old fellows around. 'Such a horse as this we
shall never see again, a pity that he is so old.'"

But Dr. Knapp informs us that the well-known trotting stallion, Marshland
Shales, was not offered for sale by auction until 1827, when he was
twenty-five years old, and ten years after the date implied in
"Lavengro." And what is more, Dr. Knapp concludes that Borrow must have
been in Norwich in 1827, on the fair day, April 12.

CHAPTER V--HIS PREDECESSORS

I do not wish to make Borrow out a suffering innocent in the hands of
that learned heavy-weight and wag, Dr. Knapp. Borrow was a writing man;
he was sometimes a friend of jockeys, of Gypsies and of pugilists, but he
was always a writing man; and the writer who is delighted to have his
travels in Spain compared with the rogue romance, "Gil Blas," is no
innocent. Photography, it must be remembered, was not invented. It was
not in those days thought possible to get life on to the paper by copying
it with ink. Words could not be the equivalents of acts. Life itself is
fleeting, but words remain and are put to our account. Every action, it
is true, is as old as man and never perishes without an heir. But so are
words as old as man, and they are conservative and stern in their
treatment of transitory life. Every action seems new and unique to the
doer, but how rarely does it seem so when it is recorded in words, how
rarely perhaps it is possible for it to seem so. A new form of
literature cannot be invented to match the most grand or most lovely
life. And fortunately; for if it could, one more proof of the ancient
lineage of our life would have been lost. Borrow did not sacrifice the
proof. He had read many books in many languages, and he had a strong
taste. He liked "Gil Blas," which is a simple chain of various and
surprising adventures. He liked the lives of criminals in the "Newgate
Lives and Trials" (or rather "Celebrated Trials," 1825), which he
compiled for a publisher in his youth.

"What struck me most," he said, "with respect to these lives was the art
which the writers, whoever they were, possessed of telling a plain story.
It is no easy thing to tell a story plainly and distinctly by mouth; but
to tell one on paper is difficult indeed, so many snares lie in the way.
People are afraid to put down what is common on paper, they seek to
embellish their narrative, as they think, by philosophic speculations and
reflections; they are anxious to s