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CHAPTER V: LIFE AT OULTON

After many painful experiences in London, whither he went in the hope of being able to gain a livelihood by devoting himself to literature, George Borrow turned his back upon the metropolis, and set out on that wild, rambling excursion narrated and enlarged upon in the pages of “Lavengro.” Lapse of time has emphasised the impossibility of ascertaining how much is fact and how much fiction in the fascinating account of his wanderings. Criticism on that point is unjustifiable, for Borrow announced that the book was “a dream,” and a history only up to a certain point. From what the writer has gathered, however, from those who knew Borrow intimately, he has good reason to believe that there are more facts recorded in the latter part of “Lavengro,” and in “The Romany Rye,” than are credited by many students of “Don Jorge’s” writings.

After lengthy roamings far and wide, he returned again to Norwich, where he lived for a time a quiet life, of which he has left no record. His literary exploits had not been of such a nature as to rank his name with those of the known writers of his day; indeed, there is every reason for believing that as an author he was as little known as on the day when he abandoned the quiet little house in Willow Lane for a wider field of life. Yet, painful, and even heartbreaking, as his experiences had been, he was infinitely the gainer by the hard fate that sent him out a wanderer upon the face of the earth, and we who read his books to-day may be thankful for the tears and toilings that brought about so rich and abundant a harvest.

An introduction from Joseph John Gurney to the British and Foreign Bible Society resulted in Borrow’s leaving England in 1830 for the Continent, where he went on another wanderjahre not unlike that he had taken in his native land.

After visiting France, Austria and Italy, we eventually find him in St. Petersburg, where he undertook the translation of the Bible into the Mandschu-Tartar language, and issued in 1835, through Schulz and Beneze, his “Targum; or Metrical Translations from Thirty Languages and Dialects.” While in Russia, he made many friends amongst the nobility there, who frequently invited him to their country homes. In the same year that saw the publication of “Targum,” he returned home. His stay in England, however, was a very short one. The British and Foreign Bible Society was so satisfied with his work in Russia that they pressed him to continue to serve them, and undertake a journey into Spain for the purpose of circulating the Scriptures in that country. His travels in Spain occupied over four years. While there he met Mrs. Mary Clarke, who afterwards became his wife. This lady, who was the widow of a naval officer, was connected with a Suffolk family which had been associated with the village of Oulton for several generations. Their name was Skeppar, and it was in their old Suffolk home by the side of Oulton Broad that Borrow went to live on his return to England.

Borrow, who was now in his thirty-eighth year, set to work at Oulton upon his “Bible in Spain,” which was published by Mr. John Murray, three years later, in 1843. Of his method, or lack of method, in working, something may be gathered from the preface to the second edition of “The Zincali,” which was written about the time of the issue of the former book. Mr. Murray had advised him to try his hand at something different from his “sorry trash”¹ about gipsies, and write a work that would really be of credit to the great firm in Albemarle Street. Borrow responded by starting on an account of his wanderings in Spain.

“At first I proceeded slowly – sickness was in the land, and the face of Nature was overcast – heavy rainclouds swam in the heavens, the blast howled amid the pines which nearly surround my lonely dwelling, and the waters of the lake, which lies before it, so quiet in general and tranquil, were fearfully agitated.. A dreary summer and autumn passed by, and were succeeded by as gloomy a winter. I still proceeded with the Bible in Spain. The winter passed, and spring came, with cold dry winds and occasional sunshine, whereupon I arose, shouted, and mounting my horse, even Sidi Habismilk, I scoured all the surrounding district, and thought but little of the Bible in Spain. So I rode about the country, over the heaths, and through the green lanes of my native land, occasionally visiting friends at a distance, and sometimes, for variety’s sake, I stayed at home and amused myself by catching huge pike, which lie perdue in certain deep ponds skirted with lofty reeds, upon my land, and to which there is a communication from the lagoon by a deep and narrow watercourse. I had almost forgotten the Bible in Spain. Then came the summer with much heat and sunshine, and then I would lie for hours in the sun and recall the sunny days I had spent in Andalusia, and my thoughts were continually reverting to Spain, and at last I remembered that the Bible in Spain was still unfinished; whereupon I arose and said: ‘This loitering profiteth nothing,’ and I hastened to my summer-house by the side or the lake, and there I thought and wrote, and thought and wrote, until I had finished the ‘Bible in Spain.’”

