Transcribed from the 1911 John Murray edition, by David Price,
ccx074@pglaf.org
LAVENGRO
THE SCHOLAR, THE GYPSY,
THE PRIEST
BY GEORGE BORROW
A NEW EDITION CONTAINING THE UNALTERED TEXT
OF THE ORIGINAL ISSUE; SOME SUPPRESSED
EPISODES, MS. VARIORUM, VOCABULARY
AND NOTES BY THE AUTHOR OF
THE LIFE OF GEORGE BORROW
LONDON
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET
1911
{Rackman's Offices, Tuck's Court, St. Giles', Norwich: p0.jpg}
FIRST EDITION . . . 1851
SECOND EDITION . . . ----
THIRD EDITION . . . 1872
FOURTH EDITION . . . 1888
FIFTH EDITION . . . 1896
SIXTH (DEFINITIVE) EDITION . . . 6/- _March_, 1900
_Reprinted_ . . . _July_, 1902
_Reprinted_ . . . _May_, 1904
_Reprinted_ . . . Thin Paper . _Aug._, 1905
_Reprinted_ . . . 6/- . _Jan._, 1907
_Reprinted_ . . . _Sept._, 1907
_Reprinted_ . . . 2/6 net . _Sept._, 1907
_Reprinted_ . . . Thin Paper . _June_ 1908
_Reprinted_ . . . 1/- net . _Feb._, 1911
[ORIGINAL TITLE PAGE.]
LAVENGRO;
THE SCHOLAR--THE GYPSY--THE PRIEST.
BY GEORGE BORROW,
AUTHOR OF "THE BIBLE IN SPAIN" AND "THE GYPSIES OF SPAIN"
IN THREE VOLUMES--VOL. I.
LONDON:
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.
1851.
ADVERTISEMENT. (1851.)
In compliance with the advice of certain friends who are desirous that it
may not be supposed that the following work has been written expressly
for the present times, the author begs leave to state that it was planned
in the year 1842, and all the characters sketched before the conclusion
of the year 1843. The contents of the volumes here offered to the public
have, with the exception of the Preface, existed in manuscript for a very
considerable time.
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. (1851.)
In the following pages I have endeavoured to describe a dream, partly of
study, partly of adventure, in which will be found copious notices of
books, and many descriptions of life and manners, some in a very unusual
form.
The scenes of action lie in the British Islands. Pray be not displeased,
gentle reader, if perchance thou hast imagined that I was about to
conduct thee to distant lands, and didst promise thyself much instruction
and entertainment from what I might tell thee of them. I do assure thee
that thou hast no reason to be displeased, inasmuch as there are no
countries in the world less known by the British than these selfsame
British Islands, or where more strange things are every day occurring,
whether in road or street, house or dingle.
The time embraces nearly the first quarter of the present century. This
information, again, may perhaps be anything but agreeable to thee; it is
a long time to revert to--but fret not thyself, many matters which at
present much occupy the public mind originated in some degree towards the
latter end of that period, and some of them will be treated of.
The principal actors in this dream, or drama, are, as you will have
gathered from the title-page, a Scholar, a Gypsy, and a Priest. Should
you imagine that these three form one, permit me to assure you that you
are very much mistaken. Should there be something of the Gypsy manifest
in the Scholar, there is certainly nothing of the Priest. With respect
to the Gypsy--decidedly the most entertaining character of the
three--there is certainly nothing of the Scholar or the Priest in him;
and as for the Priest, though there may be something in him both of
scholarship and gypsyism, neither the Scholar nor the Gypsy would feel at
all flattered by being confounded with him.
Many characters which may be called subordinate will be found, and it is
probable that some of these characters will afford much more interest to
the reader than those styled the principal. The favourites with the
writer are a brave old soldier and his helpmate, an ancient gentlewoman
who sold apples, and a strange kind of wandering man and his wife.
Amongst the many things attempted in this book is the encouragement of
charity, and free and genial manners, and the exposure of humbug, of
which there are various kinds, but of which the most perfidious, the most
debasing, and the most cruel, is the humbug of the Priest.
