Eliza Lee Follen - "The Pedler of Dust Sticks"

Irving Bacheller - "The Master of Silence"

Henry Bore - "The Story of the Invention of Steel Pens"

Thornton W. Burgess - "Mrs. Peter Rabbit"

New Philadelphia Book Publisher Highlights Local Talent
Book and Publishing News from Publishers Newswire(tm)

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PHILADELPHIA, Pa. -- The Philadelphia literary world will celebrate the launch of two new players today, April 10th: Kay Square Press, a new publishing company focused on Philadelphia-area artists, their stories, and their art; and Kay Square's first release, 'With the Rich and Mighty: Emlen Etting of Philadelphia' (ISBN: 978-0-9815129-0-7), a critical biography by Kenneth C. Kaleta.

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Books: The Life of George Borrow

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




Borrow had much time upon his hands in London, which he occupied
largely in walking. He visited the Metropolitan Gypsyries at
Wandsworth, "the Potteries," and "the Mounts," as described in Romano
Lavo-Lil. Sometimes he would be present at some sporting event, such
as the race between the Indian Deerfoot and Jackson, styled the
American Deer--tame sport in comparison with the "mills" of his
boyhood. He did very little writing, and from 1862, when Wild Wales
appeared, until he published The Romano Lavo-Lil in 1874, his
literary output consisted of only some translations contributed to
Once a Week (January 1862 to December 1863).

In 1865 he was to lose his stepdaughter, who married a William
MacOubrey, M.D., described in the marriage register as a physician of
Sloane Street, London, and subsequently upon his tombstone as a
barrister. In the July of 1866 Borrow and his wife went to Belfast
on a visit to the newly married pair. From Belfast Borrow took
another trip into Scotland, crossing over to Stranraer. From there
he proceeded to Glen Luce and subsequently to Newton Stewart, Castle
Douglas, Dumfries, Ecclefechan, Gretna Green, Carlisle, Langholm,
Hawick, Jedburgh, Yetholm (where he saw Esther Blyth of Kirk
Yetholm), Kelso, Abbotsford, Melrose, Berwick, Edinburgh, Glasgow,
and so back to Belfast, having been absent for nearly four weeks.

Mrs Borrow's health had been the cause of the family leaving Oulton
for Great Yarmouth, and about the time of the Irish visit it seems to
have become worse. When Borrow was away upon his excursion he
received a letter at Carlisle in which his wife informed him that she
was not so well; but urging him not to return if he were enjoying his
trip and it were benefiting his health.

In the autumn of the following year (1867) they were at Bognor, Mrs
Borrow taking the sea air, her husband tramping about the country and
penetrating into the New Forest. On their return to town Mrs Borrow
appears to have become worse. There was much correspondence to be
attended to with regard to the Oulton Estate, and she had to go down
to Suffolk to give her personal attention to certain important
details. Miss Cobbe throws a little light on the period in a letter
to a friend, in which she says:


"Mr Borrow says his wife is very ill and anxious to keep the peace
with C. (a litigious neighbour). Poor old B. was very sad at first,
but I cheered him up and sent him off quite brisk last night. He
talked all about the Fathers again, arguing that their quotations
went to prove that it was NOT our gospels they had in their hands. I
knew most of it before, but it was admirably done. I talked a little
theology to him in a serious way (finding him talk of his 'horrors')
and he abounded in my sense of the non-existence of Hell, and of the
presence and action on the soul of _A_ Spirit, rewarding and
punishing. He would not say 'God'; but repeated over and over again
that he spoke not from books but from his own personal experience."
{456a}


On 24th January (1869) Mrs Borrow was taken suddenly ill and the
family doctor being out of town, Borrow sent for Dr W. S. Playfair of
5 Curzon Street. A letter from Dr Playfair, 25th January, to the
family doctor is the only coherent testimony in existence as to what
was actually the matter with Mrs Borrow. It runs:-


"I found great difficulty in making out the case exactly," he writes,
"since Mr Borrow himself was so agitated that I could get no very
clear account of it. I could detect no marked organic affection
about the heart or lungs, of which she chiefly complained. It seemed
to me to be either a very aggravated form of hysteria, or, what
appears more likely, some more serious mental affection. In any
case, the chief requisite seemed very careful and intelligent nursing
or management, and I doubt very much, from what I saw, whether she
gets that with her present surroundings. If it is really the more
serious mental affection, I should fancy that the sooner means are
taken to have her properly taken care of, the better."


