An Inland Voyage

An Inland Voyage

The Project Gutenberg EBook of An Inland Voyage, by Robert Louis
Stevenson (#23 in our series by Robert Louis Stevenson)
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Title: An Inland Voyage
Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
Release Date: May, 1996 [EBook #534] [Yes, we are more than one
year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on March 19, 1996]
[Most recently updated: August 27, 2002]
Edition: 10

Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, AN
INLAND VOYAGE ***

Transcribed from 1904 Chatto & Windus edition by David Price, email
[email protected] Second proof by Margaret Price

AN INLAND VOYAGE

Contents: Preface Antwerp to Boom On the Willebroek Canal The
Royal Sport Nautique At Maubeuge On the Sambre Canalised: to
Quartes Pont-sur-Sambre: We are Pedlars The Travelling Merchant On
the Sambre Canalised: to Landrecies At Landrecies Sambre and Oise
Canal: Canal boats The Oise in Flood Origny Sainte-Benoite A By-day
The Company at Table Down the Oise: to Moy La Fere of Cursed
Memory Down the Oise: Through the Golden Valley Noyon Cathedral
Down the Oise: to Compiegne At Compiegne Changed Times Down
the Oise: Church interiors Precy and the Marionnettes Back to the
world

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

To equip so small a book with a preface is, I am half afraid, to sin
against proportion. But a preface is more than an author can resist, for it
is the reward of his labours. When the foundation stone is laid, the
architect appears with his plans, and struts for an hour before the public
eye. So with the writer in his preface: he may have never a word to say,
but he must show himself for a moment in the portico, hat in hand, and
with an urbane demeanour.
It is best, in such circumstances, to represent a delicate shade of manner
between humility and superiority: as if the book had been written by
some one else, and you had merely run over it and inserted what was
good. But for my part I have not yet learned the trick to that perfection;

I am not yet able to dissemble the warmth of my sentiments towards a
reader; and if I meet him on the threshold, it is to invite him in with
country cordiality.
To say truth, I had no sooner finished reading this little book in proof,
than I was seized upon by a distressing apprehension. It occurred to me
that I might not only be the first to read these pages, but the last as well;
that I might have pioneered this very smiling tract of country all in vain,
and find not a soul to follow in my steps. The more I thought, the more
I disliked the notion; until the distaste grew into a sort of panic terror,
and I rushed into this Preface, which is no more than an advertisement
for readers.
What am I to say for my book? Caleb and Joshua brought back from
Palestine a formidable bunch of grapes; alas! my book produces naught
so nourishing; and for the matter of that, we live in an age when people
prefer a definition to any quantity of fruit.
I wonder, would a negative be found enticing? for, from the negative
point of view, I flatter myself this volume has a certain stamp.
Although it runs to considerably upwards of two hundred pages, it
contains not a single reference to the imbecility of God's universe, nor
so much as a single hint that I could have made a better one myself.--I
really do not know where my head can have been. I seem to have
forgotten all that makes it glorious to be man.--'Tis an omission that
renders the book philosophically unimportant; but I am in hopes the
eccentricity may please in frivolous circles.
To the friend who accompanied me I owe many thanks already, indeed
I wish I owed him nothing else;