George Borrow and His Circle Part 26

To Mrs. George Borrow, Oulton, Lowestoft

BUCHAREST, _August 5, 1844._

MY DEAREST CARRETA,--I write you a few lines from the house of the Consul, Mr. Colquhoun, to inform you that I arrived at Bucharest quite safe: the post leaves to-day, and Mr. C. has kindly permitted me to send a note along with the official despatches. I am quite well, thank G.o.d, but I thought you would like to hear from me. Bucharest is in the province of Wallachia and close upon the Turkish frontier. I shall remain here a week or two as I find the place a very interesting one; then I shall proceed to Constantinople. I wrote to you from Hermanstadt last week and the week previous from Clausenburgh, and before I leave I shall write again, and not so briefly as now. I have experienced every possible attention from Mr. C., who is a very delightful person, and indeed everybody is very kind and attentive. I hope sincerely that you and Hen. are quite well and happy, and also my dear mother. G.o.d bless you, dearest.

GEORGE BORROW.

To Mrs. George Borrow, Oulton, Lowestoft

BUCHAREST, _August 14, 1844._

MY DARLING CARRETA,--To-morrow or the next day I leave Bucharest for Constantinople. I wrote to you on my arrival a few days ago, and promise to write again before my departure. I shall not be sorry to get to Constantinople, as from thence I can go where-ever I think proper without any difficulty. Since I have been here, Mr. Colquhoun, the British Consul-General, has shown me every civility, and upon the whole I have not pa.s.sed the time disagreeably. I have been chiefly occupied of late in rubbing up my Turkish a little, which I had almost forgotten; there was a time when I wrote it better than any other language. It is coming again rapidly, and I make no doubt that in a little time I should speak it almost as well as Spanish, for I understand the groundwork. In Hungary and Germany I picked up some curious books, which will help to pa.s.s the time at home when I have nothing better to do. It is a long way from here to Constantinople, and it is probable that I shall be fifteen or sixteen days on the journey, as I do not intend to travel very fast. It is possible that I shall stay a day or two at Adrianople, which is half way. If you should not hear from me for some time don't be alarmed, as it is possible that I shall have no opportunities of writing till I get to Constantinople. Bucharest, where I am now, is close on the Turkish frontier, being only half a day's journey. Since I have been here, I have bought a Tartar dress and a couple of Turkish s.h.i.+rts. I have done so in order not to be stared at as I pa.s.s along. It is very beautiful and by no means dear. Yesterday I wrote to M. Since I have been here I have seen some English newspapers, and see that chap H. has got in with M. Perhaps his recommendation was that he had once insulted us. However, G.o.d only knows. I think I had never much confidence in M. I can read countenances as you know, and have always believed him to be selfish and insincere. I, however, care nothing about him, and will not allow, D.V., any conduct of his to disturb me. I shall be glad to get home, and if I can but settle down a little, I feel that I can accomplish something great. I hope that my dear mother is well, and that you are all well. G.o.d bless you. It is something to think that since I have been away I have to a certain extent accomplished what I went about. I am stronger and better and hardier, my cough has left me, there is only occasionally a little huskiness in the throat. I have also increased my stock of languages, and my imagination is brightened, Bucharest is a strange place with much grandeur and much filth. Since I have been here I have dined almost every day with Mr. C., who wants me to have an apartment in his house. I thought it, however, better to be at an inn, though filthy. I have also dined once at the Russian Consul-General's, whom I knew in Russia. Now G.o.d bless you my heart's darling; kiss also Hen., write to my mother, and remember me to all friends.

G. BORROW.

The best letter that I have of this journey, and indeed the best letter of Borrow's that I have read, is one from Constantinople to his wife--the only letter by him from that city:

To Mrs. George Borrow, Oulton, Lowestoft

CONSTANTINOPLE, 16_th September 1844._

MY DARLING CARRETA,--I am about to leave Constantinople and to return home. I have given up the idea of going to Russia; I find that if I go to Odessa I shall have to remain in quarantine for fourteen days, which I have no inclination to do; I am, moreover, anxious to get home, being quite tired of wandering, and desirous of being once more with my loved ones.