Dr Playfair saw in Borrow's highly nervous excitable nature, if not
the cause of his wife's breakdown, at least an obstacle to her
recovery, and was of opinion that Mrs Borrow's disorder had been
greatly aggravated by her husband's presence.

Mrs Borrow never rallied from the attack, and on the 30th she died of
"valvular disease of the heart and dropsy," being then in her
seventy-seventh year. On 4th February she was buried in Brompton
Cemetery, and the lonely man, her husband, returned to Hereford
Square. The grave bears the inscription, "To the Beloved Memory of
My Mother, Mary Borrow, who fell asleep in Jesus, 30th January 1869."
It is strange that this should be in Henrietta's and not Borrow's
name.

Mrs Borrow evidently made over her property to her husband during her
lifetime, as there is no will in existence, and no application
appears to have been made either by Borrow or anyone else for letters
of administration.



CHAPTER XXIX: JANUARY 1869-1881



The death of his wife was a last blow to Borrow, and he soon retired
from the world. At first he appears to have sought consolation in
books, to judge from the number of purchases he made about this time;
but it was, apparently, with pitiably unsuccessful results. In a
letter to a friend Miss Cobbe gives a picture in his lonliness:


"Poor old Borrow is in a sad state," she wrote. "I hope he is
starting in a day or two for Scotland. I sent C. with a note begging
him to come and eat the Welsh mutton you sent me to-day, and he sent
back word, 'Yes.' Then, an hour afterwards, he arrived, and in a
most agitated manner said he had come to say 'he would rather not.
He would not trouble anyone with his sorrows.' I made him sit down,
and talked as gently to him as possible, saying: 'It won't be a
trouble Mr. Borrow, it will be a pleasure to me.' But it was all of
no use. He was so cross, so RUDE, I had the greatest difficulty in
talking to him. I asked about his servant, and he said I could not
help him. I asked him about Bowring, and he said: 'Don't speak of
it.' (It was some dispute with Sir John Bowring, who was an
acquaintance of mine, and with whom I offered to mediate.) 'I asked
him would he look at the photos of the Siamese,' and he said: 'Don't
show them to me!' So, in despair, as he sat silent, I told him I had
been at a pleasant dinner-party the night before, and had met Mr L--
, who told me of certain curious books of mediaeval history. 'Did he
know them?' 'No, and he DARE SAID Mr L-- did not, either! Who was
Mr L--?' I described that OBSCURE individual, (one of the foremost
writers of the day), and added that he was immensely liked by
everybody. Whereupon Borrow repeated at least twelve times,
'Immensely liked! As if a man could be immensely liked!' quite
insultingly. To make a diversion (I was very patient with him as he
was in trouble), 'I said I had just come home from the Lyell's and
had heard--' . . . But there was no time to say what I had heard!
Mr Borrow asked: 'Is that old Lyle I met here once, the man who
stands at the door (of some den or other) and BETS?' I explained who
Sir Charles was, {459a} (of course he knew very well), but he went on
and on, till I said gravely: 'I don't think you will meet those sort
of people here, Mr Borrow. We don't associate with blacklegs,
exactly.'" {459b}


In the Autumn of 1870 Borrow became acquainted with Charles G. Leland
("Hans Breitmann") as the result of receiving from him the following
letter:-


BRIGHTON, 24th October 1870.

Dear Sir,--During the eighteen months that I have been in England, my
efforts to find some mutual friend who would introduce me to you have
been quite in vain. As the author of two or three works which have
been kindly received in England, I have made the acquaintance of many
literary men and enjoyed much hospitality; but I assure you very
sincerely that my inability to find you out or get at you has been a
source of great annoyance to me. As you never published a book which
I have not read through five times--excepting The Bible in Spain and
Wild Wales, which I have only read once--you will perfectly
understand why I should be so desirous of meeting you.

As you have very possibly never heard of me before, I would state
that I wrote a collection of Ballads satirising Germany and the
Germans under the title of Hans Breitmann.

I never before in my life solicited the favour of any man's
acquaintance, except through the regular medium of an introduction.
If my request to be allowed the favour of meeting and seeing you does
not seem too outre, I would be to glad to go to London, or wherever
you may be, if it can be done without causing you any inconvenience,
and if I should not be regarded as an intruder. I am an American,
and among us such requests are parfaitment (sic) en regle.

I am, . . .

CHARLES G. LELAND.


Borrow replied on 2nd Nov.:


Sir,

I have received your letter and am gratified by the desire you
express to make my acquaintance.

Whenever you please to come I shall be happy to see you.

Truly yours,
GEORGE BORROW. {460a}


The meeting unquestionably took place at Hereford Square, and Leland
found Borrow "a tall, large, fine-looking man who must have been
handsome in his youth." {460b} The result of the interview was that
Leland sent to Borrow a copy of his Ballads and also The Music Lesson
of Confucius, then about to appear. At the same time he wrote to
Borrow drawing his attention to one of the ballads written in German
Romany jib, and enquiring if it were worth anything. Whilst
deprecating his "impudence" in writing a Romany gili and telling, as
a pupil might a master, of his interest in and his association with
the gypsies, he continues: "My dear Mr Borrow, for all this you are
entirely responsible. More than twenty years ago your books had an
incredible influence on me, and now you see the results." After
telling him that he can NEVER thank him sufficiently for the
instructions he has given in The Romany Rye as to how to take care of
a horse on a thirty mile ride, he concludes--"With apologies for the
careless tone of this letter, and with sincere thanks for your
kindness in permitting me to call on you and for your courteous
note,--I am your sincere admirer."


The account that Leland gives of this episode in his Memoirs is
puzzling and contradictory in the light of his first letter. He
writes:


"There was another hard old character with whom I became acquainted
in those days, and one who, though not a Carlyle, still, like him,
exercised in a peculiar way a great influence on English literature.
This was George Borrow. I was in the habit of reading a great deal
in the British Museum, where he also came, and there I was introduced
to him. {461a} [Leland seems to be in error here; see ante, page
460.] He was busy with a venerable-looking volume in old Irish, and
made the remark to me that he did not believe there was a man living
who could read old Irish with ease (which I now observe to myself was
'fished' out of Sir W. Betham). We discussed several Gypsy words and
phrases. I met him in the same place several times." {461b}


Leland states that he sent a note to Borrow, care of John Murray,
asking permission to dedicate to him his forthcoming book, The
English Gypsies and Their Language; but received no reply, although
Murray assured him that the letter had been received by Borrow. "He
received my note on the Saturday," Leland writes--"never answered it-
-and on Monday morning advertised in all the journals his own
forthcoming work on the same subject." {461c} Had Borrow asked him
to delay publishing his own book, Leland says he would have done so,
"for I had so great a respect for the Nestor of Gypsyism, that I
would have been very glad to have gratified him with such a small
sacrifice." {462a}

However Borrow may have heard that Leland had in preparation a book
on the English Gypsies, he seemed to feel that it was a trespass upon
ground that was peculiarly his own. Having revised and prepared for
the press the new edition of the Gypsy St Luke for the Bible Society
(published December 1872), and the one-volume editions of Lavengro
and The Romany Rye, he set to work to forestall Leland with his own
Romano Lavo-Lil.

In spite of his haste, however, Borrow was beaten in the race, and
Leland got his volume out first. When the Romano Lavo-Lil {462b}
appeared in March 1874, Borrow found what, in all probability he had
not dreamed of, that the thirty-three years intervening between its
publication and that of The Zincali, had changed the whole literary
world as regards "things of Egypt." In 1841 Borrow had produced a
unique book, such as only one man in England could have written, and
that man himself {462c}; but in 1874 he found himself not only out of
date, but out-classed.

The title very thoroughly explains the scope of the work. The
Vocabulary had existed in manuscript for many years. For some
reason, difficult to explain, Borrow had omitted from this Vocabulary
a number of the gypsy words that appeared in Lavengro and The Romany
Rye. In spite of this "Mr Borrow's present vocabulary makes a goodly
show," wrote F. H. Groome, ". . . containing no fewer than fourteen
hundred words, of which about fifty will be entirely new to those who
only know Romany in books." {463a}

After praising the Gypsy songs as the best portion of the book,
Groome proceeds:


"Of his prose I cannot say so much. It is the Romany of the study
rather than of the tents [!] Mr Borrow has attempted to rehabilitate
English Romany by enduing it with forms and inflections, of which
some are still rarely to be heard, some extinct, and others
absolutely incorrect; while Mr Leland has been content to give it as
it really is. Of the two methods I cannot doubt that most readers
will agree with me in thinking that Mr Leland's is the more
satisfactory." {463b}


The Athenaeum sternly rebuked Borrow for seeming "to make the mistake
of confounding the amount of Rommanis which he has collected in this
book with the actual extent of the language itself." The reviewer
pays a somewhat grudging tribute to other portions of the book, the
accounts of the Gypsyries and the biographical particulars of the
Romany worthies, but the work suffers by comparison with those of
Paspati and Leland. He acknowledges that Borrow was one of the
pioneers of those who gave accounts of the Gypsies in English, who
gave to many their present taste for Gypsy matters,


"but," he proceeds, "we cannot allow merely sentimental
considerations to prevent us from telling the honest truth. The fact
is that the Romano Lavo-Lil is nothing more than a rechauffe of the
materials collected by Mr Borrow at an early stage of his
investigations, and nearly every word and every phrase may be found
in one form or another in his earlier works. Whether or not Mr
Borrow HAS in the course of his long experience become the DEEP Gypsy
which he has always been supposed to be, we cannot say; but it is
certain that his present book contains little more than he gave to
the public forty years ago, and does not by any means represent the
present state of knowledge on the subject. But at the present day,
when comparative philology has made such strides, and when want of
accurate scholarship is as little tolerated in strange and remote
languages as in classical literature, the Romano Lavo-Lil is, to
speak mildly, an anachronism."


This notice, if Borrow read it, must have been very bitter to him.
All the loyalty to, and enthusiasm for, Borrow cannot disguise the
fact that his work, as far as the Gypsies were concerned, was
finished. He had first explored the path, but others had followed
and levelled it into a thoroughfare, and Borrow found his facts and
theories obsolete--a humiliating discovery to a man so shy, so proud,
and so sensitive.

The Romano Lavo-Lil was Borrow's swan song. He lived for another
seven years; but as far as the world was concerned he was dead. In
an obituary notice of Robert Latham, Mr Watts-Dunton tells a story
that emphasizes how thoroughly his existence had been forgotten. At
one of Mrs Procter's "at homes" he was talking of Latham and Borrow,
but when he happened to mention that both men were still alive, that
is in the early Seventies, and that quite recently he had been in the
company of each on separate occasions, he found that he had lost
caste in the eyes of his hearers for talking about men as alive "who
were well known to have been dead years ago." {464a}

There is an interesting picture of Borrow as he appeared in the
Seventies, given by F. H. Groome, who writes:


