the most ridiculous situations in a striking way, but you do not feel sure that he is laughing over them. Men like Borrow seldom find a congenial companion, and he therefore had no one either to laugh with him, or to prevent him from making himself ridiculous. The most unusual events strike him as extraordinary rather than amusing. He had come to Spain with a single object, and it aroused his resentment to find himself hampered by an ignorant people in carrying out his ostentatiously philanthropic plans. Borrow was thus the last man in England to understand the Peninsular character on which the sun, Oriental traditions and the Roman Catholic Church-among other unEnglish influences-had placed a unique stamp.

The recent issue of Borrow's letters to the Bible Society, which had been thought lost, suggests an entirely new point of view of the man and allows us to add a few traits to the portrait of this brilliant vagrant, whose book, The Bible in Spain, has for decades so delightfully entertained and fooled an infinite number of readers. Only a relatively small portion of that book is taken directly from these communications sent to the Society; and they assuredly have more value than his book because they gave his impressions before he had time to doctor them. Wherever the original has been furbished up, the revised version is apt to be topheavy with the ego of the author, consequently his additions present far more of Borrow than they do of Spain. But let us accompany him through his wanderings and note his own first comments. Where it is possible we shall let him speak for himself.

Borrow's orders on leaving England appear to have been very simple: Whosoever will take away the New Testament let him have the Old also, and add thereto a few tracts. His entrance into the Peninsula was bound to be melodramatic. He wrote to the Secretary of the Society that before beginning his campaign in Portugal where he landed, he made inquiries as to "which was the province of that country the population of which was considered the

most ignorant and benighted." Having learned that it was the Alemtejo he at once determined on going thither with a small cargo of Testaments and Bibles. "My reasons I need not state, as they must be manifest to every Christian; but I cannot help thinking that it was the Lord who inspired me with the idea of going thither, as by so doing I have introduced the Scriptures into the worst part of the Peninsula, and have acquired lights and formed connections (some of the latter most singular ones, I admit) which if turned to proper account will wonderfully assist us in our object of making the heathen of Portugal and Spain acquainted with God's Holy Word." He now hired a wild-looking lad to ferry him across the Tagus, but unfortunately the lad did not speak any of Borrow's thirty tongues, for "he gabbled in a most incoherent manner" with a "harsh and rapid articulation" like the "scream of a hyena blended with the bark of a terrier." This circumstance coupled with the fact that a storm arose and that the lad did not know much about sailing made it apparent that it was only "the will of the Almighty that permitted them to gain shelter on the other side." The guide with whom Borrow now proceeds on his way at once regaled him with the "truly horrible" tales of the atrocities which robbers "were in the habit of practicing" in those very spots; and while the mules stopped to drink at a shallow pool, Borrow reflects that the gang "were in the habit of watering their horses at the pool and perhaps of washing their hands stained with the blood of their victims." But his courage went further; he climbed up to the place where once stood the home of the banditti, now in ruins, and found there vestiges of a fire and a broken bottle. "The sons of plunder had been there very lately," so he took the opportunity to leave a "New Testament and some tracts among the ruins, and hastened away." We may take for granted the speedy repentance of these blood-thirsty villains. Continuing his course he meets some wild-looking men who, if they were not banditti, could easily have been mistaken for such.

