the whole of a book, not merely its
parts, and to judge that whole when found, will be not least fond of
_Wild Wales_. If they have, as every reader of Borrow should have, the
spirit of the roads upon them, and are never more happy than when
journeying on "Shanks his mare," they will, of course, have in addition
a peculiar and personal love for it. It is, despite the interludes of
literary history, as full of Borrow's peculiar conversational gift as
any of its predecessors. Its thumbnail sketches, if somewhat more
subdued and less elaborate, are not less full of character. John Jones,
the Dissenting weaver, who served Borrow at once as a guide and a
whetstone of Welsh in the neighbourhood of Llangollen; the "kenfigenous"
Welshwoman who first, but by no means last, exhibited the curious local
jealousy of a Welsh-speaking Englishman; the doctor and the Italian
barometer-seller at Cerrig-y-Druidion; the "best Pridydd of the world"
in Anglesey, with his unlucky addiction to beer and flattery; the waiter
at Bala; the "ecclesiastical cat" (a cat worthy to rank with those of
Southey and Gautier); the characters of the walk across the hills from
Machynlleth to the Devil's Bridge; the scene at the public-house on the
Glamorgan Border, where the above-mentioned jealousy comes out so
strongly; the mad Irishwoman, Johanna Colgan (a masterpiece by herself);
and the Irish girl, with her hardly inferior history of the
faction-fights of Scotland Road (which Borrow, by a mistake, has put in
Manchester instead of in Liverpool); these make a list which I have
written down merely as they occurred to me, without opening the book,
and without prejudice to another list, nearly as long, which might be
added. _Wild Wales_, too, because of its easy and direct opportunity of
comparing its description with the originals, is particularly valuable
as showing how sober, and yet how forcible, Borrow's descriptions are.
As to incident, one often, as before, suspects him of romancing, and it
stands to reason that his dialogue, written long after the event, must
be full of the "cocked-hat-and-cane" style of narrative. But his
description, while it has all the vividness, has also all the
faithfulness and sobriety of the best landscape-painting. See a place
which Kingsley or Mr. Ruskin, or some other master of our decorative
school, has described--much more one which has fallen into the hands of
the small fry of their imitators--and you are almost sure to f