t "once in the south of France, when he was weary, hungry,
and penniless, he observed one of these patterans or Gypsy trails, and,
following the direction pointed out, arrived at the resting place of some
Gypsies, who received him with kindness and hospitality on the faith of
no other word of recommendation than patteran." It may be true that he
wandered in Italy, and rested at nightfall by a kiln "about four leagues
from Genoa." But by April, 1827, he must have been back in Norwich,
according to Knapp, to see Marshland Shales at the fair. Knapp gives
certain proof that he was there between September and December.
Thereafter, if Knapp was right, he was translating Vidocq's "Memoirs." In
1829 again he was in London, at 17, Great Russell Street, Bloomsbury, and
was projecting with John Bowring a collection of "Songs of Scandinavia."
He applied for work to the Highland Society and to the British Museum, in
1830. In that summer he was at 7, Museum Street, Bloomsbury. He was not
satisfied with his work or its remuneration. He thought of entering the
French Army, of going to Greece, of getting work, with Bowring's help,
under the Belgian Government. His name "had been down for several years"
for the purchase of a commission in the English Army, and Bowring offered
to recommend him to "a corps in one of the Eastern Colonies," where he
could perfect his Arabic and Persian. In 1842 he wrote a letter to
Bowring, printed by Mr. Walling, asking for "as many of the papers and
manuscripts which I left at yours some twelve years ago, as you can
find," and for advice and a loan of books, and promising that Murray will
send a copy of "The Bible in Spain" to "my oldest, I may say my _only_
friend." But whatever Bowring's help, Borrow was "drifting on the sea of
the world, and likely to be so," and especially hurt because of the
figure he must cut in the eyes of his own people. Was it now, or when he
was bookkeeper at the inn in 1825, that he saw so much of the ways of
commercial travellers? {114}

It is not necessary to quote from the metrical translations, probably of
this period, "selections from a huge, undigested mass of translation,
accumulated during several years devoted to philological pursuits,"
published in "The Targum" of 1835. They were made from originals in the
Hebrew, Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Tartar, Tibetian, Chinese, Mandchou,
Russian, Malo-Russian, Polish, Finnish, Anglo-Saxon, Ancient Norse,
Suabian, German