It is in this ecstatic mood that he passes through Wales. Let me recall the eulogy on “Gronwy” Owen, and here it may be said that Borrow rarely got his spelling correct of the proper names of his various literary heroes, in the various Norse and Celtic tongues in which he delighted. But how much Borrow delighted in his poets may be seen by his eulogy on Goronwy Owen, which in its pathos recalls Carlyle’s similar eulogies over poor German scholars who interested him, Jean Paul Richter and Heyne, for example. Borrow ignored Owen’s persistent intemperance and general impracticability. Here and here only, indeed, does he remind one of Carlyle. He had a great capacity for hero-worship, although the two were not interested in the same heroes. His hero-worship of Owen took him over large tracks of country in search of that poet’s birthplace. He writes of the delight he takes in inspecting the birth-places and haunts of poets. “It is because I am fond of poetry, poets, and their haunts, that I am come to Anglesey.” “I proceeded on my way,” he says elsewhere, “in high spirits indeed, having now seen not only the tomb of the Tudors, but one of those sober poets for which Anglesey has always been so famous.” And thus it is that Wild Wales is a high-spirited book, which will always be a delight and a joy not only to Welshmen, who, it may be hoped, have by this time forgiven “the ecclesiastical cat” of Llangollen, but to all who rejoice in the great classics of the English tongue.
CHAPTER XXXII
Life In London, 1860–1874
George Borrow’s earlier visits to London are duly recorded, with that glamour of which he was a master, in the pages of Lavengro. Who can cross London Bridge even to-day without thinking of the apple-woman and her copy of Moll Flanders; and many passages of Borrow’s great book make a very special appeal to the lover of London. Then there was that visit to the Bible Society’s office made on foot from Norwich, and the expedition a few months later to pass an examination in the Manchu language. When he became a country squire and the author of the very successful Bible in Spain Borrow frequently visited London, and his various residences may be traced from his letters. Take, for example, these five notes to his wife, the first apparently written in 1848, but all undated:
To Mrs. George Borrow
Tuesday afternoon.
My dear Wife,—I just write you a line to tell you that I am tolerably well as I hope you are. Every thing is in confusion abroad. The French King has disappeared and will probably never be heard of, though they are expecting him in England. Funds are down nearly to eighty. The Government have given up the income tax and people are very glad of it. I am not. With respect to the funds, if I were to sell out I should not know what to do with the money. J. says they will rise. I do not think they will, they may, however, fluctuate a little.—Keep up your spirits, my heart’s dearest, and kiss old Hen. for me.
G. B.
To Mrs. George Borrow
53a, Pall Mall.
Dear Wife Carreta,—I write you a line as I suppose you will be glad to have one. I dine to-night with Murray and Cooke, and we are going to talk over about The Sleeping Bard; both are very civil. I have been reading hard at the Museum and have lost no time. Yesterday I went to Greenwich to see the Leviathan. It is almost terrible to look at, and seems too large for the river. It resembles a floating town—the paddle is 60 feet high. A tall man can stand up in the funnel as it lies down. ’Tis sad, however, that money is rather scarce. I walked over Blackheath and thought of poor dear Mrs. Watson. I have just had a note from FitzGerald. We have had some rain but not very much. London is very gloomy in rainy weather. I was hoping that I should have a letter from you this morning. I hope you and Hen. have been well.—God bless you.
George Borrow.
To Mrs. George Borrow
Pall Mall, 53a, Saturday.
Dear Carreta,—I am thinking of coming to you on Thursday. I do not know that I can do anything more here, and the dulness of the weather and the mists are making me ill. Please to send another five pound note by Tuesday morning. I have spent scarcely anything of that which you sent except what I owe to Mrs. W., but I wish to have money in my pocket, and Murray and Cooke are going to dine with me on Tuesday; I shall be glad to be with you again, for I am very much in want of your society. I miss very much my walks at Llangollen by the quiet canal; but what’s to be done? Everything seems nearly at a standstill in London, on account of this wretched war, at which it appears to me the English are getting the worst, notwithstanding their boasting. They thought to settle it in an autumn’s day; they little knew the Russians, and they did not reflect that just after autumn comes winter, which has ever been the Russians’ friend. Have you heard anything about the rent of the Cottage? I should have been glad to hear from you this morning. Give my love to Hen. and may God bless you, dear.
