V 



III 

 Landscape and Literature T 



The several races of mankind are marked off from 

 each other by certain bodily and mental differences 

 which, there can be no doubt, have been largely deter- 

 mined by the diverse geographical conditions of the 

 surface of the globe. We may be disposed to put 

 aside the first origin of these racial differences, as a 

 problem which may for ever remain insoluble. Yet 

 we cannot refuse to admit that in the disposition of 

 land and sea, in the form and trend of coast-lines, 

 in the grouping of mountains, valleys, and plains, in 

 the disposition and flow of rivers, in the arrangement 

 of climates, and in the distribution of vegetation and 

 animals, a series of influences must be recognized 

 which have unquestionably played a large part in the 

 successive stages of human development. 



Though no record of the earliest of these stages 

 has probably survived, some of the later steps in the 

 progress of advancement may not be beyond the 

 reach of investigation. The connection, for example, 



1 Types of Scenery and Their Influence on Literature, the Romanes 

 Lecture, delivered in the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford, June I, 

 1808. 