Yet let no one think that irreligion is advocated in this book. With
respect to religious tenets, I wish to observe that I am a member of the
Church of England, into whose communion I was baptised, and to which my
forefathers belonged. Its being the religion in which I was baptised,
and of my forefathers, would be a strong inducement to me to cling to it;
for I do not happen to be one of those choice spirits "who turn from
their banner when the battle bears strongly against it, and go over to
the enemy," and who receive at first a hug and a "viva," and in the
sequel contempt and spittle in the face; but my chief reason for
belonging to it is, because, of all Churches calling themselves Christian
ones, I believe there is none so good, so well founded upon Scripture, or
whose ministers are, upon the whole, so exemplary in their lives and
conversation, so well read in the Book from which they preach, or so
versed in general learning, so useful in their immediate neighbourhoods,
or so unwilling to persecute people of other denominations for matters of
doctrine.
In the communion of this Church, and with the religious consolation of
its ministers, I wish and hope to live and die, and in its and their
defence will at all times be ready, if required, to speak, though humbly,
and to fight, though feebly, against enemies, whether carnal or
spiritual.
And is there no priestcraft in the Church of England? There is
certainly, or rather there was, a modicum of priestcraft in the Church of
England, but I have generally found that those who are most vehement
against the Church of England are chiefly dissatisfied with her because
there is only a modicum of that article in her. Were she stuffed to the
very cupola with it, like a certain other Church, they would have much
less to say against the Church of England.
By the other Church I mean Rome. Its system was once prevalent in
England, and, during the period that it prevailed there, was more
prolific of debasement and crime than all other causes united. The
people and the government at last becoming enlightened by means of the
Scripture, spurned it from the island with disgust and horror, the land
instantly after its disappearance becoming a fair field, in which arts,
sciences, and all the amiable virtues flourished, instead of being a
pestilent marsh where swine-like ignorance wallowed, and artful
hypocrites, like so many wills-o'-the-wisp, played antic gambols about,
around and above debased humanity.
But Popery still wished to play her old part, to regain her lost
dominion, to reconvert the smiling land into the pestilential morass,
where she could play again her old antics. From the period of the
Reformation in England up to the present time, she has kept her
emissaries here--individuals contemptible in intellect, it is true, but
cat-like and gliding, who, at her bidding, have endeavoured, as much as
in their power has lain, to damp and stifle every genial, honest, loyal
and independent thought, and to reduce minds to such a state of dotage as
would enable their old Popish mother to do what she pleased with them.
And in every country, however enlightened, there are always minds
inclined to grovelling superstition--minds fond of eating dust and
swallowing clay--minds never at rest, save when prostrate before some
fellow in a surplice; and these Popish emissaries found always some weak
enough to bow down before them, astounded by their dreadful denunciations
of eternal woe and damnation to any who should refuse to believe their
Romania; but they played a poor game--the law protected the servants of
Scripture, and the priest with his beads seldom ventured to approach any
but the remnant of those of the eikonolatry--representatives of
worm-eaten houses, their debased dependants and a few poor crazy
creatures among the middle classes--he played a poor game, and the labour
was about to prove almost entirely in vain, when the English Legislature,
in compassion or contempt, or, yet more probably, influenced by that
spirit of toleration and kindness which is so mixed up with
Protestantism, removed almost entirely the disabilities under which
Popery laboured, and enabled it to raise its head and to speak out almost
without fear.
And it did raise its head, and, though it spoke with some little fear at
first, soon discarded every relic of it; went about the land uttering its
damnation cry, gathering around it--and for doing so many thanks to
it--the favourers of priestcraft who lurked within the walls of the
Church of England; frightening with the loudness of its voice the weak,
the timid and the ailing; perpetrating, whenever it had an opportunity,
that species of crime to which it has ever been most partial--_deathbed
robbery_; for as it is cruel, so is it dastardly. Yes, it went on
enlisting, plundering and uttering its terrible threats till--till it
became, as it always does when left to itself, a fool, a very fool. Its
plunderings might have been overlooked, and so might its insolence, had
it been common insolence, but it--, and then the roar of indignation
which arose from outraged England against the viper, the frozen viper
which it had permitted to warm itself upon its bosom.
