Transcribed from the [1920] J. M. Dent & Sons edition by David Price,
email ccx074@pglaf.org
[Picture: George Borrow]
THE WAYFARER’S LIBRARY
* * * * *
The
LIFE OF
GEORGE BORROW
Clement K. Shorter
[Picture: Decorative graphic]
* * * * *
LONDON & TORONTO: J. M. DENT & SONS, Ltd.
NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO.
TO
AUGUSTINE BIRRELL
A FRIEND OF LONG YEARS AND A TRUE
LOVER OF GEORGE BORROW
C. K. S.
INTRODUCTION
THERE is a substantial biography of George Borrow in two large volumes by
the late Dr. Knapp, an American professor who gave many years of devotion
to the subject. But I have had the singular advantage over Dr. Knapp in
that all the private letters and personal papers left by Borrow to his
step-daughter and heir, Henrietta MacOubrey, have come into my hands.
These include Borrow’s letters to his wife and step-daughter, many of
which will be found scattered through this biography. This book was
first published under the title of _George Borrow and his Circle_, but I
am grateful to a publisher for sending it forth once more in a form which
makes it available to a larger public. Certain new letters from Borrow
to his wife which have been found since the first appearance of this book
have been added, together with other hitherto unprinted documents, making
this issue of _The Life of George Borrow_ of much more value than its
predecessor.
CLEMENT K. SHORTER.
_Dec._ 9_th_, 1919.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
INTRODUCTION 3
I. CAPTAIN BORROW OF THE WEST NORFOLK MILITIA 7
II. BORROW’S MOTHER 14
III. JOHN THOMAS BORROW 17
IV. A WANDERING CHILDHOOD 25
V. THE GURNEYS AND THE TAYLORS OF NORWICH 36
VI. AT THE NORWICH GRAMMAR SCHOOL 44
VII. IN A LAWYER’S OFFICE 50
VIII. AN OLD-TIME PUBLISHER 55
IX. “FAUSTUS” AND “ROMANTIC BALLADS” 60
X. “CELEBRATED TRIALS” AND JOHN THURTELL 67
XI. BORROW AND THE FANCY 74
XII. EIGHT YEARS OF VAGABONDAGE 78
XIII. SIR JOHN BOWRING 81
XIV. BORROW AND THE BIBLE SOCIETY 90
XV. ST. PETERSBURG AND JOHN P. HASFELD 97
XVI. THE MANCHU BIBLE—“TARGUM”—“THE TALISMAN” 102
XVII. THREE VISITS TO SPAIN 110
XVIII. BORROW’S SPANISH CIRCLE 130
XIX. MARY BORROW 140
XX. “THE CHILDREN OF THE OPEN AIR” 147
XXI. “THE BIBLE IN SPAIN” 153
XXII. RICHARD FORD 160
XXIII. IN EASTERN EUROPE 168
XXIV. “LAVENGRO” 183
XXV. A VISIT TO CORNISH KINSMEN 191
XXVI. IN THE ISLE OF MAN 195
XXVII. OULTON BROAD AND YARMOUTH 199
XXVIII. IN SCOTLAND AND IRELAND 207
XXIX. “THE ROMANY RYE” 222
XXX. EDWARD FITZGERALD 227
XXXI. “WILD WALES” 235
XXXII. LIFE IN LONDON 244
XXXIII. FRIENDS OF LATER YEARS 250
XXXIV. HENRIETTA CLARKE 255
XXXV. THE AFTERMATH 268
INDEX 273
CHAPTER I
CAPTAIN BORROW OF THE WEST NORFOLK MILITIA
GEORGE HENRY BORROW was born at Dumpling Green near East Dereham,
Norfolk, on the 5th of July, 1803. It pleased him to state on many an
occasion that he was born at East Dereham.
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,
he writes in the opening lines of _Lavengro_, using almost the identical
phraseology that we find in the opening lines of Goethe’s _Wahrheit und
Dichtung_. Here is a later memory of Dereham from _Lavengro_:
What it is at present I know not, for thirty years and more have
elapsed since I last trod its streets. It will scarcely have
improved, for how could it be better than it was? I love to think on
thee, pretty, quiet D—, thou pattern of an English country town, with
thy clean but narrow streets branching out from thy modest
market-place, with their old-fashioned houses, with here and there a
roof of venerable thatch, with thy one half-aristocratic mansion,
where resided the Lady Bountiful—she, the generous and kind, who
loved to visit the sick, leaning on her golden-headed cane, while the
sleek old footman walked at a respectful distance behind. Pretty,
quiet D—, with thy venerable church, in which moulder the mortal
remains of England’s sweetest and most pious bard.
