. . .re he is despised and cannot have justice.”  In my Disquisition on the Gipsies and elsewhere I attached weight to the p. 8fact of Bunyan having been a tinker, as illustrative and confirmatory proof of his having been a Gipsy, when the name of Gipsy was so severely proscribed by law; in consequence of which the Gipsies would call themselves tinkers, to evade the legal and social responsibility.  At the present day it is exceedingly difficult to ascertain who English tinkers are or were originally.  They will all deny that they are or were ever related to the Gipsies; and the Gipsies proper will do the same.  I attach no weight to the loose assertions either way made by people promiscuously, who know little or nothing of the subject, or merely have a theory to maintain.  All this I have already very fully put in print.

In your letter is a phrase that sounds a little unpleasantly to my ear.  You say, “However, whatever may have been Bunyan&. . . Read More