But thanks, Popery, you have done all that the friends of enlightenment
and religious liberty could wish; but if ever there were a set of foolish
ones to be found under Heaven, surely it is the priestly rabble who came
over from Rome to direct the grand movement, so long in its getting up.
But now again the damnation cry is withdrawn, there is a subdued meekness
in your demeanour, you are now once more harmless as a lamb. Well, we
shall see how the trick--"the old trick"--will serve you.
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. (1872.)
_Lavengro_ made its first appearance more than one and twenty years ago.
It was treated in anything but a courteous manner. Indeed, abuse ran
riot, and many said that the book was killed. If by killed was meant
knocked down and stunned, which is the Irish acceptation of the
word--there is a great deal about Ireland in the book--they were right
enough. It was not dead, however, oh dear no! as is tolerably well shown
by the present edition, which has been long called for.
The chief assailants of the book were the friends of Popery in England.
They were enraged because the author stood up for the religion of his
fathers, his country, and the Bible, against the mythology of a foreign
priest. As for the Pope--but the Pope has of late had his misfortunes,
so no harsh language. To another subject! From the Pope to the Gypsies!
From the Roman Pontiff to the Romany Chals!
A very remarkable set of people are the Gypsies; frequent mention is made
of them in _Lavengro_, and from their peculiar language the word
"Lavengro" is taken. They first attracted notice in Germany, where they
appeared in immense numbers in the early part of the fifteenth century, a
period fraught with extraordinary events: the coming of the Black Death;
the fortunes and misfortunes of the Emperor Sigismund; the quarrels of
the Three Popes--the idea of three Popes at one time!--the burning alive
of John Huss; the advance of the Crescent, and the battle of Agincourt.
They were of dark complexion, some of them of nearly negro blackness, and
spoke a language of their own, though many could converse in German and
other tongues. They called themselves Zingary and Romany Chals, and the
account they gave of themselves was that they were from Lower Egypt, and
were doing penance, by a seven years' wandering, for the sin of their
forefathers, who of old had refused hospitality to the Virgin and Child.
They did not speak truth, however; the name they bore, Zingary, and
which, slightly modified, is still borne by their descendants in various
countries, shows that they were not from Egypt, but from a much more
distant land, Hindostan; for Zingaro is Sanscrit, and signifies a man of
mixed race, a mongrel; whilst their conduct was evidently not that of
people engaged in expiatory pilgrimage; for the women told the kosko
bokht, the good luck, the _buena ventura_; kaured, that is, filched money
and valuables from shop-boards and counters by a curious motion of the
hands, and poisoned pigs and hogs by means of a certain drug, and then
begged, and generally obtained, the carcases, which cut up served their
families for food; the children begged and stole; whilst the men, who it
is true professed horse-clipping, farriery and fiddling, not unfrequently
knocked down travellers and plundered them. The hand of justice of
course soon fell heavily upon them; men of Egypt, as they were called,
were seized, hung, or maimed; women scourged or branded; children
whipped; but no severity appeared to have any effect upon the Zingary;
wherever they went (and they soon found their way to almost every country
in Europe), they adhered to their evil practices. Before the expiration
of the fifteenth century bands of them appeared in England with their
horses, donkeys and tilted carts. How did they contrive to cross the sea
with their carts and other property? By means very easy to people with
money in their pockets, which the Gypsies always have, by paying for
their passage; just as the Hungarian tribe did, who a few years ago came
to England with their horses and vehicles, and who, whilst encamping with
their English brethren in the loveliest of all forests, Epping Wesh,
exclaimed "Sore si mensar si men". {0a}
The meaning of Zingary, one of the names by which the pseudo-penitents
from Lower Egypt called themselves, has been given above. Now for that
of the other, Romany Chals, a name in which the English Gypsies delight,
who have entirely dropped that of Zingary. The meaning of Romany Chals
is lads of Rome or Rama; Romany signifying that which belongs to Rama or
Rome, and Chal a son or lad, being a Zingaric word connected with the
_Shilo_ of Scripture, the meaning of which may be found in the Lexicon of
the brave old Westphalian Hebraist, Johannes Buxtorf. {0b}
The Gypsies of England, the Zigany, Zigeuner, and other tribes of the
Continent, descendants of the old Zingary and Romany Chals, retain many
of the characteristics of their forefathers, and, though differing from
each other in some respects, resemble each other in many. They are much
alike in hue and feature; speak amongst themselves much the same tongue;
exercise much the same trades, and are addicted to the same evil
practices. There is a little English Gypsy gillie, or song, of which the
following quatrain is a translation, containing four queries, to all of
which the English Romano might respond by Ava, and the foreign Chal by
the same affirmative to the three first, if not to the last:--
Can you speak the Roman tongue?
