George Borrow and his circle, wherein may be found many hitherto unpublished letters of Borrow and his friends

Preface

I HAVE to express my indebtedness first of all to the executors of Henrietta MacOubrey, George Borrow 's stepdaughter, who kindly placed Borrow's letters and manuscripts at my disposal. To the survivor of these executors, a lady who resides in an English provincial town, I would particularly wish to render fullest acknowledgment did she not desire to escape all publicity and forbid me to give her name in print. I am indebted to Sir William Robertson Nicoll without whose kindly and active intervention I should never have taken active steps to obtain the material to which this biography owes its principal value. I am under great obligations to Mr. Herbert Jenkins, the publisher, in that, although the author of a successful biography of Borrow, he has, with rare kindliness, brought me into communication with Mr. Wilfrid J. Bowring, the grandson of Sir John Bowring. To Mr. Wilfrid Bowring I am indebted in that he has handed to me the whole of Borrow's letters to his grandfather. I have to thank Mr. James Hooper of Norwich for the untiring zeal with which he has unearthed for me a valuable series of notes including vi PREFACE

certain interesting letters concerning Borrow. Mr. Hooper has generously placed his collection, with which he at one time contemplated writing a biography of Borrow, in my hands. I thank Dr. Aldis Wright for reading my chapter on Edward Fitz- Gerald ; also Mr. W. H. Peet, Mr. Aleck Abrahams, and INIr. Joseph Shay lor for assistance in the little known field of Sir Richard Phillips's life. I have further to thank my friends, Edward Clodd and Thomas J. Wise, for reading my proof-sheets. To Theodore \Vatts-Dunton, an untiring friend of thirty years, I have also to acknowledge abundant obligations,

C. K. S.

Contents

I'AGE

Introduction, ......... xv

Chapter I Captain Borrow Of The West Norfolk Militia, . . 1

CHAPTER n

CHAPTER HI

CHAPTER IV

A WANDERING ("HILDHOOD, ....... 36

CHAPTER V

GEORGE sorrow's NORWICH— THE GURNEYS, ... 54

CHAPTER VI

GEORGE BORROw's NORWICH THE TAYLORS, ... 63

CHAPTER VII

GEORGE sorrow's NORWICH THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL, . . 70 viii GEORGE BORROW AND HIS CIRCLE

CHAPTER VIII

GEORGE BORROw's NORWICH THE LAWYER's OFFICE, . . 79

CHAPTER XIV

SIR JOHN BOWRING, .

PAGB

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

'FAUSTUs' and ' ROMANTIC ballads,' 101

CHAPTER XI

'celebrated trials' and JOHN THURTELL, . . .112

CHAPTER XII

BORROW AND THE FANCV. . . . . . ^ .126

CHAPTER XIII

EIGHT YEARS OF VAGABONDAGE, ...... 133

CHAPTER XV

CHAPTER XVI

ST. PETEKSBURG AND JOHN P. HASFELD, . . , .162

CHAPTER XVII

THE MANCHU BIBLE ' TARGUM ' ' THE TALISMAN,' . . 169

CONTENTS ix

CHAPTER XVIII

I'AGK

CHAPTER XIX

sorrow's SPANISH CIRCLE, ....... 201

CHAPTER XX

CHAPTER XXI

CHAPTER XXII

' THE BIIiLE IN SPAIN,' ....... 237

CHAPTER XXIII

CHAPTER XXIV

CHAPTER XXV

CHAPTER XXVI

CHAPTER XXVII

X GEORGE BORROW AND HIS CIRCLE

CHAPTER XXVIII

PAGE

CHAPTER XXIX

CHAPTER XXX

CHAPTER XXXI

CHAPTER XXXII

CHAPTER XXXIII

CHAPTER XXXIV

CHAPTER XXXV

HORROw's UM'UBLISHED WRITINGS, ..... 401

CHAPTER XXXVI

CHAPTER XXXVII

THE AFTERMATH, ........ 434

INDEX, 438

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

FULL-PAGE PLATES

George Borrow, ..... Frontispiece '

A photogravure portrait from the paintinrj by Henry Wyndham Phillips.

PAGE

The Borrow House, Norwich, . . . . .16

Robert Hawkes, Mayor of Norwich in 1824, . . 24

From the painting by Benjamin Haydon in St. Andi-cvfs Hall, Norwich.

