_THE BIBLE IN SPAIN_
In an admirable appreciation of our author, the one in which he gives
the oft-quoted eulogy concerning him as 'the delightful, the bewitching,
the never-sufficiently-to-be-praised George Borrow,' Mr. Birrell records
the solace that may be found by small boys in the ambiguities of a
title-page, or at least might have been found in it in his youth and in
mine. In those days in certain Puritan circles a very strong line was
drawn between what was known as Sunday reading, and reading that might
be permitted on week-days. The Sunday book must have a religious
flavour. There were magazines with that particular flavour, every story
in them having a pious moral withal. Very closely watched and
scrutinised was the reading of young people in those days and in those
circles. Mr. Birrell, doubtless, speaks from autobiographical memories
when he tells us of a small boy with whose friends _The Bible in Spain_
passed muster on the strength of its title-page. For Mr. Birrell is the
son of a venerated Nonconformist minister; and perhaps he, or at least
those who were of his household, had this religious idiosyncrasy. It may
be that the distinction which pervaded the evangelical circles of Mr.
Birrell's youth as to what were Sunday books, as distinct from books to
be read on week-days, has disappeared. In any case think of the
advantage of the boy of that generation who was able to handle a book
with so unexceptionable a title as _The Bible in Spain_. His elders
would succumb at once, particularly if the boy had the good sense to
call their attention to the sub-title--'The Journeys, Adventures, and
Imprisonments of an Englishman in an Attempt to Circulate the Scriptures
in the Peninsula.' Nothing could be said by the most devout of seniors
against so prepossessing a title-page.[155] But what of the boy who had
thus passed the censorship? What a revelation of adventure was open to
him! Perhaps he would skip the 'preachy' parts in which Borrow was
doubtless sincere, although the sincerity has so uncertain a ring
to-day. Here are five passages, for example, which do not seem to belong
to the book:
In whatever part of the world I, a poor wanderer in the
Gospel's cause, may chance to be
* * * * *
very possibly the fate of St. Stephen might overtake me; but
does the man deserve the name of a follower of Christ who would
shrink from danger of any kind in the cause of Him whom he
calls his Master? 'He who loses his life for my sake shall find
it,' are words which the Lord Himself uttered. These words were
fraught with consolation to me, as they doubtless are to every
one engaged in propagating the Gospel, in sincerity of heart,
in savage and barbarian lands.
* * * * *
Unhappy land! not until the pure light of the Gospel has
illumined thee, wilt thou learn that the greatest of all gifts
is charity!
* * * * *
and I thought that to convey the Gospel to a place so wild and
remote might perhaps be considered an acceptable pilgrimage in
the eyes of my Maker. True it is that but one copy remained of
those which I had brought with me on this last journey; but
this reflection, far from discouraging me in my projected
enterprise, produced the contrary effect, as I called to mind
that, ever since the Lord revealed Himself to man, it has
seemed good to Him to accomplish the greatest ends by
apparently the most insufficient means; and I reflected that
this one copy might serve as an instrument for more good than
the four thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine copies of the
edition of Madrid.
* * * * *
I shall not detain the course of my narrative with reflections
as to the state of a Church which, though it pretends to be
founded on scripture, would yet keep the light of scripture
from all mankind, if possible. But Rome is fully aware that she
is not a Christian Church, and having no desire to become so,
she acts prudently in keeping from the eyes of her followers
the page which would reveal to them the truths of Christianity.
All this does not ring quite true, and in any case it is too much on the
lines of 'Sunday reading' to please the small boy, who must, however,
have found a thousand things in that volume that were to his taste--some
of the wildest adventures, hairbreadth escapes, extraordinary meetings
again and again with unique people--with Benedict Mol, for example, who
was always seeking for treasure. Gypsies, bull-fighters, quaint and
queer characters of every kind, come before us in rapid succession.
