Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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?Gypsy Smith, Jr-, Ends vices But Crowd Cries On." Mr. Smith began his lecture -was a wonderful life story of 1 pie, and especially of the trans .. tion of the lives of his fath .grandfather, at a little after 8 < He had spoken an hour and when he suddenly stopped and the people that he feared 1 keeping them too long. Manj .out that he should go on. Bul having the choir sing a stanza invitation hymn he pronouns benediction. Then there took p rhost unusual turn of affairs. I of leaving their seats the grea gregation started to cheer, thei all sat down as if they were mined/to stay there until the .heard the end of tie story. N< was left for Mr. Smith to do 1 go on. He took up the sermon and for another period of abo minutes he held .his hearers hound. After he had finished th tomary invitation was given, am eral hundred came forward, to with the appeal of the transfc lives of the Gypsies about whom had been listening, and gave < hearts to Christ. The complete addess follows: What is a Gypsy? Mr. Smith said: I am generali; very long in a city before som says to me, 'Mr. Smith, what Gypsy?" I usually turn the same i tion back to the questioners anc them just what they think a G is? I was lecturing in a middle A ( -ern state on one occasion and a g of children who occupied the i seats said that they all knew wh Gypsy was. I pointed to one 1 child and said "You tell me wh Gypsy is," and he said "Please si is a fellow who goes round and rc and round seeing what he can fi That is a pretty good definition Gypsy, because the Gypsies mighty good finders. Another 1 fellow said "Please sir, a Gypsy wild man;" another said "a Gyps loafer;" a little girl said "please a Gypsy is a fortune teller;" w another boy said "please, sir, a Gj is a fellow that swipes kids." I 1 him that a true Gypsy didn't s children, for a very good reason, 1 he didn't have to. I had a great ui who lived to be the age of nineyt-r \ before he ever heard the story of sus Christ. You fancy living ii .country the size of England, full colleges, churches and chapels 2 . teachers and being able to live ninety-nine years without - hear > that story, and when he heard story of Christ it broke his heart ? he .surrendered his life to Jesus Chi and lived to be 101. When he died was the father of thirty-one childr and I never heard that he added that number by swiping kids. He v perfectly satisfied with what he I and when you teach your chile when they are naughty the Gypsy v take them, then you malign and sh s der a race of people that yon kn nothing about, for there is no mc slandered race of people under t sun than the Gypsy race. We a slandered in your novels, we are n ligned on your stage. You owe . you are to the gospel of Jesus Chr and my people have never Had yo opportunity. Jewish Origin. There are in the world today t tween three and four million, ai there isn't a scholar yet .that ci prove their origin. Some say th originally we came from Egyp others will say that we came from I dia, but we believe ourselves to 1 'Jews, and although I cannot prc that statement, yet I want to hurrie ly give you one or two reasons wi we think we are Jews. For instanc there were lost tribes, and if you toe one hundred of our people promi cuously, you would find this remar! able fact, that 85 per cent of the: have Bible names. My grandfathe whose conversion. I want to tell ye about in a few moments, his name Gornelius; I have an uncle, my fat) er's brother, whose name is Ezek .el, my sister has two Bible name Rosa-Zilla. I had a great uncle whos name was Bartholemew, and he ha six children, all with Biblical name: Ruth, Naomi, Elipah, Ezekiel, San son and Delilah. Yau fancy having Samson and a Delilah in the sam family. Well, you say where do yo get these names from; not the Bible No, for we have not any Bibles, an if we had them we couldn't read ther for a Gypsy never goes to school t learn to read or write. We have ? great many customs that are akin ti the old Jewish customs, for instance if a person is taken sick in camp wi would set aside for their use sucl * things as they would need while the] are sick, as plate and fork, spoon knife, cup and saucer, and when th? 5 person gets better we destroy those things. They have become in the Gyp ' sy language "chickley," which meani unclean. If the person dies then mediately the body is placed in casket, and all of the clothes of deceased. Anything that they I touched in their last sickness is eil burned, buried or a casket is ni large enough to admit of the b and the clothes. We have been abl tiace those two customs of b cleanliness to the Orthodox Jew? Palestine, and have as yet not b able to trace it to any other nat Gypsy Has