"The first time I ever saw him was at Ascot, the Wednesday evening of
the Cup week in, I think, the year 1872. I was stopping at a wayside
inn, half-a-mile on the Windsor road, just opposite which inn there
was a great encampment of Gypsies. One of their lads had on the
Tuesday affronted a soldier; so two or three hundred redcoats came
over from Windsor, intending to wreck the camp. There was a babel of
cursing and screaming, much brandishing of belts and tent-rods, when
suddenly an arbiter appeared, a white-haired, brown-eyed, calm
Colossus, speaking Romany fluently, and drinking deep draughts of
ale--in a quarter of an hour Tommy Atkins and Anselo Stanley were
sworn friends over a loving-quart. "Mr Burroughs," said one of the
Gypsies (it is the name by which Gypsies still speak of him), and I
knew that at last I had met him whom of all men I most wished to
meet. Matty Cooper, the 'celebrated Windsor Frog' (vide Leland),
presented me as 'a young gentleman, Rya, a scholard from Oxford'; and
'H'm,' quoth Colossus, 'a good many fools come from Oxford.' It was
a bad beginning, but it ended well, by his asking me to walk with him
to the station, and on the way inviting me to call on him in London.
I did so, but not until nearly a twelve-month afterwards, when I
found him in Hereford Square, and when he set strong ale before me,
as again on the occasion of my third and last meeting with him in the
tent of our common acquaintance, Shadrach Herne, at the Potteries,
Notting Hill. Both these times we had much talk together, but I
remember only that it was partly about East Anglia, and more about
'things of Egypt.' Conversations twenty years old are easy to
imagine, hard to reproduce . . . Probably Borrow asked me the Romany
for 'frying-pan,' and I modestly answered, 'Either maasalli or
tasseromengri' (this is password No. 1), and then I may have asked
him the Romany for 'brick,' to which he will have answered, that
'there is no such word' (this is No. 2). But one thing I do
remember, that he was frank and kindly, interesting and interested; I
was only a lad, and he was verging on seventy. I could tell him
about a few 'travellers' whom he had not recently seen--Charlie
Pinfold, the hoary polygamist, Plato and Mantis Buckland, Cinderella
Petulengro, and Old Tom Oliver ('Ha! so he has seen Tom Oliver,' I
seem to remember that)." {466a}


There was nothing now to keep Borrow in London. Nobody wanted to
read his books, other stars had risen in the East. His publisher had
exclaimed with energy, as Borrow himself would relate, "I want to
meet with good writers, but there are none to be had: I want a man
who can write like Ecclesiastes." There is something tragic in the
account that Mr Watts-Dunton gives of his last encounter with Borrow:


"The last time I ever saw him," he writes, "was shortly before he
left London to live in the country. It was, I remember well, on
Waterloo Bridge, where I had stopped to gaze at a sunset of singular
and striking splendour, whose gorgeous clouds and ruddy mists were
reeling and boiling over the West-End. Borrow came up and stood
leaning over the parapet, entranced by the sight, as well he might
be. Like most people born in flat districts, he had a passion for
sunsets. Turner could not have painted that one, I think, and
certainly my pen could not describe it . . . I never saw such a
sunset before or since, not even on Waterloo Bridge; and from its
association with 'the last of Borrow,' I shall never forget it."
{466b}


In 1874 Borrow withdrew to Oulton, there to end his lonely life, his
spirit seeming to enjoy the dreary solitude of the Cottage, with its
mournful surroundings. His stepdaughter, the Henrietta of old,
remained in London with her husband, and Borrow's loneliness was
complete. Sometimes he was to be seen stalking along the highways at
a great pace, wearing a broad-brimmed hat and a Spanish cloak, a
tragic figure of solitude and despair, speaking to no one, no one
daring to speak to him, who locally was considered as "a funny
tempered man."

In a fragment of a letter from Edward FitzGerald to W. B. Donne (June
1874), there is an interesting reference to Borrow:-


"Wait!" he writes. "I have one little thing to tell you, which,
little as it is, is worth all the rest, if you don't know already.

