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Books: The Life of George Borrow

H >> Herbert Jenkins >> The Life of George Borrow




THE POLICE AGENT
PEDRO MARTIN DE EUGENIO. {232a}


Borrow felt that the fellow had been sent to entrap him into some
utterance that should justify his arrest. In any case a warrant was
issued that same morning. The news caused Borrow no alarm; for one
thing he was indifferent to danger, for another he was desirous of
studying the robber language of Spain, and had already, according to
his own statement, {232b} made an unsuccessful effort to obtain
admission to the city prison.

The official account of the interview between Borrow and the "Police
Agent" is given in the following letter from the Civil Governor to
Sir George Villiers:-

To the British Minister, -
MADRID, 30th April 1838.
SIR,

The Vicar of the Diocese having, on the 16th and 26th Instant,
officially represented to me, that neither the publication nor the
sale of the Gospel of St Luke translated into the romain, or Gitano
Dialect ought to be permitted, until such time as the translation had
been examined and approved by the competent Ecclesiastical Authority,
in conformity with the Canonical and Civil regulations existing on
the matter, I gave an order to a dependent of this civil
administration, to present himself in the house of Mr George Borrow,
a British Subject, charged by the London Bible Society with the
publication of this work, and to seize all the Copies of it. In
execution of this order my Warrant was yesterday morning {233a}
presented to the said Mr George Borrow; who, so far from obeying it,
broke out in insults most offensive to my authority, threw the order
on the ground with angry gestures, and grossly abused the bearer of
it, and said that he had nothing to do with the Civil Governor. The
detailed report in writing which has been made to me of this
disageeeable occurrence could not but deeply affect me, being a
question of a British Subject, to whom the Government of Her Catholic
Majesty has always afforded the same protection as to its own. As
Executor of the Law it is my duty to cause its decrees to be
inviolably observed; and you will well understand, that both the
Canonical as the Civil Laws now existing, in this kingdom, relative
to writings and works published upon Dogmas, Morals, and holy and
religious matters, are the same without distinction for the Subjects
of all Countries residing in Spain. No one can be permitted to
violate them with impunity, without detriment to the Laws themselves,
to the Royal Authority and to the Evangelical Moral which is highly
interested in preventing the propagation of doctrines which may be
erroneous, and that the purity of the sublime maxims of our divine
Faith should remain intact.

In conformity with these undeniable principles, which are in the Laws
of all civilised nations, you must acknowledge that the offensive
conduct of Mr George Borrow, and his disobedience to a legitimate
Authority sufficiently authorised the proceeding to his arrest . . .

I have, etc., etc.
DEIGO DE ENTRENA.


The "Police Agent" seems to have boasted that within twenty-four
hours Borrow would be in prison; Borrow, on the other hand,
determined to prove the "Police Agent" wrong. He therefore spent the
rest of the day and the following night at a cafe. {234a} In the
evening he received a visit from Maria Diaz, {234b} his landlady and
also his strong adherent and friend, whom he had informed of his
whereabouts. From her he learned that his lodgings had been searched
and that the alguazils, who bore a warrant for his arrest, were much
disappointed at not finding him.

The next morning, 1st May, at the request of Sir George Villiers,
Borrow called at the Embassy and narrated every circumstance of the
affair, with the result that he was offered the hospitality of the
Embassy, which he declined. Whilst in conversation with Mr Sothern,
Sir George Villiers' private secretary, Borrow's Basque servant
Francisco rushed in with the news that the alguazils were again at
his rooms searching among his papers, whereat Borrow at once left the
Embassy, determined to return to his lodgings. Immediately
afterwards he was arrested, {234c} within sight of the doors of the
Embassy, and conducted to the office of the Civil Governor.
Francisco in the meantime, acting on his master's instructions,
conveyed to him in Basque that the alguazils might not understand,
proceeded immediately to the British Embassy and informed Sir George
Villiers of what had just taken place, with such eloquence and
feeling that Mr Sothern afterwards remarked to Borrow, "That Basque
of yours is a noble fellow," and asked to be given the refusal of his
services should Borrow ever decide to part with him. With his
dependents Borrow was always extremely popular, even in Spain, where,
according to Mr Sothern, a man's servant seemed to be his worst
enemy.

