GYPSY FOLK-TALES.

1899, London, Hurst and Blackett, Limited, first edition, pplxxxiii + 302 + (ii), black cloth. From the library, and with bookplate of Robert M. Dawson. Scarce. Black, 1763. Groome, Francis Hindes (1851?Äì1902), scholar of Gypsy life and writer, was born at the rectory of Monk Soham, Suffolk, on 30 August 1851. Even in early boyhood Gypsy life seen in glimpses had exercised a singular fascination over him, and an assistant master, Mr Sanderson, at Ipswich shared his interest in Romani and Gypsy lore. At Oxford he came to know Gypsies intimately, a fact which gave a new turn to his life. He left Oxford without taking a degree, spent some time in 1873 at G??ttingen, a centre of Gypsy studies, and for years lived much with Gypsies at home and abroad; he travelled on the Puszta with Hungarian Gypsies, and elsewhere with Romanian and Roumelian companies. In 1875 he eloped to Germany with an English Gypsy and singer, Esmeralda Lock (1854?Äì1939), who at the time was still the wife of Hubert Smith. After the divorce Groome married her in 1876, and the two lived together in Edinburgh. In 1876 Groome settled down to regular literary work in Edinburgh. He was soon one of the most valued workers on the staff of the Globe Encyclopaedia (6 vols., 1876?Äì9). In 1877 he began jointly to edit 'Suffolk notes and queries' in the Ipswich Journal. He edited the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (6 vols., 1882?Äì5; 2nd edn, 1893?Äì5), which became a standard work of reference. In 1885 he joined the literary staff of Messrs W. and R. Chambers, and as sub-editor and copious contributor gave invaluable assistance in preparing the new edition of Chambers's Encyclopaedia (10 vols., 1888?Äì92). He had a large share in a gazetteer (1895), and was joint editor of a biographical dictionary, both published by the same house. Meanwhile he was an occasional contributor to Blackwood's Magazine, The Bookman, and other periodicals, wrote many articles for the Dictionary of National Biography, and did much systematic reviewing for The Athenaeum. A Short Border History was issued in 1887. The delightful sketches of his father and his father's friend, Edward FitzGerald, published as Two Suffolk Friends in 1895, were expanded from two articles in Blackwood's Magazine in 1889 and 1891. At the same time Groome wrote much on Gypsies. His article 'Gipsies', contributed to the ninth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, made him known to the world as a Gypsyologist. In Gipsy Tents (1880; 2nd edn, 1881) recorded much of his own experience. He was joint editor of the first series of the Journal of the Gypsy Lore Society (1888?Äì92; revived in 1907), and a paper by him, 'The influence of the Gypsies on the superstitions of the English folk', was printed in 1891 in the Transactions of the International Folk-Lore Congress. His hypothesis was that Gypsies had probably disseminated many European folk beliefs and tales, some of which had originated in India. Theodore Watts-Dunton said that in Groome's remarkable Gypsy novel, with the oddly irrelevant title Kriegspiel (1896), 'there was more substance than in five ordinary stories', the Gypsy chapters, with autobiographical elements, being 'absolutely perfect'. Gypsy Folk Tales (1899) contains over seventy tales with variants from many lands, and the elaborate introduction is a monument of erudition and ripe scholarship, reiterating his 1891 paper. He attributed to the Gypsies the introduction to Europe of playing cards and puppetry, among other skills. He produced also an edition of George Borrow's Lavengro (1901), with notes and a valuable introduction. When his working powers failed him, Groome was assisting in the preparation of a new edition of Chambers's Cyclopaedia of English Literature (3 vols., 1901?Äì3). [David Patrick, D. S. Kenrick; Oxford DNB]. Rebacked with original spine laid down, corners bumped and rubbed, otherwise good.…