No Malice in Blunderland
| Author | Keith Jempson |
| Published date | 01 July 1973 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X7304600307 |
| Date | 01 July 1973 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
KEITH
JEMPSON
A former chief superintendent of the Surrey Constabulary writes
on the perennial police problem of the gypsies.
NO MALICE IN BLUNDERLAND
In the days when cook used to let Ernest the Policeman, rosy
with flatulence,
out
of the back door, and Hendon's rugby team
voiced its own version of Gilbert and Sullivan arias in low dives,
there was a sport known as "Dunning the Dids", This found its
way into Anglo-Saxon folklore
but
needs describing for those
weaned on
"Ban
the Bomb" athletics and slogans like "Panic the
Pigs" or "Follow that Fuzz". Anthropological, psychological and
sociological aspects of life among the gypsies or diddikais can then
be examined or enjoyed according to taste.
Generally the game would begin when a burly inspector returned
to his station about seven a.m. humming the tune of "Where My
Caravan Has Rested", having roasted a couple of probationers for
failing to notice the new arrivals. In response to his telephone calls
two motor cycle patrols, weighing in at fifteen stones each, whose
uniform includes eye-shields, gauntlets and leggings or - depend-
ing on the size of the operation - a patrol car full of more pliant
protagonists with football shinguards tucked in their socks under
well-creased blue serge, roar out into the rising sun, gladiators into
the arena.
More achess-board than acampus, the scene is usually hidden
behind a hedgerow near good grazing-ground with enough trees
to keep the home fires burning
and
an adjacent supply of movable
vegetables, poultry, eggs and milk, yet
not
too far for the ladies
to walk into town
and
sell pegs, plants or potions, tell fortunes or
distribute a few charms and curses.
In a pregnant silence, gleaming eyes of gypsy men, women,
children, dogs, donkeys and horses watch police "surround the
area". Then, in ringing tones that reach the darkest corner of the
deepest caravan, the mobile challenger declaims a characteristically
English Opening: "You've got ten minutes". Something like a sigh
whispers its way through the camp while alert minds assess the
pawn skeleton and tactical advantages of a Slav, Sicilian or Ortho-
dox Defence to such a gambit.
When the first Black Pawn advances with tobacco-stained smile
- all Macbeth and Machiavelli - and a chin never closer than
three millimetres to a steel blade, he draws breath about ten paces
from the White Knight. "Ole Lady's 'avin' a kid, Sir". Or, depend-
ing on the success of earlier stratagems on similar grounds, "Pore
01' mare cast a shoe, Sir".
Or
perhaps: "Wheel come off, Sir".
July
1973 250
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