Borrow submitted quietly to his arrest and was first taken to the
office of the Civil Governor (Gefatura Politica), and subsequently to
the Carcel de la Corte, by two Salvaguardias, "like a common
malefactor." Here he was assigned a chamber that was "large and
lofty, but totally destitute of every species of furniture with the
exception of a huge wooden pitcher, intended to hold my daily
allowance of water." {235a} For this special accommodation Borrow
was to pay, otherwise he would have been herded with the common
criminals, who existed in a state of foulness and misery. Acting on
the advice of the Alcayde, Borrow despatched a note to Maria Diaz,
with the result that when Mr Sothern arrived, he found the prisoner
not only surrounded by his friends and furniture, but enjoying a
comfortable meal, whereat he laughed heartily.

Borrow learned that, immediately on hearing what had taken place, Sir
George Villiers had despatched Mr Sothern to interview Senor Entrena,
the Civil Governor, who rudely referred him to his secretary, and
refused to hold any communication with the British Legation save in
writing. Nothing further could be done that night, and on hearing
that Borrow was determined to remain in durance, even if offered his
liberty, now that he had been illegally placed there, Mr Sothern
commended his resolution. The Government had put itself grievously
in the wrong, and Sir George, who had already sent a note to Count
Ofalia demanding redress, seemed desirous of making it as difficult
for them as possible, now that they had perpetrated this wanton
outrage on a British subject. He determined to make it a national
affair.

It is by no means certain that Borrow was anxious to leave the Carcel
de la Corte, even with the apologies of Spain in his pocket. The
prison afforded him unique opportunities for the study of criminal
vagabonds. An entirely new phase of life presented itself to him,
and, but for this arrest and his subsequent decision to involve the
authorities in difficulties, The Bible in Spain would have lacked
some of its most picturesque pages. It would have been strange if he
had not encountered some old friend or acquaintance in the prison of
the Spanish capital. At the Carcel de la Corte he found the
notorious and immense Gitana, Aurora, who had fallen into the hands
of the Busne for defrauding a rather foolish widow.

"A great many people came to see me," Borrow wrote to his mother,
"amongst others, General Quiroga, the Military Governor, who assured
me that all he possessed was at my service. The Gypsies likewise
came, but were refused admittance." His dinner was taken to him from
an inn, and Sir George Villiers sent his butler each day to make
enquiries. There was, however, one very unpleasant feature of his
prison life, the verminous condition of the whole building. In spite
of having fresh linen taken to him each day, he suffered very much
from what the polished Spaniard prefers to call miseria.

Sir George Villiers took active and immediate steps, not only to
secure Borrow's release, but to obtain an unqualified apology.
Referring to the letter he had received from the Civil Governor (30th
April), he expressed himself as convinced that "a gentleman of
Borrow's character and education was incapable of the conduct
alleged," and had accordingly requested Mr Sothern to enquire into
the matter and then to call upon the Civil Governor to explain in
what manner he had been misinformed. As the Civil Governor refused
to receive Mr Sothern, Sir George adds that he need trouble him no
further, as the affair had been placed before Her Catholic Majesty's
Government; but during his five years of office at the Court of
Madrid, he proceeded, "no circumstance has occurred likely to be more
prejudicial to the relations between the two Countries than the
insult and imprisonment to which a respectable Englishman has now
been subjected upon the unsupported evidence of a Police Officer,"
acting under the orders of the Civil Governor.

On 3rd May Sir George Villiers wrote again to Count Ofalia, reminding
him that he had not received the letter from him that he had
expected. In the course of a lengthy recapitulation of the
occurrences of the past ten days, Sir George reminded Count Ofalia
that, as a result of their interview on 30th April about the ill-
usage of Borrow, the Count had written on 1st May to him a private
letter stating that measures had been taken to release Borrow on
parole, he to appear when necessary, and that if Sir George would
abstain from making a written remonstrance, Count Ofalia would see
that both he and Borrow received the ample satisfaction to which they
were entitled. Borrow had been taken by two Guards "like a
Malefactor, to the Common Prison, where he would have been confined
with Criminals of every description if he had not had money to pay
for a Cell to Himself." The British Minister complained that every
step that he had taken for Borrow's protection was followed by fresh
insult, and he further intimated that Borrow refused to leave the
prison until his character had been publicly cleared.

