times there have been about one hundred thousand of those vagabonds, who have lived without any regard or subjection either to the laws of the land or even those of God and nature ...  No magistrate could ever discover, or be informed, which way one in a hundred of these wretches died, or that ever they were baptized.  Many murders have been discovered among them; and they are not only a most unspeakable oppression to poor tenants (who, if they give not bread or some kind of provision to perhaps forty such villains in one day, are sure to be insulted by them), but they rob many poor people who live in houses distant from any neighbourhood.  In years of plenty, many thousands of them meet together in the mountains, where they feast and riot for many days; and at country weddings, markets, burials, and other the like public occasions, they are to be seen, both man and woman, perpetually drunk, cursing, blaspheming, and fighting together.’

Notwithstanding the deplorable picture presented in this extract, and which Fletcher himself, though the energetic and eloquent friend of freedom, saw no better mode of correcting than by introducing a system of domestic slavery, the progress of time, and increase both of the means of life and of the power of the laws, gradually reduced this dreadful evil within more narrow bounds.  The tribes of gipsies, jockies, or cairds—­for by all these denominations such banditti were known—­became few in number, and many were entirely rooted out.  Still, however, a sufficient number remained to give, occasional alarm and constant vexation.  Some rude handicrafts were entirely resigned to these itinerants, particularly the art of trencher-making, of manufacturing horn-spoons, and the whole mystery of the tinker.  To these they added a petty trade in the coarse sorts of earthenware.  Such were their ostensible means of livelihood.  Each tribe had usually some fixed place of rendezvous, which they occasionally occupied and considered as their standing camp, and in the vicinity of which they generally abstained from depredation.  They had even talents and accomplishments, which made them occasionally useful and entertaining.  Many cultivated music with success; and the favourite fiddler or piper of a district was often to be found in a gipsy town.  They understood all out-of-door sports, especially otter-hunting, fishing, or finding game.  They bred the best and boldest terriers, and sometimes had good pointers for sale.  In winter the women told fortunes, the men showed tricks of legerdemain; and these accomplishments often helped to while away a weary or stormy evening in the circle of the ‘farmer’s ha’.’  The wildness of their character, and the indomitable pride with which they despised all regular labour, commanded a certain awe, which was not diminished by the consideration that these strollers were a vindictive race, and were restrained by no check, either of fear or conscience, from taking desperate vengeance upon those who had offended them.