This is a most interesting place, but unfortunately it is extremely dear. The Turks have no inns, and I am here at an English one, at which, though everything is comfortable, the prices are very high. To-day is Monday, and next Friday I purpose starting for Salonica in a steamboat--Salonica is in Albania. I shall then cross Albania, a journey of about three hundred miles, and get to Corfu, from which I can either get to England across Italy and down the Rhine, or by way of Ma.r.s.eilles and across France. I shall not make any stay in Italy if I go there, as I have nothing to see there. I shall be so glad to be at home with you once again, and to see my dear mother and Hen. Tell Hen. that I picked up for her in one of the bazaars a curious Armenian coin; it is silver, small, but thick, with a most curious inscription upon it. I gave fifteen piastres for it. I hope it and the rest will get safe to England. I have bought a chest, which I intend to send by sea, and I have picked up a great many books and other things, and I wish to travel light; I shall, therefore, only take a bag with a few clothes and s.h.i.+rts. It is possible that I shall be at home soon after your receiving this, or at most three weeks after. I hope to write to you again from Corfu, which is a British island with a British garrison in it, like Gibraltar; the English newspapers came last week. I see those wretched French cannot let us alone, they want to go to war; well, let them; they richly deserve a good drubbing. The people here are very kind in their way, but home is home, especially such a one as mine, with true hearts to welcome me. Oh, I was so glad to get your letters; they were rather of a distant date, it is true, but they quite revived me. I hope you are all well, and my dear mother. Since I have been here I have written to Mr.

Lord. I was glad to hear that he has written to Hen. I hope Lucy is well; pray remember me most kindly to her, and tell her that I hope to see her soon. I count so of getting into my summer-house again, and sitting down to write; I have arranged my book in my mind, and though it will take me a great deal of trouble to write it, I feel that when it is written it will be first-rate. My journey, with G.o.d's help, has done me a great deal of good. I am stronger than I was, and I can now sleep. I intend to draw on England for forty or fifty pounds; if I don't want the whole of it, it will be all the same. I have still some money left, but I have no wish to be stopped on my journey for want of it. I am sorry about what you told me respecting the railway, sorry that the old coach is driven off the road. I shall patronise it as little as possible, but stick to the old route and Thurton George. What a number of poor people will these railroads deprive of their bread. I am grieved at what you say about poor M.; he can take her into custody, however, and oblige her to support the children; such is law, though the property may have been secured to her, she can be compelled to do that. Tell Hen. that there is a mosque here, called the mosque of Sultan Bajazet; it is full of sacred pigeons; there is a corner of the court to which the creatures flock to be fed, like bees, by hundreds and thousands; they are not at all afraid, as they are never killed. Every place where they can roost is covered with them, their impudence is great; they sprang originally from two pigeons brought from Asia by the Emperor of Constantinople. They are of a deep blue. G.o.d bless you, dearest.

G. B.

He returned home by way of Venice and Rome as the following two letters indicate:

To Mrs. George Borrow, Oulton, Lowestoft

VENICE, _22nd Octr. 1844._

MY DEAREST CARRETA,--I arrived this day at Venice, and though I am exceedingly tired I hasten to write a line to inform you of my well-being. I am now making for home as fast as possible, and I have now nothing to detain me. Since I wrote to you last I have been again in quarantine for two days and a half at Trieste, but I am glad to say that I shall no longer be detained on that account. I was obliged to go to Trieste, though it was much out of my way, otherwise I must have remained I know not how long in Corfu, waiting for a direct conveyance. After my liberation I only stopped a day at Corfu in order that I might lose no more time, though I really wished to tarry there a little longer, the people were so kind. On the day of my liberation, I had four invitations to dinner from the officers. I, however, made the most of my time, and escorted by one Captain Northcott, of the Rifles, went over the fortifications, which are most magnificent. I saw everything that I well could, and shall never forget the kindness with which I was treated. The next day I went to Trieste in a steamer, down the whole length of the Adriatic. I was horribly unwell, for the Adriatic is a bad sea, and very dangerous; the weather was also very rough; after stopping at Trieste a day, besides the quarantine, I left for Venice, and here I am, and hope to be on my route again the day after to-morrow. I shall now hurry through Italy by way of Ancona, Rome, and Civita Vecchia to Ma.r.s.eilles in France and from Ma.r.s.eilles to London, in not more than six days' journey. Oh, I shall be so glad to get back to you and my mother (I hope she is alive and well) and Hen. I am glad to hear that we are not to have a war with those silly people, the French. The idea made me very uneasy, for I thought how near Oulton lay to the coast. You cannot imagine what a magnificent old town Venice is; it is clearly the finest in Italy, although in decay; it stands upon islands in the sea, and in many places is intersected with ca.n.a.ls. The Grand Ca.n.a.l is four miles long, lined with palaces on either side. I, however, shall be glad to leave it, for there is no place to me like Oulton, where live two of my dear ones. I have told you that I am very tired, so that I cannot write much more, and I am presently going to bed, but I am sure that you will be glad to hear from me, however little I may write. I think I told you in my last letter that I had been to the top of Mount Olympus in Thessaly. Tell Hen. that I saw a whole herd of wild deer bounding down the cliffs, the noise they made was like thunder; I also saw an enormous eagle--one of Jupiter's birds, his real eagles, for, according to the Grecian mythology, Olympus was his favourite haunt. I don't know what it was then, but at present the most wild savage place I ever saw; an immense way up I came to a forest of pines; half of them were broken by thunderbolts, snapped in the middle, and the ruins lying around in the most hideous confusion; some had been blasted from top to bottom and stood naked, black, and charred, in indescribable horridness; Jupiter was the G.o.d of thunder, and he still seems to haunt Olympus. The worst is there is little water, so that a person might almost perish there of thirst; the snow-water, however, when it runs into the hollows is the most delicious beverage ever tasted--the snow, however, is very high up. My next letter, I hope, will be from Ma.r.s.eilles, and I hope to be there in a very few days. Now, G.o.d bless you, my dearest; write to my mother, and kiss Hen., and remember me kindly to Lucy and the Atkinses.

G. B.

To Mrs. George Borrow, Oulton, Lowestoft

ROME, _1 Nov. 1844._

MY DEAREST CARRETA,--My last letter was from Ancona; the present is, as you see, from Rome. From Ancona I likewise wrote to Woodfall requesting he would send a letter of credit for twelve or fifteen pounds, directing to the care of the British Consul at Ma.r.s.eilles. I hope you received your letter and that he received his, as by the time I get to Ma.r.s.eilles I shall be in want of money by reason of the roundabout way I have been obliged to come. I am quite well, thank G.o.d, and hope to leave here in a day or two. It is close by the sea, and France is close by, but I am afraid I shall be obliged to wait some days at Ma.r.s.eilles before I shall get the letter, as the post goes direct from no part of Italy, though it is not more than six days' journey, or seven at most, from Ancona to London. It was that wretched quarantine at Corfu that has been the cause of all this delay, as it caused me to lose the pa.s.sage by the steamer [original torn here] Ancona, which forced me to go round by Trieste and Venice, five hundred miles out of my way, at a considerable expense. Oh, I shall be so glad to get home.

As I told you before, I am quite well; indeed, in better health than I have been for years, but it is very vexatious to be stopped in the manner I have been. G.o.d bless you, my darling.

Write to my mother and kiss her.

G. BORROW.

FOOTNOTES:

[167] _Journals and Correspondence of Lady Eastlake_, edited by her nephew, Charles Eastlake Smith, vol. i. p. 124. John Murray, 1895.

[168] _Life of Borrow_ by Herbert Jenkins, p. 361.

CHAPTER XXV

_LAVENGRO_

_The Bible in Spain_ bears on its t.i.tle-page the date 1843, although my copy makes it clear in Borrow's handwriting that it was really ready for publication in the previous year.

[Ill.u.s.tration: [handwritten text]

Mary Borrow With Her Husband's Love.

13 Dec'r 1842]

Borrow's handwriting had changed its character somewhat when he inscribed to his wife a copy of his next book _Lavengro_ in 1851.

[Ill.u.s.tration: [handwritten text]

Mary Borrow With Her Husband's Love.]

In the intervening eight or nine years he had travelled much--suffered much. During all these years he had been thinking about, talking about, his next book, making no secret of the fact that it was to be an Autobiography. Even before _The Bible in Spain_ was issued he had written to Mr. John Murray foreshadowing a book in which his father, William Taylor, and others were to put in an appearance. In the 'Advertis.e.m.e.nt' to _The Romany Rye_ he tells us that 'the princ.i.p.al part of _Lavengro_ was written in the year '43, that the whole of it was completed before the termination of the year '46, and that it was in the hands of the publisher in the year '48.' As the idea grew in his mind, his friend, Richard Ford, gave him much sound advice:

Never mind nimminy-pimminy people thinking subjects _low_.

Things are low in manner of handling. Draw Nature in rags and poverty, yet draw her truly, and how picturesque! I hate your silver fork, kid glove, curly-haired school.[169]

And so in the following years, now to Ford, now to Murray, he traces his progress, while in 1844 he tells Dawson Turner that he is 'at present engaged in a kind of Biography in the Robinson Crusoe style.'[170] But in the same year he went to Buda-Pesth, Venice, and Constantinople. The first advertis.e.m.e.nt of the book appeared in _The Quarterly Review_ in July 1848, when _Lavengro, An Autobiography_, was announced. Later in the same year Mr. Murray advertised the book as _Life, A Drama_; and Dr.

