“‘I shall turn back with him. God bless you!’
“‘Go back with him not,’ said Peter, ‘he is one of those whom I like not, one of the clibberty-clabber, as Master Ellis Wyn observes—turn not with that man.’
“‘Go not back with him,’ said Winifred. ‘If thou goest with that man, thou wilt soon forget all our profitable counsels; come with us.’
“‘I cannot; I have much to say to him. Kosko Divous, Mr. Petulengro.’
“‘Kosko Divvus, Pal,’ said Mr. Petulengro, riding through the water; ‘are you turning back?’
“I turned back with Mr. Petulengro.”
At another time Jasper twists about like a weasel bewitching a bird, and in so doing puts £50 unnoticed into Lavengro’s pocket. Lavengro is indignant at the pleasantry. But Jasper insists; the money is for him to buy a certain horse; if he will not take the money and buy the horse there will be a quarrel. He has made the money by fair fighting in the ring, has nowhere to put it, and seriously thinks that it were best invested in this fine horse, which accordingly Borrow purchases and takes across England, and sells at Horncastle Fair for £150. The next scene shows Tawno Chikno at his best. Borrow has been trotting the horse and racing it against a cob, amid a company that put him “wonderfully in mind of the ancient horse-races of the heathen north,” so that he almost thought himself Gunnar of Lithend. But Tawno was the man to try the horse at a jump, said Jasper. Tawno weighed sixteen stone, and the owner thought him more likely to break the horse’s back. Jasper became very much excited, and offered to forfeit a handful of guineas if harm was done.
“‘Here’s the man. Here’s the horse-leaper of the world. . . .’ Tawno, at a bound, leaped into the saddle, where he really looked like Gunnar of Hlitharend, save
and except that the complexion of Gunnar was florid, whereas that of Tawno was of nearly Mulatto darkness; and that all Tawno’s features were cast in the Grecian model, whereas Gunnar had a snub nose. ‘There’s a leaping-bar behind the house,’ said the landlord. ‘Leaping-bar!’ said Mr. Petulengro, scornfully. ‘Do you think my black pal ever rides at a leaping bar? No more than at a windle-straw. Leap over that meadow wall, Tawno.’ Just past the house, in the direction in which I had been trotting, was a wall about four feet high, beyond which was a small meadow. Tawno rode the horse gently up to the wall, permitted him to look over, then backed him for about ten yards, and pressing his calves against the horse’s sides, he loosed the rein, and the horse launching forward, took the leap in gallant style. ‘Well done, man and horse!’ said Mr. Petulengro; ‘now come back, Tawno.’ The leap from the side of the meadow was, however, somewhat higher; and the horse, when pushed at it, at first turned away; whereupon Tawno backed him to a greater distance, pushed the horse to a full gallop, giving a wild cry; whereupon the horse again took the wall, slightly grazing one of his legs against it. ‘A near thing,’ said the landlord, ‘but a good leap. Now, no more leaping, so long as I have control over the animal.’”
A very different beautiful scene is where Mrs. Petulengro braids Isopel’s fair hair in Gypsy fashion, half against her will, and Lavengro looks on, showing Isopel at a glance his disapproval of the fashion, while Petulengro admires it. If it is not too much to quote, I will do so, because it is the clearest and most detailed picture of more than one figure in the whole of the autobiography. Mr. and Mrs. Petulengro have come to visit Isopel, and Lavengro has fetched her to his tent, where they are awaiting her: