The Life of George Borrow Part 29

Borrow recognised the stagnation of his present life.

"I wish the Government would give me some command in Ireland which would call forth my energies," he wrote to John Murray (25th Oct.

1843). "If there be an outbreak there I shall apply to them at once, for my heart is with them in the present matter: I hope they will be firm, and they have nothing to fear; I am sure that the English nation will back them, for the insolence and ingrat.i.tude of the Irish, and the cowardice of their humbug chief, have caused universal disgust." Later he wrote, also to John Murray, with reference to that "trumpery fellow O'Connell . . . I wish I were acquainted with Sir Robert Peel. I could give him many a useful hint with respect to Ireland and the Irish. I know both tolerably well. Whenever there's a row I intend to go over with Sidi Habismilk and put myself at the head of a body of volunteers."

He had previously written "the old Duke [Wellington] will at last give salt eel to that cowardly, bawling vagabond O'Connell." Borrow detested O'Connell as a "Dublin bully . . . a humbug, without courage or one particle of manly feeling." Again (17th June) he had written: "Horrible news from Ireland. I wish sincerely the blackguards would break out at once; they will never be quiet until they have got a sound licking, and the sooner the better."

The finer side of Borrow's character was shown in his eagerness to obtain employment. There is a touch of pathos in the sight of this knight, armed and ready to fight anything for anybody, wasting his strength and his talents in feuds with his neighbours.

In the profits on the old and the preparation of new editions of The Bible in Spain, Borrow took a keen interest. The money he was making enabled him to a.s.sist his wife in disembarra.s.sing her estate. "I begin to take considerable pleasure in making money," he wrote to his publisher, "which I hope is a good sign; for what is life unless we take pleasure in something?" Again he enquires, "Why does not the public call for another edition of them [The Gypsies of Spain]. You see what an unconscionable rascal I am becoming." During his lifetime Borrow received from the firm of Murray, 3437 pounds, 19s., most of which was on account of The Bible in Spain and, consequently, was paid to him during the first years of his a.s.sociation with Albemarle Street.

Caroline Fox gives an interesting picture of Borrow at this period as he appeared to her:-

"25th Oct. 1843.

"Catherine Gurney gave us a note to George Borrow, so on him we called,--a tall, ungainly, uncouth man, with great physical strength, a quick penetrating eye, a confident manner, and a disagreeable tone and p.r.o.nunciation. He was sitting on one side of the fire, and his old mother on the other. His spirits always sink in wet weather, and to-day was very rainy, but he was courteous and not displeased to be a little lionised, for his delicacy is not of the most susceptible.

He talked about Spain and the Spaniards; the lowest cla.s.ses of whom, he says, are the only ones worth investigating, the upper and middle cla.s.s being (with exceptions, of course) mean, selfish, and proud beyond description. They care little for Roman Catholicism, and bear faint allegiance to the Pope. They generally lead profligate lives, until they lose all energy and then become slavishly superst.i.tious.

He said a curious thing of the Esquimaux, namely, that their language is a most complex and highly artificial one, calculated to express the most delicate metaphysical subtleties, yet they have no literature, nor are there any traces of their ever having had one--a most curious anomaly; hence he simply argues that you can ill judge of a people by their language." {360a}

One of the strangest things about Borrow's personality was that it almost invariably struck women unfavourably. That he himself was not indifferent to women is shown by the impression made upon him by the black eyes of one of the Misses Mills of Saxham Hall, where he was taken to dinner by Dr Hake, who states that "long afterwards, his inquiries after the black eyes were unfailing." {360b} He was also very kind and considerate to women. "He was very polite and gentlemanly in ladies' society, and we all liked him," wrote one woman friend {360c} who frequently accompanied him on his walks. She has described him as walking along "singing to himself or quite silent, quite forgetting me until he came to a high hill, when he would turn round, seize my hand, and drag me up. Then he would sit down and enjoy the prospect." {360d}