Can you make the fiddle ring?
Can you poison a jolly hog?
And split the stick for the linen string?
So much for the Gypsies. There are many other things in the book to
which perhaps the writer ought to advert; but he is weary, and, moreover,
is afraid of wearying others. He will, therefore, merely add that every
book must eventually stand or fall by its deserts; that praise, however
abundant, will not keep a bad book alive for any considerable time, nor
abuse, however virulent, a good one for ever in the dust; and he thinks
himself justified in saying, that were there not some good in _Lavengro_,
it would not again be raising its head, notwithstanding all it underwent
one and twenty years ago.
LAVENGRO. (1851.)
CHAPTER I.
On an evening of July, in the year 18--, at East D---, a beautiful little
town in a certain district of East Anglia, I first saw the light. {1a}
My father was a Cornish man, the youngest, as I have heard him say, of
seven brothers. He sprang from a family of gentlemen, or, as some people
would call them, _gentillatres_, for they were not very wealthy; they had
a coat of arms, however, and lived on their own property at a place
called Tredinnock, which being interpreted means _the house on the hill_,
which house and the neighbouring acres had been from time immemorial in
their possession. I mention these particulars that the reader may see at
once that I am not altogether of low and plebeian origin; the present age
is highly aristocratic, and I am convinced that the public will read my
pages with more zest from being told that I am a _gentillatre_ by birth
with Cornish blood {1b} in my veins, of a family who lived on their own
property at a place bearing a Celtic name, signifying the house on the
hill, or more strictly the house on the _hillock_.
My father was what is generally termed a posthumous child--in other
words, the _gentillatre_ who begot him never had the satisfaction of
invoking the blessing of the Father of All upon his head, having departed
this life some months before the birth of his youngest son. The boy,
therefore, never knew a father's care; he was, however, well tended by
his mother, whose favourite he was; so much so, indeed, that his
brethren, the youngest of whom was considerably older than himself, were
rather jealous of him. I never heard, however, that they treated him
with any marked unkindness; and it will be as well to observe here that I
am by no means well acquainted with his early history, of which, indeed,
as I am not writing his life, it is not necessary to say much. Shortly
after his mother's death, which occurred when he was eighteen, he adopted
the profession of arms, which he followed during the remainder of his
life, and in which, had circumstances permitted, he would probably have
shone amongst the best. By nature he was cool and collected, slow to
anger, though perfectly fearless, patient of control, of great strength,
and, to crown all, a proper man with his hands.
With far inferior qualifications many a man has become a field-marshal or
general; similar ones made Tamerlane, who was not a _gentillatre_, but
the son of a blacksmith, emperor of one-third of the world; but the race
is not always for the swift, nor the battle for the strong, indeed I
ought rather to say very seldom; certain it is, that my father, with all
his high military qualifications, never became emperor, field-marshal, or
even general; indeed, he had never an opportunity of distinguishing
himself save in one battle, and that took place neither in Flanders,
Egypt, nor on the banks of the Indus or Oxus, but in Hyde Park.
