Early in 1824, and just before George Borrow’s articles with the solicitors expired, Captain Borrow died. He left all that he had to his widow, with something for the maintenance and education of the younger son during his minority. Borrow had already planned to go to London, to write, to abuse religion and to get himself prosecuted. A month later, the day after the expiration of his articles, before he had quite reached his majority, he went up to London. He was “cast upon the world” in no very hopeful condition. He had lately been laid up again—was it by the “fear” or something else?—by a complaint which destroyed his strength, impaired his understanding and threatened his life, as he wrote to a friend: he was taking mercury for a cure. But he had his translations from Ab Gwilym and his romantic ballads, and he believed in them. He took them to Sir Richard Phillips, who did not believe in them, and had moreover given up publishing. According to his own account, which is very well known (Lavengro, chapter XXX.), Sir Richard suggested that he should write something in the style of the “Dairyman’s Daughter” instead.

Men of this generation, fortunate at least in this ignorance, probably think of the “Dairyman’s Daughter” as a fictitious title, like the “Oxford Review” (which stood for “The Universal Review”) and the “Newgate Lives” (which should have been “Celebrated Trials,” etc.). But such a book really was published in 1811. It was an “authentic narrative” by a clergyman of the Church of England named Legh Richmond, who thought it “delightful to trace and discover the operations of Divine love among the poorer classes of mankind.” The book was about the conversion and holy life and early death of a pale, delicate, consumptive dairyman’s daughter in the Isle of Wight. It became famous, was translated into many languages, and was reprinted by some misguided or malevolent man not long ago. I will give a specimen of the book which the writer of “Six-foot-three” was asked to imitate:

“Travellers, as they pass through the country, usually stop to inquire whose are the splendid mansions which they discover among the woods and plains around them. The families, titles, fortune, or character of the respective owners, engage much attention. . . . In the meantime, the lowly cottage of the poor husbandman is passed by as scarcely deserving of notice. Yet, perchance, such a cottage may often contain a treasure of infinitely more value than the sumptuous palace of the rich man; even “the pearl of great price.” If this be set in the heart of the poor cottager, it proves a jewel of unspeakable value, and will shine among the brightest ornaments of the Redeemer’s crown, in that day when he maketh up his “jewels.”

Sir Richard Phillips. (From the painting by James Saxon in The National Portrait Gallery.) Photo: Emery Walker

“Hence, the Christian traveller, while he bestows, in common with others, his due share of applause on the decorations of the rich, and is not insensible to the beauties and magnificence which are the lawfully allowed appendages of rank and fortune, cannot overlook the humbler dwelling of the poor. And if he should find that true piety and grace beneath the thatched roof, which he has in vain looked for amidst the worldly grandeur of the rich, he remembers the word of God. . . . He sees, with admiration, that ‘the high and lofty One, that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy, who dwelleth in the high and holy place, dwelleth with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit,’ Isaiah lvii., 15; and although heaven is his throne, and the earth his footstool, yet when a home is to be built, and a place of rest to be sought for himself, he says, ‘To this man will I look, even to him that is poor, and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word,’ Isaiah lxvi., 1, 2. When a home is thus tenanted, faith beholds this inscription written on the walls, The Lord lives here. Faith, therefore, cannot pass it by unnoticed, but loves to lift up the latch of the door, and sit down, and converse with the poor, though perhaps despised, inhabitant. Many a sweet interview does faith obtain when she thus takes her walks abroad. Many such a sweet interview have I myself enjoyed beneath the roof where dwelt the Dairyman and his little family.

“I soon perceived that his daughter’s health was rapidly on the decline. The pale, wasting consumption, which is the Lord’s instrument for removing so many thousands every year from the land of the living, made hasty strides on her constitution. The hollow eye, the distressing cough, and the often too flattering red on the cheek, foretold the approach of death.

“I have often thought what a field for usefulness and affectionate attention, on the part of ministers and Christian friends, is opened by the frequent attacks and lingering progress of consumptive illness. How many such precious opportunities are daily lost, where Providence seems in so marked a way to afford time and space for serious and Godly instruction! Of how many may it be said: ‘The way of peace have they not known’; for not one friend ever came nigh to warn them to ‘flee from the wrath to come.’

