Lavengro

Lavengro

George Borrow

Birth--My father--Tamerlane--Ben Brain--French Protestants--East

Anglia--Sorrow and troubles--True peace--A beautiful child--Foreign

grave--Mirrors--Alpine country--Emblems--Slow of speech--The Jew--Strange

gestures.

On an evening of July, in the year 18--, at East D---, a beautiful little

town in a certain district of East Anglia, I first saw the light.

My father was a Cornish man, the youngest, as I have heard him say, of

seven brothers. He sprang from a family of gentlemen, or, as some people

would call them, gentillatres, for they were not very wealthy; they had a

coat of arms, however, and lived on their own property at a place called

Tredinnock, which being interpreted means the house on the hill, which

house and the neighbouring acres had been from time immemorial in their

possession. I mention these particulars that the reader may see at once

that I am not altogether of low and plebeian origin; the present age is

highly aristocratic, and I am convinced that the public will read my

pages with more zest from being told that I am a gentillatre by birth

with Cornish blood {5} in my veins, of a family who lived on their own

property at a place bearing a Celtic name, signifying the house on the

hill, or more strictly the house on the hillock.

My father was what is generally termed a posthumous child--in other

words, the gentillatre who begot him never had the satisfaction of

invoking the blessing of the Father of All upon his head; having departed

this life some months before the birth of his youngest son. The boy,

therefore, never knew a father's care; he was, however, well tended by

his mother, whose favourite he was; so much so, indeed, that his

brethren, the youngest of whom was considerably older than himself, were

rather jealous of him. I never heard, however, that they treated him

with any marked unkindness, and it will be as well to observe here that I

am by no means well acquainted with his early history, of which, indeed,

as I am not writing his life, it is not necessary to say much. Shortly

after his mother's death, which occurred when he was eighteen, he adopted

the profession of arms, which he followed during the remainder of his

life, and in which, had circumstances permitted, he would probably have

shone amongst the best. By nature he was cool and collected, slow to

anger, though perfectly fearless, patient of control, of great strength;

and, to crown all, a proper man with his hands.

With far inferior qualifications many a man has become a field-marshal or

general; similar ones made Tamerlane, who was not a gentillatre, but the

son of a blacksmith, emperor of one-third of the world; but the race is

not always for the swift, nor the battle for the strong, indeed I ought

rather to say very seldom; certain it is, that my father, with all his

high military qualifications, never became emperor, field-marshal, or

even general: indeed, he had never an opportunity of distinguishing

himself save in one battle, and that took place neither in Flanders,

Egypt, nor on the banks of the Indus or Oxus, but in Hyde Park.

Smile not, gentle reader, many a battle has been fought in Hyde Park, in

which as much skill, science, and bravery have been displayed as ever

achieved a victory in Flanders or by the Indus. In such a combat as that

to which I allude, I opine that even Wellington or Napoleon would have

been heartily glad to cry for quarter ere the lapse of five minutes, and

even the Blacksmith Tartar would, perhaps, have shrunk from the opponent

with whom, after having had a dispute with him, my father engaged in

single combat for one hour, at the end of which time the champions shook

hands and retired, each having experienced quite enough of the other's

Barracks and lodgings--A camp--The viper--A delicate child--Blackberry

time--Meun and tuum--Hythe--The Golgotha--Daneman's skull--Superhuman

stature--Stirring times--The sea-bord.

I have been a wanderer the greater part of my life; indeed I remember

only two periods, and these by no means lengthy, when I was, strictly

speaking, stationary. I was a soldier's son, and as the means of my

father were by no means sufficient to support two establishments, his

family invariably attended him wherever he went, so that from my infancy

I was accustomed to travelling and wandering, and looked upon a monthly

change of scene and residence as a matter of course. Sometimes we lived

in barracks, sometimes in lodgings, but generally in the former, always

eschewing the latter from motives of economy, save when the barracks were

inconvenient and uncomfortable; and they must have been highly so indeed,

to have discouraged us from entering them; for though we were gentry

(pray bear that in mind, gentle reader), gentry by birth, and

incontestably so by my father's bearing the commission of good old George

the Third, we were not fine gentry, but people who could put up with as

much as any genteel Scotch family who find it convenient to live on a

third floor in London, or on a sixth at Edinburgh or Glasgow. It was not

a little that could discourage us: we once lived within the canvas walls

of a camp, at a place called Pett, in Sussex; and I believe it was at

this place that occurred the first circumstance, or adventure, call it

which you will, that I can remember in connection with myself: it was a

strange one, and I will relate it.

It happened that my brother and myself were playing one evening in a

sandy lane, in the neighbourhood of this Pett camp; our mother was at a

slight distance. All of a sudden, a bright yellow, and, to my infantine

eye, beautiful and glorious, object made its appearance at the top of the

bank from between the thick quickset, and, gliding down, began to move

across the lane to the other side, like a line of golden light. Uttering

a cry of pleasure, I sprang forward, and seized it nearly by the middle.

A strange sensation of numbing coldness seemed to pervade my whole arm,

which surprised me the more, as the object to the eye appeared so warm

and sunlike. I did not drop it, however, but, holding it up, looked at

it intently, as its head dangled about a foot from my hand. It made no

resistance; I felt not even the slightest struggle; but now my brother

began to scream and shriek like one possessed. 'O mother, mother!' said

he, 'the viper!--my brother has a viper in his hand!' He then, like one

frantic, made an effort to snatch the creature away from me. The viper

now hissed amain, and raised its head, in which were eyes like hot coals,

menacing, not myself, but my brother. I dropped my captive, for I saw my

mother running towards me; and the reptile, after standing for a moment

nearly erect, and still hissing furiously, made off, and disappeared. The

whole scene is now before me, as vividly as if it occurred yesterday--the

gorgeous viper, my poor dear frantic brother, my agitated parent, and a

frightened hen clucking under the bushes--and yet I was not three years

old.

It is my firm belief that certain individuals possess an inherent power,

or fascination, over certain creatures, otherwise I should be unable to

account for many feats which I have witnessed, and, indeed, borne a share

in, connected with the taming of brutes and reptiles. I have known a

savage and vicious mare, whose stall it was dangerous to approach, even

when bearing provender, welcome, nevertheless, with every appearance of

pleasure, an uncouth, wiry-headed man, with a frightfully seamed face,