travels with my donkey robert louis stevenson

At length she passed into my service for the consideration of 65 francs & a glass of brandy. I was already backed by a deputation of my friends but as if this were not enough, all the buyers & sellers came round & helped me in the bargain & the ass & I & Father Adam were the centre of a hubbub for nearly half an hour.

In the market place at Monastier, negotiations begin, He then needs a beast of burden to carry his bed & few possessions & meets Father Adam, an old man willing to sell his donkey. It was commodious as a valise, warm & dry as a bed… I could bury myself in it up to the neck for my head I trusted to a fur cap, with a hood to fold down over my ears & a band to pass under my nose as a respirator & in case of heavy rain I proposed to make myself a little tent, or tentlet, with my waterproof coat, three stones & a bent branch. I call it ‘the sack’ but it was never a sack by more than courtesy only a sort of long roll or sausage, green waterproof cart-cloth without & blue sheep’s fur within. This child of my invention was nearly six feet square, exclusive of two triangular flaps to serve as a pillow by night & as the top & bottom of the sack by day. Stevenson began his journey in Velay, where he has a “sleeping sack” of his own design made up, The book he wrote about the journey is called Travels with a Donkey because the donkey, Modestine, is a source of exasperation & companionship during his journey. Robert Louis Stevenson set out for a fortnight’s travelling through the Cevennes region of France.

Travels with my donkey robert louis stevenson