Herne, the last, it was said, of the old stock; and then I thought what strange people the gypsies must have been in the old time.  They were sufficiently strange at present, but they must have been far stranger of old; they must have been a more peculiar people—­their language must have been more perfect—­and they must have had a greater stock of strange secrets.  I almost wished that I had lived some two or three hundred years ago, that I might have observed these people when they were yet stranger than at present.  I wondered whether I could have introduced myself to their company at that period, whether I should have been so fortunate as to meet such a strange, half-malicious, half good-humoured being as Jasper, who would have instructed me in the language, then more deserving of note than at present.  What might I not have done with that language, had I known it in its purity?  Why, I might have written books in it; yet those who spoke it would hardly have admitted me to their society at that period, when they kept more to themselves.  Yet I thought that I might possibly have gained their confidence, and have wandered about with them, and learned their language, and all their strange ways, and then—­and then—­and a sigh rose from the depth of my breast; for I began to think, “Supposing I had accomplished all this, what would have been the profit of it? and in what would all this wild gypsy dream have terminated?”

Then rose another sigh, yet more profound, for I began to think, “What was likely to be the profit of my present way of life; the living in dingles, making pony and donkey shoes, conversing with gypsy-women under hedges, and extracting from them their odd secrets?” What was likely to be the profit of such a kind of life, even should it continue for a length of time?—­a supposition not very probable, for I was earning nothing to support me, and the funds with which I had entered upon this life were gradually disappearing.  I was living, it is true, not unpleasantly, enjoying the healthy air of heaven; but, upon the whole, was I not sadly misspending my time?  Surely I was; and, as I looked back, it appeared to me that I had always been doing so.  What had been the profit of the tongues which I had learned? had they ever assisted me in the day of hunger?  No, no! it appeared to me that I had always misspent my time, save in one instance, when by a desperate effort I had collected all the powers of my imagination, and written the “Life of Joseph Sell” {326}; but even when I wrote the Life of Sell, was I not in a false position?  Provided I had not misspent my time, would it have been necessary to make that effort, which, after all, had only enabled me to leave London, and wander about the country for a time?  But could I, taking all circumstances into consideration, have done better than I had?  With my peculiar temperament and ideas, could I have pursued with advantage the profession to which my respectable parents had endeavoured to