The Bible in Spain, Vol. 1 [of 2]: Or, the Journeys, Adventures, and Imprisonments of an Englishman in an Attempt to Circulate the Scriptures in the PeninsulaBorrow, George
Religion
The Bible in Spain, Vol. 1 [of 2]: Or, the Journeys, Adventures, and Imprisonments of an Englishman in an Attempt to Circulate the Scriptures in the Peninsula
Borrow, George
Borrow, George, 1803-1881 -- Travel -- Spain; Spain -- Description and travel; Spain -- History -- 19th century
There were several booksellers’ shops at Seville, in two of which I found
copies of the New Testament in Spanish, which had been obtained from
Gibraltar about two years before, since which time six copies had been
sold in one shop and four in the other. The person who generally
accompanied me in my walks about the town and the neighbourhood, was an
elderly Genoese, who officiated as a kind of _valet de place_ in the
Posada del Turco, where I had taken up my residence. On learning from me
that it was my intention to bring out an edition of the New Testament at
Madrid, he observed that copies of the work might be extensively
circulated in Andalusia. “I have been accustomed to bookselling,” he
continued, “and at one time possessed a small shop of my own in this
place. Once having occasion to go to Gibraltar, I procured several
copies of the Scriptures: some, it is true, were seized by the officers
of the customs; but the rest I sold at a high price, and with
considerable profit to myself.”
I had returned from a walk in the country, on a glorious sunshiny morning
of the Andalusian winter, and was directing my steps towards my lodging:
as I was passing by the portal of a large gloomy house near the gate of
Xeres, two individuals, dressed in _zamarras_, emerged from the archway,
and were about to cross my path, when one, looking in my face, suddenly
started back, exclaiming in the purest and most melodious French:—“What
do I see? If my eyes do not deceive me—it is himself. Yes, the very
same as I saw him first at Bayonne; then long subsequently beneath the
brick wall at Novogorod; then beside the Bosphorus; and last at—at— Oh,
my respectable and cherished friend, where was it that I had last the
felicity of seeing your well-remembered and most remarkable physiognomy?”
_Myself_.—It was in the south of Ireland, if I mistake not. Was it not
there that I introduced you to the sorcerer who tamed the savage horses
by a single whisper into their ear? But tell me what brings you to Spain
and Andalusia, the last place where I should have expected to find you?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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