CHAPTER XXIII: MARCH 1844-1848

In March 1844 Borrow, unable longer to control the Wanderl.u.s.t within him, gave up the struggle, and determined to make a journey to the East. He was in London on the 20th, as Lady Eastlake (then Miss Elizabeth Rigby) testifies in her Journal. "Borrow came in the evening," she writes: "now a fine man, but a most disagreeable one; a kind of character that would be most dangerous in rebellious times- -one that would suffer or persecute to the utmost. His face is expressive of wrong-headed determination." {361a}

He left London towards the end of April for Paris, from which he wrote to John Murray, 1st May

"Vidocq wishes very much to have a copy of my Gypsies of Spain, and likewise one of the Romany Gospels. On the other side you will find an order on the Bible Society for the latter, and perhaps you will be so kind as to let one of your people go to Earl Street to procure it.

You would oblige me by forwarding it to your agent in Paris, the address is Monsr. Vidocq, Galerie Vivienne, No. 13 . . . V. is a strange fellow, and amongst other things dabbles in literature. He is meditating a work upon Les Bohemiens, about whom I see he knows nothing at all. I have no doubt that the Zincali, were it to fall into his hands, would be preciously gutted, and the best part of the contents pirated. By the way, could you not persuade some of the French publishers to cause it to be translated, in which event there would be no fear. Such a work would be sure to sell. I wish Vidocq to have a copy of the book, but I confess I have my suspicions; he is so extraordinarily civil."

From Paris he proceeded to Vienna, and thence into Hungary and Transylvania, where he remained for some months. He is known to have been "in the steppe of Debreczin," {362a} to Koloszvar, through Nagy- Szeben, or Hermannstadt, on his journey through Roumania to Bucharest. He visited Wallachia "for the express purpose of discoursing with the Gypsies, many of whom I found wandering about."

{362b}

So little is known of Borrow's Eastern Journey that the following account, given by an American, has a peculiar interest:-

"My companions, as we rode along, related some marvellous stories of a certain English traveller who had been here [near Grosswardein] and of his influence over the Gypsies. One of them said that he was walking out with him one day, when they met a poor gypsy woman. The Englishman addressed her in Hungarian, and she answered in the usual disdainful way. He changed his language, however, and spoke a word or two in an unknown tongue. The woman's face lighted up in an instant, and she replied in the most pa.s.sionate, eager way, and after some conversation dragged him away almost with her. After this the English gentleman visited a number of their most private gatherings and was received everywhere as one of them. He did more good among them, all said, than all the laws over them, or the benevolent efforts for them, of the last half century. They described his appearance--his tall, lank, muscular form, and mentioned that he had been much in Spain, and I saw that it must be that most ubiquitous of travellers, Mr Borrow." {362c}

This was the fame most congenial to Borrow's strange nature.

Dinners, receptions, and the like caused him to despise those who found pleasure in such "crazy admiration for what they called gentility." It was his foible, as much as "gentility nonsense" was theirs, to find pleasure in the role of the mysterious stranger, who by a word could change a disdainful gypsy into a fawning, awe- stricken slave. Fame to satisfy George Borrow must carry with it something of the greatness of Olympus.

A glimpse of Borrow during his Eastern tour is obtained from Mrs Borrow's letters to John Murray. After telling him that she possesses a privilege which many wives do not (viz.), permission to open her Husband's letters during his absence, she proceeds:-

"The accounts from him are, I am thankful to say, very satisfactory.

It is extraordinary with what marks of kindness even Catholics of distinction treat him when they know who he is, but it is clearly his gift of tongues which causes him to meet with so many adventures, several of which he has recorded of a most singular nature." {363a}

At Vienna Borrow had arranged to wait until he should receive a letter from his wife, "being very anxious to know of his family," as Mrs Borrow informed John Murray (24th July).

"Thus far," she continues, "thanks be to G.o.d, he has prospered in his journey. Many and wonderful are the adventures he has met with, which I hope at no distant period may be related to his friends.

Doctor Bowring was very kind in sending me flattering tidings of my Husband."