Rarely, surely, have so many adventures been crowded into the same
number of pages. Only when Borrow remembers, as he has to do
occasionally, that he is an agent of the Bible Society does the book
lose its vigour and its charm. We have already pointed out that the
foundations of the volume were contained in certain letters written by
Borrow during his five years in Spain to the secretaries of the Bible
Society in London. The recent publication of these letters has revealed
to us Borrow's methods. When he had settled down at Oulton he took down
his notebooks, one of which is before me, but finding this was not
sufficient, he asked the Bible Society for the loan of his letters to
them.[156] Other letters that he hoped to use were not forthcoming, as
the following note from Miss Gurney to Mrs. Borrow indicates:
To Mrs. George Borrow
EARLHAM, _12th June 1840._
DEAR MRS. BORROW,--I am sorry I cannot find any of Mr. Borrow's
letters from Spain. I don't think we ever had any, but my
brother is from home and I therefore cannot inquire of him. I
send you the only two I can find. I am very glad he is going to
publish his travels, which I have no doubt will be very
interesting. It must be a pleasant object to assist him by
copying the manuscripts. If I should visit Lowestoft this
summer I shall hope to see you, but I have no immediate
prospect of doing so. With kind regards to all your party, I
am, Dear Mrs. Borrow, Yours sincerely,
C. GURNEY.[157]
The Bible Society applied to in the same manner lent Borrow all his
letters to that organisation and its secretaries. Not all were returned.
Many came to Dr. Knapp when he purchased the half of the Borrow papers
that were sold after Borrow's death; the remainder are in my possession.
It is a nice point, seventy years after they were written, as to whom
they belong. In any case the Bible Society must have kept copies of
everything, for when, in 1911, they came to publish the _Letters_[158]
the collection was sufficiently complete. That publication revealed some
interesting sidelights. It proved on the one hand that Borrow had drawn
more upon his diaries than upon his letters, although he frequently
reproduced fragments of his diaries in his letters. It revealed further
the extraordinary frankness with which Borrow wrote to his employers.
But the main point is in the discovery revealed to us that Borrow was
not an artist in his letters. Borrow was never a good letter writer,
although I think that many of the letters that appear for the first
time in these pages will prove that his letters are very interesting as
contributions to biography. If some of the letters that helped to make
up _The Bible in Spain_ are interesting, it is because in them Borrow
incorporated considerable fragments of anecdote and adventure from his
notebooks. It is quite a mistake to assume, as does Dr. Knapp, that the
'Rev. and Dear Sir' at the head of a letter was the only variation. You
will look in vain in the Bible Society correspondence for many a pearl
that is contained in _The Bible in Spain_, and you will look in vain in
_The Bible in Spain_ for many a sentence which concludes some of the
original letters. In one case, indeed, a letter concludes with Heber's
hymn--
'From Greenland's Icy Mountains,'
with which Borrow's correspondent must already have been sufficiently
familiar. But Borrow could not be other than Borrow, and the secretaries
of the Bible Society had plentiful matter with which to astonish them.
The finished production, however, is a fascinating book. You read it
again and it becomes still more entertaining. No wonder that it took the
world by storm and made its author the lion of a season. 'A queer book
will be this same _Bible in Spain_,' wrote Borrow to John Murray in
August 1841, 'containing all my queer adventures in that queer country
... it will make two nice foolscap octavo volumes.'[159] It actually
made three volumes, and Borrow was as irritated at Mr. Murray's delay in
publishing as that publisher afterwards became at Borrow's own delay
over _Lavengro_. The whole book was laboriously copied out by Mrs.
Borrow. When this copy was sent to Mr. Murray, it was submitted to his
'reader,' who reported 'numerous faults in spelling and some in
grammar,' to which criticism Borrow retorted that the copy was the work
of 'a country amanuensis.' The book was published in December 1842, but
has the date 1843 on its title-page.[160] In its three-volumed form 4750
copies of the book were issued by July 1843, after which countless
copies were sold in cheaper one-volumed form. Success had at last come
to Borrow. He was one of the most talked-of writers of the day. His
elation may be demonstrated by his discussion with Dawson Turner as to
whether he should leave the manuscript of _The Bible in Spain_ to the
Dean and Chapter's Library at Norwich or to the British Museum, by his
gratification at the fact that Sir Robert Peel referred to his book in
the House of Commons, and by his pleasure in the many appreciative
reviews which, indeed, were for the most part all that an ambitious
author could desire. 'Never,' said _The Examiner_, 'was book more
legibly impressed with the unmistakable mark of genius.' 'There is no
taking leave of a book like this,' said the _Athenæum_. 'Better
Christmas fare we have never had it in our power to offer our readers.'
