George Borrow and His Circle Part 30

I find also in this connection a letter from Tangier addressed to 'Mr.

H. George Borrow' under date 2nd November 1847. It tells us that the worthy Jew longs once again to see the 'dear face' of his master. Since he left his service he has married and has two sons, but he is anxious to return to England if that same master will find him work. We can imagine that by this time Borrow had had enough of Hayim Ben Attar, and that his answer was not encouraging.

But by far the best glimpses of Borrow during these years of Suffolk life are those contained in a letter contributed by his friend, Elizabeth Harvey, to _The Eastern Daily Press_ of Norwich over the initials 'E.H.':[188]

When I knew Mr. Borrow he lived in a lovely cottage whose garden sloped down to the edge of Oulton Broad. He had a wooden room built on the very margin of the water, where he had many strange old books in various languages. I remember he once put one before me, telling me to read it. 'Oh, I can't,' I replied.

He said, 'You ought, it's your own language.' It was an old Saxon book. He used to spend a great deal of his time in this room writing, translating, and at times singing strange words in a stentorian voice, while pa.s.sers-by on the lake would stop to listen with astonishment and curiosity to the singular sounds. He was 6 feet 3 inches, a splendid man, with handsome hands and feet. He wore neither whiskers, beard, nor moustache. His features were very handsome, but his eyes were peculiar, being round and rather small, but very piercing, and now and then fierce. He would sometimes sing one of his Romany songs, shake his fist at me and look quite wild. Then he would ask, 'Aren't you afraid of me?' 'No, not at all,' I would say.

Then he would look just as gentle and kind, and say, 'G.o.d bless you, I would not hurt a hair of your head,' He was an expert swimmer, and used to go out bathing, and dive under water an immense time. On one occasion he was bathing with a friend, and after plunging in nothing was seen of him for some while. His friend began to be alarmed, when he heard Borrow's voice a long way off exclaiming, 'There, if that had been written in one of my books they would have said it was a lie, wouldn't they?' He was very fond of animals, and the animals were fond of him. He would go for a walk with two dogs and a cat following him. The cat would go a quarter of a mile or so and then turn back home.

He delighted to go for long walks and enter into conversation with any one he might meet on the road, and lead them into histories of their lives, belongings, and experiences. When they used some word peculiar to Norfolk (or Suffolk) countrymen he would say, 'Why, that's a Danish word.' By and by the man would use another peculiar expression, 'Why, that's Saxon'; a little later on another, 'Why, that's French.' And he would add, 'Why, what a wonderful man you are to speak so many languages.' One man got very angry, but Mr. Borrow was quite unconscious that he had given any offence. He spoke a great number of languages, and at the Exhibition of 1851, whither he went with his stepdaughter, he spoke to the different foreigners in their own language, until his daughter saw some of them whispering together and looking as if they thought he was 'uncanny,' and she became alarmed and drew him away. He, however, did not like to hear the English language adulterated with the introduction of foreign words. If his wife or friends used a foreign word in conversation, he would say, 'What's that, trying to come over me with strange languages.'

I have gone for many a walk with him at Oulton. He used to go on, 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. He was a great lover of nature, and very fond of his trees. He quite fretted if, by some mischance, he lost one. He did not shoot or hunt. He rode his Arab at times, but walking was his favourite exercise. He was subject to fits of nervous depression. At times also he suffered from sleeplessness, when he would get up and walk to Norwich (25 miles), and return the next night recovered. His fondness for the gypsies has been noticed. At Oulton he used to allow them to encamp in his grounds, and he would visit them, with a friend or alone, talk to them in Romany, and sing Romany songs. He was very fond of ghost stories and believed in the supernatural. He was keenly sympathetic with any one who was in trouble or suffering. He was no man of business and very guileless, and led a very harmless, quiet life at Oulton, spending his evenings at home with his wife and stepdaughter, generally reading all the evening. He was very hospitable in his own home, and detested meanness. He was moderate in eating and drinking, took very little breakfast, but ate a very great quant.i.ty at dinner, and then had only a draught of cold water before going to bed. He wrote much in praise of 'strong ale,' and was very fond of good ale, of whose virtue he had a great idea. Once I was speaking of a lady who was attached to a gentleman, and he asked, 'Well, did he make her an offer?' 'No,' I said. 'Ah,' he exclaimed, 'if she had given him some good ale he would.' But although he talked so much about ale I never saw him take much. He was very temperate, and would eat what was set before him, often not thinking of what he was doing, and he never refused what was offered him. He took much pleasure in music, especially of a light and lively character. My sister would sing to him, and I played. One piece he seemed never to tire of hearing. It was a polka, 'The Redowa,' I think, and when I had finished he used to say, 'Play that again, E----.' He was very polite and gentlemanly in ladies' society, and we all liked him.