Borrow was at Constantinople on 17th Sept. when he drew on his letter of credit. Leland tells an anecdote about Borrow at Constantinople; but it must be remembered that it was written when he regarded Borrow with anything but friendly feelings:-

"Sir Patrick Colquhoun told me that once when he was at Constantinople, Mr Borrow came there, and gave it out that he was a marvellous Oriental scholar. But there was great scepticism on this subject at the Legation, and one day at the table d'hote, where the great writer and divers young diplomatists dined, two who were seated on either side of Borrow began to talk Arabic, speaking to him, the result being that he was obliged to confess that he not only did not understand what they were saying, but did not even know what the language was. Then he was tried in Modern Greek, with the same result." {364a}

The story is obviously untrue. Had Borrow been ignorant of Arabic he would not have risked writing to Dr Bowring (11th Sept. 1831; see ante, page 85) expressing his enthusiasm for that language. Arabic had, apparently, formed one of the subjects of his preliminary examination at Earl Street. With regard to Modern Greek he confessed in a letter to Mr Brandram (12th June 1839), "though I speak it very ill, I can make myself understood."

Having obtained a Turkish pa.s.sport, and after being presented to Abdul Medjid, the Sultan, Borrow proceeded to Salonika and, crossing Thessaly to Albania, visited Janina and Prevesa. He pa.s.sed over to Corfu, and saw Venice and Rome, returning to England by way of Ma.r.s.eilles, Paris and Havre. He arrived in London on 16th November, after nearly seven months' absence, to find his "home particularly dear to me . . . after my long wanderings."

It is curious that he should have left no record of this expedition; but if he made notes he evidently destroyed them, as, with the exception of a few letters, nothing was found among his papers relating to the Eastern tour. There is evidence that he was occupied with his pen during this journey, in the existence at the British Museum of his Vocabulary of the Gypsy Language as spoken in Hungary and Transylvania, compiled during an intercourse of some months with the Gypsies in those parts in the year 1844, by George Borrow. In all probability he prepared his Bohemian Grammar at the same time.

{365a}

From the time that he became acquainted with Borrow, Richard Ford had const.i.tuted himself the genius of La Mezquita (the Mosque), as he states the little octagonal Summer-house was called. He was for ever urging in impulsive, polyglot letters that the curtain to be lifted.

"Publish your WHOLE adventures for the last twenty years," he had written. {365b} Ford saw that a man of Borrow's nature must have had astonis.h.i.+ng adventures, and with HIS pen would be able to tell them in an astonis.h.i.+ng manner.

As early as the summer of 1841 Borrow appears to have contemplated writing his Autobiography. On the eve of the appearance of The Bible in Spain (17th Dec.) he wrote to John Murray: "I hope our book will be successful; if so, I shall put another on the stocks. Capital subject: early life; studies and adventures; some account of my father, William Taylor, Whiter, Big Ben, etc. etc."

The first draft of notes for Lavengro, an Autobiography, as the book was originally advertised in the announcement, is extremely interesting. It runs:-

"Reasons for studying languages: French, Italian, D'Eterville.

Southern tongues. Dante.

Walks. The Quaker's Home, Mousehold. Petulengro.

The Gypsies.

The Office. Welsh. Lhuyd.

German. Levy. Billy Taylor.

Danish. Kaempe Viser. Billy Taylor. Dinner.

Bowring.

Hebrew. The Jew.

Philosophy. Radicalism. Ranters.

Thurtell. Boxers. Petulengres." {365c}

Lavengro was planned in 1842 and the greater part written before the end of the following year, although the work was not actually completed until 1846. There are numerous references in Borrow's letters of this period to the book on which he was then engaged, and he invariably refers to it as his Life. On 21st January 1843 he writes to John Murray, Junr.: "I meditate shortly a return to Barbary in quest of the Witch Hamlet, and my adventures in the land of wonders will serve capitally to fill the thin volume of My Life, a Drama, By G. B." Again and again Borrow refers to My Life. Hasfeldt and Ford also wrote of it as the "wonderful life" and "the Biography."