From a portrait by his brother, John Thomas Borrov\ in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

The Erpingham Gate and the Grammar School, Norwich, . 72

William Simpson, . . . . . .80

From a portrait by Thomas Phillips, R.A., in the Black Friars Hall, Noruich.

Friends of Borhow's Early Years —

Sir John Bowring in 1826, . . -96

John P. Hasfeld in 1835, . . . .96

William Taylor, . . . . .96 xii GEORGE BORROW AND HIS CIRCLE

PAGE

The Family of Jasper Petulengro .... 128 Where Borrow Lived in Madrid, .... 192

The Calle del Principe, Madrid, . . . .192

A HITHERTO Unpublished Portrait of George Borrow, . 304

Taken in the garden of Mrt. Simms Reeve of Norwich in 1848.

Oulton Cottage from the Broad, .... 352 The Summer-House, Oulton, as it is to-dav, . . 352

ILLUSTRATIONS IN TEXT George Borrow's Birthplace at Dumpling Green, . . 35

From a drawing hii Fortunino Matania.

Title-Pages of 'Targum' and 'The Talisman,' . . 178

Portion of a Letter from George Borrow to the Rev.

Samuel Brandram, . . . . . .187

Written from Madrid, I3th May 1838.

Facsimile of an Account of George Borrow's Expenses in

Spain made out by the Bible Society, . . . 19O

A Letter from Sir George Villiers, afterwards P^arl of Clarendon, British Minister to Spain, to George Borrow, . . . . . . .211

Mrs. Borrow's Copy of her Marriage Certificate, . . 222

An Application for a Book in the British Museum, with

Borrow's Signature, ..... 230

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xiii

PAGE

Title-Page of Basque Translation by Oteiza of the Gospel

Title-Page of First Edition of Romany Translation of the

Gospel of St. Luke, ..... 247

Two Pages from Borrow's Corrected Proof Sheets of

Romany Translation of the Gospel of St. Luke, . 247

Inscriptions in Borrow's Handwriting on his Wife's Copies

OF 'The Bible in Spain' and 'Lavengro/ . . 275

The Original Title-Page of ' Lavengro,' . . . 280

From the Manuscript in the possession of the Author of ' George Borroio and his Circle.'

Facsimile of the First Page of 'Lavengro/ . . . 282

From the Manuscript in the possession of the Author of ' George Borrow and his Circle.'

Runic Stone from the Isle of Man, .... 302

Facsimile of a Communication from Charles Darwin to

Facsimile of a Page of the Manuscript of 'The Romany

From the Borrow Papers in the possession of the Author of ' George Borrow and his Circle.'

' Wild Wales ' in its Beginnings, .... 365

Tu>o pages from one of George Borrow's Pocket-books with pencilled notes made on his journey through Wales.

Facsimile of the Title-Page of ' Wild Wales,' . . 368

From the original Manuscript in the possession of the Author of ' Georr/e Borrow and his Cirrlr,'

xiv GEORGE BORROW AND HIS CIRCLE

PAGE

Facsimile of the First Page of ' Wild Wales,' . . 370

From the original Manuscript in the possession of the Author of ' George Borrow and his Circle.'

Facsimile of a Poem from 'Targum,' .... 403

A Translation from the French by George Bo7-roiv.

Borrow as a Professor of Languages — an Advertisement, . 409

A Page of the Manuscript of Bohrow's ' Songs of Scandinavia' — an unpublished work, . . . .411

A Letter from Borrow to his Wife written from Rome in

his Continental Journey of 1844, . . .418

Introduction

It is now exactly seventeen years ago since I published a volume not dissimilar in form to this under the title of Cha?^lotte Bronte and her Circle. The title had then an element of novelty, Dante Gabriel Rossetti's Dante and /lis Circle, at the time the only book of this particular character, having quite another aim. There are now some twenty or more biographies based upon a similar plan.^ The method has its convenience where there are earlier lives of a given writer, as one can in this way differentiate the book from previous efforts by making one's hero stand out among his friends. Some such apology, I feel, is necessary, because, in these days of the multiplication of books, every book, at least other than a work of imagination, requires ample apology. In Charlotte Bronte and her Circle I was able to claim that, even though following in the footsteps of Mrs. Gaskell, I had added some four hundred new letters by Charlotte Bronte to the world's knowledge of that interesting woman, and still more considerably enlarged our knowledge of her sister Emily. This achievement has been generously acknowledged, and I am most proud of the testimony of the most accomplished of living biographers, Sir George Otto Trevelyan, who once rendered me the following quite spontaneous tribute :

^ As for example, Garrick and his Circle ; Johnson and hift Circle ; Reynolds and his Circle ; and even The Empress Eugenie and her Circle.

xvi GEORGE BORROW AND HIS CIRCLE

We have lately read aloud for the second time your Bronte book ; let alone private readings. It is unique in plan and excellence, and I am greatly obliged to you for it. Apart from the pleasure of the book, the form of it has always interested me as a professional biographer. It certainly is novel ; and in this case I am pretty sure that it is right.

