He might have said the books were a long tract to prove that many waters cannot quench gentlemanliness, or “once a gentleman always a gentleman.” As a rule, when Borrow gets away from life and begins to think about it, he ceases to be an individual and becomes a tame and entirely convenient
member of society, fit for the Commission of the Peace or a berth at the British Museum. After he has made £20 by pen-slavery and saved himself from serious poverty, he exclaims:
“Reader, amidst the difficulties and dangers of this life, should you ever be tempted to despair, call to mind these latter chapters of the life of Lavengro. There are few positions, however difficult, from which dogged resolution and perseverance may not liberate you.”
When he comes to discuss his own work he says that “it represents him, however, as never forgetting that he is the son of a brave but poor gentleman, and that if he is a hack author, he is likewise a scholar. It shows him doing no dishonourable jobs, and proves that if he occasionally associates with low characters, he does so chiefly to gratify the curiosity of a scholar. In his conversations with the apple-woman of London Bridge, the scholar is ever apparent, so again in his acquaintance with the man of the table, for the book is no raker up of the uncleanness of London, and if it gives what at first sight appears refuse, it invariably shows that a pearl of some kind, generally a philological one, is contained amongst it; it shows its hero always accompanied by his love of independence, scorning in the greatest poverty to receive favours from anybody, and describes him finally rescuing himself from peculiarly miserable circumstances by writing a book, an original book, within a week, even as Johnson is said to have written his ‘Rasselas,’ and Beckford his ‘Vathek,’ and tells how, leaving London, he betakes himself to the roads and fields.
“In the country it shows him leading a life of roving adventure, becoming tinker, Gypsy, postillion, ostler; associating with various kinds of people, chiefly of the lower classes, whose ways and habits are described; but, though leading this erratic life, we gather from the book that his habits are neither vulgar nor vicious, that he still follows
to a certain extent his favourite pursuits, hunting after strange characters, or analysing strange words and names. At the conclusion of Chapter XLVII., which terminates the first part of the history, it hints that he is about to quit his native land on a grand philological expedition.
“Those who read this book with attention—and the author begs to observe that it would be of little utility to read it hurriedly—may derive much information with respect to matters of philology and literature; it will be found treating of most of the principal languages from Ireland to China, and of the literature which they contain. . . .”
Away from the dingle and Jasper his view of life is as follows—ale, Tate and Brady, and the gloves:
“But, above all, the care and providence of God are manifested in the case of Lavengro himself, by the manner in which he is enabled to make his way in the world up to a certain period, without falling a prey either to vice or poverty. In his history there is a wonderful illustration of part of the text quoted by his mother, ‘I have been young, and now am old, yet never saw I the righteous forsaken, or his seed begging bread.’ He is the son of good and honourable parents, but at the critical period of life, that of entering into the world, he finds himself without any earthly friend to help him, yet he manages to make his way; he does not become a Captain in the Life Guards, it is true, nor does he get into Parliament, nor does the last chapter conclude in the most satisfactory and unobjectionable manner, by his marrying a dowager countess, as that wise man Addison did, or by his settling down as a great country gentleman, perfectly happy and contented, like the very moral Roderick Random, or the equally estimable Peregrine Pickle; he is hack author, Gypsy, tinker, and postillion, yet, upon the whole, he seems to be quite as happy as the younger sons of most earls, to have as high
feelings of honour; and when the reader loses sight of him, he has money in his pocket honestly acquired, to enable him to commence a journey quite as laudable as those which the younger sons of earls generally undertake. Surely all this is a manifestation of the kindness and providence of God: and yet he is not a religious person; up to the time when the reader loses sight of him, he is decidedly not a religious person; he has glimpses, it is true, of that God who does not forsake him, but he prays very seldom, is not fond of going to church; and, though he admires Tate and Brady’s version of the Psalms, his admiration is rather caused by the beautiful poetry which that version contains than the religion; yet his tale is not finished—like the tale of the gentleman who touched objects, and that of the old man who knew Chinese without knowing what was o’clock; perhaps, like them, he is destined to become religious, and to have, instead of occasional glimpses, frequent and distinct views of his God; yet, though he may become religious, it is hardly to be expected that he will become a very precise and strait-laced person; it is probable that he will retain, with his scholarship, something of his Gypsyism, his predilection for the hammer and tongs, and perhaps some inclination to put on certain gloves, not white kid, with any friend who may be inclined for a little old English diversion, and a readiness to take a glass of ale, with plenty of malt in it, and as little hop as may well be—ale at least two years old—with the aforesaid friend, when the diversion is over; for, as it is the belief of the writer that a person may get to heaven very comfortably without knowing what’s o’clock, so it is his belief that he will not be refused admission there because to the last he has been fond of healthy and invigorating exercises, and felt a willingness to partake of any of the good things which it pleases the Almighty to put within the reach of His children during their sojourn upon earth.”