Travels with a Donkey by Robert Louis Stevenson

First published: 1879

Type of work: Record of travel

Type of plot: Sketches and impressions

Time of work: 1878

Locale: The Cevennes, French Highlands

Principal Characters:

• Robert Louis Stevenson, the traveler
• Modestine, a donkey
• Father Apollinaris, a Trappist monk

Critique:

Stevenson said that every book is a circular letter to the friends of him who wrote it. TRAVELS WITH A DONKEY IN THE CEVENNES takes much of its merit from the warm-hearted spirit of Stevenson himself. Throughout the narrative the reader is led by Stevenson’s voice as if Stevenson were talking in the same room for the enjoyment of his reader. More vivid than either his account of the people or his account of the history made in the Cevennes is Stevenson’s way of describing the countryside and its variations in mood.

The Story:

In twelve days, from September 22, 1878, until October 3, 1878, Robert Louis Stevenson walked from Le Monastier to St. Jean du Gard in the Cevennes. His only companion was Modestine, a donkey. He traveled as his fancy led him, stopping to sleep whenever occasion offered. One morning after a night’s sleep out of doors Stevenson scattered coins along the road upon the turf in payment for his night’s lodging.

Modestine, the donkey, demanded that her owner exercise all his ingenuity. At first he loathed her for her intractable differences of opinion displayed concerning the rate of travel to be maintained. Repeated blows seemed not to influence her until he learned to use the magical word “Proot” to get her moving. Later he obtained a real goad from a sympathetic innkeeper at Bouchet St. Nicolas. Modestine was dainty in her eating. She seemed to prefer white bread, but she learned to share half of Stevenson’s brown loaves with him.

Modestine and her owner quarreled about a short cut. She hacked, she reared; she even brayed in a loud, aggrieved tone. However, he forced her to give in. A few days later Stevenson began to understand his strong-willed donkey; he came to understand her stupidity, and he overlooked her flights of ill-judged light-heartedness.

Stevenson, like many who buy at the insistence of others and sell at their own pleasure, was eager to dismiss the matter of Modestine’s cost. He had paid sixty-five francs and a glass of brandy for her, but he sold her for thirty-five francs. Stevenson commented that the pecuniary gain was not obvious, but that he had bought freedom into the bargain.

More absorbing than the pleasure with which Stevenson contrasted his vagabond life and that of deeply-rooted monks and peasants was his interest in long-remembered, local conflicts. Such a conflict was that struggle at Pont de Montvert where Camisards, led by Pierre Seguier, murdered the Archpriest of the Cevennes. Seguier was soon taken and his right hand cut off. He himself was then burned alive. Stevenson also identified the characteristic elements in the landscape as he went along. He thought the Cevennes remarkably beautiful.

Stevenson’s account of the local peasantry was less appreciative than his account of the landscape. He described two mishaps. In the first place, the peasants looked with suspicion upon a traveler wandering on their bleak high hills with very little money and no obvious purpose other than to stare at them. At his approach to one village the people hid themselves. They barricaded their doors and gave him wrong directions from their windows. Secondly, two girls whom he termed “impudent sly sluts” bade him follow the cows. For these reasons, Stevenson came to feel sympathy for the infamous beast of Gevauden, who, according to tradition, ate about a hundred children of the district.

During his travels he visited Our Lady of the Snows Monastery. Approaching the monastery, he encountered Father Apollinaris, who, clad in the white robe of his order, greeted him and led him to the entrance of the monastery. He felt the atmosphere of his environment and portrayed it in descriptions of the monks at their duties, the feel of the highland wind on his face, the cheerless, four-square buildings which were bleak and too new to be seasoned into the place. The belfry and the pair of slatted gables seemed plain and barren. When he departed after a day of quiet repose, the lonely Trappist, Father Apollinaris, accompanied him, holding Stevenson’s hands in his own.

Stevenson continued on to St. Jean du Gard. He lost his way and found it again. Modestine learned to wait patiently when he wanted to stop to talk with someone. The procession of days took him through gullies, along river beds, and over high ridges. At St. Jean du Gard he parted from Modestine. Then, seated by the driver en route to Alais through a rocky gully past orchards of dwarf olive trees, Stevenson began to reflect what Modestine had become in his life. She had been patient and she had come to regard him as a god. She had eaten from his hand. He felt that he had parted from his best friend.

Further Critical Evaluation of the Work:

TRAVELS WITH A DONKEY is one of the most perfect pieces of prose composition in the English language. With infinite grace and precision, Stevenson tells of his simple journey through the French countryside. The author’s style is flawless and yet without pretension. TRAVELS WITH A DONKEY is a book easily underrated because it presents such a simple, unaffected appearance, but its charm and humor and the beauty of the writing make it a sheer delight to read.

The book illustrates Stevenson’s continual strain to overcome his physical handicap and lead a natural and vigorous life in the out-of-doors. At the same time, Stevenson possessed the gift to turn everything into art, from his encounters with peasants to his battles with a stubborn donkey. Although a learned and sophisticated writer, he was able to view his experiences and the scenes of his travels with a fresh eye. The descriptions of the mountains and the farm lands are exquisite, the meetings with the peasants are earthy and humorous, and the donkey, Modestine, proves to have a distinctive and intractable personality.

Stevenson understood the fascination of apparently petty details. Much of the book is taken up with minute descriptions of his preparations, of his equipment, and of the plotting and planning of routes. The reader, because of these carefully presented details, comes to feel that he is sharing the experience with Stevenson. The freshness of mountain air, the shade of a cloud, the aromas of the cattle, are all described vividly and made real by Stevenson’s immense skill. The discovery of the unknown little French villages tucked away in tiny mountain valleys results in some of the most charming passages in the book. The chapters dealing with the Trappist monastery of Our Lady of the Snows are handled with a sensitivity and beauty which make them the heart of the book. The distance of the trip is only a hundred and twenty miles, but it is a fascinating experience and shows that one need not cover vast distances if one is able to observe truly and interpret what one sees.