Then follows an exquisite eulogy of the poet Cowper, which readers of
_Lavengro_ know full well. Three years before Borrow was born William
Cowper died in this very town, leaving behind him so rich a legacy of
poetry and of prose, and moreover so fragrant a memory of a life in which
humour and pathos played an equal part. It was no small thing for a
youth who aspired to any kind of renown to be born in the neighbourhood
of the last resting-place of the author of _The Task_.
Yet Borrow was not actually born at East Dereham, but a mile and a half
away, at the little hamlet of Dumpling Green, in what was then a glorious
wilderness of common and furze bush, but is now a quiet landscape of
fields and hedges. You will find the home in which the author of
_Lavengro_ first saw the light without much difficulty. It is a
fair-sized farmhouse, with a long low frontage separated from the road by
a considerable strip of garden. It suggests a prosperous yeoman class,
and I have known farm-houses in East Anglia not one whit larger dignified
by the name of “hall.” Nearly opposite is a pond. The trim hedges are a
delight to us to-day, but you must cast your mind back to a century ago
when they were entirely absent. The house belonged to George Borrow’s
maternal grandfather, Samuel Perfrement, who farmed the adjacent land at
this time. Samuel and Mary Perfrement had eight children, the third of
whom, Ann, was born in 1772.
In February, 1793, Ann Perfrement, aged twenty-one, married Thomas
Borrow, aged thirty-five, in the Parish Church of East Dereham, and of
the two children that were born to them George Henry Borrow was the
younger. Thomas Borrow was the son of one John Borrow of St. Cleer in
Cornwall, who died before this child was born, and is described by his
grandson as the scion “of an ancient but reduced Cornish family, tracing
descent from the de Burghs, and entitled to carry their arms.”
When Thomas Borrow was born the family were nothing more than small
farmers, and Thomas Borrow and his brothers were working on the land in
the intervals of attending the parish school. At the age of eighteen
Thomas was apprenticed to a maltster at Liskeard, and about this time he
joined the local Militia. Tradition has it that his career as a maltster
was cut short by his knocking his master down in a scrimmage. The victor
fled from the scene of his prowess, and enlisted as a private soldier in
the Coldstream Guards. This was in 1783, and in 1792 he was transferred
to the West Norfolk Militia; hence his appearance at East Dereham, where,
now a serjeant, his occupations for many a year were recruiting and
drilling. It is recorded that at a theatrical performance at East
Dereham he first saw, presumably on the stage of the county-hall, his
future wife—Ann Perfrement. She was, it seems, engaged in a minor part
in a travelling company, not, we may assume, altogether with the sanction
of her father, who, in spite of his inheritance of French blood,
doubtless shared the then very strong English prejudice against the
stage. However, Ann was one of eight children, and had, as we shall find
in after years, no inconsiderable strength of character, and so may well
at twenty years of age have decided upon a career for herself. In any
case we need not press too hard the Cornish and French origin of George
Borrow to explain his wandering tendencies, nor need we wonder at the
suggestion of Nathaniel Hawthorne, that he was “supposed to be of gypsy
descent by the mother’s side.” You have only to think of the father,
whose work carried him from time to time to every corner of England,
Scotland, and Ireland, and of the mother with her reminiscence of life in
a travelling theatrical company, to explain in no small measure the
glorious vagabondage of George Borrow.
Behold then Thomas Borrow and Ann Perfrement as man and wife, he being
thirty-five years of age, she twenty-one. A roving, restless life was in
front of the pair for many a day, the West Norfolk Militia being
stationed in some eight or nine separate towns within the interval of ten
years between Thomas Borrow’s marriage and his second son’s birth. The
first child, John Thomas Borrow, was born on the 15th April, 1801. The
second son, George Henry Borrow, the subject of this memoir, was born in
his grandfather’s house at Dumpling Green, East Dereham, his mother
having found a natural refuge with her father while her husband was
busily recruiting in Norfolk. The two children passed with their parents
from place to place, and in 1809 we find them once again in East Dereham.