Within a few weeks of the publication of the “Bible in Spain,” Borrow’s name was in everyone’s mouth. Attempts were made to “lionise” him; but were met with his distinct disapproval, though it was always a pleasure to him to be looked upon as a celebrity. To escape from the Mrs. Leo Hunters of fashionable society, he almost immediately fled to the Continent, where he went on another pilgrimage. Having journeyed through Turkey, Albania, Hungary, and Wallachia, he again came home to Oulton, and completed “Lavengro,” which had been commenced almost as soon as the manuscript of “The Bible in Spain” had left his hands. This book was finished in the summer-house of his garden by the broad where most of his future work was done, and was issued in 1851.

Defending himself against the critics who attacked him for intermingling truth and fiction in “Lavengro,” he afterwards wrote: “In the preface ‘Lavengro’ is stated to be a dream; and the writer takes this opportunity of stating that he never said it was an autobiography; never authorised any person to say that it was one; and that he has in innumerable instances declared in public and in private, both before and after the work was published, that it was not what is generally termed an autobiography: but a set of people who pretend to write criticisms on books, hating the author for various reasons, amongst others, because, having the proper pride of a gentleman and a scholar, he did not in the year 1843, choose to permit himself to be exhibited and made a zany of in London, and especially because he will neither associate with, nor curry favour with, them who are neither gentlemen nor scholars – attack his book with abuse and calumny.”

Interrogated by Mr. Theodore Watts as to the real nature of an autobiography, Borrow asked the question, “What is an autobiography? Is it a mere record of the incidents of a man’s life? or is it a picture of the man himself – his character, his soul?”

This, Mr. Watts thinks, was a very suggestive query of Borrow’s with regard to himself and his work. “That he sat down to write his own life in ‘Lavengro’ I know. He had no idea then of departing from the strict line of fact. Indeed, his letters to his friend, Mr. John Murray, would alone be sufficient to establish this in spite of his calling ‘Lavengro’ a dream. In the first volume he did almost confine himself to matters of fact. But as he went on he clearly found that the ordinary tapestry into which Destiny had woven the incidents of his life were not tinged with sufficient depth of colour to satisfy his sense of wonder… When he wishes to dive very boldly into the ‘abysmal deeps of personality,’ he speaks and moves partly behind the mask of some fictitious character.. Let it be remembered that it was this instinct of wonder, not the instinct of the mere poseur, that impelled him to make certain exaggerated statements about the characters themselves that are introduced into his books.”

The village of Oulton lies on the border of the marshland about a mile from the most easterly point of England, and within hearing of the beating of the billows of the wild North Sea. Borrow’s home, which was little more than a cottage, stood on the side of a slight rising bank overlooking Oulton Broad, and was sheltered from the winds of the sea and marshland by a belt of storm-rent pines. The house contained a sitting-room on either side of the entrance-hall, a kitchen, four bedrooms, and two attics. It was its smallness and compactness that commended it to Borrow, and it also had the extra recommendation to a man of his disposition of being quiet and secluded. Indeed, so out-of-the-way was its situation that to take a boat upon the broad was looked upon as the best and most direct means of attaining this isolated nook of the Broadland.

At the present time the broad, that stretches away from Lake Lothing to the westward of Borrow’s Ham,² is for several months of the year picturesque with the white sails of yachts and other pleasure boats that have skimmed its placid waters since the Broadland first became a holiday resort. In the early days of Borrow’s residence at Oulton, the only craft that stirred its sunlit ripples were the punts of the eel-catcher and wildfowl-seeker and the slowly gliding wherries voyaging to and from the coast and inland towns. To-day, a little colony of dwellers in red-brick villas have invaded the lonely spot where Borrow lived; but even now you have but to turn aside a few steps from the lake side to reach the edge of far-stretching marshland levels that have changed their face but little during the passage of many centuries. Farther away the marshlanders have seized upon any slight piece of rising ground to establish a firm foundation for their humble homes; here and there a grey church tower or skeleton windmill breaks the line of the level horizon. The meres and marshes have the silence of long dead years resting upon them, save where the breeze stirs the riverside reeds or a curlew cries above the ooze flats.

Queer company the “walking lord of gipsy lore” must have kept as he sat alone in that little book-lined summer-house, hearing strange voices in the sighing of the wind through the fir-trees and the distant sobbing of the sea. Out of the shadow of the past there would come to him, not only the swarthy Romanies, but Francis Ardrey, the friend of his youth; the Armenian merchant, with whom Lavengro discussed Haik; the victim of the evil chance, who talked nonsense about the star Jupiter and told him that “touching” story of his fight against destiny; the Rev. Mr. Platitude, who would neither admit there were any Dissenters nor permit any to exist; Peter Williams, the man who committed the unpardonable sin against the Holy Ghost, and Winifred, his patient, constant wife; the student of Chinese, who learnt the language of the land of the Celestials from the figures on the teapots; the Hungarian, who related so many legends and traditions of the Magyars; and Murtagh, with his wonderful stories of the Pope. These were the friends with whom he spent the real life of his latter days, and it is hardly surprising that under the influence of their companionship he should have become somewhat of a recluse, and lost touch with living friends and acquaintances.

Dr. Gordon Hake, whose residence at Bury St. Edmunds was contemporary with Borrow’s settling down at Oulton, writes in his Memoirs: “George Borrow was one of those whose mental powers are strong, and whose bodily frame is yet stronger – a conjunction of forces often detrimental to a literary career in an age of intellectual predominance. His temper was good and bad; his pride was humility; his humility was pride; his vanity, in being negative, was of the most positive kind. He was reticent and candid, measured in speech, with an emphasis that makes trifles significant. Borrow was essentially hypochondriacal. Society he loved and hated alike; he loved it that he might be pointed out and talked of; he hated it because he was not the prince that he felt himself in its midst. His figure was tall, and his bearing noble; he had a finely moulded head and thick white hair – white from his youth; his brown eyes were soft, yet piercing; his nose somewhat of the Semitic type, which gave his face the cast of the young Memnon; his mouth had a generous curve, and his features, for beauty and true power, were such as can have no parallel in our portrait gallery, where it is to be hoped the likeness of him, in Mr. Murray’s possession, may one day find a place. Borrow and his family used to stay with me at Bury; I visited him, less often, at his cottage on the lake at Oulton, a fine sheet of water that flows into the sea at Lowestoft. He was much courted there by his neighbours and by visitors to the seaside. I there met Baron Alderson and his daughters, who had ridden from Lowestoft to see him.”

Borrow had many good qualities, but it must be admitted that his temper was queer and uncertain. At times he was passionate and overbearing, and he never had the necessary patience to submit to what seemed to him the inanities and boredom of admirers, hero worshippers, and others who were desirous of being brought to his notice. Mr. J. W. Donne, who occupied the position of librarian of the London Library and was afterwards reader of plays, related to Dr. Hake how on one occasion Miss Agnes Strickland urged him to introduce her to her brother author. Borrow, who was in the room at the time, offered some objection, but was at length prevailed upon to accept the introduction. Ignorant of the peculiar twists in Borrow’s nature, the gifted authoress commenced the conversation by an enthusiastic eulogy of his works, and concluded by asking permission to send him a copy of her “Queens of England.” “For God’s sake, don’t, madam,” exclaimed Borrow. “I should not know what to do with them.” He then got up in a rage, and, addressing Mr. Donne, said, “What a d- fool that woman is!”

“He once,” writes Dr. Hake, “went with me to a dinner at Mr. Bevan’s country-house, Rougham Rookery, and placed me in an extremely awkward position. Mr. Bevan was a Suffolk banker, a partner of Mr. Oakes. He was one of the kindest and most benevolent of men. His wife was gentle, unassuming, attentive to her guests. A friend of Borrow, the heir to a very considerable estate, had run himself into difficulties and owed money, which was not forthcoming, to the Bury banking-house; and in order to secure repayment Mr. Bevan was said to have ‘struck the docket.’ I knew this beforehand from Borrow, who, however, accepted the invitation, and was seated at dinner at Mrs. Bevan’s side. This lady, a simple, unpretending woman, desirous of pleasing him, said, ‘Oh, Mr. Borrow, I have read your books with so much pleasure!’ On which he exclaimed, ‘Pray, what books do you mean, madam? Do you mean my account-books?’ On this he fretted and fumed, rose from the table, and walked up and down amongst the servants during the whole of dinner, and afterwards wandered about the rooms and passage, till the carriage could be ordered for our return home.”

On another occasion Hake and Borrow were guests together at Hardwicke House, Suffolk, a fine old Jacobean Hall, then the residence of Sir Thomas Cullum. There were also staying at the Hall at the time Lord Bristol, Sir Fitzroy Kelly, William Makepeace Thackeray, and other distinguished people. Borrow and Thackeray did not get on well together. The latter evidently felt it his duty to live up to his reputation by entertaining the company with lively sallies and witticisms. At last he approached Borrow, and inquired, “Have you read my Snob Papers in Punch?” “In Punch?” asked Borrow. “It is a periodical I never look at.”

Mr. John Murray, in his “Reminiscences,” has also given instances of Borrow’s strange behaviour in other people’s houses; but there is reason to believe that he often keenly reproached himself afterwards for giving way in public to such unseemly displays of temper and spleen. That his heart was in the right place and he was not lacking in powers of restraint, are facts fully demonstrated by the following incident. He was invited to meet Dr. Robert Latham at the house of Dr. Hake, who had many inward tremors at what might be the outcome of bringing them together. Latham was in the habit of indulging somewhat too freely at table, and under such circumstances, as might be expected, was often deficient in tact and courtesy.

“All, like most things that are planned, began well. But with Latham life was a game of show. He had to put forth all his knowledge of subjects in which he deemed Borrow was an adept. He began with horse-racing. Borrow quietly assented. He showed off all he knew of the ring. Borrow freely responded. He had to show what he knew of publishers, instancing the Longmans. Borrow said, ‘I suppose you dine with your publishers sometimes?’ It was Latham’s opportunity; he could not resist it, and replied, ‘Never; I hope I should never do anything so low. You do not dine with Mr. John Murray, I presume?’ ‘Indeed, I do,’ said Borrow, emotionally. ‘He is a most kind friend. When I have had sickness in my house he has been unfailing in his goodness towards me. There is no man I value more.’ Latham’s conversation was fast falling under the influence of wine; with this his better taste departed from him. ‘I have heard,’ he said, ‘that you are a brave man over a bottle of wine. Now, how many bottles can you get through at a sitting?’ Borrow saw what the other was; he was resolved not to take offence at what was only impertinent and self-asserting, so he said, ‘When I was in Madrid I knew a priest who would sit down alone to his two bottles.’ ‘Yes,’ replied Latham, with his knowing look and his head on one side like a bird, ‘but what I want to know is, how many bottles you can manage at one sitting?’ ‘I once knew another priest,’ said Borrow, ‘it was at Oporto; I have seen him get through two bottles by himself.’ By this time Latham was a little unsteady, he slipped from his chair as if it had been an inclined plane and lay on the carpet. He was unable to rise, but he held his head up with a cunning smile, saying, ‘This must be a very disreputable house.’ Borrow saw Latham after this at times on his way to me, and always stopped to say a kind word to him, seeing his forlorn condition.”