The Spanish Government now found itself in a quandary. The British
Minister was pressing for satisfaction, and he was too powerful and
too important to the needs of Spain to be offended. The prisoner
himself refused to be liberated, because he had been illegally
arrested, inasmuch as he, a foreigner, had been committed to prison
without first being conducted before the Captain-General of Madrid,
as the law provided. Furthermore, Borrow advised the authorities
that if they chose to eject him from the prison he would resist with
all his bodily strength. In this determination he was confirmed by
the British Minister.

A Cabinet Council was held, at which Senor Entrena was present. The
Premier explained the serious situation in which the ministry found
itself, owing to the attitude assumed by the British Minister, and he
remarked that the Civil Governor must respect the privileges of
foreigners. Senor Entrena suggested that he should be relieved of
his duties; but the majority of the Cabinet seems to have been
favourable to him. The Affaire Borrow is said to have come up for
debate even during a secret session of the Chamber.

When Count Ofalia had called at the British Embassy (4th May) he was
informed by Sir George Villiers that the affair had passed beyond the
radius of a subordinate authority of the Government, and that he
"considered that great want of respect had been shown to me, as Her
Majesty's Minister, and that an unjustifiable outrage had been
committed upon a British Subject," {238a} and that the least
reparation that he was disposed to accept was a written declaration
that an injustice had been done, and the dismissal of the Police
Officer. {238b}

The value of a British subject's freedom was brought home to the
Spanish Government with astonishing swiftness and decision. The
Civil Governor wrote to Sir George Villiers (3rd May), apparently at
the instance of the distraught premier, discoursing sagely upon the
Civil and Canon Laws of Spain, and adding that the 25 copies of the
Gitano St Luke were seized, "not as being confiscated, but as a
deposit to be restored in due time." He concluded by hoping that he
had convinced the British Minister of his good faith.

In his reply, Sir George considered that the Civil Governor had been
led to view the matter in a light that would not "bear the test of
impartial examination." The result of this interchange of letters
was twofold. Sir George dropped the correspondence with "that
Functionary [who] displays so complete a disregard for fact," {239a}
and as Count Ofalia evaded the real question at issue, holding out
"slender hopes of the matter ending in the reparation which I
considered to be peremptorily called for," {239b} he advised Borrow
to claim protection from the Captain-General, the only authority
competent to exercise any jurisdiction over him. The Captain-General
Quiroga, jealous of his authority, entered warmly into the dispute
and ordered the Civil Governor to hand over the case to him. There
was now a danger of the Affaire Borrow being made a party question,
in which case it would have been extremely difficult to settle.

The intervention of the Captain-General rendered all the more obvious
the illegality of the Civil Governor's action, and increased the
embarrassment of Count Ofalia, who called on Sir George to ask him to
have Borrow's memorial to the Captain-General withdrawn. He refused,
and said the only way now to finish the affair was that "His
Excellency should in an official Note declare to me that Mr Borrow
left the prison, where he had been improperly placed, with unstained
honour,--that the Police Agent, upon whose testimony he had been
arrested, should be dismissed,--that all expenses imposed upon Mr
Borrow by his detention should be repaid him by the Government,--that
Mr Borrow's not having availed himself of the 'Fuero Militar' should
not be converted into a precedent, or in any way be considered to
prejudice that important right, and that Count Ofalia should add with
reference to maintaining the friendly relations between Great Britain
and Spain, that he hoped I would accept this satisfaction as
sufficient." {240a}

Borrow states that Sir George Villiers went to the length of
informing Count Ofalia that unless full satisfaction were accorded
Borrow, he would demand his passports and instruct the commanders of
the British war vessels to desist from furnishing further assistance
to Spain. {240b} There is, however, no record of this in the
official papers sent by Sir George to the Foreign Office. What
actually occurred was that, on 8th May, the British Minister,
determined to brook no further delay, wrote a grave official
remonstrance, in which he stated that, "if the desire had existed to
bring it to a close," the case of Borrow could have been settled.
"Having up to the present moment," he proceeds, "trusted that in Your
Excellency's hands, this affair would be treated with all that
consideration required by its nature and the consequences that may
follow upon it . . . I have forborne from denouncing the whole extent
of the illegality which has marked the proceedings of the case"
(viz., the Civil Governor's having usurped the right of the Captain-
General of the Province in causing Borrow's arrest). In conclusion,
Sir George states that he considers the


"case of most pressing importance, for it may compromise the
relations now existing between Great Britain and Spain. It is one
that requires a complete satisfaction, for the honor of England and
the future position of Englishmen in the Country are concerned; and
the satisfaction, in order to be complete, required to be promptly
given."