With such a testimony before me I cannot hesitate to present my second biography in similar form. In the case of George Borrow, however, I am not in a position to supplement one transcendent biography, as in the case of Charlotte Bronte and Mrs. Gaskell. I have before me no less than four biographies of Borrow, every one of them of distinctive merit. These are :

Life, Writings, and Correspondence of George Borroio. Derived from Official and other Authentic Sources. By William I. Knapp, Ph.D., LL.D. 2 vols. John Murray, 1899.

George Borrow : The Man and his Work. By R. A. J. Walling. Cassell, 1908.

The Life of George Borrow. Compiled from Unpublished Official Documents. His Works, Corres})ondence. etc. By Herbert Jenkins. John Murray, 1912.

George Borroxv : The Man and his Books. By Edward Thomas. Chapman and Hall, 1912.

All of these books have contributed something of value and importance to the subject. Dr. Knapp'swork it is easiest to praise because he is dead.^ His biography of Borrow was the effort of a lifetime. A scholar with great linguistic qualifications for writing the biography of an author whose knowledge of languages was one of

^ William Ireland Knapp died in Paris in June 1908, aged seventy-four. He was an American, and had held for many years the Chair of Modern Languages at Vassar College. After eleven years in Spain he returned to occupy the Chair of Modern Languages at Yale, and later held a Professorship at Chicago. After his Life of Borrow was published he resided in Paris until his death.

INTRODUCTION xvii

his titles to fame, Dr. Knapp spared neither time nor money to achieve his purpose. Starting with an article in The Chautauquan 3Iagazine in 1887, which was reprinted in pamphlet form. Dr. Knapp came to England — to Norwich — and there settled down to write a Life of Borrow, which promised at one time to develop into several volumes. As well it might, for Dr. Knapp reached Norfolk at a happy moment for his purpose. Mrs. MacOubrey, Borrow's stepdaughter, was in the humour to sell her father's manuscripts and books. They w^ere offered to the city of Norwich ; there was some talk of Mr. Jeremiah Coleman, M.P., whose influence and wealth were overpowering in Norwich at the time, buying them. Finally, a very considerable portion of the collection came into the hands of Mr. Webber, a bookseller of Ipswich, who later became associated with the firm of Jarrold of Norwich. From Webber Dr. Knapp purchased the larger portion, and, as his bibliography indicates {Life, vol. ii. pp. 355-88), he became possessed of sundry note-books which furnish a record of certain of Borrow's holiday tours, about a hundred letters from and to Borrow, and a considerable number of other documents. The result, as I have indicated, was a book that abounded in new facts and is rich in new material. It was not, however, a book for popular reading. You must love the subject before you turn to this book with any zest. It is a book for your true Borrovian, who is thankful for any information about the word-master, not for the casual reader, who might indeed be alienated from the subject by this copious memoir. The result was somewhat discouraging. There were not enough of true Borrovians in those years, and the book was not received too generously. The two volumes have gone out of

b xviii GEORGE BORROW AND HIS CIRCLE

print and have not reached a second edition. Time however, will do them justice. As it is, your good Borrow lover has always appreciated their merits. Take Lionel Johnson for example, a good critic and a master of style. After saying that these ' lengthy and rich volumes are a monument of love's labour, but not of literary art or biographical skill,' he adds : * Of his over eight hundred pages there is not one for which I am not grateful ' and every new biographer of Borrow is bound to re-echo that sentiment. Dr. Knapp did the spade work and other biographers have but entered into his inheritance. Dr. Knapp's fine collection of Borrow books and manuscripts was handed over by his widow to the American nation — to the Hispanic Society of New York. Dr. Knapp's biography was followed nine years later by a small volume by JNIr. R. A. J. Walling, whose little book adds considerably to our knowledge of Borrow's Cornish relatives, and is in every way a valuable monograph on the author of Lavengro. Mr. Herbert Jenkins's book is more ambitious. Within four hundred closely printed pages he has compressed every incident in Borrow's career, and we would not quarrel with him nor his publisher for calling his life a ' definitive biography ' if one did not know that there is not and cannot be anything ' definitive ' about a biography except in the case of a Master. Boswell, Lockhart, Mrs. Gaskell are authors who had the advantage of knowing personally the subjects of their biographies. Any biographer who has not met his hero face to face and is dependent solely on documents is crippled in his undertaking. Moreover, such a biographer is always liable to be in a manner superseded or at least supplemented by the appearance of still more documents. However, Mr. Jenkins's excellent biography has the

