The next move on the part of the authorities was to produce sworn testimony from three people (all living in the same house, by the way) that they had purchased copies of “the New Testament and other Biblical translations at the Despacho on 5th May.” Borrow was in prison at the time, and his assistant denied the sale. Documents were also produced proving that the imprint on the title-page of the Scio New Testament was false, as at the time it was printed no such printer as Andréas Borrégo (who by the way was the Government printer and at one time a candidate for cabinet rank) lived in Madrid. In drawing the British Minister’s attention to these matters, Count Ofalia wrote (31st May):
“It would be opportune if you would be pleased to advise Mr Borrow that, convinced of the inutility of his efforts for propagating here the translation in the vulgar tongue of Sacred Writings without the forms required by law, he would do much better in making use of his talents in some other class of scientifical or literary Works during his residence in Spain, giving up Biblical Enterprises, which may be useful in other countries, but which in this Kingdom are prejudicial for very obvious reasons.”
CHAPTER XVII
JULY–NOVEMBER 1838
Borrow’s spirit chafed under this spell of enforced idleness. His horses were neighing in the stable and “Señor Antonio was neighing in the house,” as Maria Diaz expressed it; and for himself, Borrow required something more actively stimulating than pen and ink encounters with Mr Brandram. He therefore determined to defy the prohibition and make an excursion into the rural districts of New Castile, offering his Testaments for sale as he went, and sending on supplies ahead. His first objective was Villa Seca, a village situated on the banks of the Tagus about nine leagues from Madrid.
He was aware of the danger he ran in thus disregarding the official decree.
“I will not conceal from you,” he writes to Mr Brandram on 14th July, “that I am playing a daring game, and it is very possible that when I least expect it I may be seized, tied to the tail of a mule, and dragged either to the prison of Toledo or Madrid. Yet such a prospect does not discourage me in the least, but rather urges me on to persevere; for I assure you, and in this assertion there lurks not the slightest desire to magnify myself and produce an effect, that I am eager to lay down my life in this cause, and whether a Carlist’s bullet or a gaol-fever bring my career to an end, I am perfectly indifferent.”
He was not averse from martyrdom; but he objected to being precipitated into it by another man’s folly. In his interview with Count Ofalia, he had been solemnly warned that if a second time he came within the clutches of the authorities he might not escape so easily, and had replied that it was “a pleasant thing to be persecuted for the Gospel’s sake.”
In his decision to make Villa Seca his temporary headquarters, Borrow had been influenced by the fact that it was the home of Maria Diaz, his friend and landlady. Her husband was there working on the land, Maria herself living in Madrid that her children might be properly educated. Borrow left Madrid on 10th July, and on his arrival at Villa Seca he was cordially welcomed by Juan Lopez, the husband of Maria Diaz, who continued to use her maiden name, in accordance with Spanish custom. Lopez subsequently proved of the greatest possible assistance in the work of distribution, shaming both Borrow and Antonio by his energy and powers of endurance.
The inhabitants of Villa Seca and the surrounding villages of Bargas, Coveja, Villa Luenga, Mocejon, Yunclér eagerly bought up “the book of life,” and each day the three men rode forth in heat so great that “the very arrieros frequently fall dead from their mules, smitten by a sun-stroke.” [269a]
It was in Villa Seca that Borrow found “all that gravity of deportment and chivalry of disposition which Cervantes is said to have sneered away” [269b] and there were to be heard “those grandiose expressions which, when met with in the romances of chivalry, are scoffed at as ridiculous exaggerations.” [269c] Borrow so charmed the people of the district with the elaborate formality of his manner, that he became convinced that any attempt to arrest or do him harm would have met with a violent resistance, even to the length of the drawing of knives in his defence.