Those Hungarian wretches have, according to their own account, for twelve years gratified their horrid cravings, undiscovered by the magistrates, in a country where the police is by no means bad: perhaps they might have continued unsuspected for ever, had they not laid their unlucky hands on the people of the country, thereby bringing on a strict enquiry, and rendering the discovery more easy. Nor do the older writings seem to be entirely silent on this head; at least there is an appearance of something of the kind in them. Many authors mention the Gipseys stealing people, and accuse them particularly of lying in wait for young children. Others again deny this, saying, that the Gipseys have brats enough of their own, and therefore have not the least reason to covet strange children. How does the matter look, if we suppose they did not want to rear these children, but to sacrifice them to their inordinate appetite?—and the Hungarian intelligence expressly says, they were particularly fond of young subjects. What renders the truth of this accusation in the old writings suspicious, is, that before even a single Gipsey had set his foot in Europe, the Jews lay under the same imputation. Perhaps in this, as in many other instances, the calumny invented against the Jews might be afterwards transferred to the Gipseys. This alone considered, the imputation of kidnapping children might become doubtful; but then occurs the weighty circumstance, that it has been judicially proved in England; and, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, an act of parliament was passed on the occasion. Enough of this; let people reason upon the cannibal appetite of the Gipseys as they please, there will always remain ground for suspicion.
After having shewn how little delicate they are in satisfying their appetites, we should scarcely expect to find them squeamish with regard to articles of diet that are highly esteemed among civilised people. But Griselini gives a long catalogue of things which, he says, are disagreeable to a Gipsey’s palate; among which, he particularly mentions beans and onions, red bream, pearch, lampreys, with every kind of wild-fowl. Whereas the fact is, Gipseys not only eat beans and onions, but are very fond of them; and as for the red bream, pearch and lampreys, pheasants, partridges, &c. their only reason for abstaining from them is, the difficulty of procuring them: in which they are not singular; many other people being in the same predicament.