Smile not, gentle reader, many a battle has been fought in Hyde Park, in
which as much skill, science and bravery have been displayed as ever
achieved a victory in Flanders or by the Indus. In such a combat as that
to which I allude, I opine that even Wellington or Napoleon would have
been heartily glad to cry for quarter ere the lapse of five minutes, and
even the Blacksmith Tartar would, perhaps, have shrunk from the opponent
with whom, after having had a dispute with him, {2a} my father engaged in
single combat for one hour, at the end of which time the champions shook
hands and retired, each having experienced quite enough of the other's
prowess. The name of my father's antagonist was Brain.
What! still a smile? did you never hear that name before? I cannot help
it! Honour to Brain, who four months after the event which I have now
narrated was champion of England, having conquered the heroic Johnson.
Honour to Brain, who at the end of other four months, worn out by the
dreadful blows which he had received in his many {2b} combats, expired in
the arms of my father, who read the Bible to him in his latter
moments--Big Ben Brain.
You no longer smile, even _you_ have heard of Big Ben.
I have already hinted that my father never rose to any very exalted rank
in his profession, notwithstanding his prowess and other qualifications.
After serving for many years in the line, he at last entered as captain
in the militia regiment of the Earl of ---, {3} at that period just
raised, and to which he was sent by the Duke of York to instruct the
young levies in military manoeuvres and discipline; and in this mission I
believe he perfectly succeeded, competent judges having assured me that
the regiment in question soon came by his means to be considered as one
of the most brilliant in the service, and inferior to no regiment of the
line in appearance or discipline.
As the head-quarters of this corps were at D---, the duties of my father
not unfrequently carried him to that place, and it was on one of these
occasions that he became acquainted with a young person of the
neighbourhood, for whom he formed an attachment, which was returned; and
this young person was my mother.
She was descended from a family of French Protestants, natives of Caen,
who were obliged to leave their native country when old Louis, at the
instigation of the Pope, thought fit to revoke the Edict of Nantes. Their
name was Petrement, and I have reason for believing that they were people
of some consideration; that they were noble hearts and good Christians
they gave sufficient proof in scorning to bow the knee to the tyranny of
Rome. So they left beautiful Normandy for their faith's sake, and with a
few louis d'ors in their purse, a Bible in the vulgar tongue, and a
couple of old swords, which, if report be true, had done service in the
Huguenot wars, they crossed the sea to the isle of civil peace and
religious liberty, and established themselves in East Anglia.
And many other Huguenot families bent their steps thither, and devoted
themselves to agriculture or the mechanical arts; and in the venerable
old city, the capital of the province, in the northern shadow of the
Castle of De Burgh, the exiles built for themselves a church where they
praised God in the French tongue, and to which, at particular seasons of
the year, they were in the habit of flocking from country and from town
to sing--
"Thou hast provided for us a goodly earth; Thou waterest her furrows,
Thou sendest rain into the little valleys thereof, Thou makest it soft
with the drops of rain, and blesset the increase of it".
I have been told that in her younger days my mother was strikingly
handsome; this I can easily believe. I never knew her in her youth, for
though she was very young when she married my father (who was her senior
by many years) she had attained the middle age before I was born, no
children having been vouchsafed to my parents in the early stages of
their union. Yet even at the present day, now that years threescore and
ten have passed over her head, attended with sorrow and troubles
manifold, poorly chequered with scanty joys, can I look on that
countenance and doubt that at one time beauty decked it as with a
glorious garment? Hail to thee, my parent! as thou sittest there, in thy
widow's weeds, in the dusky parlour in the house overgrown with the
lustrous ivy of the sister isle, the solitary house at the end of the
retired court shaded by lofty poplars. Hail to thee, dame of the oval
face, olive complexion, and Grecian forehead; by thy table seated with
the mighty volume of the good Bishop Hopkins spread out before thee;
there is peace in thy countenance, my mother; it is not worldly peace,
however, not the deceitful peace which lulls to bewitching slumbers, and
from which, let us pray, humbly pray, that every sinner may be roused in
time to implore mercy not in vain! Thine is the peace of the righteous,
my mother, of those to whom no sin can be imputed, the score of whose
misdeeds has been long since washed away by the blood of atonement, which
imputeth righteousness to those who trust in it. It was not always thus,
my mother; a time was, when the cares, pomps and vanities of this world
agitated thee too much; but that time is gone by, another and a better
has succeeded, there is peace now on thy countenance, the true peace;
peace around thee, too, in thy solitary dwelling, sounds of peace, the
cheerful hum of the kettle and the purring of the immense Angola, which
stares up at thee from its settle with its almost human eyes.
