ABSTRACT
Richard Francis Burton is most spectacularly recorded in history as the traveller-explorer extraordinary, and his place in literature depends in large measure upon the volumes he himself wrote narrating his travels and adventures. Fairfax Downey dates Burton's travels from the age of three when the boy's family began searching throughout the Continent for a dry climate where the elder Burton's suffering from asthma might be relieved. The 'nomad caravan' never stayed long at one place, 'a ship always waiting at the dock, their yellow coach at the door. Burton relates incident after incident of boyish deviltry ranging from the breaking of a pastry-shop window in France to the instigation of a riot at a brothel in Italy. It is no wonder that he found Oxford life dull and monotonous. The mere awareness of the circumstances of time and place surrounding his travel-books is enough to impress one with Burton's fearless wanderlust.