[Illustration: A SHEKEL
given to Borrow by Hasfeld, his Danish friend, as a talisman when they
parted at St. Petersburg. In _The Bible in Spain_ Borrow relates that he
showed this shekel at Gibraltar to a Jew, who exclaimed, 'Brothers,
witness, these are the letters of Solomon. This silver is blessed. We
must kiss this money.']
The publication of _The Bible in Spain_ made Borrow famous for a time.
Hitherto he had been known only to a small religious community, the
coterie that ran the Bible Society. Even the large mass of people who
subscribed to that Society knew its agent in Spain only by meagre
allusions in the Annual Reports. Now the world was to talk about him,
and he enjoyed being talked about. Borrow declared--in 1842--that the
five years he passed in Spain were the most happy years of his
existence. But then he had not had a happy life during the previous
years, as we have seen, and in Russia he had a toilsome task with an
added element of uncertainty as to the permanence of his position. The
five years in Spain had plentiful adventure, and they closed in a
pleasant manner. Yet the year that followed, even though it found him
almost a country squire, was not a happy one. Once again the world did
not want him and his books--not the _Gypsies of Spain_ for example.
Seven weeks after publication it had sold only to the extent of some
three hundred copies.[161] But the happiest year of Borrow's life was
undoubtedly the one that followed the publication of _The Bible in
Spain_. Up to that time he had been a mere adventurer; now he was that
most joyous of beings--a successful author; and here, from among his
Papers, is a carefully preserved relic of his social triumph:
To George Borrow, Esq., at Mr. Murray's, Bookseller, Albemarle Street.
4 CARLTON TERRACE, _Tuesday, 30th May._
The Prussian Minister and Madam Bunsen would be very happy to
see Mr. Borrow to-morrow, Wednesday evening, about half past
nine o'clock or later, when some German national songs will be
performed at their house, which may possibly suit Mr. Borrow's
taste. They hoped to have met him last night at the Bishop of
Norwich's, but arrived there too late. They had already
commissioned Lady Hall (sister to Madam Bunsen) to express to
Mr. Borrow their wish for his acquaintance.
In a letter to his wife, of which a few lines are printed in Dr. Knapp's
book, he also writes of this visit to the Prussian Minister, where he
had for company 'Princes and Members of Parliament.' 'I was the star of
the evening,' he says; 'I thought to myself, "what a difference!"'[162]
The following letter is in a more sober key:
To Mrs. George Borrow, Oulton, Suffolk.
_Wednesday_, 58 JERMYN STREET.
DEAR CARRETA,--I was glad to receive your letter; I half
expected one on Tuesday. I am, on the whole, very comfortable,
and people are kind. I passed last Sunday at Clapham with Mrs.
Browne; I was glad to go there for it was a gloomy day. They
are now glad enough to ask me: I suppose I must stay in London
through next week. I have an invitation to two grand parties,
and it is as well to have something for one's money. I called
at the Bible Society--all remarkably civil, Joseph especially
so. I think I shall be able to manage with my own Dictionary.
There is now a great demand for Morrison. Yesterday I again
dined at the Murrays. There was a family party; very pleasant.
To-morrow I dine with an old schoolfellow. Murray is talking of
printing a new edition to sell for five shillings: those
rascals, the Americans, have, it seems, reprinted it, and are
selling it for _eighteen_ pence. Murray says he shall print ten
thousand copies; it is chiefly wanted for the Colonies. He says
the rich people and the libraries have already got it, and he
is quite right, for nearly three thousand copies have been sold
at 27s.[163] There is no longer the high profit to be made on
books there formerly was, as the rascals abroad pirate the good
ones, and in the present state of copyright there is no help;
we can, however, keep the American edition out of the Colonies,
which is something. I have nothing more to say save to commend
you not to go on the water without me; perhaps you would be
overset; and do not go on the bridge again till I come. Take
care of Habismilk and Craffs; kiss the little mare and old Hen.
