a ripple of laughter stirred the Committee on hearing of this plan, the Secretary merely replying: "On hearing your plans a general and simultaneous question was asked. Can the people in these wilds read? . . . Is there no middle sort of course? Can you not establish a depôt in some principal place, and thence make excursions of two or three days at a time, instead of devoting yourself wholly to the wild people?" To this Borrow replied, softening the terrors of his project with a pastoral note: "I did not intend to devote myself entirely to the wild people, but to visit the villages and towns as well as the remote and secluded glens." As a matter of fact, Borrow was again drawing completely on his imagination. The experiences of Richard Ford, who is always an excellent corrective lens for Borrow's distorted point of view, show that the Asturias and Galicia at that time were what the present writer has found them today-peaceful abodes inhabited by a backward, closemouthed, mild, thrifty, overworked race. The skull of the Galician is perhaps a little thick, and the worst that can or could then be said of him is that his thriftiness is so akin to miserliness as to have become proverbial in Spain, that his backwardness has kept him bound too closely to the soil; hence his wildest occupation has been the cultivation of the potato, of corn, of barley and the vine. His brain is somewhat affected by the atmosphere of his smoke-filled hut which quite generally has no chimney, and a wild Galician who can read is as rare as one inclined to spend a copper of what he has earned by the sweat of his brow. To sell him Testaments would therefore be, according to a Spanish saying, as futile an undertaking as looking for five legs on a cat. But the scheme seemed magnificent to Borrow and he accordingly made his preparations for the operatic venture. His first step was to purchase "a black Andalusian stallion of great size and strength" worthy of 'the passion which he had always had for the equine race,' and well-suited to the regions of his prospective campaign, for he was "unbroke, savage, and furious." Yet he, like the

wild people to whom he was bound, was about to see a great light, for "a cargo of Bibles which I hope shortly to put on his back will, I have no doubt, thoroughly tame him, especially when laboring up the flinty hills of the north of Spain." Having procured his Rocinante, our evangelical Don Quixote had to have a squire, and one worthy of the cause. This is the first one: "I have a servant, a person who has been a soldier for fifteen years, who will go with me for the purpose of attending to the horses and otherwise assisting me in my labors. His conduct on the journey is the only thing to which I look forward with uneasiness; for though he has some good points, yet in many respects a more atrocious fellow never existed. He is inordinately given to drink, and of so quarrelsome a disposition that he is almost constantly involved in some broil. Like most of his countrymen, he carries an exceedingly long knife which he frequently unsheathes and brandishes in the face of those who are unfortunate enough to awaken his choler. It is only a few days since that I rescued the maid-servant of the house from his grasp, whom otherwise he would undoubtedly have killed, and all because she too much burnt a red herring which he had given her to cook . . . He is very honest, a virtue which is rarely to be found in a Spanish servant, and I have no fear of his running away with the horses during the journey, after having perhaps knocked me on the head in some lone posada." This servant's tenure of office was very short; presumably, his inordinate love of drink did not have merely the effect of warm water, and another servant had to be found, this time a Greek who spoke French. But before knight and squire could ride forth, the master was taken ill and had to resort to the "desperate experiment of calling in a native barber." We now have the picture of the Society's agent relieved of sixteen ounces of Protestant blood by a horrible Papist who was naturally skilled in blood-letting. Nevertheless, the start could at last be made, Borrow setting out with only his servant and their animals, traversing for four

days regions reported to swarm with banditti, cut-throats, wild beasts and other natives who, as usual, neglected to put in an appearance. In the large cities through which Borrow passed he prepared an advertisement of the work which was the sole guide to salvation, explaining incidentally the pecuniary sacrifices made by the Society in its efforts to dispel darkness. A small candle was lighted, for Borrow had the pleasure "of seeing three New Testaments despatched in less than a quarter of an hour that he remained in the shop." To follow him in his entire journey before his return to Madrid would lead us too far afield; much of it may be found in The Bible in Spain, wherefore the gist of his letters must be summed up briefly.