From his son’s two books, _Lavengro_ and _Wild Wales_, we can trace the
father’s later wanderings until his final retirement to Norwich on a
pension. In 1810 the family were at Norman Cross in Huntingdonshire,
when Captain Borrow had to assist in guarding the French prisoners of
war; for it was the stirring epoch of the Napoleonic conflict, and within
the temporary prison “six thousand French and other foreigners, followers
of the Grand Corsican, were now immured.”
What a strange appearance had those mighty casernes, with their blank
blind walls, without windows, or grating, and their slanting roofs,
out of which, through orifices where the tiles had been removed,
would be protruded dozens of grim heads, feasting their prison-sick
eyes on the wide expanse of country unfolded from that airy height.
Ah! there was much misery in those casernes; and from those roofs,
doubtless, many a wistful look was turned in the direction of lovely
France. Much had the poor inmates to endure, and much to complain
of, to the disgrace of England be it said—of England, in general so
kind and bountiful. Rations of carrion meat, and bread from which I
have seen the very hounds occasionally turn away, were unworthy
entertainment even for the most ruffian enemy, when helpless and a
captive; and such, alas! was the fare in those casernes.
But here we have only to do with Thomas Borrow, of whom we get many a
quaint glimpse in _Lavengro_, our first and our last being concerned with
him in the one quality that his son seems to have inherited, as the
associate of a prize-fighter—Big Ben Brain. Borrow records in his
opening chapter that Ben Brain and his father met in Hyde Park probably
in 1790, and that after an hour’s conflict “the champions shook hands and
retired, each having experienced quite enough of the other’s prowess.”
Borrow further relates that four months afterwards Brain “died in the
arms of my father, who read to him the Bible in his last moments.” More
than once in his after years the old soldier seems to have had a shy
pride in that early conflict, although the piety which seems to have come
to him with the responsibilities of wife and children led him to count
any recalling of the episode as a “temptation.” When Borrow was about
thirteen years of age, he overheard his father and mother discussing
their two boys, the elder being the father’s favourite and George the
mother’s:
“I will hear nothing against my first-born,” said my father, “even in
the way of insinuation: he is my joy and pride; the very image of
myself in my youthful days, long before I fought Big Ben, though
perhaps not quite so tall or strong built. As for the other, God
bless the child! I love him, I’m sure; but I must be blind not to
see the difference between him and his brother. Why, he has neither
my hair nor my eyes; and then his countenance! why, ’tis absolutely
swarthy, God forgive me! I had almost said like that of a gypsy, but
I have nothing to say against that; the boy is not to be blamed for
the colour of his face, nor for his hair and eyes; but, then, his
ways and manners!—I confess I do not like them, and that they give me
no little uneasiness.” {11a}
Borrow throughout his narrative refers to his father as “a man of
excellent common sense,” and he quotes the opinion of William Taylor, who
had rather a bad reputation as a “freethinker” with all the church-going
citizens of Norwich, with no little pride. Borrow is of course the
“young man” of the dialogue. He was then eighteen years of age:
“Not so, not so,” said the young man eagerly; “before I knew you I
knew nothing, and am still very ignorant; but of late my father’s
health has been very much broken, and he requires attention; his
spirits also have become low, which, to tell you the truth, he
attributes to my misconduct. He says that I have imbibed all kinds
of strange notions and doctrines, which will, in all probability,
prove my ruin, both here and hereafter; which—which—”
“Ah! I understand,” said the elder, with another calm whiff. “I
have always had a kind of respect for your father, for there is
something remarkable in his appearance, something heroic, and I would
fain have cultivated his acquaintance; the feeling, however, has not
been reciprocated. I met him the other day, up the road, with his
cane and dog, and saluted him; he did not return my salutation.”
“He has certain opinions of his own,” said the youth, “which are
widely different from those which he has heard that you profess.”