“But the Dairyman’s Daughter was happily made acquainted with the things which belonged to her everlasting peace before the present disease had taken root in her constitution. In my visits to her I might be said rather to receive information than to impart it. Her mind was abundantly stored with Divine truths, and her conversations truly edifying. The recollection of it still produces a thankful sensation in my heart.”

Nevertheless, when Borrow had bought a copy of this book he was willing to do what was asked, and to attempt also to translate into German Phillips’ “Proximate Causes of the Material Phenomena of the Universe,” or what the translator called “his tale of an apple and a pear.” But Phillips changed his mind about the “Dairyman’s Daughter” and commissioned a compilation of “Newgate Lives and Trials” instead. Borrow failed with the translation of the “Proximate Causes” but liked very well the compiling of the “Celebrated Trials”—of Joan of Arc, Cagliostro, Mary Queen of Scots, Raleigh, the Gunpowder Plotters, Queen Caroline, Thurtell, the Cato Street Conspirators, and many more—in six volumes. He also wrote reviews for Phillips’ Magazine, and contributed more translations of poetry and many scraps of “Danish Traditions and Superstitions,” like the following:

“At East Hessing, in the district of Calling, there was once a rural wedding; and when the morning was near at hand, the guests rushed out of the house with much noise and tumult. When they were putting their horses to the carts, in order to leave the place, each of them boasted and bragged of his bridal present. But when the uproar was at the highest, and they were all speaking together, a maiden dressed in green, and with a bulrush plaited over her head, came from a neighbouring morass, and going up to the fellow who was noisiest and bragged most of his bridal gift, she said, ‘What will you give to Lady Boe?’ The boor, who was half intoxicated from the brandy and ale he had swallowed, seized a whip, and answered, ‘Three strokes of my waggon-whip.’ But at the same moment he fell a corpse to the ground.”

If translation like this is journeyman’s work for the journeyman, for Borrow it was of great value because it familiarised him with the marvellous and the supernatural and so helped him towards the expression of his own material and spiritual adventures. The wild and often other-worldly air of much of his work is doubtless due to his wild and other-worldly mind, but owes a considerable if uncertain debt to his reading of ballads and legends, which give a little to the substance of his work and far more to the tone of it. Among other things translated at this time he mentions the “Saga of Burnt Njal.”

He was not happy in London. He had few friends there, and perhaps those he had only disturbed without sweetening his solitude. One of these was a Norwich friend, named Roger Kerrison, who shared lodgings with him at 16, Millman Street, Bedford Row. Borrow confided in Kerrison, and had written to him before leaving Norwich in terms of perhaps unconsciously worked-up affection. But Borrow’s low spirits in London were more than Kerrison could stand. When Borrow was proposing a short visit to Norwich his friend wrote to John Thomas Borrow, suggesting that he should keep his brother there for a time, or else return with him, for this reason. Borrow had “repeatedly” threatened suicide, and unable to endure his fits of desperation Kerrison had gone into separate lodgings: if his friend were to return in this state and find himself alone he would “again make some attempt to destroy himself.” Nothing was done, so far as is known, and he did not commit suicide. It is a curious commentary on the work of hack writers that this youth should have written as a note to his translation of “The Suicide’s Grave,” {85} that it was not translated for its sentiments but for its poetry; “although the path of human life is rough and thorny, the mind may always receive consolation by looking forward to the world to come. The mind which rejects a future state has to thank itself for its utter misery and hopelessness.” His malady was youth, aggravated, the food reformer would say, by eating fourteen pennyworth of bread and cheese at a meal, and certainly aggravated by literary ambition.

