusing the following extracts from the laws framed against the Gitános, will be filled with wonder that the Gypsy sect still exists in Spain, contrary to the declared will of the sovereign and the nation, so often repeated during a period of three hundred years; yet such is the fact, and it can only be accounted for on the ground of corruption. It was notorious that the Gitános had powerful friends and favourers in every district, who sanctioned and encouraged them in their Gypsy practices. These their fautors were of all ranks and grades, from the corregidor of noble blood to the low and obscure escribano; and from the viceroy of the province to the archer of the Hermandad. To the high and noble, they were known as Chalanes, and to the plebeian functionaries, as people who, notwithstanding their general poverty, could pay for protection. A law was even enacted against these protectors of the Gitános, which of course failed, as the execution of the law was confided to the very delinquents against whom it was directed. Thus, the Gitáno bought, sold, and exchanged animals openly, though he subjected himself to the penalty of death by so doing, or left his habitation when he thought fit, though such an act, by the law of the land, was punishable with the galleys. In one of their songs they have commemorated the impunity with which they wandered about. The escribano, to whom the Gitános of the neighbourhood pay contribution, on a strange Gypsy being brought before him, instantly orders him to be liberated, assigning as a reason that he is no Gitáno, but a legitimate Spaniard:— ‘I left my house, and walked about They seized me fast, and bound: It is a Gypsy thief, they shout, The Spaniards here have found. ‘From out the prison me they led, Before the scribe they brought; It is no Gypsy thief, he said, The Spaniards here have caught.’ In a word, nothing was to be gained by interfering with the Gitános, by those in whose hands the power was vested; but, on the contrary, something was to be lost. The chief sufferers were the labourers, and they had no power to right themselves, though their wrongs were universally admitted, and laws for their protection continually being made, which their enemies contrived to set at nought; as will presently be seen.