He now passed in his Odyssey through regions "where literature of every description was at its lowest ebb," and after leaving inhospitable Valladolid on the right he continued through desolate plains covered with scantily-sown but smiling barley, the sustenance of an "ignorant and brutal" people, through fever-stricken Leon, filled with "blinded followers of the old Papal Church," and thence to rock-bound Astorga where he took up his abode with the pigs and vermin. But he returned God thanks and glory, and would not have exchanged that situation for a throne. At Corunna he made a depôt of five hundred Testaments, and then proceeded to hope for the dawning of better and more enlightened times.

Because of his histrionic temperament, his highly coloristic style, his attitude toward Nature, Borrow may be considered an important figure of English Romanticism. This is particularly evident in this portion of his letters. In many of his traits he is wholly Byronic; he too could have repeated, "I have not loved the world, nor the world me." In his correspondence as in The Bible in Spain he stands isolated, and his brilliant personality dwarfs everything else. His sympathies are far greater for Nature than for his fellowmen. His feeling for the peculiar charms of the landscape dictated some of the finest pages which he ever

penned and which are worthy to live with the best of the early Victorian age. The following passage, describing a picturesque landscape in northwestern Spain, may serve as an example. "Perhaps the whole world might be searched in vain for a spot whose natural charms could rival those of this plain or valley of Bembibre, with its walls of mighty mountains, its spreading chestnut-trees, and its groves of oaks and willows which clothe the banks of its stream, a tributary to the Minho. True it is that when I passed through it the candle of Heaven was shining in full splendor, and everything lighted by its rays looked gay, glad and blessed. Whether it would have filled me with the same feelings of admiration if viewed beneath another sky I will not pretend to determine, but it certainly possesses advantages which at no time could fail to delight; for it exhibited all the peaceful beauties of an English landscape blended with something wild and grand, and I thought within myself that he must be a restless, dissatisfied man who, born amongst these scenes, could wish to quit them. At the time I would have desired no better fate than that of a shepherd on the prairies or a hunter on the hills of Bembibre." Contrast now the following sudden change: "The aspect of Heaven had blackened; clouds were rolling rapidly from the west over the mountains, and a cold wind was moaning dismally. "There is a storm travelling through the air,' said a peasant whom we overtook mounted on a wretched mule . . . He had scarce spoken when a light so vivid and dazzling that it seemed the whole lustre of the fiery element was concentrated therein broke around us, filling the whole atmosphere, and covering rock, tree and mountain with a glare indescribable. . . The lightening was followed by a peal almost as terrible, but distant, for it sounded hollow and deep; the hills, however, caught up its voice, seemingly pitching it along their summits, till it was lost in interminable space . . . 'A hundred families are weeping where that bolt fell,' said the peasant. 'were the friars still in their nest above there, I should say

that this was their doing, for they are the cause of all the miseries of the land.'

Borrow returned through the far north of Spain and finally reached Oviedo safely after an exceedingly arduous journey, chiefly on foot. He sat down to begin an account to the Society, and had hardly begun a stirring report on the feverish anxiety of the people about him, when he experienced a typical "strange adventure." "But I am interrupted and I lay down my pen." Having properly mystified the reader he continues: "I am in a very large, scantily-furnished and remote room of an ancient posada, formerly a palace of the Counts of Santa Cruz. It is past ten at night and the rain is descending in torrents. I ceased writing on hearing numerous footsteps ascending the creaking stairs which lead to my apartment-the door was flung open, and in walked nine men of tall stature, marshalled by a little hunch-backed personage. They were all muffled in the long cloaks of Spain, but I instantly knew by their demeanor that they were caballeros, or gentlemen. They placed themselves in a rank before the table where I was sitting; suddenly and simultaneously they all flung back their cloaks, and I perceived that everyone bore a book in his hand, a book which I knew full well. After a pause, which I was unable to break, for I sat lost in astonishment and almost conceived myself to be visited by apparitions, the hunch-back advancing somewhat before the rest said in soft, silvery tones: 'Señor Cavalier, was it you who brought this book to the Asturias?' I now supposed that they were the civil authorities of the place come to take me into custody, and rising from my seat I exclaimed: 'It certainly was I, and it is my glory to have done so. The book is the New Testament of God; I wish it was in my power to bring a million.' 'I heartily wish so too,' said the little person with a sigh... After about half-an-hour's conversation, he suddenly said in the English language, 'Good-night, sir,' wrapped his cloak around him, and walked out as he had come. His companions, who had hitherto not uttered a