No Religion. The Gypsy has no religion; he lieves in a first cause. He does know whether this first cause ii person or a spirit, but believes t someday this first cause will rew those who do right and punish th who do not. So there are certain li that persons have handed down him which he tries to obey. For stance, he teaches his children not whistle on the Sabbath; he wont on the Sabbath to the brook with horses to water them, unless it is i possible to get enough water on S urday to last until Monday; he wo go to the woods to gather sticks * his camp fire on a Sunday, he tries get enough wood on Saturday to 1; until Monday. That custom can su ly only have come from the Jews, J we read that when the Israelites h received the Ten Commandments o of their men on the Sabbath day wc out of the camp and gathered wo for his fire, and when his tribe s? him they went to Moses and Aar and said "what shall we do with tl man who is breaking the Sabbath h Observances?" and Moses and Aar did not know what to do, but th said "we will go and ask Jehovar and Jehovah said "take that man th has broken my Sabbath day, ta him out of the camp and stone him death, for he has broken the Sabba day." Now, the only place the Gyp could get that from is from the Je' Marriage Customs. Up to sixty years ago the Gypsi observed no law on marriage, on the old Jewish custom. If a man wan ed to get married he must be twent one, and his sweetheart must 1 twenty-one, which was according i the old Patriarchal form of goveri ment too, for' a boy was not a ma among the Jews until he was twent; one. Then after he Had received tl consent of his parents he built her home on wheels, for a Gypsy gi does not believe in light housekee] ing and then in the presence of h parents and her parents she went int his tent and became his wife. Gypsy Morality. Just a word now about the goo qualities of the Gypsy. The late M: W. T. Saetd, who went down on th Titanic, and was one of the greates editorial writers that .Britain ha known in the last fifty years, said o the Gypsies, after making a life tim study of them, that moi'ally they ha no peers in the world. Have you eve picked up a newspaper and read o a Gypsy committing murder? W have been in England for hundreds o years and are yet to have our firs murder case. Have you ever read b a Gypsy committing suicide, or break ing into a bank or putting his han into another fellow's pocket on winter's day to keep it warm? I wil tell you something that you hav never heard of, and that is, you wi] never see one of our girls on th streets peddling her virtue, or find he in one of your segregated districts A Gypsy learns from his cradle tha he must grow up to honor and protec womanhood. You think of a race o people without any God, or schools o churches, or Bibles or teachers, an< yet you.have no murders or suicides no bank robbers, no fallen women ii your vice districts. I do not mean ti make them out a paragon of virtue they have their faults and God know they are bad enough, but how woul< you like to live in a population o: say forty thousand population, fo: that is the number of Gypsies we havi in England-, without any God 01 Christ, or schools or Bibles, and ye there has not a single denomination as far as I know, who has ever sen an accerdited missionary to my peo pie. You send you missionaries to th< Isles of the Sea, but as yet I hav< never heard of one being sent to mj people. Worst Fault Profanity. I think our worst fault is profanity but then Christianity does not seen to have done your men any good or that score. You can walk down Broac street any day and hear men sweai as though they had takon a post grad uate course in hell and had the devil himself for their school master, foi they have learned the language to thc pit of perfection, and you can always tell what kind of wheels a fellow has in his head by the spokes that come out of his mouth. The next worst hab it is their drinking habits; they are not all drunkards but they all drink. A Gypsy nan would never go into a : saloon without' taking his wife with . him, and if his children were over the i age of twenty-one they would go with him too. The next worst habit is their petty pilfering. I don't like that word "thieves;" I think it is too harsh. I like the other word better, they are good finders, for they never buy any thing they can find. If they come across your truck patch and they wanted something for dinner, well, they would take it, but they would not take very much. They wouldn't bother carrying it, they know there is plenty more further down the road. They are like their ancestors, they gather their manna daily. Occasional ly they find an old piece of rope with a horse on the end. They worst habit is their lying when they profess to tell fortunes. A Gypsy girl