It is refres.h.i.+ng to read this tribute, from which I have omitted nothing salient, because a very disagreeable Borrow has somehow grown up into a tradition. I note in reading some of the reviews of Dr. Knapp's _Life_ that he is charged, or half-charged, with suppressing facts, 'because they do not reflect credit upon the subject of his biography.' Now, there were really no facts to suppress. Borrow was at times a very irritable man, he was a very self-centred one. His egotism might even be p.r.o.nounced amazing by those who had never met an author. But those of us who have, recognise that with very few exceptions they are all egotists, although some conceal it from the un.o.bservant more deftly than others.

Let me recall Mr. Arthur Christopher Benson's verses on 'My Poet.'

He came; I met him face to face, And shrank amazed, dismayed; I saw No patient depth, no tender grace, No prophet of the eternal law.

But weakness, fretting to be great, Self-consciousness with sidelong eye, The impotence that dares not wait For honour, crying 'This is I.'

The tyrant of a sullen hour, He frowned away our mild content; And insight only gave him power To see the slights that were not meant.[189]

Many successful and unsuccessful authors, living and dead, are here described, and Borrow was far from one of the worst. He was quarrelsome, and I rather like him for that. If he was a good hater he was also a very loyal friend, as we find Miss Elizabeth Harvey and, in after years, Mr. Theodore Watts-Dunton testifying. Moreover, Borrow had a grievance of a kind that has not often befallen a man of his literary power. He had written a great book in _Lavengro_, and the critics and the public refused to recognise that it was a great book. Many authors of power have died young and unrecognised; but recognition has usually come to those men of genius who have lived into middle age. It did not come to Borrow. He had therefore a right to be soured. This sourness found expression in many ways. Borrow, most sound of churchmen, actually quarrelled with his vicar over the tempers of their respective dogs.

Both the vicar, the Rev. Edwin Proctor Denniss, and his paris.h.i.+oner wrote one another acrid letters. Here is Borrow's parting shot:

Circ.u.mstances over which Mr. Borrow has at present no control will occasionally bring him and his family under the same roof with Mr. Denniss; that roof, however, is the roof of the House of G.o.d, and the prayers of the Church of England are wholesome from whatever mouth they may proceed.[190]

Surely that is a kind of quarrel we have all had in our day, and we think ourselves none the less virtuous in consequence. Then there was Borrow's very natural ambition to be made a magistrate of Suffolk. He tells Mr. John Murray in 1842 that he has caught a bad cold by getting up at night in pursuit of poachers and thieves. 'A terrible neighbourhood this,' he adds, 'not a magistrate dare do his duty.' And so in the next year he wrote again to the same correspondent:

Present my compliments to Mr. Gladstone, and tell him that the _Bible in Spain_ will have no objection to becoming one of the 'Great Unpaid.'

Mr. Gladstone, although he had admired _The Bible in Spain_, and indeed had even suggested the modification of one of its sentences, did nothing. Lockhart, Lord Clarendon, and others who were applied to were equally powerless or indifferent. Borrow never got his magistracy.

To-day no man of equal eminence in literature could possibly have failed of so slight an ambition. Moreover, Borrow wanted to be a J.P., not from mere sn.o.bbery as many might, but for a definite, practical object. I am afraid he would not have made a very good magistrate, and perhaps inquiry had made that clear to the authorities. Lastly, there was Borrow's quarrel with the railway which came through his estate. He had thoughts of removing to Bury, where Dr. Hake lived, or to Troston Hall, once the home of the interesting Capell Lofft. But he was not to leave Oulton. In intervals of holidays, journeys, and of sojourn in Yarmouth it was to remain his home to the end. In 1849 his mother joined him at Oulton. She had resided for thirty-three years at the Willow Lane Cottage. She was now seventy-seven years of age. She lived-on near her son as a tenant of his tenant at Oulton Hall until her death nine years later, dying in 1858 in her eighty-seventh year. She lies buried in Oulton Churchyard, with a tomb thus inscribed:

Sacred to the memory of Ann Borrow, widow of Captain Thomas Borrow. She died on the 16th of August 1858, aged eighty-six years and seven months. She was a good wife and a good mother.

During these years at Oulton we have many glimpses of Borrow. Dr.

