I was determined, if not to camp out, at least to have the means of camping out in my possession for there is nothing more harassing to an easy mind than the necessity of reaching shelter by dusk, and the hospitality of a village inn is not always to be reckoned sure by those who trudge on foot. It was already hard upon October before I was ready to set forth, and at the high altitudes over which my road lay there was no Indian summer to be looked for. All were ready to help in my preparations a crowd of sympathisers supported me at the critical moment of a bargain not a step was taken but was heralded by glasses round and celebrated by a dinner or a breakfast. I was looked upon with contempt, like a man who should project a journey to the moon, but yet with a respectful interest, like one setting forth for the inclement Pole.
A traveller of my sort was a thing hitherto unheard of in that district. This was not merely from the natural hospitality of mountain people, nor even from the surprise with which I was regarded as a man living of his own free will in Le Monastier, when he might just as well have lived anywhere else in this big world it arose a good deal from my projected excursion southward through the Cevennes. In the midst of this Babylon I found myself a rallying-point every one was anxious to be kind and helpful to the stranger. Except for business purposes, or to give each other the lie in a tavern brawl, they have laid aside even the civility of speech.
There are adherents of each of the four French parties–Legitimists, Orleanists, Imperialists, and Republicans–in this little mountain-town and they all hate, loathe, decry, and calumniate each other. Monastier is notable for the making of lace, for drunkenness, for freedom of language, and for unparalleled political dissension.
In a little place called Le Monastier, in a pleasant highland valley fifteen miles from Le Puy, I spent about a month of fine days.
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