"This disagreeable business," Sir George writes in another of his
despatches, "is rendered yet more so by the impossibility of
defending with success all Mr Borrow's proceedings . . . His
imprudent zeal likewise in announcing publicly that the Bible Society
had a depot of Bibles in Madrid, and that he was the Agent for their
sale, irritated the Ecclesiastical Authorities, whose attention has
of late been called to the proceedings of a Mr Graydon,--another
agent of the Bible Society, who has created great excitement at
Malaga (and I believe in other places) by publishing in the
Newspapers that the Catholic Religion was not the religion of God,
and that he had been sent from England to convert Spaniards to
Protestantism. I have upon more than one occasion cautioned Mr
Graydon, but in vain, to be more prudent. The Methodist Society of
England is likewise endeavouring to establish a School at Cadiz, and
by that means to make conversions.

"Under all these circumstances it is not perhaps surprising that the
Archbishop of Toledo and the Heads of the Church should be alarmed
that an attempt at Protestant Propagandism is about to be made, or
that the Government should wish to avert the evils of religious
schism in addition to all those which already weigh upon the Country;
and to these different causes it must, in some degree, be attributed
that Mr Borrow has been an object of suspicion and treated with such
extreme rigor. Still, however, they do not justify the course
pursued by the Civil Governor towards him, or by the Government
towards myself, and I trust Your Lordship will consider that in the
steps I have taken upon the matter, I have done no more than what the
National honor, and the security of Englishmen in this Country,
rendered obligatory upon me." {241a}


Whilst Borrow was in the Carcel de la Corte, a grave complication had
arisen in connection with the misguided Lieutenant Graydon. Borrow
gives a strikingly dramatic account {241b} of Count Ofalia's call at
the British Embassy. He is represented as arriving with a copy of
one of Graydon's bills, which he threw down upon a table calling upon
Sir George Villiers to read it and, as a gentleman and the
representative of a great and enlightened nation, tell him if he
could any longer defend Borrow and say that he had been ill or
unfairly treated. According to the Foreign Office documents, Count
Ofalia WROTE to Sir George Villiers on 5th May, ENCLOSING a copy of
an advertisement inserted by Lieutenant Graydon in the Boletin
Oficial de Malaga, which, translated, runs as follows:-


"The Individual in question most earnestly calls the greatest
attention of each member of the great Spanish Family to this DIVINE
Book, in order that THROUGH IT he may learn the chief cause, if not
the SOLE ONE, of all his terrible afflictions and of his ONLY remedy,
as it is so clearly manifested in the Holy Scripture . . . A
detestable system of superstition and fanaticism, ONLY GREEDY FOR
MONEY, and not so either of the temporal or eternal felicity of man,
has prevailed in Spain (as also in other Nations) during several
Centuries, by the ABSOLUTE exclusion of the true knowledge of the
Great God and last Judge of Mankind: and thus it has been plunged
into the most frightful calamities. There was a time in which
precisely the same was read in the then VERY LITTLE Kingdom of
England, but at length Her Sons recognising their imperative DUTY
towards God and their Neighbour, as also their unquestionable rights,
and that since the world exists it has never been possible to gather
grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles, they destroyed the system
and at the price of their blood chose the Bible. Oh that the
unprejudiced and enlightened inhabitants not only of Malaga and of so
many other Cities, but of all Spain, would follow so good an
example." {242a}


The result of Graydon's advertisement was that "the people flocked in
crowds to purchase it [the Bible], so much so that 200 copies, all
that were in Mr Graydon's possession at the time, were sold in the
course of the day. The Bishop sent the Fiscal to stop the sale of
the work, but before the necessary measures were taken they were all
disposed of." {242b} In consequence Graydon "was detained and under
my [the Consul's] responsibility allowed to remain at large." {243a}
A jury of nine all pronounced the article to contain "matter subject
to legal process" {243b} but a second jury of twelve at the
subsequent public trial "unanimously absolved" Graydon.

