The Life of George Borrow

r atmosphere of the big city" did not agree with him, and this fact, together with the anxiety and hard work of the past twelve months, caused him to flag, and his first t

clothes and books to the old town [Norwich]." He struck out in a south-westerly direction, musing on his achievements

extreme as to become a slave to it and render himself unsociable, sometimes churlish. It was this virtue carried to excess that drove Bor

make up the wastage of the last few months. The weather was fine and his health and spirits rapidly improved as he tramped on, his "daily journeys varying from twenty to twenty-five miles." He encountered the mysterious stranger who "touched" against the evil eye. F. H. Groome asserts,

ouch the objects along his path in order to save himself from the evil chance. He never conquered the superstition. In walking through Richm

master, a scholar is not," [61b] he remarks, and then proceeds to draw tears and moans from the dispirited Slingsby and his family by a description of the joys of tinkering, "the happiest life under heaven . . . pitching your t

ttle pony, Ambrol, he set out, a tinkering Ulysses, indifferent to what direction he took, allowing the pony to go whither he felt inclined. At first he experienced some apprehension at passing the

nsisted of various tools, an iron ladle, a chafing-pan, and small bellows, sundry pans and kettles, the latter being of tin, with the exception of one which was of copper, all in a state of considerable dilapidation." The pans and kettles were to be sold after being mended, for which purpose there was "a block of tin, sheet-tin

ilym, giving as an excuse for not accompanying them further that it was "neither fit nor proper that I cross into Wales at this time, and in this manner. When I go into Wales, I should wish to go in a new suit of superfine black, with hat and beaver, mounted on a powerful steed, black and glossy, like that which bore Greduv to the fight of Catraeth. I should wish, moreover," he continued, "to see the Welshmen assembled on the border ready to welcome me with pipe and fiddle, and m

llenhall, in Staffordshire, "the little dingle by the side of the great north road." Here

arned for solitude and the country's quiet. He told Mr Petulengro that he desired only some peaceful spot where he might hold uninterrupted communion with his own thoughts, and prac

and protection." [64a] He had not recovered from the prostrating effects of that night of tragedy when he was called upon to fight Anselo Herne, "the Flaming Tinman," who somehow or other seemed to be part of the bar

rue or false the account of her relations with Borrow may be, she is drawn by him as a living woman. He was incapable of conceiving her from his imagination. It may go unques

expression," he showed a more amiable side of his character; yet he seems to have treated her with no little cruelty. He told her about himself, how he "had tamed savage mares, wrestled with Satan, and had dealings with ferocious publishers," bringing tears to her eyes, and when she grew too

d or write." He asked her to marry him, but not until he had convinced her that he was mad. How much she had become part of his life in the dingle he did not seem to realise until after she had left him. Isopel Berners was a woman whose character was almost masculine in its strength; but she was prepared to subdue her spirit to his, wished to do so even. With her

deliberating upon the expediency of emulating King Pharaoh in the number of his wives. Mrs Petuleng

orgiko, something genteel. Now Bess is of blood gorgious; if you doubt it, look at her face, all full of pawno ratter, white blood, bro

e offer to fight the best of them for nothing, and Tawno Chikno were absent, who was to fight him? Mr Petulengro could not do

or confirm the story of Isopel. Why did Borrow omit it from Lavengro? Not from caprice surely. It has been stated t

, just as her stature was heightened by him. If she were taller than he, she must have appeared a giantess. Borrow was an impressionist, and he h

ro, a small valise strapped to the saddle, and "some desire to meet with one of those adventures which upon the roads of England

his mind. Therefore the story of his employment at the Swan Inn, Stafford, where he found his postilion friend, and the subsequent adventures must be reluctantly sacrificed. They do no

The arrival of Ardry (Arden) at the inn, [67a] passing through Stafford on his way to Warwick to be present at a dog and lion fight that had already ta

neas] to purchase the wonderful trotting cob of the innkeeper with the green Newmarket coat, which three days after you sold for two hundred. Well, brother, if you had

ates) or two hundred pounds is immaterial. It is quite likely that he sold the horse before he left the dingle, and that the adventures he narrates may be true in all else save the continued possession of his steed, that is, with the exception of the Francis Ardry episode, the encou

le time at the inn, if we may judge by the handsome cheque (￡10) offered to him by the landlord as a bonus on account of his services. Then there was the accident and the consequent lying-up at the house of the man who knew Chinese, but could not tell what o'clock it was. To confirm Borrow's itinerary

the coach that was to take him to Amesbury. The moon was in its first quarter on 24th May. There actually was a great thunderstorm in the Willenhall district about the

they should be called forth. He believed implicitly in the power of the will. [69d] He possessed ambition and a fine workable theory of how success was to be obtained; but he lacked initiative. He expected fortune to wait for him on the high-road, just as he knew adventures awaited him. He would not go "across the country," to use a phrase of the time common to postilions. He was too independent, perhaps too sensitive of being patronised, to seek employment. That he cared "for nothing in this world but old words and strange stories," was an error into which his friend Mr Petulengro might well fall. The mightiness of the man's pride could be covered only by a cloak of assumed indifference. He must be independent of the world, not only in material things, but in those intangible qualities of the spirit. It was this that lost him Isopel Berners,

ct and obtain their good-will, if he wished to do so. He demanded of men that they should have done things, or be capable of doing things. They must know everything there was to be known about some one thing; and the ostler, than whom none could groom a hor

a Jew or a Gypsy. He was fully justified in his boast of being able to take "precious good care of" himself, and

hers of Faustus about the bill that was shortly to fall due. The fact of the book having been destroyed at both the Norwich libraries, gave him the i