Note 168 — Chapter VI · THE GYPSY IN AFRICA

Lane (chap. xx.), generally so correct, falls, according to Kremer, into an error when he explains Hawi simply by “performer of sleight of hand tricks” (Taschenspieler); the origin of the word, Hayyeh, “a snake,” shows its signification. Amongst the Sinaitic Bedawin almost every tribe has an official called the Hawi, who is supposed to be poison-proof, and to have the power of stanching wounds and curing hurts by his breath. The necessary qualification for this office is that the mother should make her babe swallow, before he has tasted other food, a cake composed of seven barleycorns, seven grains of wheat, a small scorpion, and a hornet, all pounded and mixed together (The Desert of the Exodus).