. In those days in certain Puritan circles a very strong line was
drawn between what was known as Sunday reading, and reading that might
be permitted on week-days. The Sunday book must have a religious
flavour. There were magazines with that particular flavour, every story
in them having a pious moral withal. Very closely watched and
scrutinised was the reading of young people in those days and in those
circles. Mr. Birrell, doubtless, speaks from autobiographical memories
when he tells us of a small boy with whose friends _The Bible in Spain_
passed muster on the strength of its title-page. For Mr. Birrell is the
son of a venerated Nonconformist minister; and perhaps he, or at least
those who were of his household, had this religious idiosyncrasy. It may
be that the distinction which pervaded the evangelical circles of Mr.
Birrell's youth as to what were Sunday books, as distinct from books to
be read on week-days, has disappeared. In any case think of the
advantage of the boy of that generation who was able to handle a book
with so unexceptionable a title as _The Bible in Spain_. His elders
would succumb at once, particularly if the boy had the good sense to
call their attention to the sub-title--'The Journeys, Adventures, and
Imprisonments of an Englishman in an Attempt to Circulate the Scriptures
in the Peninsula.' Nothing could be said by the most devout of seniors
against so prepossessing a title-page.[155] But what of the boy who had
thus passed the censorship? What a revelation of adventure was open to
him! Perhaps he would skip the 'preachy' parts in which Borrow was
doubtless sincere, although the sincerity has so uncertain a ring
to-day. Here are five passages, for example, which do not seem to belong
to the book:

In whatever part of the world I, a poor wanderer in the
Gospel's cause, may chance to be

* * * * *

very possibly the fate of St. Stephen might overtake me; but
does the man deserve the name of a follower of Christ who would
shrink from danger of any kind in the cause of Him whom he
calls his Master? 'He who loses his life for my sake shall find
it,' are words which the Lord Himself uttered. These words were
fraught with consolation to me, as they doubtless are to every
one engaged in propagating the Gospel, in sincerity of heart,
in savage and barbarian lands.

* * * * *

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