An Inland Voyage Section 7 - Pont-Sur-Sambre -- the Travelling Merchant

Alan Mapstone (0:01)

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An Inland Voyage by Robert Louis Stevenson Poste de Sambre The Travelling Merchant Like the lackeys in Molière's Farce, when the true noblemen broke in on their high life below stairs, we were destined to be confronted with a real peddler. To make the lesson still more poignant for fallen gentlemen like us, he was a peddler of infinitely more consideration than the sort of scurvy fellows we were taken for, like a lion among mice or a ship of war bearing down upon two cock-boats. Indeed, he did not deserve the name of peddler at all. He was a travelling merchant.

I suppose it was about half-past eight when this worthy, Mr. Hector Gilliard of Moubert, turned up at the ale-house door in a tilt-cart drawn by a donkey and cried cheerily on the inhabitants. He was a lean, nervous, flibberty gibbet of a man, with something of the look of an actor, and something the look of a horse jockey. He had evidently prospered without any of the favours of education, for he adhered with a stern simplicity to the masculine gender, and in the course of the evening passed off some fancy futures in a very florid style of architecture.

With him came his wife, a comely young woman, with her hair tied in a yellow handkerchief, and their little son, a little fellow of four in a blouse and military capi. It was notable that the child was many degrees better dressed than either of the parents. We were informed that he was already at a boarding school, but the holidays having just commenced, he was off to spend them with his parents on a cruise. An enchanting holiday occupation was it not, to travel all day with father and mother in the tilt cart full of countless treasures, the green country racking by on either side, and the children in all the villages contemplating him with envy and wonder. It is better fun during the holidays to be the son of a travelling merchant than the son-in-air to the greatest cotton spinner in creation. And as for being a reigning prince, indeed, I never saw one if it was not Master Gillyard.

While Monsieur Ector and the son of the house were putting up the donkey, and getting all the valuables under lock and key, the landlady warmed up the remains of our beefsteak, and fried the cold potatoes in slices, and Madame Gillyard set herself to waken the boy, who had come far that day, and was peevish and dazzled by the light. He was no sooner awake than he began to prepare himself for supper by eating galatte, unripe pears, and cold potatoes, with, so far as I could judge, positive benefit to his appetite. The landlady, fired with motherly emulation, awoke her own little girl, and the two children were confronted. Master Gillyard looked at her for a moment, very much as a dog looks at his own reflection in a mirror before he turns away. He was at that time absorbed in the galatte. His mother seemed crestfallen that he should display so little inclination towards the other sect, and expressed her disappointment with some candour and a very proper reference to the influence of years. Sure enough, a time will come when he will pay more attention to the girls and think a great deal less of his mother. Let us hope that she will like it as well as she seems to fancy. But it is odd enough, the very women who profess most contempt for mankind as a sex seem to find even its ugliest particulars rather lively and high-minded in their own sons.

The little girl looked longer and with more interest, probably because she was in her own house, while he was a traveller and accustomed to strange sights. And besides, there was no galate in the case with her.

All the time of supper there was nothing spoken of but my young lord. The two parents were both absurdly fond of their child. Monsieur kept insisting on his sagacity, how he knew all the children at school by name, and when this utterly failed on trial, how he was cautious and exact to a strange degree, and if asked anything, he would sit and think. And think, and if he did not know it, my faith he wouldn't tell you at all. Fois, il ne vous le dira pas. Which is certainly a very high degree of caution. At intervals, Monsieur Hector would appeal to his wife, with his mouth full of beefsteak, as to the little fellow's age at such or such a time when he had said or done something memorable. And I noticed that Madame usually poo-pooed these inquiries. She herself was not boastful in her vain, but she never had her fill of caressing the child, and she seemed to take a gentler pleasure in recalling all that was fortunate in his little existence. No schoolboy could have talked more of the holidays which were just beginning, and less of the black school time which must inevitably follow after. She showed with a pride, perhaps part mercantile in origin, his pockets preposterously swollen with tops and whistles and string. When she courted a house in the way of business, it appeared he kept her company, and whenever a sale was made, received a sue out of the profit. Indeed, they spoiled him vastly, these two good people. But they had an eye to his manners for all that, and reproved him for some little faults in reading, which occurred from time to time during supper.