“Nobody,” he wrote, “sympathises with wounded vanity, and the world only laughs when a man angrily informs it that it does not rate him at his true value. The public to whom he appeals must, after all, be the judge of his pretensions. Their verdict at first is frequently wrong, but it is they themselves who must reverse it, and not the author who is upon his trial before them. The attacks of critics, if they are unjust, invariably yield to the same remedy. Though we do not think that Mr Borrow is a good counsel in his own cause, we are yet strongly of the opinion that Time in this case has some wrongs to repair, and that Lavengro has not obtained the fame which was its due. It contains passages which in their way are not surpassed by anything in English Literature.”
The value of these prophetic words lies in the fine spirit of fatherly reproof in which the whole review was written. It is the work of a critic who regarded literature as a thing to be approached, both by author and reviewer, with grave and deliberate ceremony, not with enthusiasm or prejudice. From any other source the following words would not have possessed the significance they did, coming from a man of such sane ideas with the courage to express them:—
“Various portions of the history are known to be a faithful narrative of Mr Borrow’s career, while we ourselves can testify, as to many other parts of his volumes, that nothing can excel the fidelity with which he has described both men and things. Far from his showing any tendency to exaggeration, such of his characters as we chance to have known, and they are not a few, are rather within the truth than beyond it. However picturesquely they may be drawn, the lines are invariably those of nature. Why under these circumstances he should envelop the question in mystery is more than we can divine. There can be no doubt that the larger part, and possibly the whole, of the work is a narrative of actual occurrences.” [436]
The Appendix itself, which had drawn from Elwin the grave declaration that “Mr Borrow is very angry with his critics,” is a fine piece of rhetorical denunciation. It opens with the deliberate restraint of a man who feels the fury of his wrath surging up within him. It tells again the story of Lavengro, pointing morals as it goes. Then the studied calm is lost—Priestcraft, “Foreign Nonsense,” “Gentility Nonsense,” “Canting Nonsense,” “Pseudo-Critics,” “Pseudo-Radicals” he flogs and pillories mercilessly until, arriving at “The Old Radical,” he throws off all restraint and lunges out wildly, mad with hate and despair. As a piece of literary folly, the Appendix to The Romany Rye has probably never been surpassed. It alienated from Borrow all but his personal friends, and it sealed his literary fate as far as his own generation was concerned. In short, he had burnt his boats.
Borrow had sent a copy of The Romany Rye to FitzGerald, which is referred to by him in a letter written from Gorleston to Professor Cowell (5th June 1857):—
“Within hail almost lives George Borrow who has lately published, and given me, two new Volumes of Lavengro called Romany Rye, with some excellent things, and some very bad (as I have made bold to write to him—how shall I face him!). You would not like the Book at all, I think.” [437a]
Borrow was bitterly disappointed at the effect produced by The Romany Rye. On someone once saying that it was the finest piece of literary invective since Swift, he replied, “Yes, I meant it to be; and what do you think the effect was? No one took the least notice of it!” [437b]
The Romany Rye was not a success. The thousand copies lasted a year. When it appeared likely that a second edition would be required, Borrow wrote to John Murray urging him not to send the book to the press again until he “was quite sure the demand for it will at least defray all attendant expenses.” He saw that whatever profits had resulted from the publication of the first edition, were in danger of being swallowed up in the preparation of a second. When this did eventually make its appearance in 1858, it was limited to 750 copies, which lasted until 1872.
Borrow’s own attitude with regard to the work and his wisdom in publishing it is summed up in a letter to John Murray (17th Sept. 1857):—
“I was very anxious to bring it out,” he writes; “and I bless God that I had the courage and perseverance to do so. It is of course unpalatable to many; for it scorns to foster delusion, to cry ‘peace where there is no peace,’ and denounces boldly the evils which are hurrying the country to destruction, and which have kindled God’s anger against it, namely, the pride, insolence, cruelty, covetousness, and hypocrisy of its people, and above all the rage for gentility, which must be indulged in at the expense of every good and honourable feeling.”