INTRODUCTION xix

advantage of many new documents from Mr. John Murray's archives and from the Record Office Manuscripts. His work was the first to make use of the letters of George Borrow to the Bible Society, which the Rev. T. H. Darlow has published as a book under that title, a book to which I owe him an acknowledgment for such use of it as I have made, as also for permission to reproduce the title-page of Borrow's Basque version of St. Luke's gospel. There only remains for me to say a word in praise of Mr. Edward Thomas's fine critical study of Borrow which was published under the title of George Bori^ow : The Man and his Books. Mr. Thomas makes no claim to the possession of new documents. This brings me to such excuse as I can make for perpetrating a fifth biography. When Mrs. MacOubrey, Borrow's stepdaughter, the ' Hen.' of Wild JVales and the affisctionate companion of his later years, sold her father's books and manuscripts — and she always to her dying day declared that she had no intention of parting with the manuscripts, which were, she said, taken away under a misapprehension — she did not, of course, part with any of his more private documents. All the more intimate letters of Borrow were retained. At her death these passed to her executors, from whom I have purchased all legal rights in the publication of Borrow's hitherto unpublished manuscripts and letters. I trust that even to those who may disapprove of the discursive method with which — solely for my own pleasure — I have written this book, will at least find a certain biographical value in the many new letters by and to George Borrow that are to be found in its pages. The book has taken me ten years to write, and has been a labour of love.

CHAPTER 1

CAPTAIN BORROW OF THE WEST NORFOLK MILITIA

George Henry Borrow was born at Dumpling Green near East Dereham, Norfolk, on the 5th of July 1803. It pleased him to state on many an occasion that he was born at East Dereham.

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,

he writes in the opening lines o^ Lavengro, using almost the identical phraseology that we find in the opening lines of Goethe's WaJiJ^heit und Dichtung. Here is a later memory of Dereham from luavengro ;

What it is at present I know not, for thirty years and more have elapsed since I last trod its streets. It will scarcely have improved, for how could it be better than it was ? I love to

think on thee, pretty, quiet D , thou pattern of an English

country town, with thy clean but narrow streets branching out from thy modest market-place, with their old-fashioned houses, with here and there a roof of venerable thatch, with thy one half-aristocratic mansion, where resided the Lady Bountiful — she, the generous and kind, who loved to visit the sick, leaning on her golden-headed cane, while the sleek old footman walked at a respectful distance behind. Pretty, quiet D , with thy venerable church, in which moulder the mortal remains of England's sweetest and most pious bard.

Then follows an exquisite eulogy of the poet Cowper, which readers of Lavengro know full well. Three years before Borrow was born William Cowper died in this very town, leaving behind him so rich a legacy of poetry and of prose, and moreover so fragrant a memory of a life in which humour and pathos played an equal part. It was no small thing for a youth who aspired to any kind of renown to be born in the neighbourhood of the last resting-place of the author of The Task.

Yet Borrow was not actually born in East Dereham, but a mile and a half away, at the little hamlet of Dumpling Green, in what was then a glorious wilderness of common and furze bush, but is now a quiet landscape of fields and hedges. You will find the home in which the author of Lavengro first saw the light without much difficulty. It is a fair-sized farmhouse, with a long low frontage separated from the road by a considerable strip of garden. It suggests a prosperous yeoman class, and I have known farm-houses in East Anglia not one whit larger dignified by the name of ' hall.' Nearly opposite is a pond. The trim hedges are a delight to us to-day, but you must cast your mind back to a century ago when they were entirely absent. The house belonged to George Borrow's maternal grandfather, Samuel Perfrement, who farmed the adjacent land at this time. Samuel and Mary Perfrement had eight children, the third of whom, Ann, was born in 1772.

In February 1793 Ann Perfrement, aged twenty-one, married Thomas Borrow, aged thirty-five, in the Parish Church of East Dereham, and of the two children that were born to them George Henry Borrow was the younger. Thomas Borrow was the son of one John Borrow of St. Cleer in Cornwall, who

CAPTAIN BORROAV 3

died before this child was born, and is described by his grandson ^ as the scion ' of an ancient but reduced

^ In the jesiY 1870 Borrow was asked for material for a biography by the editor of Men of the Time, a publication which many years later was incoi*- porated in the present Who's Who. He drew up two drafts in his own handwriting, which are so interesting, and yet vary so much in certain particulars, that we are tempted to print both here, or at least that part of the second draft that differs from the first. The concluding passages of both drafts are alike. The biography as it stands in the 1871 edition of 3fe7i of the Time appears to have been compiled from the earlier of these drafts. It must have been another copy of Draft No. 1 that was forwarded to the editor :

Draft I. — George Henry Borrow, born at East Dereham in the county of Norfolk in the early part of the present century. His father was a military officer, with whom he travelled about most parts of the United Kingdom. He was at some of the best schools in England, and also for about two years at the High School at Edinburgh. In 1818 he was articled to an eminent solicitor at Norwich, with whom he continued five years. He did not, however, devote himself much to his profession, his mind being much engrossed by philology, for which at a very early period he had shown a decided inclination, having when in Ireland acquired the Irish language. At the age of twenty he knew little of the law, but was well versed in languages, being not only a good classical scholar but acquainted with French, Italian, Spanish, all the Celtic and Gothic dialects, and also with the peculiar language of the English Romany Chals or Gypsies. This speech, which, though broken and scanty, exhibits evident signs of high antiquity, he had picked up amongst the wandering tribes with whom he had formed acquaintance on a wild heath near Norwich, where they were in the habit of encamping. At the expiration of his clerkship, which occurred shortly after the death of his father, he betook himself to London, and endeavoured to get a livelihood by literature. For some time he was a hack author. His health failing he left London, and for a considerable time lived a life of roving adventure. In the year 1833 he entered the service of he British and Foreign Bible Society, and being sent to Russia edited at Saint Petersburg the New Testament in the Manchu or Chinese Tartar. Whilst at Saint Petersburg he published a book called Targum, consisting of metrical translations from thirty languages. He was subsequently for some years agent of the Bible Society in Spain, where he was twice imprisoned for endeavouring to circulate the Gospel. In Spain he mingled much with the Calore or Zincali, called by the Spaniards Gitanos or Gypsies, whose language he found to be much the same as that of the English Romany. At Madrid he edited the New Testament in Spanish, and translated the Gospel of Saint Luke into the language of the Zincali. Leaving the service of the Bible Society he returned to England in 1839, and shortly afterwards married a Suffolk lady. In 1841 he published The Zincali, or an

Cornish family, tracing descent from the de Burghs, and entitled to carry their arms.' This claim, of which

account of the Gypsies of Spain, with a vocabulary of their language, which he proved to be closely connected with the Sanskrit. This work obtained almost immediately a European celebrity, and was the cause of many learned works being published on the continent on the subject of the Gypsies. In 1842 he gave to the world The Bible in Spain, or an account of an attempt to circulate the Gospel in the peninsula, a work which received a warm and eloquent eulogium from Sir Robert Peel in the House of Commons. In 1844 he was wandering amongst the Gypsies of Hungary, ^V^alachia, and Turkey, gathering up the words of their respective dialects of the Romany, and making a collection of their songs. In 1851 he published Lavengro, in which he gives an account of his early life, and in 1857 The Romany Rye, a sequel to the same. His latest publication is Wild Wales. He has written many other works, some of which are not yet published. He has an estate in Suffolk, but spends the greater part of his time in wandering on foot through various countries.

