'Lavengro,' in fact, is like nothing else in either biography or fiction--and it is both fictitious and biographical. It is the gradual revelation of a strange, unique being. But the revelation does not proceed in an orderly and chronological fashion: it is not begun in the first chapter, and still less is it completed in the last. After a careful perusal of the book, you will admit that though it has fascinated and impressed you, you have quite failed to understand it. Why is the author so whimsical? Wherefore these hinted but unconfessed secrets? Why does he stop short on the brink of an important disclosure, and diverge under cover of a line of asterisks into another subject?--But Borrow in 'Lavengro' is not constructing a book, he is creating one. He has the reserves of a man who respects his own nature, yet he treats the reader fairly. If you are worthy to be his friend, by-and-by you will see his heart,--look again, and yet again! That passage in a former chapter was incomplete; but look ahead a hundred pages and consider a paragraph there: by itself it seems to say little; but gradually you recognize in it a part of the inwoven strand which disappears in one part of the knot and emerges in another. Though you cannot solve the genial riddle to-day, you may to-morrow. The only clue is sympathy. This man hides his heart for him who has the mate to it; and beneath the whimsical, indifferent, proud, and cold exterior, how it heaves and fears and loves and wonders! This is a wild, unprecedented, eloquent, mysterious, artistic yet artless book; it is alive; it tells of an existence apart, yet in contact with the deep things of all human experience. No other man ever lived as Borrow did, and yet his book is an epitome of life. The magic of his personal quality beguiles us on every page; but deeper still lie the large, immutable traits that make all men men, and avouch the unity of mankind. 'Romany Rye' is the continuation of 'Lavengro,' but scarcely repeats its charm; its most remarkable feature is an 'Appendix,' in which Borrow expounds his views upon things in general, including critics and politics. It is a marvelously trenchant piece of writing, and from the literary point of view delightful; but it must have hurt a good many people's feelings at the time it was published, and even now shows the author on his harsh side only. We may agree with all he says, and yet wish he had uttered it in a less rasping tone.