No more earthly cares and affections now, my mother? Yes, one. Why dost
thou suddenly raise thy dark and still brilliant eye from the volume with
a somewhat startled glance? What noise is that in the distant street?
Merely the noise of a hoof--a sound common enough; it draws nearer,
nearer, and now it stops before thy gate. Singular! And now there is a
pause, a long pause. Ha! thou hearest something--a footstep, a swift but
heavy footstep! thou risest, thou tremblest; there is a hand on the pin
of the outer door; there is some one in the vestibule; and now the door
of thy apartment opens; there is a reflection on the mirror behind thee--a
travelling hat, a grey head and sunburnt face. "My dearest Son!" "My
darling Mother!"
Yes, mother, thou didst recognise in the distant street the hoof-tramp of
the wanderer's horse.
I was not the only child of my parents; I had a brother some three years
older than myself. He was a beautiful child; one of those occasionally
seen in England, and in England alone; a rosy, angelic face, blue eyes,
and light chestnut hair. It was not exactly an Anglo-Saxon countenance,
in which, by-the-bye, there is generally a cast of loutishness and
stupidity; it partook, to a certain extent, of the Celtic character,
particularly in the fire and vivacity which illumined it; his face was
the mirror of his mind; perhaps no disposition more amiable was ever
found amongst the children of Adam, united, however, with no
inconsiderable portion of high and dauntless spirit. So great was his
beauty in infancy, that people, especially those of the poorer classes,
would follow the nurse who carried him about in order to look at and
bless his lovely face. At the age of three months an attempt was made to
snatch him from his mother's arms in the streets of London, at the moment
she was about to enter a coach; indeed, his appearance seemed to operate
so powerfully upon every person who beheld him, that my parents were
under continual apprehension of losing him; his beauty, however, was
perhaps surpassed by the quickness of his parts. He mastered his letters
in a few hours, and in a day or two could decipher the names of people on
the doors of houses and over the shop windows.
As he grew up, his personal appearance became less prepossessing, his
quickness and cleverness, however, rather increased; and I may say of
him, that with respect to everything which he took in hand he did it
better and more speedily than any other person. Perhaps it will be asked
here, what became of him? Alas! alas! his was an early and a foreign
grave. As I have said before, the race is not always for the swift, nor
the battle for the strong.
And now, doubtless, after the above portrait of my brother, painted in
the very best style of Rubens, the reader will conceive himself justified
in expecting a full-length one of myself, as a child, for as to my
present appearance, I suppose he will be tolerably content with that
flitting glimpse in the mirror. But he must excuse me; I have no
intention of drawing a portrait of myself in childhood; indeed it would
be difficult, for at that time I never looked into mirrors. No attempts,
however, were ever made to steal me in my infancy, and I never heard that
my parents entertained the slightest apprehension of losing me by the
hands of kidnappers, though I remember perfectly well that people were in
the habit of standing still to look at me, ay, more than at my brother;
from which premises the reader may form any conclusion with respect to my
appearance which seemeth good unto him and reasonable. Should he, being
a good-natured person and always inclined to adopt the charitable side in
any doubtful point, be willing to suppose that I, too, was eminently
endowed by nature with personal graces, I tell him frankly that I have no
objection whatever to his entertaining that idea; moreover, that I
heartily thank him, and shall at all times be disposed, under similar
circumstances, to exercise the same species of charity towards himself.
With respect to my mind and its qualities I shall be more explicit; for,
were I to maintain much reserve on this point, many things which appear
in these memoirs would be highly mysterious to the reader, indeed
incomprehensible. Perhaps no two individuals were ever more unlike in
mind and disposition than my brother and myself. As light is opposed to
darkness, so was that happy, brilliant, cheerful child to the sad and
melancholy being who sprang from the same stock as himself, and was
nurtured by the same milk.