“I respect a man for entertaining an opinion of his own,” said the
elderly individual. “I hold certain opinions; but I should not
respect an individual the more for adopting them. All I wish for is
tolerance, which I myself endeavour to practise. I have always loved
the truth, and sought it; if I have not found it, the greater my
misfortune.” {11b}
When Borrow is twenty years of age we have another glimpse of father and
son, the father in his last illness, the son eager as usual to draw out
his parent upon the one subject that appeals to his adventurous spirit,
“I should like to know something about Big Ben,” he says:
“You are a strange lad,” said my father; “and though of late I have
begun to entertain a more favourable opinion than heretofore, there
is still much about you that I do not understand. Why do you bring
up that name? Don’t you know that it is one of my temptations? You
wish to know something about him? Well, I will oblige you this once,
and then farewell to such vanities—something about him. I will tell
you—his—skin when he flung off his clothes—and he had a particular
knack in doing so—his skin, when he bared his mighty chest and back
for combat; and when he fought he stood, so if I remember right—his
skin, I say, was brown and dusky as that of a toad. Oh me! I wish
my elder son was here!”
Concerning the career of Borrow’s father there seem to be no documents
other than one contained in _Lavengro_, yet no _Life of Borrow_ can
possibly be complete that does not draw boldly upon the son’s priceless
tributes. And so we come now to the last scene in the career of the
elder Borrow—his death-bed—which is also the last page of the first
volume of _Lavengro_. George Borrow’s brother has arrived from abroad.
The little house in Willow Lane, Norwich, contained the mother and her
two sons sorrowfully awaiting the end, which came on 28th February, 1824.
At the dead hour of night—it might be about two—I was awakened from
sleep by a cry which sounded from the room immediately below that in
which I slept. I knew the cry—it was the cry of my mother; and I
also knew its import, yet I made no effort to rise, for I was for the
moment paralysed. Again the cry sounded, yet still I lay
motionless—the stupidity of horror was upon me. A third time, and it
was then that, by a violent effort, bursting the spell which appeared
to bind me, I sprang from the bed and rushed downstairs. My mother
was running wildly about the room; she had awoke and found my father
senseless in the bed by her side. I essayed to raise him, and after
a few efforts supported him in the bed in a sitting posture. My
brother now rushed in, and, snatching up a light that was burning, he
held it to my father’s face. “The surgeon! the surgeon!” he cried;
then, dropping the light, he ran out of the room, followed by my
mother; I remained alone, supporting the senseless form of my father;
the light had been extinguished by the fall, and an almost total
darkness reigned in the room. The form pressed heavily against my
bosom; at last methought it moved. Yes, I was right; there was a
heaving of the breast, and then a gasping. Were those words which I
heard? Yes, they were words, low and indistinct at first, and then
audible. The mind of the dying man was reverting to former scenes.
I heard him mention names which I had often heard him mention before.
It was an awful moment; I felt stupefied, but I still contrived to
support my dying father. There was a pause; again my father spoke: I
heard him speak of Minden, and of Meredith, the old Minden Serjeant,
and then he uttered another name, which at one period of his life was
much on his lips, the name of —; but this is a solemn moment! There
was a deep gasp: I shook, and thought all was over; but I was
mistaken—my father moved, and revived for a moment; he supported
himself in bed without my assistance. I make no doubt that for a
moment he was perfectly sensible, and it was then that, clasping his
hands, he uttered another name clearly, distinctly—it was the name of
Christ. With that name upon his lips the brave old soldier sank back
upon my bosom, and, with his hands still clasped, yielded up his
soul.
Did Borrow’s father ever really fight Big Ben Brain or Bryan in Hyde
Park, or is it all a fantasy of the artist’s imagining? We shall never
know. Borrow called his _Lavengro_ “An Autobiography” at one stage of
its inception, although he wished to repudiate the autobiographical
nature of his story at another. Dr. Knapp in his anxiety to prove that
Borrow wrote his own memoirs in _Lavengro_ and _Romany Rye_ tells us that
he had no creative faculty—an absurd proposition. But I think we may
accept the contest between Ben Brain and Thomas Borrow, and what a
revelation of heredity that impressive death-bed scene may be counted.
Borrow on one occasion in later life declared that his favourite books
were the Bible and the Newgate Calendar. We know that he specialised on
the Bible and Prize-Fighting in no ordinary fashion—and here we see his
father on his death-bed struggling between the religious sentiments of
his maturity and the one great worldly escapade of his early manhood.