Knapp, who had in his collection the original proof-sheets of _Lavengro_, reproduces the t.i.tle-page of the book which then stood as _Life, A Drama_, and bore the date 1849. Borrow's procrastination in delivering the complete book worried John Murray exceedingly. Not unnaturally, for in 1848 he had offered the book at his annual sale dinner to the booksellers who had subscribed to it liberally. Eighteen months later Murray was still worrying Borrow for the return of the proof-sheets of the third and last volume. Not until January 1850 do we hear of it as _Lavengro, An Autobiography_, and under this t.i.tle it was advertised in _The Quarterly Review_ for that month as 'nearly ready for publication.' In April 1850 we find Woodfall, John Murray's printer, writing letter after letter urging celerity, to which Mrs. Borrow replies, excusing the delay on account of her husband's indifferent health. They have been together in lodgings at Yarmouth. 'He had many plunges into the briny Ocean, which seemed to do him good.'[171] Murray continued to exhort, but the final chapter did not reach him. 'My sale is fixed for December 12th,' he writes in November, 'and if I cannot show the book then I must throw it up.' This threat had little effect, for on 13th December we find Murray still coaxing his dilatory author, telling him with justice that there were pa.s.sages in his book 'equal to Defoe.' The very printer, Mr. Woodfall, joined in the chase. 'The public is quite prepared to devour your book,' he wrote, which was unhappily not the case. Nor was Ford a happier prophet, although a true friend when he wrote--'I am sure it will be _the_ book of the year when it is brought forth.'[172] The activity of Mrs. Borrow in this matter of the publication of _Lavengro_ is interesting. 'My husband ... is, I a.s.sure you, doing all he can as regards the completion of the book,' she writes to Mr. Murray in December 1849, and in November of the following year Murray writes to her to say that he is engraving Phillips's portrait of Borrow for the book. 'I think a cheering letter from you will do Mr. Borrow good,' she writes later. Throughout the whole correspondence between publisher and printer we are impressed by Mrs.

Borrow's keen interest in her husband's book, her anxiety that he should be humoured. Sadly did Borrow need to be humoured, for if he had cherished the illusion that his book would really be the 'Book of the Year' he was to suffer a cruel disillusion. Scarcely any one wanted it.

All the critics abused it. In _The Athenaeum_ it was bluntly p.r.o.nounced a failure. 'The story of _Lavengro_ will content no one,' said Sir William Stirling-Maxwell in _Fraser's Magazine_. The book 'will add but little to Mr. Borrow's reputation,' said _Blackwood_. The only real insight into the book's significance was provided by Thomas Gordon Hake in a letter to _The New Monthly Review_, in which journal the editor, Harrison Ainsworth, had already p.r.o.nounced a not very favourable opinion. '_Lavengro's_ roots will strike deep into the soil of English letters,' wrote Dr. Hake, and he then p.r.o.nounced a verdict now universally accepted. George Henry Lewes once happily remarked that he would make an appreciation of Boswell's _Life of Johnson_ a test of friends.h.i.+p. Many of us would be almost equally inclined to make such a test of Borrow's _Lavengro_. Tennyson declared that an enthusiasm for Milton's _Lycidas_ was a touchstone of taste in poetry. May we not say that an enthusiasm for Borrow's _Lavengro_ is now a touchstone of taste in English prose literature?

But the reception of _Lavengro_ by the critics, and also by the public,[173] may be said to have destroyed Borrow's moral fibre.

Henceforth, it was a soured and disappointed man who went forth to meet the world. We hear much in the gossip of contemporaries of Borrow's eccentricities, it may be of his rudeness and gruffness, in the last years of his life. Only those who can realise the personality of a self-contained man, conscious, as all genius has ever been, of its achievement, and conscious also of the failure of the world to recognise, will understand--and will sympathise.

Borrow, as we have seen, took many years to write _Lavengro_. 'I am writing the work,' he told Dawson Turner, 'in precisely the same manner as _The Bible in Spain_, viz., on blank sheets of old account-books, backs of letters,' etc., and he recalls Mahomet writing the Koran on mutton bones as an a.n.a.logy to his own 'slovenliness of ma.n.u.script.'[174]

I have had plenty of opportunity of testing this slovenliness in the collection of ma.n.u.scripts of portions of _Lavengro_ that have come into my possession. These are written upon pieces of paper of all shapes and sizes, although at least a third of the book in Borrow's very neat handwriting is contained in a leather notebook, of which I give examples of the t.i.tle-page and opening leaf in facsimile. The t.i.tle-page demonstrates the earliest form of Borrow's conception. Not only did he then contemplate an undisguised autobiography, but even described himself, as he frequently did in his conversation, as 'a Norfolk man.'

Before the book was finished, however, he repudiated the autobiographical note, and by the time he sat down to write _The Romany Rye_ we find him fiercely denouncing his critics for coming to such a conclusion. 'The writer,' he declares, 'never said it was an autobiography; never authorised any person to say it was one.' Which was doubtless true, in a measure. Yet I find among my Borrow Papers the following letter from Whitwell Elwin, who, writing from Booton Rectory on 21st October 1852, and addressing him as 'My dear Mr. Borrow,' said:

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE ORIGINAL t.i.tLE-PAGE OF _LAVENGRO_.

_From the Ma.n.u.script in the possession of the Author of 'George Borrow and his Circle.'_]