Draft II. — George Henry Borrow was born at East Dereham in the county of Norfolk on the 5th July 1803. His father, Thomas Borrow, who died captain and adjutant of the West Norfolk Militia, was of an ancient but reduced Cornish family, tracing descent from the de Burghs, and entitled to carry their arms. His mother, Ann Perfrement, was a native of Norfolk, and descended from a family of French Protestants banished from France on the revocation of the edict of Nantes. He was the youngest of two sons. His brother, John Thomas, who was endowed with various and very remarkable talents, died at an early age in Mexico. Both the brothers had the advantage of being at some of the first schools in Britain. The last at which they were placed was the Grammar School at Norwich, to which town their father came to reside at the termination of the French war. In the year 1818 George Borrow was articled to an eminent solicitor in Norwich, with whom he continued five years. He did not devote himself much to his profession, his mind being engrossed by another and very different subject — namely philology, for which at a very early period he had shown a decided inclination, having when in Ireland with his father acquired the Irish language. At the expiration of his clerkship he knew little of the law, but was well versed in languages, being not only a good Greek and Latin scholar, but acquainted with French, Italian, and Spanish, all the Celtic and Gothic dialects, and likewise with the peculiar language of tlie English Romany Chals or Gypsies. This speech or jargon, amounting to about eleven hundred and twenty-seven words, he had picked up amongst the wandering tribes with whom he had formed acquaintance on Mousehold, a wild heath near Norwich, where they were in the habit of encamping. By the time his clerkship was expired his father was dead, and he had little to depend upon but the exercise of his abilities such as they were. In 1823 he betook himself

CAPTAIN BORROW 5

I am thoroughly sceptical, is endorsed by Dr. Knapp,^ who, however, could find no trace of the family earlier than 1678, the old parish registers having been destroyed. When Thomas Borrow was born the family were in any case nothing more than small farmers, and Thomas Borrow and his brothers were working on the land in the intervals of attending the parish school. At the age of eighteen Thomas was apprenticed to a maltster at Liskeard, and about this time he joined the local Militia. Tradition has it that his career as a maltster was cut short by his knocking his master down in a scrimmage. The victor fled from the scene of his prowess, and enlisted as a private soldier in the Coldstream Guards. This was in 1783, and in 1792 he was transferred to the West Norfolk Militia ; hence liis appearance at East Dereham, where, now a Serjeant, his occupations for many a year were recruiting and drilling.^ It is recorded that at a theatrical performance at East Dereham he first saw, presumably on the stage of the county-hall, his future wife — Ann Perfrement. She was, it seems, engaged in a minor part in a travelling company, not, we may assume, altogether with the sanction of her father, who, in spite of his inheritance of French blood, doubtless shared the then very strong English prejudice against the stage. However, Ann

to London^ and endeavoured to obtain a livelihood by literature. For some time he was a hack author, doing common work for booksellers. For one in particular he prepared an edition of the Newgate Calendar, from the carefu study of which he has often been heard to say that he first learned to write genuine English. His health failed, he left London, and for a considerable time he lived a life of roving adventure.

^ Knapp's Life of Borrow, vol. i. p. G.

2 The writer recalls at his own school at Downham Market in Norfolk an old Crimean Veteran — Serjeant Cauham — drilling the boys each week, thus supplementing his income precisely in the same manner as did Serjeant Borrow.

was one of eight children, and had, as we shall find in after years, no inconsiderable strength of character, and so may well at twenty years of age have decided upon a career for herself. In any case we need not press too hard the Cornish and French origin of George Borrow to explain his wandering tendencies, nor need we wonder at the suggestion of Nathaniel Hawthorne, that he was ' supposed to be of gypsy descent by the mother's side.' You have only to think of the father, whose work carried him from time to time to every corner of England, Scotland, and Ireland, and of the mother with her reminiscence of life in a travelling theatrical company, to explain in no small measure the glorious vagabondage of George Borrow.

Behold then Thomas Borrow and Ann Perfrement as man and wife, he being thirty-five years of age, she twenty-one. A roving, restless fife was in front of the pair for many a day, the West Norfolk Militia being stationed in some eight or nine separate towns within the interval of ten years between Thomas Borrow 's marriage and his second son's birth. The first child, John Thomas Borrow, was born on the 15th April 1801.^ The second son, George Henry Borrow, the subject of this memoir, was born in his grandfather's house at Dumpling Green, East Dereham, his mother having found a natural refuge with her father while her husband was busily recruiting in Norfolk. The two children passed with their parents from place to place, and in 1809 we find them once again in East

' The date has always hitherto been wrongly given. I find it in one of Ann Borrow's note-books^ but although every vicar of every parish in Chelmsford and Colchester has searched the registers for me^ with agreeable courtesy, I cannot discover a record of John's birthplace, and am compelled to the belief that Dr. Knapp was wrong in suggesting one or other of these towns.