There is a delightful description of a night among the firs in which the very spirit of nature breathes through his words, and his reason for travelling as he does is happy and convincing.
'I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move, to feel the needs and hitches of our life more nearly; to come down off the feather bed of civilisation and find the globe granite under foot and stern with cutting flints. Alas! as we get up in life and are more pre-occupied with our affairs, even a holiday is a thing to be worked for.'
Many people have all through life a closer acquaintance with 'the globe granite under foot' than with 'the feather bed of civilisation,' and daily bread even more than a holiday is a thing to be worked for. But Mr Stevenson's lines had hitherto fallen in very pleasant places, and he had not as yet entered as seriously as he had to do later into the bitter battle of life.
After twelve days together he sold Modestine at St Jean du Gard and made his return journey by diligence. This book, like the first, was widely read and heartily appreciated as soon as it appeared.
FOOTNOTE:
[4] This is to be found reprinted in the Edinburgh Edition, in which are also published for the first time the Amateur Emigrant in full, a fragmentary romance, The Great North Road, and other papers and letters, &c., not hitherto known to the public.