Borrow, but the departure from Milman Street of Roger Kerrison, lest
he should become involved in a tragedy connected with Borrow's oft-
repeated threat of suicide. Kerrison became "very uneasy and
uncomfortable on his account, so that I have found it utterly
impossible to live any longer in the same lodgings with him." {48a}
Looked at dispassionately it seems nothing short of an act of
cowardice on Kerrison's part to leave alone a man such as Borrow, who
might at any moment be assailed by one of those periods of gloom from
which suicide seemed the only outlet. On the other hand, from an
anecdote told by C. G. Leland ("Hans Breitmann"), there seems to be
some excuse for Kerrison's wish to live alone. "I knew at that time
[about 1870]," he writes, {48b} "a Mr Kerrison, who had been as a
young man, probably in the Twenties, on intimate terms with Borrow.
He told me that one night Borrow acted very wildly, whooping and
vociferating so as to cause the police to follow him, and after a
long run led them to the edge of the Thames, 'and there they thought
they had him.' But he plunged boldly into the water and swam in his
clothes to the opposite shore, and so escaped."

A serious misfortune now befell Borrow in the premature death of The
Universal Review, which expired with the sixth number (March 1824--
January 1825). It is not known what was the rate of pay to young and
impecunious reviewers {49a} certainly not large, if it may be judged
by the amount agreed upon for Celebrated Trials. Still, its end
meant that Borrow was now dependent upon what he received for his
compilation, and what he merited by his translation into German of
Proximate Causes.

There appears to have been some difficulty about payment for Borrow's
contributions to the now defunct review, which considerably widened