knows that she cannot tell you anything of tomor: row, but she is not averse to making money by it. Formerly when we ap proached the saloon keeper and asked him to give his heart to Jesus Christ he would say "well, what about my business, this is the only thing I know and if I give it up what is to become of my wife and child?" . The Gypsy girl says "if I" accept your message of Christianity, what am I to do about my fortune telling," for she can make more money in one morning telling fortunes than she can make in legiti mate trading in a week; but when you cross a Gypsy girl's palm with silver to tell you your fortune, let me tell you just what you do : You, a cultured, educated, refined woman pay an ignorant woman to lie, rand you make it just that much harder for that girl ever to become a Chris tian. A Change Comes. Now, let me tell you- something of the change that came into our family. My father was born the fourth of a family of five children, on March 31, 1860, in Epting Forest, which is just outside the city of London. He grew up just as wild as the birds and the rabbits, and as sweet as the flowers, for I think my father lives closer to Jesus Christ than any man I ever knew. He lives on the street and in his home the religion that he teaches from the pulpit, so that men believe in him and love him, and his children are trying to follow in his footsteps. The Gypsies are what you call in this country "peddlers," and we call them in England "hawkers." They make clothes pins of the willows, they re cane chairs, they make baskets out of underbrush, they do an odd job of tinkering. The girls carry on their arms as a blind a basket filled with notions, which she can sell to house wives if she cannot tell fortunes, for while the English law allows you to put out a sign of palmistry, it forbids a Gypsy girl telling fortunes, and so if she is approached by the officer pf the law she says she is selilng her wares. My grandfather and grand mother, with their five children, were travelling in the southern counties of England in this way when the eld est girl of the family was taken sick. The Gypsy women are skilled in the use of herbs, for they are children of nature, and my grandmother gave her what local remedies she knew of, but instead of the girl getting better she gradually got worse, until one day she said to her husband "we must go in to a village and see a physician for our girl is getting worse." They pull ed into a little town by the name of Boldock in Hertfordshire, and stop ped opposite a doctor's house. My grandfather went up to the door pf the house and asked for the doctor, and when the doctor came he said "what can I do for you, sir?" My grandfather said "I would like for you to come into our wagon and see our sick child." The doctor climbed up the steps to the wagon and looked in over the half open door. ? Only a Gypsy Home. He could not go into the home, for it was only a Gypsy home, and he beckoned to the gili to come from her ? bed. She got out as well as she could and crawled across the floor, and standing at the half open do?r in her night robe, while the March biting winds " hummed around her. When the doctor had examined her he turn ed to my grandfather and said "get out of the city as quickly as you can, and get beyond* the city limits, your daughter has the small pox." My grandfather knew that that disease was contagious; he also knew that she ought to have the best care and the best food and that is not always possible in a Gypsy tent. So turning to the doctor he said "where shall I go to, I don't want to go too far away, so' that you cannot attend to my child." The doctor named a little lane about two and a half or three miles out of the village, and said "you go there and I will come and see your sick child." My grandfather turned around with an aching heart, he loved his wife and children, even if he was aGypsy, and he did not know how he \v-s going to be able to separate that child with the disease from the rest of his family. When he arrived at the (Continued on Seventh Page.) NEW BATTERY SERVICE STATION EDGEFIELD, SOUTH CAROLINA / We have opened an up-to-date battery service in the T. J. Paul building in front of Dixie Highway Hotel We have installed the most modern ?iachinery for repairing and charging batteries. No battery station in any of the largest cities can give any better service, for we have a more modern equipment than most of them have. We have a specially trained and thoroughly equipped battery mechanic and we guarantee absolutely every battery we send out. We work on all makes and kinds, or build a battery. We also have rental batteries. WATER AND ALL ?