FOOTNOTES:
[144] There were 750 copies of the first edition of The Zincali in two vols. in 1841. 750 of the second edition in 1843, and a third issue of 750 in the same year. A fourth edition of 7,500 copies appeared in the cheap Home and Colonial Library in 1846, and there was a fifth edition of 1000 copies in 1870. These were all the editions published in England during Borrow's lifetime. Dr. Knapp traced three American editions during the same period.
[145] The Zincali; or an Account of the Gypsies of Spain. With an original collection of their songs and poetry, and a copious dictionary of their language. By George Borrow, Late Agent of the British and Foreign Bible Society in Spain. 'For that which is unclean by nature, thou canst entertain no hope; no washing will turn the gypsy white.'—Ferdousi. In two volumes. London: John Murray, Albemarle Street, 1841.
[146] Knapp's Life, vol. i. p. 378.
[147] Mrs. Pennell. See Charles Godfrey Leland: a Biography, by Elizabeth Robins Pennell. 2 vols. 1906.
[148] Given in Mrs. Pennell's Leland: a Biography, vol. ii. pp. 142-3. The letter to which it is a reply is given in Knapp's Borrow, vol. ii. pp. 228-9.
[149] The Academy, June 13, 1874.
[150] Romano Lavo-Lil: Word Book of the Romany; or, English Gypsy Language. By George Borrow. London: John Murray, Albemarle Street, 1874.
[151] Charles Godfrey Leland (1824-1903) better known as 'Hans Breitmann' of the popular ballads, was born in Philadelphia and died in Florence. He was always known among his friends as 'The Rye,' in consequence of his enthusiasm for the gypsies concerning whom he wrote four books, the best known being: The English Gypsies and their Language, by Charles G. Leland: Trübner. The Gypsies, by Charles G. Leland: Trübner.
[152] See Groome's In Gipsy Tents (W. P. Nimmo, 1880), and Gipsy Folk-Tales (Hurst & Blackett, 1899). Francis Hindes Groome (1851-1902), whom it was my privilege to know, was the son of Archdeacon Groome, the friend of Edward FitzGerald. He was the greatest English authority of his time on gypsy language and folk-lore. He celebrated his father's friendship with the paraphraser of Omar Khayyám in Two Suffolk Friends, 1895, and wrote a good novel of gypsydom in Kriegspiel, 1896. He also edited an edition of Lavengro (Methuen), 1901.
[153] Groome to Leland in Charles Godfrey Leland: a Biography, by E. R. Pennell, vol. ii. p. 141.
[154] Introduction to Lavengro (Methuen), 1901.
CHAPTER XXII
THE BIBLE IN SPAIN
In an admirable appreciation of our author, the one in which he gives the oft-quoted eulogy concerning him as 'the delightful, the bewitching, the never-sufficiently-to-be-praised George Borrow,' Mr. Birrell records the solace that may be found by small boys in the ambiguities of a title-page, or at least might have been found in it in his youth and in mine. In those days in certain Puritan circles a very strong line was drawn between what was known as Sunday reading, and reading that might be permitted on week-days. The Sunday book must have a religious flavour. There were magazines with that particular flavour, every story in them having a pious moral withal. Very closely watched and scrutinised was the reading of young people in those days and in those circles. Mr. Birrell, doubtless, speaks from autobiographical memories when he tells us of a small boy with whose friends The Bible in Spain passed muster on the strength of its title-page. For Mr. Birrell is the son of a venerated Nonconformist minister; and perhaps he, or at least those who were of his household, had this religious idiosyncrasy. It may be that the distinction which pervaded the evangelical circles of Mr. Birrell's youth as to what were Sunday books, as distinct from books to be read on week-days, has disappeared. In any case think of the advantage of the boy of that generation who was able to handle a book with so unexceptionable a title as The Bible in Spain. His elders would succumb at once, particularly if the boy had the good sense to call their attention to the sub-title—'The Journeys, Adventures, and Imprisonments of an Englishman in an Attempt to Circulate the Scriptures in the Peninsula.' Nothing could be said by the most devout of seniors against so prepossessing a title-page.[155] But what of the boy who had thus passed the censorship? What a revelation of adventure was open to him! Perhaps he would skip the 'preachy' parts in which Borrow was doubtless sincere, although the sincerity has so uncertain a ring to-day. Here are five passages, for example, which do not seem to belong to the book:
In whatever part of the world I, a poor wanderer in the Gospel's cause, may chance to be
very possibly the fate of St. Stephen might overtake me; but does the man deserve the name of a follower of Christ who would shrink from danger of any kind in the cause of Him whom he calls his Master? 'He who loses his life for my sake shall find it,' are words which the Lord Himself uttered. These words were fraught with consolation to me, as they doubtless are to every one engaged in propagating the Gospel, in sincerity of heart, in savage and barbarian lands.
Unhappy land! not until the pure light of the Gospel has illumined thee, wilt thou learn that the greatest of all gifts is charity!
and I thought that to convey the Gospel to a place so wild and remote might perhaps be considered an acceptable pilgrimage in the eyes of my Maker. True it is that but one copy remained of those which I had brought with me on this last journey; but this reflection, far from discouraging me in my projected enterprise, produced the contrary effect, as I called to mind that, ever since the Lord revealed Himself to man, it has seemed good to Him to accomplish the greatest ends by apparently the most insufficient means; and I reflected that this one copy might serve as an instrument for more good than the four thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine copies of the edition of Madrid.
I shall not detain the course of my narrative with reflections as to the state of a Church which, though it pretends to be founded on scripture, would yet keep the light of scripture from all mankind, if possible. But Rome is fully aware that she is not a Christian Church, and having no desire to become so, she acts prudently in keeping from the eyes of her followers the page which would reveal to them the truths of Christianity.
All this does not ring quite true, and in any case it is too much on the lines of 'Sunday reading' to please the small boy, who must, however, have found a thousand things in that volume that were to his taste—some of the wildest adventures, hairbreadth escapes, extraordinary meetings again and again with unique people—with Benedict Mol, for example, who was always seeking for treasure. Gypsies, bull-fighters, quaint and queer characters of every kind, come before us in rapid succession. Rarely, surely, have so many adventures been crowded into the same number of pages. Only when Borrow remembers, as he has to do occasionally, that he is an agent of the Bible Society does the book lose its vigour and its charm. We have already pointed out that the foundations of the volume were contained in certain letters written by Borrow during his five years in Spain to the secretaries of the Bible Society in London. The recent publication of these letters has revealed to us Borrow's methods. When he had settled down at Oulton he took down his notebooks, one of which is before me, but finding this was not sufficient, he asked the Bible Society for the loan of his letters to them.[156] Other letters that he hoped to use were not forthcoming, as the following note from Miss Gurney to Mrs. Borrow indicates: