THE ROMANY RYE
THERE have been various attempts to solve the riddle of George Borrow. His writings are autobiographical ; and yet it might almost have been easier to write his life if they had been purely imaginative. His very egoism makes it difficult to discover the real man ; for one to whom his own self is everything puts everything else in a false perspective. There are times when we are tempted to regard him as a mere humbug, and others when we cannot but think him a great man. He is a born romancer, and, as he ponders over his doings, sees them glorified in a glamorous mist. He boasts, and fancies his boasts are the simple truth ; and his belief is so confident that he all but convinces others. To take one slight example, he tells us that his Welsh is perfect, and never dreams that Welshmen are smiling at it.
It is precisely this that lends the charm to his works. They are novels, with an air of absolute veracity about them which is singularly attractive. It is not exactly like that which De Foe contrives to give to the Purnal of the Plague or the Memoirs of a Cavalier ; but it produces much the same effect. I well remember my first reading of The Bible in Spain at school. I took it as the most exact of travel-books,
and went through every page in the spirit of a believer in verbal inspiration. This feeling was certainly shared by thousands of others.
There is no reason to think that Borrow was deliberately lying. We have all known romancers whose memories deceive them, who—to use Walter Scott's expression—do not know when they are giving a story a new hat and stick, and who, in telling an impersonal anecdote, somehow represent them- selves as the chief actors concerned. Borrow was one of these, with the additional disturbing factor that he really had had many wonderful adventures, and rightly knew himself to be a very remarkable human being. It was all but impossible for him not to make himself out to be still more remarkable than he was.
To discover the real man behind the author is thus, as I said, no easy task—no easier than it is with Casanova or Benvenuto Cellini ; but I think Mr. Dearden has essayed it with a noteworthy measure of success. He has identified many of the characters in the stories—Petulengro, perhaps the most outstanding ; Mrs. Herne, whose attempt to poison Borrow is one of the most vividly described of all the episodes ; the "Flaming Tinman," with whom Borrow fought a fight as famous as that of Tom Brown with Slogger Williams ; and a dozen others. He has also availed himself of Borrow's letters. Wherever, in fact, genuine records are accessible, Mr. Dearden, with the utmost diligence, has searched them out, and corrected or supplemented Borrow's accounts and dates accord- ingly. The result is a most interesting and probably quite trustworthy book, which is not likely to be superseded.
Like other men of a tempestuous type of character, Borrow had his ups and downs, his periods of extreme exaltation, and of fearful depression, which he calls "the horrors." These have much perplexed his biographers. Mr. Dearden has faced the problem, and, following a hint given by Augustus Jessopp, who knew Borrow well, appears to have settled it. Borrow, he holds, was a Narcissist, and, like Carlyle, was sub- ject to the recurring paroxysms natural to such a state. Hence the fact that, while capable of inspiring love, he was incapable of returning it—a fact more than once striking the reader of his adventures—seems to be fully explained ; at least, no other explanation is even plausible.
In the publishers' prefatory note to this book, Borrow is called "one of the neglected great figures of the nineteenth century." This is a surprising statement ; one would have thought that there has never been a time, during the last eighty years, when his books have failed to find readers. If it is true, so much the worse. Mr. Dearden's book may be the means of putting things right. E. E. KELLETT.
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