Once, when travelling in an Alpine country, I arrived at a considerable
elevation; I saw in the distance, far below, a beautiful stream hastening
to the ocean, its rapid waters here sparkling in the sunshine, and there
tumbling merrily in cascades. On its banks were vineyards and cheerful
villages; close to where I stood, in a granite basin with steep and
precipitous sides, slumbered a deep, dark lagoon, shaded by black pines,
cypresses and yews. It was a wild, savage spot, strange and singular;
ravens hovered above the pines, filling the air with their uncouth notes,
pies chattered, and I heard the cry of an eagle from a neighbouring peak;
there lay the lake, the dark, solitary and almost inaccessible lake;
gloomy shadows were upon it, which, strangely modified as gusts of wind
agitated the surface, occasionally assumed the shape of monsters. So I
stood on the Alpine elevation, and looked now on the gay distant river,
and now at the dark granite-encircled lake close beside me in the lone
solitude, and I thought of my brother and myself. I am no moraliser; but
the gay and rapid river and the dark and silent lake, were, of a verity,
no bad emblems of us two.
So far from being quick and clever like my brother, and able to rival the
literary feat which I have recorded of him, many years elapsed before I
was able to understand the nature of letters, or to connect them. A
lover of nooks and retired corners, I was as a child in the habit of
fleeing from society, and of sitting for hours together with my head on
my breast. What I was thinking about, it would be difficult to say at
this distance of time; I remember perfectly well, however, being ever
conscious of a peculiar heaviness within me, and at times of a strange
sensation of fear, which occasionally amounted to horror, and for which I
could assign no real cause whatever.
By nature slow of speech, I took no pleasure in conversation, nor in
hearing the voices of my fellow-creatures. When people addressed me I
not unfrequently, especially if they were strangers, turned away my head
from them, and if they persisted in their notice burst into tears, which
singularity of behaviour by no means tended to dispose people in my
favour. I was as much disliked as my brother was deservedly beloved and
admired. My parents, it is true, were always kind to me; and my brother,
who was good nature itself, was continually lavishing upon me every mark
of affection.
There was, however, one individual who, in the days of my childhood, was
disposed to form a favourable opinion of me. One day, a Jew--I had quite
forgotten the circumstance, but I was long subsequently informed of
it--one day a travelling Jew knocked at the door of a farmhouse in which
we had taken apartments. I was near at hand, sitting in the bright
sunshine, drawing strange lines on the dust with my fingers, an ape and
dog were my companions. The Jew looked at me and asked me some
questions, to which, though I was quite able to speak, I returned no
answer. On the door being opened, the Jew, after a few words, probably
relating to pedlary, demanded who the child was, sitting in the sun; the
maid replied that I was her mistress's youngest son, a child weak _here_,
pointing to her forehead. The Jew looked at me again, and then said:
"'Pon my conscience, my dear, I believe that you must be troubled there
yourself to tell me any such thing. It is not my habit to speak to
children, inasmuch as I hate them, because they often follow me and fling
stones after me; but I no sooner looked at that child than I was forced
to speak to it. His not answering me shows his sense, for it has never
been the custom of the wise to fling away their words in indifferent talk
and conversation. The child is a sweet child, and has all the look of
one of our people's children. Fool, indeed! did I not see his eyes
sparkle just now when the monkey seized the dog by the ear? they shone
like my own diamonds--does your good lady want any, real and fine? Were
it not for what you tell me, I should say it was a prophet's child. Fool,
indeed! he can write already, or I'll forfeit the box which I carry on my
back, and for which I should be loth to take two hundred pounds!" He
then leaned forward to inspect the lines which I had traced. All of a
sudden he started back, and grew white as a sheet; then, taking off his
hat, he made some strange gestures to me, cringing, chattering, and
showing his teeth, and shortly departed, muttering something about "holy
letters," and talking to himself in a strange tongue. The words of the
Jew were in due course of time reported to my mother, who treasured them
in her heart, and from that moment began to entertain brighter hopes of
her youngest-born than she had ever before ventured to foster.