Judging from the thirty-first chapter of “Lavengro,” he was exceptionally sensitive at this time to all impressions—probably both pleasant and unpleasant. He describes himself on his first day gazing at the dome of St. Paul’s until his brain became dizzy, and he thought the dome would fall and crush him, and he shrank within himself, and struck yet deeper into the heart of the big city. He stood on London Bridge dazed by the mighty motion of the waters and the multitude of men and “horses as large as elephants. There I stood, just above the principal arch, looking through the balustrade at the scene that presented itself—and such a scene! Towards the left bank of the river, a forest of masts, thick and close, as far as the eye could reach; spacious wharfs, surmounted with gigantic edifices; and, far away, CÆsar’s Castle, with its White Tower. To the right, another forest of masts, and a maze of buildings, from which, here and there, shot up to the sky chimneys taller than Cleopatra’s Needle, vomiting forth huge wreaths of that black smoke which forms the canopy—occasionally a gorgeous one—of the more than Babel city. Stretching before me, the troubled breast of the mighty river, and, immediately below, the main whirlpool of the Thames—the Maelstrom of the bulwarks of the middle arch—a grisly pool, which, with its superabundance of horror, fascinated me. Who knows but I should have leapt into its depths?—I have heard of such things—but for a rather startling occurrence which broke the spell. As I stood upon the bridge, gazing into the jaws of the pool, a small boat shot suddenly through the arch beneath my feet. There were three persons in it; an oarsman in the middle, whilst a man and woman sat at the stern. I shall never forget the thrill of horror which went through me at this sudden apparition. What!—a boat—a small boat—passing beneath that arch into yonder roaring gulf! Yes, yes, down through that awful water-way, with more than the swiftness of an arrow, shot the boat, or skiff, right into the jaws of the pool. A monstrous breaker curls over the prow—there is no hope; the boat is swamped, and all drowned in that strangling vortex. No! the boat, which appeared to have the buoyancy of a feather, skipped over the threatening horror, and the next moment was out of danger, the boatman—a true boatman of Cockaigne, that—elevating one of his skulls in sign of triumph, the man hallooing, and the woman, a true Englishwoman that—of a certain class—waving her shawl. Whether any one observed them save myself, or whether the feat was a common one, I know not; but nobody appeared to take any notice of them. As for myself, I was so excited, that I strove to clamber up the balustrade of the bridge, in order to obtain a better view of the daring adventurers. Before I could accomplish my design, however, I felt myself seized by the body, and, turning my head, perceived the old fruit-woman, who was clinging to me.”

On this very day, in his account, he first met the “fiery, enthusiastic and open-hearted,” pleasure-loving young Irishman, whom he calls Francis Ardry, who took him to the theatre and to “the strange and eccentric places of London,” and no doubt helped to give him the feeling of “a regular Arabian Nights’ entertainment.” C. G. Leland {87} tells a story told to him by one who might have been the original of Ardry. The story is the only independent evidence of Borrow’s London life. This “old gentleman” had been in youth for a long time the most intimate friend of George Borrow, who was, he said, a very wild and eccentric youth. “One night, when skylarking about London, Borrow was pursued by the police, as he wished to be, even as Panurge so planned as to be chased by the night-watch. He was very tall and strong in those days, a trained shoulder-hitter, and could run like a deer. He was hunted to the Thames, and there they thought they had him. But the Romany Rye made for the edge, and leaping into the wan water, like the Squyre in the old ballad, swam to the other side, and escaped.”

It is no wonder he “did not like reviewing at all,” especially as he “never could understand why reviews were instituted; works of merit do not require to be reviewed, they can speak for themselves, and require no praising; works of no merit at all will die of themselves, they require no killing.” He forgot “The Dairyman’s Daughter,” and he could not foresee the early fate of “Lavengro” itself. He preferred manlier crime and riskier deception to reviewing. As he read over the tales of rogues, he says, he became again what he had been as a boy, a necessitarian, and could not “imagine how, taking all circumstances into consideration, these highwaymen, these pickpockets, should have been anything else than highwaymen and pickpockets.”

These were the days of such books as “The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Samuel Denmore Hayward, denominated the Modern Macheath, who suffered at the Old Bailey, on Tuesday, November 27, 1821, for the Crime of Burglary,” by Pierce Egan, embellished with a highly-finished miniature by Mr. Smart, etched by T. R. Cruikshank; and a facsimile of his handwriting. London, 1822.”