George Borrow.
(Keep this.)
To Mrs. George Borrow
No. 53a Pall Mall.
Dear Carreta,—I hope you received my last letter written on Tuesday. I am glad that I came to London. I find myself much the better for having done so. I was going on in a very spiritless manner. Everybody I have met seems very kind and glad to see me. Murray seems to be thoroughly staunch. Cooke, to whom I mentioned the F.T., says that Murray was delighted with the idea, and will be very glad of the 4th of Lavengro. I am going to dine with Murray to-day, Thursday. W. called upon me to-day. I wish you would send me a blank cheque, in a letter so that if I want money I may be able to draw for a little. I shall not be long from home, but now I am here I wish to do all that’s necessary. If you send me a blank cheque, I suppose W. or Murray would give me the money. I hope you got my last letter. I received yours, and Cooke has just sent the two copies of Lavengro you wrote for, and I believe some engravings of the picture. I shall wish to return by the packet if possible, and will let you know when I am coming. I hope to write again shortly to tell you some more news. How is mother and Hen., and how are all the creatures? I hope all well. I trust you like all I propose—now I am here I want to get two or three things, to go to the Museum, and to arrange matters. God bless you. Love to mother and Hen.
George Borrow.
To Mrs. George Borrow
No. 58 Jermyn Street, St. James.
Dear Carreta,—I got here safe, and upon the whole had not so bad a journey as might be expected. I put up at the Spread Eagle for the night for I was tired and hungry; have got into my old lodgings as you see, those on the second floor, they are very nice ones, with every convenience; they are expensive, it is true, but they are cheerful, which is a grand consideration for me. I have as yet seen nobody, for it is only now a little past eleven. I can scarcely at present tell you what my plans are, perhaps to-morrow I shall write again. Kiss Hen., and God bless you.
G. B.
Borrow was in London in 1845 and again in 1848. There must have been other occasional visits on the way to this or that starting point of his annual holiday, but in 1860 Borrow took a house in London, and he resided there until 1874, when he returned to Oulton. In a letter to Mr. John Murray, written from Ireland in November, 1859, Mrs. Borrow writes to the effect that in the spring of the following year she will wish to look round “and select a pleasant holiday residence within three to ten miles of London.” There is no doubt that a succession of winters on Oulton Broad had been very detrimental to Mrs. Borrow’s health, although they had no effect on Borrow, who bathed there with equal indifference in winter as in summer, having, as he tells us in Wild Wales, “always had the health of an elephant.” And so Borrow and his wife arrived in London in June, and took temporary lodgings at 21 Montagu Street, Portman Square. In September they went into occupation of a house in Brompton—22 Hereford Square, which is now commemorated by a County Council tablet. Here Borrow resided for fourteen years, and here his wife died on 30th January, 1869. She was buried in Brompton Cemetery, where Borrow was laid beside her twelve years later. For neighbours on the one side the Borrows had Mr. Robert Collinson and, on the other, Miss Frances Power Cobbe and her companion, Miss M. C. Lloyd. From Miss Cobbe we have occasional glimpses of Borrow, all of them unkindly. She was of Irish extraction, her father having been grandson of Charles Cobbe, Archbishop of Dublin. Miss Cobbe was an active woman in all kinds of journalistic and philanthropic enterprises in the London of the ’seventies and ’eighties of the last century, writing in particular in the now defunct newspaper, the Echo, and she wrote dozens of books and pamphlets, all of them forgotten except her Autobiography, in which she devoted several pages to her neighbour in Hereford Square. Borrow had no sympathy with fanatical women with many “isms,” and the pair did not agree, although many neighbourly courtesies passed between them for a time. Here is an extract from Miss Cobbe’s Autobiography:
George Borrow, who, if he were not a gypsy by blood, ought to have been one, was for some years our near neighbour in Hereford Square. My friend was amused by his quaint stories and his (real or sham) enthusiasm for Wales, and cultivated his acquaintance. I never liked him, thinking him more or less of a hypocrite. His missions, recorded in The Bible in Spain, and his translations of the Scriptures into the out-of-the-way tongues, for which he had a gift, were by no means consonant with his real opinions concerning the veracity of the said Bible.