Jessopp, for example, has recorded in _The Athenaeum_[191] newspaper his own hero-wors.h.i.+p for the author of _Lavengro_, whom he was never to meet. This enthusiasm for _Lavengro_ was shared by certain of his Norfolk friends of those days:

Among those friends were two who, I believe, are still alive, and who about the year 1846 set out, without telling me of their intention, on a pilgrimage to Oulton to see George Borrow in the flesh. In those days the journey was not an inconsiderable one; and though my friends must have known that I would have given my ears to be of the party, I suppose they kept their project to themselves for reasons of their own. Two, they say, are company and three are none; two men could ride in a gig for sixty miles without much difficulty, and an odd man often spoils sport. At any rate, they left me out, and one day they came back full of malignant pride and joy and exultation, and they flourished their information before me with boastings and laughter at my ferocious jealousy; for they had seen, and talked with, and eaten and drunk with, and sat at the feet of the veritable George Borrow, and had grasped his mighty hand.

To me it was too provoking. But what had they to tell?

They found him at Oulton, living, as they affirmed, in a house which belonged to Mrs. Borrow and which her first husband had left her. The household consisted of himself, his wife, and his wife's daughter; and among his other amus.e.m.e.nts he employed himself in training some young horses to follow him about like dogs and come at the call of his whistle. As my two friends were talking with him Borrow sounded his whistle in a paddock near the house, which, if I remember rightly, was surrounded by a low wall. Immediately two beautiful horses came bounding over the fence and trotted up to their master. One put his nose into Borrow's outstretched hand and the other kept snuffing at his pockets in expectation of the usual bribe for confidence and good behaviour. Borrow could not but be flattered by the young Cambridge men paying him the frank homage they offered, and he treated them with the robust and cordial hospitality characteristic of the man. One or two things they learnt which I do not feel at liberty to repeat.

Mr. Arthur W. Upcher of Sheringham Hall, Cromer, also provided in _The Athenaeum_[192] a quaint reminiscence of Borrow in which he recalled that Lavengro had called upon Miss Anna Gurney. This lady had, a.s.suredly with less guile, treated him much as Frances Cobbe would have done. She had taken down an Arabic grammar, and put it into his hand, asking for explanation of some difficult point which he tried to decipher; but meanwhile she talked to him continuously. 'I could not,' said Borrow, 'study the Arabic grammar and listen to her at the same time, so I threw down the book and ran out of the room.' He soon after met Mr. Upcher, to whom he made an interesting revelation:

He told us there were three personages in the world whom he had always a desire to see; two of these had slipped through his fingers, so he was determined to see the third. 'Pray, Mr.

Borrow, who were they?' He held up three fingers of his left hand and pointed them off with the forefinger of the right: the first Daniel O'Connell, the second Lamplighter (the sire of Phosphorus, Lord Berners's winner of the Derby), the third, Anna Gurney. The first two were dead and he had not seen them; now he had come to see Anna Gurney, and this was the end of his visit.

Mr. William Mackay, who now lives at Oulton Broad, where he has heard all the village gossip about Borrow and his _menage_, and we may hope has discounted it fully, furnishes me with the following impression of Borrow, which is of a much later date than those I have just given:

I met Borrow in 1869 at the house of Dr. Gordon Hake at Coombe End, near the top of Roehampton Lane, Wimbledon Common. My recollection is of a tall, broad-shouldered old man, stooping a little, engaged in reading a small volume held close to his eyes. Something Yorks.h.i.+re about his powerful build, but little tolerance or benevolence in his expression. A fine, strongly marked clean shaven face, but with no kindliness or sense of humour indicated in its lines. In loosely made broadcloth he gave the idea of a nonconformist minister--a Unitarian, judging from the intellectuality betrayed in his countenance. To me he was always civil and, even, genial, for he did not know that I was a writing fellow. But to others casually met he seemed to be invariably and intolerably rude. He could not brook contradiction--particularly on religious topics. He was an earnest believer. But it was in the G.o.d of Battles that he believed. And he would be delighted at any time to prove in a stand-up fight the honesty of his convictions. In the union of a deep religious fervour with an overwhelming love of fighting--sheer physical hand-to-hand fighting--he was an interesting study. In this curious blending of what appear to be opposite qualities he resembled General Gordon, who, by the way, was a cousin of Dr. Gordon Hake at whose place I met Borrow.

He was a splendid liar too. Not in the ordinary domestic meaning of the word. But he lied largely, picturesquely, like Baron Munchausen. That is one of the reasons that he did not take to the literary persons whom he met at Hake's. Perhaps he was afraid that some of them would steal his thunder, or perhaps he had a contempt for their serious pose. But to those whom he did not suspect of literary leanings he lied delightfully. That fine boys' book, _The Bible in Spain_, is, I should say, chiefly lies. I have heard him reel off adventures as amazing as any in the Spanish reminiscences, related as having happened on the very Common which we were crossing.

Theodore Watts, who first met Borrow at Hake's, appears to have got on all right with him. But then Watts would get on with anybody. Besides, the two men had a common topic in Romany lore. But toward the literary man in general his att.i.tude was pretty much that of Carlyle. He was contemptuous towards those who followed his own trade.

At one moment of the correspondence we obtain an interesting glimpse of a great man of science. Mr. Darwin sent the following inquiry through Dr. Hooker, afterwards Sir Joseph Hooker, and it reached Borrow through his friend Thomas Brightwell:

Is there any Dog in Spain closely like our English Pointer, in _shape_ and size, and _habits_,--namely in pointing, backing, and not giving tongue. Might I be permitted to quote Mr.

Borrow's answer to the query? Has the improved English pointer been introduced into Spain?

C. DARWIN.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FACSIMILE OF A COMMUNICATION FROM CHARLES DARWIN TO GEORGE BORROW.]

Borrow took constant holidays during these Oulton days. We have elsewhere noted his holidays in Eastern Europe, in the Isle of Man, in Wales, and in Cornwall. Letters from other parts of England would be welcome, but I can only find two, and these are but sc.r.a.ps. Both are addressed to his wife, each without date:

To Mrs. George Borrow

OXFORD, _Feb. 2nd._

DEAR CARRETA,--I reached this place yesterday and hope to be home to-night (Monday). I walked the whole way by Kingston, Hampton, Sunbury (Miss Oriel's place), Windsor, Wallingford, etc., a good part of the way was by the Thames. There has been much wet weather. Oxford is a wonderful place. Kiss Hen., and G.o.d bless you!

GEORGE BORROW.

To Mrs. George Borrow

TUNBRIDGE WELLS, _Tuesday evening._

DEAR CARRETA,--I have arrived here safe--it is a wonderful place, a small city of palaces amidst hills, rocks, and woods, and is full of fine people. Please to carry up stairs and lock in the drawer the little paper sack of letters in the parlour; lock it up with the bank book and put this along with it--also be sure to keep the window of my room fastened and the door locked, and keep the key in your pocket. G.o.d bless you and Hen.

GEORGE BORROW.

One of the very last letters of Borrow that I possess is to an unknown correspondent. It is from a rough 'draft' in his handwriting:

OULTON, LOWESTOFT, _May 1875._

SIR,--Your letter of the eighth of March I only lately received, otherwise I should have answered it sooner. In it you mention Chamberlayne's work, containing versions of the Lord's Prayer translated into a hundred languages, and ask whether I can explain why the one which purports to be a rendering into Waldensian is evidently made in some dialect of the Gaelic. To such explanation as I can afford you are welcome, though perhaps you will not deem it very satisfactory. I have been acquainted with Chamberlayne's work for upwards of forty years.

I first saw it at St. Petersburg in 1834, and the translation in question very soon caught my attention. I at first thought that it was an attempt at imposition, but I soon relinquished that idea. I remembered that Helvetia was a great place for Gaelic. I do not mean in the old time when the Gael possessed the greater part of Europe, but at a long subsequent period: Switzerland was converted to Christianity by Irish monks, the most active and efficient of whom was Gall. These people founded schools in which together with Christianity the Irish or Gaelic language was taught. In process of time, though the religion flourished, the Helveto Gaelic died away, but many pieces in that tongue survived, some of which might still probably be found in the recesses of St. Gall. The n.o.ble abbey is named after the venerable apostle of Christianity in Helvetia; so I deemed it very possible that the version in question might be one of the surviving fruits of Irish missionary labour in Helvetia, not but that I had my doubts, and still have, princ.i.p.ally from observing that the language though certainly not modern does not exhibit any decided marks of high antiquity. It is much to be regretted that Chamberlayne should have given the version to the world under a t.i.tle so calculated to perplex and mislead as that which it bears, and without even stating how or where he obtained it. This, sir, is all I have to say on the very obscure subject about which you have done me the honour to consult me.--Yours truly,

GEORGE BORROW.

FOOTNOTES:

[185] They lived first at 169 King Street, then at two addresses unknown, then successively at 37, 38 and 39 Camperdown Terrace, their last address was 28 Trafalgar Place.

[186] Borrow's letters were frequently addressed to Oulton Hall, but he never lived here. Oulton Hall was the name given to the farm house which went with Oulton Hall Farm. 'Old inhabitants,' writes Mr. William Mackay of Oulton Broad to me, 'remember that seventy years ago it was occupied by Skepper, who was succeeded by Grimmer, who was succeeded by Smith.'

'I can find no one,' continues Mr. Mackay, 'who recollects old Mrs.