"Borrow--has got back to his own Oulton Lodge. My Nephew, Edmund
Kerrich, now Adjutant to some Volunteer Battalion, wants a house
NEAR, not IN, Lowestoft: and got some Agent to apply for Borrow's--
who sent word that he is himself there--an old Man--wanting
Retirement, etc. This was the account Edmund got.

"I saw in some Athenaeum a somewhat contemptuous notice of G. B.'s
'Rommany Lil' or whatever the name is. I can easily understand that
B. should not meddle with SCIENCE of any sort; but some years ago he
would not have liked to be told so, however Old Age may have cooled
him now." {467a}


Borrow sent a message to FitzGerald through Edmund Kerrich of
Geldeston, asking him to visit Oulton Cottage. The reply shows all
the sweetness of the writer's nature:-


LITTLE GRANGE, WOODBRIDGE,
Jan. 10/75.

Dear Borrow,--My nephew Kerrich told me of a very kind invitation
that you sent to me, through him, some while ago. I think the more
of it because I imagine, from what I have heard, that you have slunk
away from human company as much--as I have! For the last fifteen
years I have not visited any one of my very oldest friends, except
the daughters of my old [?friend] George Crabbe, and Donne--once
only, and for half a day, just to assure myself by--my own eyes how
he was after the severe illness he had last year, and which he never
will quite recover from, I think; though he looked and moved better
than I expected.

Well--to tell you all about WHY I have thus fallen from my company
would be a tedious thing, and all about one's self too--whom,
Montaigne says, one never talks about without detriment to the person
talked about. Suffice to say, 'so it is'; and one's friends, however
kind and 'loyal' (as the phrase goes), do manage to exist and enjoy
themselves pretty reasonably without one.

So with me. And is it not much the same with you also? Are you not
glad now to be mainly alone, and find company a heavier burden than
the grasshopper? If one ever had this solitary habit, it is not
likely to alter for the better as one grows older--as one grows OLD.
I like to think over my old friends. There they are, lingering as
ineffaceable portraits--done in the prime of life--in my memory.
Perhaps we should not like one another so well after a fifteen-years
separation, when all of us change and most of us for the worse. I do
not say THAT would be your case; but you must, at any rate, be less
inclined to disturb the settled repose into which you, I suppose,
have fallen. I remember first seeing you at Oulton, some twenty-five
years ago; then at Donne's in London; then at my own happy home in
Regent's Park; then ditto at Gorleston--after which, I have seen
nobody, except the nephews and nieces left me by my good sister
Kerrich.

So shall things rest? I could not go to you, after refusing all this
while to go to older--if not better--friends, fellow Collegians,
fellow schoolfellows; and yet will you still believe me (as I hope
THEY do)

Yours and theirs sincerely,
EDWARD FITZGERALD.


Borrow was still a remarkably robust man. Mr Watts-Dunton tells how,


"At seventy years of age, after breakfasting at eight o'clock in
Hereford Square, he would walk to Putney, meet one or more of us at
Roehampton, roam about Wimbledon and Richmond Park with us, bathe in
the Fen Ponds with a north-east wind cutting across the icy water
like a razor, run about the grass afterwards like a boy to shake off
some of the water-drops, stride about the park for hours, and then,
after fasting for twelve hours, eat a dinner at Roehampton that would
have done Sir Walter Scott's eyes good to see. Finally, he would
walk back to Hereford Square, getting home late at night. And if the
physique of the man was bracing, his conversation, unless he happened
to be suffering from one of his occasional fits of depression, was
still more so. Its freshness, raciness and eccentric whim no pen
could describe. There is a kind of humour the delight of which is
that while you smile at the pictures it draws, you smile quite as
much or more to think that there is a mind so whimsical, crotchetty,
and odd as to draw them. This was the humour of Borrow." {469a}