Travels with a donkey in the Cevennes . d a pairof post-runners, the road was dead solitaryall the way to Pradelles. I scarce rememberan incident but one. A handsome foal witha bell about his neck came charging up tous upon a stretch of common, sniffed theair martially as one about to do great deeds,and suddenly thinking otherwise in his greenyoung heart, put about and galloped off ashe had come, the bell tinkling in the a long while afterwards I saw his nobleattitude as he drew up, and heard the noteof his bell; and when I struck the high-road,the song of the telegraph-wires seemed t
Travels with a donkey in the Cevennes . d a pairof post-runners, the road was dead solitaryall the way to Pradelles. I scarce rememberan incident but one. A handsome foal witha bell about his neck came charging up tous upon a stretch of common, sniffed theair martially as one about to do great deeds,and suddenly thinking otherwise in his greenyoung heart, put about and galloped off ashe had come, the bell tinkling in the a long while afterwards I saw his nobleattitude as he drew up, and heard the noteof his bell; and when I struck the high-road,the song of the telegraph-wires seemed tocontinue the same nmsic. Pradelles stands on a hill-side, high abovethe AUier, surrounded by rich were cutting aftermath on all sides,which gave the neighbourhood, this gustyautumn morning, an untimely smell of the opposite bank of the Allier the landkept mounting for miles to the horizon : atanned and sallow autumn landscape, withblack blots of fir-wood and w^iite roadswandering through the hills. Over all this 38. I ^ ^4^)^ V .fe- H •^^ \2inx^MS^^£r:^^^^!^ A CAVALCADE OF STRIDE-LEGGED LADIES I HAVE A GOAD the clouds shed a uniform and purplishshadow, sad and somewhat menacing, exag-gerating height and distance, and throwinginto still higher relief the twisted ribbons ofthe highway. It was a cheerless prospect,but one stimulating to a traveller. For Iwas now upon the limit of Velay, and allthat I beheld lay in another county—wildGevaudan, mountainous, uncultivated, andbut recently disforested from terror of thewolves. Wolves, alas, like bandits, seem to fleethe travellers advance ; and you may trudgethrough all our comfortable Europe, and notmeet with an adventure worth the here, if anywhere, a man was on thefrontiers of hope. For this was the land ofthe ever-memorable Beast, the NapoleonBonaparte of wolves. What a career washis ! He lived ten months at free quartersin Gevaudan and Vivarais; he ate womenand children and shepherdesses celebrat
Size: 1665px × 1501px
Photo credit: © The Reading Room / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookauthorstevensonrobertlouis1, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900