=@BSTfiF EXAMINATIONS ? litt Our prices will be reasonable. We will live and let live. Our iron-clad guarantee goes with every job. We will appreciate your business. OUR MOTTO: Very Best Service i Women of the W. C. T. Commend Mr. Taylor's Brave Stand. The W. C. T. U. met with B Stewart and Mrs. Kernaghan Maj anti was called to order by the pr dent, Mrs. J. L. Mims. Mrs. E. J. Norris graciously exte ed an invitation to Rev. Mr. Tay who was present, to conduct the votions, which he did most acceptai The reading was 1 Cor. 8. Mr. Tay laid stress upon the last verse, urg that whatever may make our broil to offend is to be avoided by the f lowers of Jesus, that it is the Chi tian's duty to abstain from anythi that might cause another tc fall. 3 Taylor's closing prayer was a pl for the protection of the young nu hood and womanhood of our toi against the evil tendencies of the af After the singing of Coronation, M Mims resumed the chair, and thank Mr. Taylor for giving us the pleasu of hearing him. She also present the cause of the youth of our tov and recommended them to our te der care, urging that we pray th God would protect them fom the e^ pf the world and that we help the by encouragement, and by beir courageous ourselves for the righ A call to vigilance by the Nation; Temperance Council was read. Mrs. Peak read an article by Coi Stoddard which made the startlin statemnt that the soldiers on the ba tie fields had better protection tha *he babies of some of our cities. Martha Stewart sang a sweet lil tie song for us, entitled "Six Littl Daisies," accompanied on the pian by her mother. . Mrs. Rainsford read an article oi Child Training. Helen Dunovant sang sweetly 'Tn in Heaven When I'm in My Mother': Arms," and literature was distribut ed on Better Babies. Mrs. Mims told about the progres! of Annie Schneider, the little gir who is receiving instructions in Eng' lish from Mrs. W. C. Tompkins. Sh? also spoke of the needs of some othei foreigners who were here, and sug gested a night school. Mrs. Tillman used for her lesson in citizenship "The Municipal Gov ernment." Mrs. Mims discussed the council system and Mrs. Cogburn the commission form and the newer idea of a city manager was discussed. After singing "All Round the World," Mrs.' Mims again urged the practice of giving expression to our convictions and give an incident fall ing under our observation, and asked the privilege to extend thanks to Mr. Taylor for his fearless stand in the American Legion to save our youth fro^m the evil of intoxicants and to hold the' organization to the high ideals of citizenship, which is the original intention of that organiza tion. Whereupon, Mrs. W. B. Cogburn moved that a rising.vote of thanks be given Mr. Taylor and the young men who took high ground with him. The morion was seconded by Mrs. J. W. Peak and every woman rose. The women of Edgefield believe in making the atmosphere of Edgefield safe for their sons and d?ughters, and will not condone anything which goes counter to ic. After the resolution was passed, which was entirely unexpected to him and seemed to be a spontaneous ex pression, Mr. Taylor arose and told the women of the . lack of understand ing of sonie of the young men, of the strong sentiment in our town and county against the use of intoxicating liquors, andy saying that he had boys of his own whom he had to teach that it is a disgrace to make, buy or use WEDDIN Diamond Rin Birth Stone, Friend: Brooches, Bar Pins Bracelet Watc or Individi Silver Table W s Anniversary o V Make (he young couple happy with elegant cut class that wi51 add joy ti home-Such articles ?re now on dis] The Guaranti POPULAR PRI 974 Broad St. Expert Watch anc intoxicating liquors. That, we believe to be the senti ment of a large majority of the peo pie of our county, and of the nation at large, else the 18th Amendment to the constitution of the United States, which forbids the manufac turo and sale of intoxicating liquors would not have been passed. Every lawyer and public official is supposed to make oath to support the constitution, and he cannot sup port a law and disobey it at the same time. The minutes were read by Mrs. W. L. Dunovant and the meeting was ad journed with prayer. The hostesses assisted by Misses Carrie and Helen Dunovant and Katherine Stewart served block cream and cake, and the social hour was much enjoyed by the large number of members present. NOTICE. We having organized the Edgefield National Farm Loan Association in connection with the Federal Land Bank, I shall be glad to file your ap plication for a loan. J. H. CANTELOU, Secretary-Treasurer, j Edgefield, S. C. G GIFTS g or Lavalli?re ship or Dinner Ring , a String of Pearls h, a Toilet Set "j. jal Articles fare, Cut Glass ir Chime Clock i jewelry-a set of shining silver or o their lives and beauty to the new jlay in our store. ?e Jewelry Co. ICE JEWELERS AUGUSTA, OA. F Jewelry Repairers I