GEORGE BORROW.
The earliest literary efforts of Borrow in Spain were his two
translations of St. Luke's Gospel--the one into Romany, the other into
Basque. This last book he did not actually translate himself, but
procured 'from a Basque physician of the name of Oteiza.'
[Illustration: TITLE-PAGE OF BASQUE TRANSLATION BY OTEIZA OF THE GOSPEL
OF ST. LUKE]
[Illustration: TITLE-PAGE OF FIRST EDITION OF ROMANY TRANSLATION OF THE
GOSPEL OF ST. LUKE]
[Illustration: TWO PAGES FROM BORROW'S CORRECTED PROOF SHEETS OF ROMANY
TRANSLATION OF THE GOSPEL OF ST. LUKE]
FOOTNOTES:
[155] Yet one critic of Borrow--Jane H. Findlater, in the _Cornhill
Magazine_, November 1899--actually says that '_The Bible in Spain_ was
perhaps the most ill-advised title that a well-written book ever
laboured under, giving, as it does, the idea that the book is a
prolonged tract.'
[156] Borrow had really written a great deal of the book in Spain. The
'notebook' contained many of his adventures, and moreover on August 20,
1836, the _Athenæum_, published two long letters from him under the
title of 'The Gypsies in Russia and in Spain,' opening with the
following preliminary announcement:
We have been obligingly favoured with the following extracts from
letters of an intelligent gentleman, whose literary labours, the least
important of his life, we not long since highly praised, but whose name
we are not at liberty, on this occasion, to make public. They contain
some curious and interesting facts relating to the condition of this
peculiar people in very distant countries.
The first letter is dated September 23, 1835, and gives an account of
his experiences with the gypsies in Russia. The whole of this account he
incorporated in _The Gypsies of Spain_. Following this there are two
columns, dated Madrid, July 19, 1836, in which he gives an account of
the gypsies in Spain. All the episodes that he relates he incorporated
in _The Bible in Spain_. The two letters so plainly indicate that all
the time Borrow was in Spain his mind was more filled with the subject
of the gypsies than with any other question. He did his work well for
the Bible Society no doubt, and gave them their money's worth, but there
is a humorous note in the fact that Borrow should have utilised his
position as a missionary--for so we must count him--to make himself so
thoroughly acquainted with gypsy folklore and gypsy songs and dances as
these two fragments by an 'intelligent gentleman' imply. It is not
strange that under the circumstances Borrow did not wish that his name
should be made public.
[157] This was Miss Catherine Gurney, who was born in 1776, in Magdalen
Street, Norwich, and died at Lowestoft in 1850, aged seventy-five. She
twice presided over the Earlham home. The brother referred to was Joseph
John Gurney.
[158] _Letters of George Borrow to the British and Foreign Bible
Society_. Published by direction of the Committee. Edited by T. H.
Darlow. Hodder and Stoughton, 1911.
[159] Samuel Smiles: _A Publisher and his Friends_, vol. ii. p. 485.
[160] _The Bible in Spain; or The Journeys, Adventures, and
Imprisonments of an Englishman in an Attempt to Circulate the Scriptures
in the Peninsula_. By George Borrow, author of _The Gypsies of Spain_.
In three volumes. London: John Murray, Albemarle St., 1843.
[161] Herbert Jenkins: _Life_, p. 341.
[162] Knapp's _Life_, vol. i. p. 398. In the _Annals of the Harford
Family_, edited by Alice Harford (Westminster Press, 1909), there is an
account of this gathering in a letter from J. Harford-Battersby to
Louisa Harford. There was present 'the amusing author of _The Bible in
Spain_, a man who is remarkable for his extraordinary powers as a
linguist, and for the originality of his character, not to speak of the
wonderful adventures he narrates, and the ease and facility with which
he tells them. He kept us laughing a good part of breakfast time by the
oddity of his remarks, as well as the positiveness of his assertions,
often rather startling, and, like his books, partaking of the
marvellous.'
[163] 4750 copies were sold in the three volume form in 1843, and a
sixth and cheaper edition the same year sold 9000 copies.