Nevertheless, he reached Evora safely, the center of the darkness he had come to dispel, and at once determined to lay the axe to the root of all superstition and tyranny by finding some respectable merchant who would take charge of the necessary sale of his cargo. He also made it a point to speak to as many "bigoted Romanists" as possible on matters connected with their eternal welfare, "telling them repeatedly that the Pope whom they revered was a deceiver and the prime minister of Satan here on earth." No doubt the words which he uttered sank deep into the hearts of his hearers, for we are told they departed "musing and pensive." Borrow may have been a trifle optimistic. There are many things which can make us depart musing and pensive. His guide, for example, when asked whether his master could understand the language of the people replied in the affirmative, but added that he probably spoke some other language better. Again, when we hear our most revered institutions decried we may depart musing and pensive in search of a half-brick. Having learned too of some of the superstitions of the peasantry, notably their peculiar beliefs in witchcraft, some of which are as old as the race, he characterizes them as "relics of the monkish system," the aim of which had been merely "to besot the minds of the people." It was therefore evident that more tracts were needed here. So he rode about the neighborhood, "dropping a great many in the favorite walks of the people," thinking that if they found them on the ground, "curiosity might induce them to pick them up and examine them." Thus we find the most benighted people in Portugal, who had presumably never seen a printed word in their lives, alert and curious enough to devour the tracts of the British Bible Society, conveniently dropped in their favorite walks. Of the sale of the Testaments we hear nothing further, for the letter concluding his sojourn in Portugal was evidently never received, and we next find Borrow in Madrid.

Spanish critics have asserted that the British Bible Society took advantage of the turbulent conditions in Spain and

Portugal at this time to sell Testaments because its agents could escape the vigilance of the authorities occupied as they were in quelling the rebellion against the central government at Madrid. There seems to be some justice in this accusation. Nevertheless, whatever side of the argument we choose to take, a period of civil war was not the time to introduce the Gospel to the people of Spain. Such wars have always assumed with them a unique aspect; politics and religion are inseparably linked in the questions at issue. A man with a gun is apt to consider himself a military unit, and while he is waiting behind a harmless-looking hedge-row with a blunderbuss in order to impress his opinions on the passerby, it might seen inadvisable to attempt to sell him a New Testament. In the face of these conditions, Borrow wrote to the Secretary of the Society: "A little patience and a little prudence is all that is required to win the game. His first object was necessarily to obtain permission to print a Spanish translation of the New Testament, but without any notes or comments. Versions in this bare form had been prohibited in Spain ever since the beginning of the sixteenth century, and only unusual conditions or extraordinary pressure could squeeze the coveted licence out of the authorities. Borrow first visited the Prime Minister, at that time Mendizábal; but the atmosphere around that gentleman reminded him of the temperature at the North Pole, and he found himself obliged to withdraw with the vague promise that when matters in the Peninsula had settled down a little the Bible Society "would be allowed to commence operations.' His request had other obstacles to contend with. Cabinets were shortlived in those days, lasting a few weeks, or at the most, a few months; to lay a plea before the Prime Minister was therefore like negotiating a loan with a man through the car-window when his train is already moving out of the station. Nor would the promises made by one minister necessarily seem binding to his successor.

In the meantime an article had appeared in a Spanish paper, explaining to the whole nation "the philosophic and civilizing mission" of the agent of the Bible Society, which, not content with making Great Britain the sole beneficiary of this salutary institution was willing "to extend it to all countries." Such generosity must have appealed to all Spaniards if any ever read the article. But Borrow had more matter to communicate which would afford the reverend committee at headquarters "subject for some congratulation." He had been in Madrid less than three months, but had discovered that the authority of the Pope in Spain was "in so very feeble and precarious a situation" that "little more than a breath is required to destroy it." Borrow was evidently about to supply the necessary breath, for he adds "that he was doing whatever he could in Madrid to prepare the way for an event so desirable." Moreover, if the Man of Rome continued in his subversive course he would lose Spain and then "Ireland will alone remain to him-much good may it do him!" If Borrow showed himself now and then a trifle gullible, his Society must have been equally naïve, for there is in all the replies of its Secretary but little evidence that the members ever laughed in committee over his epistles. But as he took himself seriously at all times it is little wonder that the philanthropic gentlemen at the London end of things should merely express themselves as deeply interested in his proceedings. The Reverend Secretary Brandram, however, admonishes Borrow "with a rap on the knuckles" that it is wiser for an agent of the Society not "in vulgus spargere voces: verbum sat. . . . Information of what is passing we are glad to receive, but do not mix yourself up in such matters. In his next letter Borrow therefore contented himself with referring to the Pope merely as "a certain personage," but reiterated his opinion that "the last skirts of the cloud of papal superstition are vanishing below the horizon of Spain."

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