It is a poor book, and now has descendants lower in the social scale. It pretends to give “a most awful but useful lesson to the rising generation” by an account of the criminal whose appearance as a boy “was so superior to other boys of his class in life as to have the look of a gentleman’s child.” He naturally became a waiter, and “though the situation did not exactly accord with his ambition, it answered his purpose, because it afforded him an opportunity of studying character, and being in the company of gentlemen.” He was “a generous high-minded fellow towards the ladies,” and became the fancy man of someone else’s mistress, living “in the style of a gentleman solely at the expense of the beautiful Miss ---.” His “unembarrassed and gentlemanly” behaviour survived even while he was being searched, and he entered the chapel before execution “with a firm step, accompanied with the most gentlemanly deportment.” The end came nevertheless: “Bowing to the sheriffs and the few persons around him with all the manners of an accomplished gentleman, he ascended the drop with a firmness that astonished everyone present; and resigned his eventful life without scarce a struggle.”

The moral was the obvious one. “His talents were his misfortunes.” The biographer pretends to believe that, though the fellow lived in luxury, he must always have had a harassed mind; the truth being that he himself would have had a harassed mind if he had played so distinguished a part. “The chequered life of that young man,” he says, “abounding with incidents and facts almost incredible, and scarcely ever before practised with so much art and delusion in so short a period, impressively points out the danger arising from the possession of great talents when perverted or misapplied.”

He points out, furthermore, how vice sinks before virtue. “For instance, view the countenances of thieves, who are regaling themselves on the most expensive liquors, laughing and singing, how they are changed in an instant by the appearance of police officers entering a room in search of them. . . .”

Finally, “let the youth of London bear in mind that honesty is the best policy. . . .

“In this happy country, where every individual has an opportunity of raising himself to the highest office in the State, what might the abilities of the unfortunate Hayward have accomplished for him if he had not deviated from the paths of virtue? There is no place like London in the world where a man of talents meets with so much encouragement and liberality; his society is courted, and his presence gives a weight to any company in which he appears; if supported by a good character.”

But the crime was the thing. Of a different class was John Hamilton Reynolds’ “The Fancy.” This book, published in 1820, would have wholly delighted Borrow. I will quote the footnote to the “Lines to Philip Samson, the Brummagem Youth”:

“Of all the great men of this age, in poetry, philosophy, or pugilism, there is no one of such transcendent talent as Randall;—no one who combines the finest natural powers with the most elegant and finished acquired ones. The late Professor Stewart (who has left the learned ring) is acknowledged to be clever in philosophy, but he is a left-handed metaphysical fighter at best, and cannot be relied upon at closing with his subject. Lord Byron is a powerful poet, with a mind weighing fourteen stone; but he is too sombre and bitter, and is apt to lose his temper. Randall has no defect, or at best he has not yet betrayed the appearance of one. His figure is remarkable, when peeled, for its statue-like beauty, and nothing can equal the alacrity with which he uses either hand, or the coolness with which he receives. His goodness on his legs, Boxiana (a Lord Eldon in the skill and caution of his judgments) assures us, is unequalled. He doubles up an opponent, as a friend lately declared, as easily as though he were picking a flower or pinching a girl’s cheek. He is about to fight Jos. Hudson, who challenged him lately at the Royal Tennis Court. Randall declared, that ‘though he had declined fighting, he would accommodate Joshua’; a kind and benevolent reply, which does equal honour to his head and heart. The editor of this little volume, like Goldfinch in the ‘Road to Ruin,’ ‘would not stay away for a thousand pounds.’ He has already looked about for a tall horse and a taxed cart, and he has some hopes of compassing a drab coat and a white hat, for he has no wish to appear singular at such scenes.”

Reynolds, like Borrow, was an admirer of Byron, and he anticipated Borrow in the spirit of his remark to John Murray that the author’s trade was contemptible compared with the jockey’s. At that moment it was unquestionably so. Soon even reviewing failed. The “Universal Review” died at the beginning of 1825, and Borrow seems to have quarrelled with Phillips because some Germans had found the German of his translation as unintelligible as he had found the publisher’s English. He had nothing left but his physical strength, his translations, and a very little money. When he had come down to half-a-crown, he says, he thought of accepting a patriotic Armenian’s invitation to translate an Armenian work into English; only the Armenian went away.