Sir George Villiers acknowledged the letter from Count Ofalia (9th
May) saying that he had written to Graydon warning him to be more
cautious in future. He stated that from personal knowledge he could
vouch for the purity of Lieutenant Graydon's intentions; but he
regretted that he should have announced his object in so imprudent a
manner as to give offence to the ministers of the Catholic religion
of Spain. In a despatch to Lord Palmerston he states that he has not
thought it in the interests of the Bible Society to defend this
conduct of Graydon, "whose zeal appears so little tempered by
discretion," {243c} as he had written to Count Ofalia. "Had I done
so," he proceeds, "and thereby tended to confirm some of the idle
reports that are current, that England had a national object to serve
in the propagation of Protestantism in Spain, it is not improbable
that a legislative Enactment might have been introduced by some
Member of the Cortes, which would be offensive to England, and render
it yet more difficult than it is the task the Bible Society seems
desirous to undertake in this Country." {243d} Sir George concludes
by saying that he gave to "these Agents the best advice and
assistance in my power, but if by their acts they infringe the laws
of the Country," it will be impossible to defend them.

Sir George thought so seriously of the Affaire Borrow, as endangering
the future liberty of Englishmen in Spain, that he went so far as to
send a message to the Queen Regent, "by a means which I always have
at my disposal," {244a} in which he told her that he thought the
affair "might end in a manner most injurious to the continuance of
friendly relations between the two Countries." {244b} He received a
gracious assurance that he should have satisfaction. Later there
reached him


"a second message from the Queen Regent expressing Her Majesty's hope
that Count Ofalia's Note [of 11th May] would be satisfactory to me,
and stating that Her Ministers had so fully proved their incompetency
by giving any just cause of complaint to the Minister of Her only
real Friend and Ally, The Queen of England, that she should have
dismissed them, were it not that the state of affairs in the Northern
Provinces at this moment might be prejudiced by a change of
Government, which Her Majesty said she knew no one more than myself
would regret, but at the same time if I was not satisfied I had only
to state what I required and it should be immediately complied with.
My answer was confined to a grateful acknowledgement of Her Majesty's
condescension and kindness. Count Ofalia has informed me that as
President of the Council He had enjoined all his Colleagues never to
take any step directly or indirectly concerning an Englishman without
a previous communication with Him as to its propriety, and I
therefore venture to hope that the case of Mr Borrow will not be
unattended with ultimate advantage to British subjects in Spain."
{243c}


The "Note" referred to by the Queen Regent in her message was Count
Ofalia's acquiescence in Sir George Villiers' demands, with the
exception of the dismissal of the Police Officer. His communication
runs:-


"11th May 1838.

"SIR,--The affair of Mr Borrow is already decided by the Judge of
First Instance and his decision has been approved by the Superior or
Territorial Court of the Province. As I stated to you in my note of
the fourth last, the foundation of the arrest of Mr Borrow, who was
detained (and not committed), was an official communication from the
Agent of Police, Don Pedro Martin de Eugenio, in which he averred
that on intimating to Mr Borrow the written order of the Civil
Governor relative to the seizure of a book which he had published and
exposed for sale without complying with the forms prescribed by the
Civil and Ecclesiastical Laws of Spain, he (Mr Borrow) had thrown on
the floor the order of the Superior Authority of the Province and
used offensive expressions with regard to the said Authority.

"The judicial proceedings have had for their object the ascertainment
of the fact. Mr Borrow has denied the truth of the statement and the
Agent of Police, who it appears entered the lodgings of Mr Borrow
without being accompanied by any one, has been unable to confirm by
evidence what he alleged in his official report, or to produce the
testimony of any one in support of it.

"This being the case the judge has declared and the Territorial Court
approved the superceding of the cause, putting Mr Borrow immediately
at complete liberty, with the express declaration that the arrest he
has suffered in no wise affects his honor and good fame, and that the
'celador of Public Security,' Don Pedro Martin de Eugenio, be
admonished for the future to proceed in the discharge of his duty
with proper respect and circumspection according to the condition and
character of the persons whom he has to address.